Donald Prothero’s Imaginary Evidence for Evolution (yet another evo hoax!)

That’s the lesson of Donald Prothero’s book, Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why It Matters (New York: Columbia University Press, 2007). Prothero is a professor of geology at Occidental College in Los Angeles. On November 30, he teamed up with atheist Michael Shermer (founding publisher of Skeptic Magazine) to debate Stephen Meyer and Richard Sternberg of the Discovery Institute.

Shermer wrote the foreword to Prothero’s book, calling it “the best book ever written on the subject.” In fact, “Don’s visual presentation of the fossil and genetic evidence for evolution is so unmistakably powerful that I venture to say that no one could read this book and still deny the reality of evolution.”

Of course, “evolution” can mean many things, most of which nobody would deny even without Prothero’s book. For example, evolution can mean simply change over time, or minor changes in existing species (“microevolution”), neither of which any sane person doubts. Both Shermer and Prothero, however, make it clear that by “evolution” they mean Darwin’s theory that all living things are descended from a common ancestor, modified principally by natural selection acting on unguided variations (“macroevolution”).

The modern version of the theory asserts that new variations originate in genetic mutations. Some of the most dramatic mutations occur in “Hox genes,” which can determine which appendages develop in various parts of the body. On page 101 of his book, Prothero shows pictures of two Hox gene mutations: “antennapedia,” which causes a fruit fly to sprout legs instead of antennae from its head, and “ultrabithorax,” which causes a fruit fly to develop a second pair of wings from it midsection. But both of these are harmful: A fruit fly with legs sticking out of its head is at an obvious disadvantage, and a four-winged fruit fly has no flight muscles in its extra pair of wings, so it has trouble flying and mating. Both mutants can survive only in the laboratory; in the wild they would quickly be eliminated by natural selection.

Some Darwinists have suggested that ancestral four-winged fruit flies could have evolved by mutation into modern two-winged fruit flies. But this explanation doesn’t work, because a two-winged fly hasn’t simply lost a pair of wings; it has acquired a large and complex gene (ultrabithorax) that enables it to develop “halteres,” or balancers. The halteres are located behind the fly’s normal pair of wings and vibrate rapidly to stabilize the insect in flight. So the two-winged fly represents the gain—not loss—of an important structure. (See Chapter 9 of my book Icons of Evolution).

Prothero ignores the evidence and suggests that ancestral four-winged flies simply mutated into modern two-winged flies. Modern four-winged mutants, he writes on page 101, “have apparently changed their regulatory genes so that ancestral wings appeared instead of halteres.”

Not only does Prothero ignore the evidence from developmental genetics, but he also invents an imaginary animal to complete the story he wants us to believe. Page 195 of his book carries an illustration of an eighteen-winged dragonfly next to a normal four-winged dragonfly, with the following caption: “The evolutionary mechanism by which Hox genes allow arthropods to make drastic changes in their number and arrangement of segments and appendages, producing macroevolutionary changes with a few simple mutations.”

Yet there is no evidence that eighteen-winged dragonflies ever existed. There are lots of dragonflies in the fossil record, but none of them remotely resemble this fictitious creature.

No matter. In what Michael Shermer calls “the best book ever written on the subject,” Donald Prothero simply makes up whatever evidence he wants.

And dissent is NOT allowed.

So much for objectivity.

That's what bothers me the most which is telling. I've got a reading list compiled, starting with the Catholic biochemist Behe who had believed it was true since his Catholic school days without questioning and on into his career, then started belatedly questioning and felt alone for some time.

Dr. Mike Behe, "The Origin of a Skeptic"

So far I've got Donald Prothero, "Imaginary Evidence for Evolution"; Siegfried Scherer; Jon Wells (Embryologist); Michael Denton, "Evolution, A Theory in Crisis"; Phil Johnson, and Richard Dawkins, "Blind Watchmaker" (pro evo). Some of the afore-mentioned may not have written articles or books.

I started asking myself some serious questions about what Jesus and the NT writers said. I'm really not prepared to argue it one way or the other at this point but am going to try to track down some of those books, probably better read Darwin, too.

Maybe you could explain how your post is a defense of the ToE and not an attack on GGG.

And while you’re at it, would YOU care to comment on the article and absurd speculations in it, like about 18 winged dragonflies for which there’s no evidence and yet is being used to bolster this guy’s theory.

And how a book with made up creatures, science fiction at the least, is considered by Shermer [who] wrote the foreword to Prothero’s book, calling it “the best book ever written on the subject.” In fact, “Don’s visual presentation of the fossil and genetic evidence for evolution is so unmistakably powerful that I venture to say that no one could read this book and still deny the reality of evolution.”

Sketches of imaginary creatures are the visual presentation that is “powerful”?

And evos mock creationists for believing *fairy tales* and the ramblings of bronze age goat herders? And this book is any better?

You can prove evolution is a lie in one sentence. I won’t stick to just one sentence, but you could if you weren’t given to talking too much.

It is a random process, right?

Wrong. Mutation is random, selection is non-random.

So where are all of evolution’s failures(that’s the one sentence, btw)? Show me the fossil of just one “impossible creature.” There should be an entire branch of science dedicated to them. For every random success...there should be a billion, a trillion, a gajillion failures.

Any organism, because it is in constant competition with others for scarce environment resources, mating opportunities, etc, will only be able to depart a small distance from a well adapted state before it is unable to successfully contribute its genes to future populations (or until it just dies directly). There's no opportunity to get anywhere near an advanced stage of maladaptation, i.e. being an “impossible creature.”

I mean, what are you even thinking here? Sorry to be blunt, but this is one of the dumbest antievolution arguments I've ever read. The whole idea of Darwinian evolution, after noting that organisms vary, is that survival and reproductive success depends on how well the particular mix of variations an organism possesses adapts it to these purposes.

But you're suggesting exactly the opposite: that evolution instead requires organisms to survive, successfully reproduce (and therefore be available to be preserved as fossils) even if, or without regard to whether, they are monstrously maladapted?! Where do you get this bizarre notion?

Ten bucks says the book doesn't claim that an 18-winged dragonfly ever existed, and that this is just another example of creationists taking things out of context.

While I don't have any problem with creationists, I do have a problem with the handful who lie, misrepresent, and omit facts to get their point across. To me its a sign of wavering faith. I have a strong faith in God despite my belief in evolutionary theory. Guess I just don't think God is in danger from it.

As for evolutionary dead ends, the fossil record is full of them. For that matter we can even count a few species that have gone extinct during human history as evolutionary dead ends. Dodo birds are a fine example of a modern evolutionary dead end that couldn't survive a new element in their environment. In that case, man and animals he brought with him were the new environmental elements. The American bison nearly faced the same fate. At the other end of the scale is the California condor which seems to have been well on its way to extinction all by itself until man decided to save it.

Those who claim that all dinosaurs died because of a cataclysmic event are conveniently omitting the species that arose and died out prior to the cataclysmic even and after the cataclysmic event. (Very similar to the climatologists "trick".)

My favorite dinosaur hunter/ evolutionist is Bob Bakker who also happens to be a Pentecostal minister. I tend to agree with his view that God Created the heavens and the earth, how he populated them is a mystery and will likely remain that way till God decides otherwise. I personally believe that God gave me a brain with the intent that I use it for more than reading the bible and repetitive quotation from it.

Wrong. Mutation is random, selection is non-random.

The pressures exerted on the organism are what then? Planned? Designed? Controlled?

The whole idea of Darwinian evolution, after noting that organisms vary, is that survival and reproductive success depends on how well the particular mix of variations an organism possesses adapts it to these purposes.

And explain how that process is not due to random influences.

It doesn't read that way, not that there should be lots of examples of a mutation that doesn't work because they were maladapted. But there appear to be no examples of failed mutations, monstrosities, as it were, in the fossil record. Could you explain how all the fossils that are found are found in their complete and fully functional form?

Guess I just don't think God is in danger from it.

Nobody said God is in danger from the ToE much less anything. What it comes down to is whether you choose to believe that God created man and animals fro the dust of the earth, as separate creative acts or not, like it says in His word.

Those who claim that all dinosaurs died because of a cataclysmic event are conveniently omitting the species that arose and died out prior to the cataclysmic even and after the cataclysmic event. (Very similar to the climatologists "trick".)

Maybe you need to tell that to other evolutionists then. That's THEIR explanation if you research it.

I personally believe that God gave me a brain with the intent that I use it for more than reading the bible and repetitive quotation from it.

Ah, the old *anyone who disagrees with my opinion is stupid mentality*, again.

Evos are soooo hung up on how much smarter they are than anyone else just because of an opinion they have about a scientific theory. The biggest insult an evolutionist can made towards someone is to call them stupid, simply because they disagree on an issue.

That's a really great criteria for determining intelligence.

A real example from real life would have been far more effective and made him look like less of an idiot.

It looks like evos grasping at straws again to find something, anything, somewhere, anywhere to bolster their explanations for the ToE.

And you going on to defend it,....

Well,.... it’s not impressive, to say the least.

There is nothing an evolutionist can say do that’s too stupid for FR evolutionists to not defend it. It would do you guys a lot of good PR wise to look at some of this stuff and admit that the person’s judgment was poor, they spoke to soon, they presumed too much, they used a bad example, whatever.

But to just knee jerk defend anything without regard to how it looks to others, puts you in the same boat.

The number of times those in the evolutionary world have jumped the gun about some new discovery and had to eat those words, has done more to cut into their credibility than ANYTHING a creationist has had to say.

In their haste to find support for the ToE, or manufacture it for that matter, evolutionists are their own worst enemy.

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