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Answering the charge that the eoliths were perhaps naturefacts rather than artifacts, Prestwich (1895, p. 625) stated: “It has also been frequently asserted that these implements are natural forms produced by the friction of the shingle on the shore or in the beds of rivers. Challenged to show any such natural specimens, those who have made the assertion have been unable, although nearly three years have elapsed since the challenge was given, to bring forward a single such specimen. If, moreover, implements were formed in that manner, they should be found in gravel beds of all ages and origins. So far from running water having this constructive power, the tendency of it is to wear off all angles, and reduce the flint to a more or less rounded pebble.”

So here one of Britain’s foremost geologists, a Fellow of the Geological Society, and a Fellow of the Royal Society, made quite a coherent case for the human origin and Pliocene date of the Eolithic implements collected by Benjamin Harrison. He answered in a convincing manner all possible objections to his interpretation. Of course, some scientists maintained their opposition, as might be expected of persons with strongly held beliefs. Nevertheless, we must still wonder why, as far as modern paleoanthropology is concerned, the Plateau eoliths have completely disappeared from view. Apparently there is no place in the modern views on human origins for toolmaking hominids in England at least 2–4 million years ago in the Pliocene period.

3.2.12 On the Treatment of Anomalous Evidence

In 1896, Prestwich died, but Harrison, in his prominent patron’s absence, continued with the Plateau excavations and answered the doubters. On May 18, 1898, Harrison wrote to W. J. Lewis Abbott, reproducing in his letter a poem called “That Chocolate Stone,” written by his son ( E. Harrison 1928, p. 219):

If only that chocolate stone could explain what the dickens it did in the past,

That those sages might cease from exciting the brain, and the hatchet be

buried at last,

Whether eolith, neolith, nature, or man, could they but of that question dispose,

Why, those eminent men might relinquish the pen—till a new controversy

arose.

This verse, light and humorous though it may be, strikes at the very heart of an important epistemological consideration. In the absence of direct knowledge of the past, any discussion of paleoanthropological evidence, which is always somewhat ambiguous, is certain to involve controversy, because of the differing preconceptions and methods of analysis of the participants in the debate. Empiricism thus becomes inextricably entangled with speculative modes of thought and deeply held emotional biases and prejudices. In most cases, the speculation and bias are carefully masked with a thin veneer of fact. But as imperfect as this process may be, it is, for scientists, the only one that can be applied; therefore, one can at least insist on consistent application of principles and close reasoning from the observed facts. This granted, the case made by Prestwich and Harrison held up quite well against the arguments thrown by their opponents, who simply seemed to be searching for ways to reject something they were a priori not prepared to accept.

An interesting example of this may be found in G. Worthington Smith’s continued opposition to Harrison’s eoliths. On March 22, 1899, Benjamin Harrison wrote in a letter to Sir Edward R. Harrison (1928, p. 224): “After I became acquainted with Mr. Worthington Smith in 1878, he from time to time sent me interesting trifles, which were duly marked and placed in a drawer. In going through this lot yesterday, I came upon some interesting rude specimens from Basuto Land. These are about as rude as can be, and are facsimiles of those now found in Bushmen’s caves in Central Africa. They feature [resemble] my rude implements. Strange that Smith classes all my Plateau finds [eoliths] as cretins, make-beliefs, casuals, travesties—anything but human made. And yet, as long ago as 1880, he sent me those then-acknowledged