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George F. Hart, Ph.D., B.Sc.,

Professor emeritus, Louisiana State University


NEWS-FLASH

Two new statistical files have been added as suppliments to publications.  Please see "eNotes" under Archives for details.


WHO IS GFH?

George F. Hart was born in Yorkshire, England and educated as as a palaeontologist - biostratigrapher at Sheffield University, England, and Moscow State University, Russia: specializing in Palynology, the Permian System and Coal Stratigraphy. At that time he was primarily a taxonomist interested in classification systems and species distribution in time and space during the Permian Period of the Palaeozoic Era. He is Professor emeritus in Geology & Geophysics at Louisiana State University with extensive teaching, research, consulting and administrative credentials in the Earth Sciences that have spanned a professional career of over 50 years as a paleobiologist and geologist, with digressions into statistics, computer science and economics.

          Professor Hart’s reputation as an internationally recognized scientist is backed by the fact that he has held many prestigious international Research Fellowships and Awards. This commenced when he was awarded a British Council Studentship to West Germany and Belgium [1959] and later became a British Council - Soviet Ministry of Education Fellow to the USSR [1960-61]. At that time he was the first western geologist allowed into the Soviet Union on a long term basis after Stalin’s death, and the first western Geologist to teach Field Methods at the Moscow State University Field Camp in the Crimea.  During 1961-63 he held a NATO Fellowship to South Africa; followed by an Anglo-American Senior Fellowship at the Bernard Price Institute of Paleontology in Johannesburg [1963-1966].  During that period, he ran the Micro-stratigrapy Basin Research Unit which specialized in studying the Karroo Basin. Together with his colleagues Edna Plumstead and Raymond Dart, he was instrumental in re-building the Bernard Price Institute of Palaeontology, University of Johannesburg. In 1973-74 he was the National Academy of Sciences of the USA Senior Fellow to the former Soviet Union and was awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to India in 1983.

          In addition to his work in Europe, the former Soviet Union, and South Africa, he undertook research for approximately 20 years in India where he initially went as a United Nations Consultant [1983-84] and later became affiliated with the American Institute of Indian Studies in New Delhi, sponsored by The Smithsonian Institution, USA, studying the deltas of Peninsular India in cooperation the scientists at Andhra University.

          As an educator Professor Hart taught graduate classes in nineteen different subjects and supervised Ph.D. students in Geology, Economics, Computer Science, Petroleum Engineering and Marine Sciences. He has lectured, taught or undertaken general geological field visits in Britain, Norway, Sweden, Finland, USSR, France, Germany, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, Yugoslavia, India, Nepal, Tibet, Australia, Botswana, Republic of South Africa, Swaziland, Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Mozambique, Brazil, Guatemala, Mexico, Canada, and the USA. In addition, he has worked on material from Antarctica, Tanzania, China, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Congo, South West Africa, and Pakistan.

          Administratively George Hart progressed from Head of the Microstratigraphy Research Unit in the Bernard Price Institute of Paleontology, Johannesburg, South Africa, where he was the curator in Micropaleontology; to Professor and Director of the Museum of Geosciences at Louisiana State University; and finally Director of Research for the Louisiana Geological Survey.

        Professor Hart is the author of over 100 publications and appeared on television and radio in both the USA and South Africa.  He currently lives in the Front Range of the Colorado Rocky Mountains with his wife Clare [www.BisonEstate.com].

Professional scientific activities

Curriculum vitae

Educational philosophy


A starting point

Only a few snippets of modern knowledge are needed to make the point that the American education system has failed the majority of our people. Science knowledge is sufficiently advanced to see, in the study of physics, chemistry, geology and biology, how our Universe could have been created and how matter probably evolved. To the surprise of some, modern scientific reasoning does allow the following to be stated as facts.

  1. Our Universe is of immense, and probably finite size and has existed for many billions of years prior to humankind's development.  
  2. The same basic physical-chemical laws control all forms of matter in our Universe, including living systems.
  3. The origin of life on Earth and its existence elsewhere in our Universe was a natural step in the evolution of matter.
  4. All life forms, found on Earth, were developed principally as a product of natural selection of biochemical reactions involving twenty main amino acids and five nucleotides, adenosine-tri-phosphate [ATP], nicotinamide-adenine-dinucleotide [NAD] and a few other chemical molecules involved in cell metabolism .
  5. Cellar life on Earth indicates it has an underlying mechanistic basis in which the cell is a complex biochemical machine, based principally upon four chemical systems: proteins, nucleic acids, polysaccharides and lipids. All of these came into existence naturally by the evolutionary process.
  6. The fundamental evolutionary process within the cell was the extension of metabolic pathways, by modification NOT innovation. This indicates a uniformity of living systems going all the way back to the primordial cells i.e. it is a legacy system. The resultant cellular developments require neither a plan of some super-natural force, nor rational design. On the contrary they are the result of random thermal motion within water.
  7. There is clear scientific evidence supporting the physical evolution of humankind from other Great Ape ancestors. To view humankind as a central theme, or end point, in the universe is scientifically naive.
  8. Many of the attributes of living people and their unborn offspring can be controlled by science. In the future, it is probable that all aspects will be controllable.
  9. Controlled evolution of any organisms will be possible using the scientific method.
  10. There is no scientific evidence that a soul exists.
  11. There is no scientific evidence that an interfering god exists. Indeed, there is nothing to god but believing in it.
  The future evolution of our lineage
George F. Hart Ph.D.,
Professor emeritus
Department of Geology and Geophysics
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge
Louisiana 70803

If you have any suggestions or comments about the site please send me an eMail at ghart@lsu.edu or ghart@lsu.edu