New Record-Setting Living Fossil Flabbergasts Scientists

Creation-Evolution Headlines ^ | 12/5/2003 | Creation-Evolution Headlines

[bondserv]

New Record-Setting Living Fossil Flabbergasts Scientists   12/05/2003
A remarkably-detailed fossil ostracode, a type of crustacean, has been announced in the Dec. 5 issue of Science¹ that is blowing the socks off its discoverers.  Erik Stokstad in a review of the discovery in the same issue² explains its significance in the evolutionary picture of prehistory:

Over the past half-billion years [sic], evolution has dished up [sic] an almost endless variety of novelties: lungs, legs, eyes, wings, scales, feathers, fur.  So when paleontologists find a creature that doesn’t change, they take note.   (Emphasis added in all quotes.)

Two things about this fossil are exceptional.  (1) It has a “jaw-dropping” amount of detail, such that even small fragile parts and soft tissues were perfectly preserved.  (2) It is indistinguishable from modern ostracodes:

What’s most amazing, ostracode experts say, is how eerily similar the soft-tissue anatomy is to that of modern relatives.  “I was flabbergasted,” says Koen Martens, a zoologist at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 

This fossil, found near Herefordshire, U.K., was found in Silurian deposits estimated to be 425 million years old.  That means that its modern counterparts are living fossils, virtually unchanged for all that time:

Some ostracode specialists are stunned.  “This is a demonstration of unbelievable stability,” says Tom Cronin of the U.S. Geological Survey in Reston, Virginia.  Whereas ostracodes diversified [sic] into some 33,000 living and extinct species, “these guys have just been plodding along totally unfazed.”

This fossil, named Colymbosathon, is also upsetting those who look for evolution in the genes:

Finding a modern cylindroleberid in the Silurian clashes with molecular data, which suggest that the group and related families originated relatively recently, says evolutionary biologist Todd Oakley of the University of California, Santa Barbara.  There’s no conflict for zoologist Anne Cohen, a research associate at the California Academy of Sciences in San Francisco, who thinks Colymbosathon actually belongs to a long-extinct family.  In any case, the new fossil indicates that a basic ostracode body plan was already present in the Silurian.  It could also help [sic] sort out evolutionary relationships of fossil ostracodes.

David Horne (Queen Mary College, London) predicts more “long-lost evolutionary blueprints” [sic] may emerge from these deposits.  “The probability that they will find similarly preserved representatives of other ostracode lineages, and of other arthropods, is both high and extremely exciting.”

---

¹Siveter et al., “An Ostracode Crustacean with Soft Parts from the Lower Silurian,” Science Dec. 5, 2003.
²Erik Stokstad, “Invertebrate Paleontology: Gutsy Fossil Sets Record for Staying the Course,” Science Volume 302, Number 5651, Issue of 5 Dec 2003, p. 1645.

This is just one more of many remarkable, astounding, flabbergasting examples of living fossils.  “Unbelievable stability” is not a prediction of Darwinism.  The Darwinian world is supposed to be a fluid world, filled with diversification, radiation, and innovation.  During the imaginary 425 million years, the continents moved all over the world, animals crawled onto the land and became geckos and crocodiles and birds and caribou.  Mountains rose and valleys sank, and glaciers repeatedly advanced and retreated over much of the planet.  Some animals moved back into the oceans and became whales, porpoises, manatees and sea lions in just a small fraction of this much time, and humans emerged from grunting chimpanzees, invented language and abstract thought, and conquered space.  Is it reasonable to assume that in this slow whirlwind of continuous dynamical change, these ostracodes just reproduced themselves over and over millions of times without any change whatsoever?
    Darwinists are caught in a crossfire of antagonistic evidence.  Only a well-armored Darwinist could be excited about incoming bombshells like this.  Only by wearing Kevlar-lined lead helmets around their brains can they keep the bullets from penetrating and the insides from exploding.

[dinasour]

Lots of living things still exist which aren't evolving further. Roaches, certain 'palm' trees, alligators, ants, creationists.

Not only that, a subspecies can also split off, even though the parent species continues unchanged.

For example, clams, snails, octipi, "intelligent designers"

[PatrickHenry]

I'm not going to deploy my ping list for this thread. The whole thing is based on a misconception that evolution commands everything to change all the time, so that nothing could possibly remain in stasis, which is goofy. I'm content to let the creos have this thread to themselves.

[snowballinhell]

You mean like the fact the most evolved species is the weakest on the planet?? What happened to survival of the fittest. Should we not resemble the other creatures on the top of the food chain, such as big teeth, big claws,immense size, fur to keep us warm (or cold blood for that matter. What happened to survival of the fittest, a kitten could last longer than a human when exposed to the elements.

[bondserv]

It is my firm conviction, resting on years of cover to cover Bible study, that the Holy Spirit has preserved His word for all to read. I am convinced that the scholars commissioned by King James, painstakingly reviewed all of the manuscript documents that they had access to (which included a newer copy of the gnostic Alexandrian text than was used by Westcott and Hort).

Westcott and Hort chose to use the oldest documents they could get their hands on as their primary documents. They wrongly chose to believe because it was older it was closer to the original. The King James scholars had reliable copies of the same documents from Alexandria and found them to be erroneous.

With the recent discoveries of the Dead Sea Scrolls the King James scholars have been vindicated on their choice of documents in creating the King James Authorised Version.

A Holy Spirit miracle of preservation of God's Word. Praise God.

[FastCoyote]

"So you are saying your engineering research has led you to believe nature can take a lack of information, and order things together giving the appearance of intelligence?"

Think about this. The universe itself has a memory (what you see in the Hubble Telescope is 12 billion years worth of memory), it has a nervous system (light and radio rays transmitting information), it has local pockets of order (at least the earth, likely more) which form cells. It is a self conscious entity (gravity holds it together). So, there may well be thinking creatures on a cosmic scale.

But of course, I already think nature/God has evolved thinking creatures right here.

[bondserv]

You're so kind.

Flabbergastic Placemarker!

[Grut]

The term 'survival of the fittest' is unfortunate; what Darwin ought to have used was 'survival of the fitted '. So long as an environment exists to which an organism is optimally fitted, that organism will persist without change. In fact, any examples of that organism which do change (mutate) will be selected out because they are less well fitted to that environment than their parents.

[bert]

Weak doesn't apply to the issue. Fit or unfit applies to the ability to exist within a specific evolving ecology. The species in question was extremely fit for what must be considerable ecological variation. Thus, no change took place.

The species had evolved to a point where it was the fittest. Additional change did not improve the ability to exist.

There were changes, but the individuals exhibiting the change were not successful, not fit, did not survive.

[bondserv]

Recent scientific Catastrophic discoveries are shaking up things a bit too.

Link

[snowballinhell]

OK so lets see if I have this straight there is no example of evolution because... every thing has already evolved, that at no other time in history has the need to evolve stopped except for today?
You attempt to use the no current evolving species scenario to explain evolution.
I am sitting down therefore I can run 100 yards in 3 seconds- same logic.

[bondserv]

The species had evolved to a point where it was the fittest. Additional change did not improve the ability to exist.

There were changes, but the individuals exhibiting the change were not successful, not fit, did not survive.

There is more and more evidence that adaptation to an environment is preprogrammed in. The finches would adapt back and forth to the changes in conditions, suggesting it is part of their intelligently designed mechanism.

Darwin was and is wrong! Keep watching the journals. Link

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

Here's the color photo from Science magazine.

[bondserv]

HeHe.

For example, clams, snails, octipi, "intelligent designers"

Are "intelligent designers" further evolved. I tend to believe we are. :-)

[BMCDA]

Must have been a pretty strange world before the Fall. Without the second law of thermodynamics "past" and "future" don't make any sense because time's arrow points in "both" directions. But I guess the YEC's have figured this out already ;^)

[Ichneumon]

“Unbelievable stability” is not a prediction of Darwinism. The Darwinian world is supposed to be a fluid world, filled with diversification, radiation, and innovation.

Sigh. Yet again a creationist reveals that he doesn't have a clue what "Darwinism" actually predicts, or any real understanding of the thing he attempts to debate against. This is called a "straw man attack", since it's like declaring victory after beating up a scarecrow instead of a real opponent.

You say "“Unbelievable stability” is not a prediction of Darwinism.". Well gee, let's see what Darwin himself actually predicted, shall we?

Species of different genera and classes have not changed at the same rate, or in the same degree. In the oldest tertiary beds a few living shells may still be found in the midst of a multitude of extinct forms. Falconer has given a striking instance of a similar fact, in an existing crocodile associated with many strange and lost mammals and reptiles in the sub-Himalayan deposits. The Silurian Lingula differs but little from the living species of this genus; whereas most of the other Silurian Molluscs and all the Crustaceans have changed greatly. The productions of the land seem to change at a quicker rate than those of the sea, of which a striking instance has lately been observed in Switzerland. There is some reason to believe that organisms, considered high in the scale of nature, change more quickly than those that are low: though there are exceptions to this rule. The amount of organic change, as Pictet has remarked, does not strictly correspond with the succession of our geological formations; so that between each two consecutive formations, the forms of life have seldom changed in exactly the same degree. Yet if we compare any but the most closely related formations, all the species will be found to have undergone some change. When a species has once disappeared from the face of the earth, we have reason to believe that the same identical form never reappears. The strongest apparent exception to this latter rule, is that of the so- called `colonies' of M. Barrande, which intrude for a period in the midst of an older formation, and then allow the pre- existing fauna to reappear; but Lyell's explanation, namely, that it is a case of temporary migration from a distinct geographical province, seems to me satisfactory.

These several facts accord well with my theory. I believe in no fixed law of development, causing all the inhabitants of a country to change abruptly, or simultaneously, or to an equal degree. The process of modification must be extremely slow. The variability of each species is quite independent of that of all others. Whether such variability be taken advantage of by natural selection, and whether the variations be accumulated to a greater or lesser amount, thus causing a greater or lesser amount of modification in the varying species, depends on many complex contingencies, -- on the variability being of a beneficial nature, on the power of intercrossing, on the rate of breeding, on the slowly changing physical conditions of the country, and more especially on the nature of the other inhabitants with which the varying species comes into competition. Hence it is by no means surprising that one species should retain the same identical form much longer than others; or, if changing, that it should change less. We see the same fact in geographical distribution; for instance, in the land-shells and coleopterous insects of Madeira having come to differ considerably from their nearest allies on the continent of Europe, whereas the marine shells and birds have remained unaltered. We can perhaps understand the apparently quicker rate of change in terrestrial and in more highly organised productions compared with marine and lower productions, by the more complex relations of the higher beings to their organic and inorganic conditions of life, as explained in a former chapter.

-- Charles Darwin, "On the Origin of Species"

So gibber about how "stability" for some species is not a prediction of Darwinism all you like, but you're completely and ignorantly wrong. It most certainly *is* a prediction of Darwinism, and has been since 1859. You're only 144 years behind in your scientific knowledge, which at least puts you well ahead of the many young-Earth creationists who are blissfully unaware of the 18th Century (not a typo) evidence for an old Earth (the vast age of the Earth was accepted of necessity long before either Darwin or radiometric dating were even around, contrary to what the YECs would have you believe).

If you want to disagree with what Darwin *actually* said on the matter, feel free, but you do your position a disservice when you reveal that you haven't the slightest idea what predictions he actually made, while not letting that stop you from attacking what you made up about what he said or didn't say.

It's as if creationists believe a priori that evolution must be stupid and wrong and dishonest, therefore any stupid, wrong, and dishonest thing the creationists dream up about evolution must actually be a position that evolutionists hold and therefore a valid target. I can think of no other explanation for such behavior.

It would be refreshing if for a change creationists would actually learn what evolutionary science *actually* says and then provided arguments against *that*. Instead, almost without exception I have to spend my time explaining to them why they're finding fault with what they *imagine* evolution is about instead of what it actually *is* about.

It's like someone arguing against the Bible on the grounds that Adam and Mary wouldn't have been able to get Moses on the ark in order to evade the Four Horsemen. All too many creationist critiques of evolution are similarly based on poorly grasped and jumbled bits and pieces of the actual big picture.

[Ichneumon]

Darwinists are caught in a crossfire of antagonistic evidence. Only a well-armored Darwinist could be excited about incoming bombshells like this. Only by wearing Kevlar-lined lead helmets around their brains can they keep the bullets from penetrating and the insides from exploding.

Do even *you* believe this hyperbole?

This discovery is intriguing in a "well would you look at *that*" sort of way, but your orgasm over your hope that it is any sort of "bombshell" that somehow causes any problems for evolutionary science is just goofy.

[RadioAstronomer]

Adam and Mary wouldn't have been able to get Moses on the ark in order to evade the Four Horsemen.

WOW! I didn't know that. No wonder Moses was not on the ark. :-)

On a more serious note, you are so right in that post. I hope folks read it completely and truly ponder what you are trying to convey.

[PatrickHenry]

[Thunderous applause!]

[Fester Chugabrew]

There is no trump card the evolutionist cannot play. Once it is assumed that all of existence is due to natural, impersonal forces, the rest can be "explained" easily.

[Elsie]

Is not EVERYTHING evloving?

Well.. I'm TRYING to, but my doctor suggests that I REMOVE the polyps. Maybe they'll allow me to digest food more efficiently and I can eat less, but who knows??

[Elsie]

I thought you were leavin'.........

[VadeRetro]

So gibber about how "stability" for some species is not a prediction of Darwinism all you like, but you're completely and ignorantly wrong.

Yes. Creation Science is an oxymoron. Creation Science is bludgeoning with willful ignorance.

The same people will be back again dumb as a stump tomorrow with the same posts you have rebutted so well today. It's the name of the game. It's all they have. When you join a cult, what's outside of it doesn't count for much anyway. The only real world is what's inside.

[xzins]

Doesn't seem to be a strong argument in favor of Darwinism. They need far faster changing than this reveals.

Behe's model seems to tell the story......designer.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[bondserv]

That doesn't go to why a creature who has found it's nitch in it's respective environment can produce the diversity of life we see in such a short period of time.

You seem to believe these things can happen at a rapid clip, despite the evidence in that there were many mass extinctions, which shut down the majority of the long drawn out changes that could lead to what we see today.

Utter foolishness by any stretch of the imagination. This evidence clearly goes to the fact that there has been little time since the creation of the various life forms we see today. Why do you seem to have such a strong desire to ignore the obvious implications?

A billion years with little to no change clearly flies in the face of Darwinian theory. A slight advantage developed in an "evolved" organism competing for the same resources eliminates the chances of a less capable predecessor living in the same nitch.

Deducing and reasoning among Evolutionists has lead to the fantasy of Punctuated Equilibrium. Sad really.

[bondserv]

but your orgasm

Just to clear things up, the commentary within the article (In Green) was not provided by me (bondserv). It was provided by the staff at Creation-Evolution Headlines.

[John Valentine]

Save it for the idiot echo chamber.

[bondserv]

Save it for the idiot echo chamber.

You guys play rough!

[PatrickHenry]

You guys play rough!

Reality is a harsh mistress.

[Elsie]

Deducing and reasoning among Evolutionists has lead to the fantasy of Punctuated Equilibrium.

B-b-but.... they've given THIS idea up!

[Elsie]

I'm content to let the creos have this thread to themselves.

You've LIED to us! (or else you're no longer contented ;^)

MOO!

[Elsie]

(Elsie's favorite bat: it's very NAME says, "MOO")

 

 

Genus: Mormoops Mormoops megalophylla Peters's ghost-faced bat

---

Fourty five different bats in the USoA  (http://www.batcon.org/discover/species/usspecies.html) and even MORE throughout the world (http://batcall.csu.edu.au/batcall/abs/indiv.htm), but even the OLDEST fossils (http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/mammal/eutheria/chirofr.html) show complete wings and apparent echo location abilities.

---

Just makes me wonder...............

[Elsie]

(Unless they think that MIRACLES happen..........)

[bert]

Ho, Ho, Ho. What fallacious thinking.

[bert]

By insisting on absolute certainty, you are confusing the general with the specific. The evolutionary path of each species is different.

To insist on absolute conformity to rules causes the mental problem. The processes are random over extensive time.

[VadeRetro]

That doesn't go to why a creature who has found it's nitch in it's respective environment can produce the diversity of life we see in such a short period of time.

You were supposed to wait until tomorrow. Anyway, that's not what happens. The ones who are well settled in a niche don't change much. There are still protists. There are still fish. There are still amphibians. There are still reptiles. This is true despite all of these things having also spawned something different.

You seem to believe these things can happen at a rapid clip, despite the evidence in that there were many mass extinctions, which shut down the majority of the long drawn out changes that could lead to what we see today.

Tempo and Mode of Speciation. It can be fast, yes. Extinctions in particular figure in the adaptive radiation scenarios discussed at the end of that presentation. A lot of diversity is lost in mass extinction events but the surviving forms radiate into empty niches and evolve rapidly.

By comparison, the several different massive extinction events we see at their different levels in the fossil record (together with the horizons of appearances for different life forms) make utterly no sense against the YEC interpretation that the geologic column is the remnant of a single mythical worldwide flood.

A billion years with little to no change clearly flies in the face of Darwinian theory.

When you know more of Darwin than a novice in a nunnery you can announce what the implications of his theory are.

Deducing and reasoning among Evolutionists has lead to the fantasy of Punctuated Equilibrium. Sad really.

Unsupported question-begging. On what thread ever did you lay a glove on punctuated equilibrium? There's plenty of evidence for punk-eek scenarios happening.

[dinasour]

Are "intelligent designers" further evolved. I tend to believe we are.

Yes, definitely. They have developed a sense of humor. Something that is sorely needed in these contentious debates.

[PatrickHenry]

You've LIED to us!

At least I didn't ping anyone.

[snowballinhell]

Sorry I took so long to reply, it just hasn't been the same around here since my dog some how managed to grow fingers and I can't keep him off the computer(surfing dogie porn sites-nasty)

Again please provide links to evolving fossils or species that are "halfway there" to evolving into something else( and no jack-a-lopes please)

I do find it amusing that each time there is another hole punched through the THEORY of evolution,scientists come up with another THEORY (an idea with no proof)to fill that hole, usually more outrageous and statistically impossible.

Darwin "If we can not find a transitional species my theory may be incorrect"

[bert]

It's pretty obvious to any one with a more than passing knowledge of botany. Get off you lazy butt and spend some time in the field observing wild flowers. The variation within species and genera will become quite obvious to any one with eyes.

It ain't rocket science, just pure old using your eyes.

[snowballinhell]

Again you are using micro adaptation to explain macro evolution.
If I cross pollinate a red and a white flower and come up with a pink one, Have I created a new species or just a variation of the same with no evolved change to help it survive any better than the parent

You have to do better than that.

[snowballinhell]

I wonder why cows have not developed fangs and claws yet, you would think they should evolve into something that can defend itself from us burger munchers

[Markofhumanfeet]

On the other hand:

It would be refreshing if for a change evolutionists would actually learn what scripture *actually* says and then provided arguments against *that*. Instead, almost without exception I have to spend my time explaining to them why they're finding fault with what they *imagine* God's Word is about instead of what it actually *is* about. It's like someone arguing against the religion of Science on the grounds that Pasteur and Gallileo wouldn't have been able to get Max Planck on the space shuttle in order to view firsthand the theory of evolution. All too many evolutionist critiques of creation are similarly based on poorly grasped and jumbled bits and pieces of the actual big picture.

[snowballinhell]

The Many Myths of Evolution
It is hard to discuss the problems with the theory of evolution because there are so many theories of evolution. All of them have major problems. Let's look at them.

Lamarkian Inheritance
Modern theories of evolution begin with the 18th century French evolutionist Jean-Baptiste Antoine de Monet, Chevalier de Lamark. In the 1790's he popularized the idea of "the development or atrophy of organs through 'use or disuse' and their transmission to offspring who inherit these 'acquired characteristics'". 1 His ideas weren't universally accepted because he could not really explain how or why these characteristics were passed on. He had a vague notion that they were passed on because the critter "must" pass them on.

We discussed this replacement of logic with wishful thinking in The Santa Similarity. In that essay we said that when a child sees Christmas presents under the tree, the child believes that Santa must have been there, which proves the existence of Santa Claus. In the same way, Lamark saw different sized trees, which he took as evidence that the taller trees must have evolved from shorter trees, which was his proof of evolution.

Since the French word Lamark used for "must" (besoin) was translated as "wants to" in the English translations of his work, English-speaking critics made fun of his idea that Giant Sequoia trees produced seeds for taller trees because the trees wanted to have taller offspring. This criticism wasn't entirely fair. Lamark didn't believe plants had conscious will. But the criticism stuck because Lamark made no attempt to explain the evolutionary mechanism. This left his theory of evolution too close to the realm of magic and miracles for scientists to accept it.

Darwinism
Darwin revived the theory of evolution by doing what Lamark could not do. He supplied a plausible mechanism for descent with modification. He correctly observed: (1) there is a certain amount of variation in offspring; (2) there are more offspring produced than can survive; (3) in the fight for survival, the best variants live and the worst variants die. He correctly concluded that this gradually causes small, but noticeable, changes in species.

Darwin then extrapolated this truth into non-truth. He believed that these gradual changes could continue without limit, resulting in changes so large that entirely new species would evolve. He believed that when more fossils were found, the fossil record would show evidence of these gradual changes. But after more than 130 years of searching, those fossils have not been found.

Pangenesis
Both Lamark and Darwin believed in pangenesis. According to pangenesis, a trait acquired by a parent during his or her lifetime could be passed on to children (Lamarkian or "soft" inheritance). If a man worked to develop large muscles, for instance, the repeated habit of weight-lifting would somehow leave a lasting record in the cells of his body. Particles carrying this information were called "gemmules." They would migrate from all parts of the body to the sex cells, whereby they could be inherited by the offspring. 2


We now know that acquired characteristics can't be inherited. If you look at really old issues of National Geographic, you will see pictures of African women who from early childhood had placed increasingly large wooden crescents between their teeth and their lips, causing their lips to stick out several inches by they time the were adults, making them very beautiful (at least, in the eyes of the African men of that era). Their daughters, however, were never born with these big, beautiful lips. Every generation of girls painfully had to acquire large lips themselves.

Darwin, who was not a subscriber to National Geographic, didn't know this. He thought that giraffes who stretched their necks to eat the leaves other giraffes could not reach would have children with longer necks. The truth is, acquired characteristics are never inherited.

Suppose I tried to tell you that if you studied hard and spent a lot of time thinking, then you would have children who would be smarter and have bigger brains. You would have good justification for laughing at me. If I told you that we should eliminate IQ tests and simply measure the size of a child's head to determine how intelligent he is, you could legitimately say that is a stupid idea. It is well-known that you can't tell how smart a man is by measuring the size of his brain. You also know that knowledge can't be inherited. These are stupid ideas! But see how these very ideas are used by a UCSC biologist to explain how the human race evolved:


The force that seems to have accelerated our brain's growth is a new kind of stimulant: language, signs, collective memories-all elements of culture. As our cultures evolved in complexities, so did our brains, which then drove our cultures to still greater complexity. Big and clever brains led to more complex cultures, which in turn led to bigger and cleverer brains. 3

In other words, he claims that exercising our brains makes them stronger, and that this acquired characteristic is inherited by our children. This lets them think harder, making them even smarter, and so every generation gets smarter. The foolish notion of pangenesis still plays a part in modern, main-stream evolution.

Neo-Darwinism
When biologists learned more about genetics, and discovered that acquired characteristics could not be inherited, this dealt a serious blow to Darwinism. But in 1905, George Romanes recognized that there is a difference between acquired characteristics and inherited characteristics. He proposed the theory of Neo-Darwinism, which asserted that natural selection could operate using only inherited characteristics. This gave Darwinism a temporary reprieve by replacing Darwin's erroneous concept of inheritance with a plausible genetic explanation for differences in offspring.

Natural Selection
Natural selection is simply the process that determines who wins the battle for survival. It is the filter that removes the inferior individuals and allows the superior ones to reproduce.

Synthetic Theory
The mathematical field of statistics and probability can be used to describe natural variations of things, including populations of living creatures. If you take the concept of a population of creatures with small differences (which are the result of inherited characteristics) and combine it with natural selection you get the Synthetic Theory of evolution. This theory says that the randomness of variations in offspring is guided by natural selection producing a gradual genetic drift towards new, better, more highly-evolved species.

When people talk about Neo-Darwinsim or Gradualism, they usually are really talking about the Synthetic Theory. The Synthetic Theory is one of the two most commonly believed theories of evolution today.

The Synthetic Theory, however, has some major recognized problems. The first problem is that the amount of genetic variation in normal offspring is limited. You can breed thoroughbred horses for speed, but there is a limit to how fast they can run. Everything we have learned from breeding dogs, pigeons, cows, pigs, or any another animal, has shown us that there are limits to the natural variations in animals.

Second, the Synthetic Theory is absolutely incompatible with the fossil record. If the Synthetic Theory were true, then the fossil record would contain, for example, a series of giraffe-like animals. The oldest would have relatively short legs and necks. The more modern ones would have longer legs and necks. But the fossil record doesn't show that.

The real question in the fossil record is not, "What happened to the dinosaurs?" It is, "Where did the dinosaurs come from?" The fossil record doesn't show a gradual change from any creature into Tyrannosaurus Rex, or any other dinosaur.

Hopeful Monsters (Saltation)
By 1940 it was clear (to Richard Goldschmidt, at least) that genetic research had proved that species cannot gradually evolve into other species, and that the fossil record showed that they had not. Since Goldschmidt believed that evolution must have happened somehow, he rejected Darwin's statement that Natura non facit saltum ("Nature does not make jumps"). He reasoned that a small change in a gene might cause a large change in a mutant offspring.

Of course it is true that sometimes five-legged frogs are found living in polluted streams. Mutant creatures can be radically different from their parents. Maybe a reptile did once lay an egg, and a bird hatched out of it. But it isn't very likely.

It has often been observed that mutations are harmful and rarely, if ever, beneficial. It is said that two heads are better than one, and two-headed calves have been born, but two-headed cows have not driven the one-headed variety into extinction yet.

If Goldschmidt's Hopeful Monster theory is true, then there had to be thousands of mutants that each developed into a different species. It is a hard theory to take seriously. Not very many scientists do.

Punctuated Equilibrium
In 1972, it was still evident from the study of genetics that species can't gradually evolve into other species, and the fossil record still showed that species didn't gradually evolve into other species. The Synthetic Theory was not consistent with scientific data. The only other options were Lamark's unspecified magic process and Goldschmidt's Hopeful Monster theory. Neither of these theories were acceptable. So, Stephen Jay Gould and Niles Eldredge proposed the theory of Punctuated Equilibrium. This popularized Ernst Mayr's earlier idea that "speciation could occur fairly rapidly in small, isolated populations. Cut off from the larger gene pool by geographic barriers, a small amount of variation would be amplified by selection." 4

The theory of Punctuated Equilibrium is the other main theory of evolution that is accepted in evolutionary circles today. Its popularity is due to the fact that it is consistent with the fossil record (which shows no evidence of gradual evolution) without resorting to hopeful monsters.

The problem with this theory is that there isn't any positive evidence to support it. It claims that gradual evolution happens so quickly, in such limited areas, that the chances of finding any transitional fossils is essentially zero. Transitional fossils haven't been found, which is what the theory of Punctuated Equilibrium predicts. So, the fossils that haven't been found are claimed as support for the theory.

Horses
Many people think that transitional fossils have been found. They usually cite the evolution of the horse as an example. The Encyclopedia of Evolution, which has earned an Ev+ rating because it is highly critical of creationists in its sections on Flat-Earthers, Fundamentalism, Scientific Creationism, and Noah's Flood, has a section entitled "HORSE, EVOLUTION OF Saddled With Errors". (Gee, we wish we'd said that.) It says,


[Yale paleontologist Othniel C.] Marsh's classic (straight-line) development of the horse became enshrined in every biology textbook and in a famous exhibit at the American Museum of Natural History. It showed a sequence of mounted skeletons, each one larger and with a more well-developed hoof than the last. (The exhibit is now hidden from public view as an outdated embarrassment.)
Almost a century later, paleontologist George Gaylord Simpson reexamined horse evolution and concluded that generations of students had been misled. In his book Horses (1951), he showed that there was no simple, gradual unilineal development at all.

… Marsh arranged his fossils to "lead up" to the one surviving species, blithely ignoring many inconsistencies and any contradictory evidence. 5


If you look at the textbooks used at Burroughs High School 6 and Cerro Coso Community College7, you will see beautiful illustrations showing the classic straight-line development of the horse are still enshrined there. I don't know if those science teachers tell their students that this is an obsolete theory that has been discredited, but both books present the figures as if this development of the horse is still believed to be true by paleontologists. It may be possible that generations of students are still being misled.

One wonders why these textbooks still use the horse as their showcase example of a "progressive series of fossils leading from an ancient, primitive organism, through several intermediate stages, and culminating in the modern form." 8 Could it be because they don't have anything else to offer in its place?

Creation of Life
It is popularly believed that experiments have been done that showed that the chemicals present in the early Earth's oceans and atmosphere could have formed amino acids, which could have combined to form proteins, which eventually turned into the first living cell. This myth arose from the publication of the results of experiments done by Miller 9 and Fox. 10

On March 28, 1997, we showed the video. "Is Life Just Chemistry?" in which Michael Girouard, M.D., showed that these experiments did not prove that amino acids and proteins could have formed naturally. In fact, they prove that life could not have happened that way.

After we showed the video, our favorite critic complained that we had taken a cheap shot by bringing up Miller and Fox. He said that those two series of experiments had been done more than 40 years ago, and that the errors in them are well known. He said that everybody knows that those experiments led nowhere, and that no respectable scientists are doing work along those lines. He said modern research into the origin of life is taking other approaches, but has not produced any positive results yet.

We agree with everything our critic said, except for the part that "everybody knows" it. It is our position that the general public does not know that these experiments failed and mistakenly believes that they succeeded.

One reason we believe that many people are misinformed is because the previously mentioned local high school text 11 presents the work of Miller and Fox as if it were long-established scientific proof of how life evolved.

The second reason is that the previously mentioned 1996 college textbook says this:


Organic Molecules Can Be Synthesized Spontaneously under Prebiotic Conditions
In 1953, inspired by the ideas of Oparin and Haldane, Stanley Miller, a graduate student, and his adviser Harold Urey of the University of Chicago set out to demonstrate prebiotic evolution in the laboratory. They mixed water, ammonia, hydrogen, and methane in a flask and provided energy with heat and electrical charge (to simulate lightening). They found simple organic molecules appeared after just a few days (Fig 19-2). In these and similar experiments, Miller and others have produced amino acids, short proteins, nucleotides, adenosine triphosphate (ATP), and other molecules characteristic of living things. 12


But even the strongly-biased Encyclopedia of Evolution admits:


Decades of persistent failure to "create life" by the "spark in the soup" method (or to find such productions in nature) have caused researchers to seek other approaches to the great enigma. 13
But even the most promising, technically sophisticated attempts to demonstrate the origin of life from nonliving chemicals are still guesses and gropes in the dark. For almost a century, many scientists have taught that some version of the "spark in the soup" theory "must" be true. Repetition of this idea as fact, without sufficient evidence, has done a disservice to new generations by capping their curiosity about a profound and open question. 14


To reputable scientists it may look like we are taking cheap shots at old, abandoned theories, but we will have to keep shooting until the public school textbooks abandon them.

Panspermia
Panspermia is the belief that life could not have started by natural processes on Earth, so it must have started in outer space. This theory was first suggested by British astronomer Fred Hoyle in 1978.


Simple life forms or amino acids may have ridden to Earth on comets or meteors. Of course, Hoyle recognizes this is no explanation for the origin of life; it simply moves the problem to another time and place. 15

The important point is that it moves the problem from a place (the Earth) where it has been scientifically proven that life could not naturally originate, to a place (anywhere else in the universe) where one can imagine any set of fantastic conditions that might be conducive to prebiotic evolution. That's why evolutionists want to believe so desperately that meteorite ALH84001 really does contain signs of life.

Summary
We agree that "repetition of this idea [that life could have been caused by a "spark in the soup"] as fact, without sufficient evidence, has done a disservice to new generations by capping their curiosity about a profound and open question." In fact, we would extend this statement to say that the repetition of the idea that evolution is a fact, without sufficient evidence, has done a disservice to the advancement of science in general. It has prejudiced the reconstruction of fossils and the interpretation of geology and astronomy. Science will truly advance when we discard the theory of evolution and examine data without evolutionary prejudice.

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[Markofhumanfeet]

Who can "know" god? And those who claim to. Prove it. :) Why isn't the theory of natural selection considered another one of gods creations?

God has revealed Himself to us through his holy prophets and through the living word. The radically changed natures of all those who come into contact with them and believe as well as live the new life, is the proof.

If God had created the world through evolution, he would have said so. The truth is, he says differently and man, as the created thing, as a pot in relation to the potter, is in no place to dispute him. It is the height of pride and arrogance to claim to have more knowledge than the Creator. Most of mankind has no difficulty in assuming that position, but a true believer will not.

[Elsie]

? There's plenty of evidence for punk-eek scenarios happening.

---

Of COURSE there is!

Because ALL of the 'transitionals' are GONE - vanished from the 'record': what else BUT punk-eek is left when you toss out GOD...

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Except for these buggy looking things that this thread started with. These little endearing creatures are STILL around. Why haven't they just vanished as well? Don't they KNOW that it just gives us "C" folks ammo to use??)

(Or is it ammo for "E" folks????

---

Wait!!!

It's ammo for BOTH sides since we can ALL spin this data into anything that fits our world view!

Cool, huh??

[Elsie]

The Road of Life

At first, I saw God as my observer, my judge, keeping track of the things I did wrong, so as to know whether I merited heaven or hell when I die. He was out there sort of like a president.. I recognized His picture when I saw it, but I really didn't know Him.

But later on when I met Christ, it seemed as though life were rather like a bike ride, but it was a tandem bike, and I noticed that Christ was in the back helping me pedal. I don't know just when it was that He suggested we change places, but life has not been the same since.

When I had control, I knew the way. It was rather boring, but predictable it was the shortest distance between two points. But when He took the lead, He knew delightful long cuts, up mountains, and through rocky places at breakneck speeds. It was all I could do to hang on!

Even though it looked like madness, He said, "Pedal!"

I worried and was anxious and asked, "Where are you taking me?"

He laughed and didn't answer, and I started to learn to trust. I forgot my boring life and entered into the adventure, and when I'd say, "I'm scared," He'd lean back and touch my hand. I gained love, peace, acceptance and joy; gifts to take on my journey, My Lord's and mine. And we were off again.

He said, "Give the gifts away. They're extra baggage, too much weight."

So I did, to the people we met, and I found that in giving I received, and still our burden was light.

I did not trust Him, at first, in control of my life. I thought He'd wreck it; but he knows bike secrets, knows how to make it bend to take sharp corners, knows how to jump to clear high rocks, knows how to fly to shorten, scary passages. And I am learning to shut up and pedal in the strangest places, and I'm beginning to enjoy the view and the cool breeze on my face with my delightful constant companion, Jesus Christ.

And when I'm sure I just can't do it anymore, He just smiles and says... "Pedal."

[bert]

How about an account of the creation myths. There are two in the Bible alone.

[Elsie]

There's plenty of evidence for punk-eek scenarios happening.

Ah HA!!

They DO believe in miracles!!!