The problems with evolutionary theory, however, do not stop with the origin, age, and evolution of the Universe itself. Biological evolution (or “macroevolution”) is just as much a problem as is cosmic evolution.⁵ At some point(s) in the past, if evolution is true, life must have arisen from lifelessness and somehow changed into all species which have ever roamed planet Earth. Does the evidence support biological evolution?

Problem #1: Life from Non-life

Before life can evolve, life has to exist. If evolution is true, that first life had to come about from non-life, a phenomenon called “abiogenesis” or “spontaneous generation.” Abiogenesis, however, has long been acknowledged to be an unprovable, though necessary, part of evolution. In 1960 G.A. Kerkut published The Implications of Evolution. Therein he listed seven non-provable assumptions upon which evolution is based. “The first assumption is that non-living things gave rise to living material, i.e., spontaneous generation occurred.”⁶ In spite of the admission that evolution is based on non-provable assumptions, many today in the evolutionary community boldly assert that their theory is a scientific fact. However, the unbiased observer must ask: what does the scientific evidence actually have to say about the origin of life?

The work of various scientists over the centuries disproved the superstitious idea that life can come from non-life (e.g., Francesco Redi and Lazzaro Spallanzani). Louis Pasteur is generally acknowledged to be the scientist whose experiments drove nails into the proverbial abiogenesis coffin. Even standard evolution-based high school biology textbooks have historically acknowledged that fact. For example, one such popular textbook stated, “It was not until 1864, and the elegant experiment of French scientist Louis Pasteur, that the hypothesis of spontaneous generation was finally disproved.”⁷ They acknowledged that, “Pasteur, like Redi and Spallanzani before him, had shown that life comes only from life.”⁸ This truth is so absolute that it has been deemed a scientific law: the Law of Biogenesis. Evolutionist George G. Simpson, one of the most influential paleontologists of the 20^th century, articulated well the findings of science: “[T]here is no serious doubt that biogenesis is the rule, that life comes only from other life, that a cell, the unit of life, is always and exclusively the product or offspring of another cell.”⁹ Though many attempts have since been made to initiate life from non-life, none have succeeded. Leading evolutionary biologists have been forced to acknowledge, therefore, that abiogenesis is “impossible,” “absurd,” and an “obsolete concept,”¹⁰ but without it, evolution cannot even get started!

Notice the following acknowledgements by leading evolutionists over the years. Evolutionist and Nobel Laureate, George Wald, of Harvard University wrote: “As for spontaneous generation, it continued to find acceptance until finally disposed of by the work of Louis Pasteur.”¹¹ He further admitted, “One has only to contemplate the magnitude of this task to concede that the spontaneous generation of a living organism is impossible. Yet here we are, as a result, I believe, of spontaneous generation.”¹² Notice that his belief in spontaneous generation is not based on the actual evidence but, instead, on blind faith in evolution in spite of the evidence. In the lecture series, Origins of Life,¹³ evolutionary geologist Robert Hazen made notable admissions: “The origin of life is a subject of immense complexity, and I have to tell you right up front, we don’t know how life began.” “How can I tell you about the origin of life when we are so woefully ignorant of that history?” Evolutionists do not know how life could emerge from non-life within their naturalistic theory, but they believe in it anyway.

Evolutionist Paul Davies, theoretical physicist, cosmologist, astrobiologist, and professor at Arizona State University, writing in New Scientist, said, “One of the great outstanding scientific mysteries is the origin of life. How did it happen?…The truth is, nobody has a clue.”¹⁴ Evolutionist John Horgan did not even try to veil his admission within an article. He titled one of his articles, “Pssst! Don’t Tell the Creationists, but Scientists Don’t Have a Clue How Life Began.”¹⁵ Such admissions are quite telling, albeit incorrect. What Davies and Horgan mean is, no naturalistic evolutionist “has a clue.” Biblical supernaturalists, on the other hand, know exactly how life originated, and the answer harmonizes perfectly with the Law of Biogenesis—unlike evolution’s life-origins fairytale. If one sticks with the evidence, he must conclude that to believe life can come from non-life would be irrational, unscientific, and requires blind faith in evolution.¹⁶

Problem #2: The Nature of the First Life

Life coming from non-life, in actuality, is the “easy” part. The difficulty of getting life from non-life is so overwhelming that we usually fail to realize other daunting aspects of the equation that compound the difficulty of the problem for evolutionists. The distinguished British astronomer, Sir Fred Hoyle, once highlighted the gravity of the abiogenesis problem.

At all events, anyone with even a nodding acquaintance with the Rubik’s cube will concede the near-impossibility of a solution being obtained by a blind person moving the cubic faces at random. Now imagine 10⁵⁰ blind persons each with a scrambled Rubik’s cube, and try to conceive of the chance of them all simultaneously arriving at the solved form. You then have the chance of arriving by random shuffling at just one of the many biopolymers on which life depends. The notion that not only biopolymers but the operating programme of a living cell could be arrived at by chance in a primordial organic soup here on the Earth is evidently nonsense of a high order.¹⁷

The arrival of life on Earth from non-life is problematic enough, but life cannot exist without an actual “operating program” that tells it how to function once it exists.

The problem does not stop there, either. What would happen to the first life if it could not reproduce itself? Famous evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins stated in an interview with Ben Stein regarding the origin of life, “Nobody knows how it got started. We know the kind of event that it must have been. We know the sort of event that must have happened for the origin of life. It was the origin of the first self-replicating molecule.” Obviously, the first life had to already have the functionality to reproduce: yet another hurdle that would be impossible for evolution to jump. Stein asked Dawkins, “Right. And how did that happen?” Dawkins replied, “I’ve told you. We don’t know.” Stein then said, “So, you have no idea how it started?” Dawkins replied, “No. Nor has anybody.”¹⁸ John Keosian, biology professor at Rutgers University, said, “Even conceptually, it is difficult to see how a system satisfying the minimum criteria for a living thing can arise by chance and, simultaneously, include a mechanism containing the suitable information for its own replication.”¹⁹ We agree.  

Another problem exists when considering what would have to occur for abiogenesis to be possible. The biomolecules of life generally are only found in one (out of two) of the main three-dimensional biomolecule configurations—a scenario called homochirality. However, as biochemist Joe Deweese of Freed-Hardeman University noted, “in a pre-biotic system (one where life does not yet exist) there is no clear mechanism for preferentially causing the formation of one chiral form over another. This means there is no homochirality. Instead, when chemicals react in experimental systems, researchers tend to get mixtures of L- and D- [i.e., “right-handed” and “left-handed”—JM] forms of molecules,”²⁰ a dilemma called the “homochirality problem” by origin-of-life scientists. Experimental evidence does not support the contention that abiogenesis occurred.

No wonder abiogenesis is deemed by many evolutionists to require a “miracle” that requires blind faith on the part of the evolutionist to accept.²¹ But the problem for evolutionists does not stop there, either. Evolutionist John Maddox, writing in Nature, said, “[I]t is disappointing that the origin of the genetic code is still as obscure as the origin of life itself.”²²

Problem #3: The Origin of Genetic Information

Darwin believed that “natural selection” would serve as a mechanism to make evolution happen. However, in the immortal words of Dutch evolutionary botanist Hugo de Vries, “Natural selection may explain the survival of the fittest, but it cannot explain the arrival of the fittest.”²³ Natural selection is simply a “filtering mechanism” that eliminates those species that are not as well suited to an environment as another species. Those species must already exist, however, in order for them to be filtered. What natural mechanism could create the species in the first place?

Mainstream evolutionary thinking today is that genetic mutations coupled with natural selection will create the best fit species, a belief known as “Neo-Darwinism.” Once again, however, genes must already exist in order for them to be mutated. Where did the first, “simple” genome come from? And how could new genetic information (i.e., new “raw material”) be subsequently spontaneously created naturally as the original life forms morphed into other life forms? In the words of the late, famous evolutionary paleontologist of Harvard University, Stephen Jay Gould, “A mutation doesn’t produce major new raw material. You don’t make a new species by mutating the species…. That’s a common idea people have; that evolution is due to random mutations. A mutation is not the cause of evolutionary change.”²⁴ If a living thing does not already have the genetic code to grow new parts, it cannot grow them, because that would require new raw material.

Consider the analogy of making a digital copy of a file from a computer onto a flash drive. When a file is copied, “mutations” can sometimes occur. The file does not always copy properly. The final copy is not always exactly like the original. Codon errors, duplications, translocations, deletions, and other mutations exist in genetics—errors that cause the final copy to be “mutated.” Do such mutations add new raw material? Do they “write a new sentence” in the file? No. A mutation might cause a fly to have extra wings (homeotic mutations) or a person to have an extra toe (polydactyly), but mutations do not create a new feature or a new creature. A mutation would not cause a wing to appear on a creature, for example, unless the creature already had wings in its genome.

Why? Because when the structure of the DNA molecule was discovered in the twentieth century, James Watson and Francis Crick “discovered that DNA stores information using a four-character chemical alphabet. Strings of precisely sequenced chemicals called nucleotide bases store and transmit the assembly instructions—the information—for building the crucial protein molecules and machines the cell needs to survive.”²⁵ Information is packed into our genes, and yet, in the words of information scientist Werner Gitt of the Federal Institute of Physics and Technology, “There is no known law of nature, no known process, and no known sequence of events which can cause information to originate by itself in matter.”²⁶ Bottom line: evolution has no way of getting life from non-life, and no way to evolve it into something different when it arrives. Once again, the evolutionist must rely on blind faith to hold his position.²⁷

Problem #4: Insufficient Evidence for Evolution

In order for a belief to be “rational,” it must have sufficient supporting evidence. After all, the Law of Rationality states that one should only draw those conclusions that are warranted by the evidence.²⁸ Biblical creation is rational, since it is based on evidence that the Bible is of divine origin.²⁹ Is belief in evolution a rational belief or a blind faith? Where is the evidence for evolution?

When a student takes “Biology” class in public high school or college, he will most likely find a section in his textbook listing alleged evidences for evolution. Upon closer examination, without exception, these evidences can be categorized as being one of three possibilities: erroneous, irrelevant, or inadequate. Consider the following commonly listed evidences for macroevolution:

Category 1: Erroneous Evidences

• Embryonic recapitulation: Ernst Haeckel, living at the turn of the 19^th century, asserted that embryos in their development in the womb repeat the evolutionary history of their species. Though his idea quickly became embedded in evolution-friendly textbooks, his claims were not only found to be inaccurate,³⁰ but eventually found to be a hoax.³¹ Upon confrontation, Haeckel eventually acknowledged that several of the charts he used to promote his theory were fabricated to support his theory. He said, “I should feel utterly condemned and annihilated by the admission, were it not that hundreds of the best observers and biologists lie under the same charge. The great majority of all morphological, anatomical, histological, and embryological diagrams are not true to nature, but are more or less doctored, schematized and reconstructed.”³²

• Horse evolution charts: Textbooks often have charts allegedly documenting the evolution of horses from the small, fox-like creature known as eohippus or hyracotherium. Several decades ago, however, leading paleontologists acknowledged that the “uniform, continuous transformation of hyracotherium into equus [modern horses—JM], so dear to the hearts of generations of textbook writers, never happened in nature.”³³ Perhaps the leading paleontologist of the twentieth century, Harvard professor Stephen Jay Gould, subtly chided those who spread misinformation by using horse evolution as proof of evolution:
  
  Once ensconced in textbooks, misinformation becomes cocooned and effectively permanent, because, as stated above, textbooks copy from previous texts. (I have written two essays on this lamentable practice: one on the amusingly perennial description of the eohippus, or “dawn horse,” as the size of a fox terrier, even though most authors, including yours truly, have no idea of the dimensions or appearance of this breed…).³⁴
  
  Keep in mind that even if some or all of the animals on the typical horse charts were, in fact, part of the ancestry of modern horses, hyracotherium (the first animal on the horse evolution chart) is still acknowledged by evolutionists to be a “horse” and, therefore, is argued by some creationists to be part of the “horse kind” which left the Ark. If so, horse evolution charts would be evidence of microevolution (not macroevolution) and would, therefore, constitute inadequate evidence of macroevolution (category three below). Bottom line: evidence for macroevolution cannot be found among the horses.³⁵

• Whale evolution charts: Whale evolution has been called “one of the best documented examples of mammal evolution,”³⁶ and yet the entire timeline of whale evolution is now being revamped (again). Whales were historically argued by many to be descended from hippos, until 1979 when pakicetus became the believed ancestor of the whales. Discovery of more bones over the years caused scientists to completely change their portraits of pakicetus to look something like a land-dwelling, wolf-like mammal, with only a slight resemblance to the whale in its teeth. As would be expected, after further discoveries, pakicetus is now being abandoned and scientists are changing the evolutionary story of whales again. They now suggest that carnivorous whales may have descended from a tiny, deer-like, herbivorous, aquatic creature known as indohyus—a big shift, to say the least, in spite of the supposed documentation of whale evolution. What will be the new supposed evolutionary ancestor of whales in the coming years?

• Transitional fossils: As we have shown elsewhere, the fossil record is, perhaps, one of the strongest evidences in favor of Creation, not evolution.³⁷ Abrupt appearance, stasis, and mass extinction characterize the fossil record from bottom to top, exactly as creationists would predict and exactly the opposite of what evolution would predict. While there should be billions of transitional fossils linking all life forms to previous ancestors if Darwin was correct, in truth, there are no undisputed transitional forms.³⁸ While change should characterize the fossil record, leading paleontologists have long acknowledged instead that stasis is the rule.³⁹ If Darwinian evolution actually happened, transitional forms would be prevalent, especially among the invertebrates which fossilize more easily and make up most of the fossils on the planet by far. However, few if any alleged transitional forms among the invertebrates have even been uncovered by evolutionists. Even among the few alleged vertebrate transitional forms, as time passes, the fossil is ultimately re-considered and marked off the list of supposed evidences for evolution. To illustrate, perhaps the two most oft-cited alleged transitional creatures in the animal kingdom would be tiktaalik and archaeopteryx.
  
  Tiktaalik has been hailed as the transitional creature linking fish and amphibians, a creature whose pelvic fins (its front fins) are thought to have been evolving into legs. However, in 2010 researchers⁴⁰ in Poland discovered four-limbed animal tracks in fossil strata believed to be nine million years older than the tiktaalik strata. How could tiktaalik be the transition from fish to legged amphibians if four-legged creatures were already around and fully-functional “nine million years” before tiktaalik was on the scene?
  
  Archaeopteryx is thought to be the creature that linked dinosaurs to their descendants, the birds. Equipped with teeth and claws, but also sporting feathers, a wishbone, and a beak, archaeopteryx looked to scientists as though it was not quite bird and was not quite dinosaur. Some admittedly modern birds and birds within the fossil record, however, have claws⁴¹ and teeth⁴² as well, proving that having them does not imply they descended from dinosaurs. Further, acknowledged birds have been found in fossil strata thought to be “millions of years” older than the strata in which archaeopteryx was found,⁴³ and the supposed feathered dinosaurs do not arrive in the fossil strata until “millions of years” after the strata in which archaeopteryx is found. In the words of British paleontologist and senior editor of Nature, Henry Gee, concerning the “dethronement of Archaeopteryx,” “Archaeopteryx is just another dinosaur with feathers.”⁴⁴ Bottom line: archaeopteryx is now considered by most to be a true bird. It is not transitional.⁴⁵

Category 2: Irrelevant Evidences

The logical Fallacy of Equivocation occurs when the same word is used in at least two unclear ways in an argument, and the two are treated as though they are one and the same.⁴⁶ “Trees have branches. My bank has branches. Therefore, my bank is a tree.” Richard Dawkins was no doubt referring to this category of evidence when he claimed that evolution is a “fact that is proved utterly beyond reasonable doubt.” He claimed, “It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that).”⁴⁷ If, by “evolution” is meant the concept that change happens over time (e.g., we are not exactly the same as our parents), then perhaps only “ignorant, stupid or insane” people reject evolution. If, however, by “evolution” Dawkins is referring to molecules-to-man evolution, then evolution certainly is not a “fact that is proved utterly beyond reasonable doubt.” However, without clarification, many students fall victim to the Fallacy of Equivocation, assuming that since change happens, (Darwinian) evolution must be true.

With that in mind, the Biology student should be careful not to be swayed by this category of alleged evidences for evolution—a category which is, perhaps, proclaimed the loudest. This category contains, for example, instances of “evolution” which are not disputed by creationists (i.e., microevolution), but which do not provide evidence for the form of evolution accepted by mainstream secular scientists today (i.e., macroevolution)—“molecules-to-man” naturalistic evolution.

• Natural selection: When a species is not as well-suited to a particular habitat as another species, if the less “fit” species does not migrate to a different environment for which it is more suited, the more fit species will tend to thrive and the less fit species will tend to die out. That is natural selection, and it is not rejected by creationists. However, natural selection in no way supports the idea that a fish can turn into an amphibian or a dinosaur can turn into a bird. As discussed earlier, natural selection is merely a filtering mechanism which cannot act until a species already exists. Evolution requires the appearance of a new creature before natural selection can do its work. Natural selection, therefore, is an irrelevant evidence in regard to macroevolution—it neither supports it nor refutes it.

• Geographic distribution and finches: Charles Darwin, in his travels, noted that animals that were slightly different from one another, but clearly still related, would often be found in a single local area, but in different habitats (e.g., slightly different climates). He saw this as evidence that those animals descended from a common ancestor in the area and that natural selection caused certain varieties to thrive in different habitats. He observed varieties of finches (as well as tortoises, iguanas, and plants), for example, with different colored feathers and different sized or shaped beaks. These varieties, he postulated, must have descended from a single ancestor in South America.
  
  However, while variety existed among the finches, they all were still acknowledged to be finches. Further, as biologists Peter and Rosemary Grant of Princeton, who spent 35 years studying the Darwin Galapagos finches, acknowledged, “for beak size and shape to evolve, there must be enough heritable variation in those traits to provide raw material for natural selection.”⁴⁸ In other words, the possible variation seen among the finches was all inherited from the original ancestor—it was not spontaneously generated from thin air. The variation was already built into the species. Nothing new came about, but macroevolution requires new material. Again, therefore, geographic distribution is an irrelevant evidence for macroevolution. Heritable variation within animals implies (1) an initial Creator of the genetic information that was inherited by offspring, and (2) variation is limited by the genetic package that the original ancestor is equipped with. Evolution across phylogenic boundaries from one kind of animal to another, therefore, cannot happen if the ancestor was not already equipped with the genetic information to allow such a change. Since the original, simple single-celled organisms thought by evolutionists to have launched life on Earth would not have been equipped with the genetic information to bring about all of the species on the planet, macroevolution is not possible.
  
  Darwin also acknowledged cases where there were animals in similar habitats across the world that were apparently not descended from the same ancestors but that had similarities in structure anyway. He considered these examples to be evidence of natural selection: that the pressures of natural selection cause certain body characteristics to appear and thrive in certain environments, while other characteristics less suited to the environment die out. This, once again, is merely evidence of natural selection, not macroevolution—an irrelevant evidence.

• Evidences of microevolution: Darwin’s finches are a classic example of microevolutionary change—small changes under the umbrella of the general kind of creature that God originally created (Genesis 1:24). Microevolution is not proof of macroevolution, however, since all available evidence supports a hard reproductive boundary, beyond which an animal cannot evolve. Evolutionary paleontologist Steven Stanley explained: “The known fossil record fails to document a single example of phyletic evolution [i.e., evolution of a new phylum—JM] accomplishing a major morphological transition and hence offers no evidence that the gradualistic model can be valid.”⁴⁹ Change between species seems only to be capable at roughly the genus or family level (e.g., speciation from wolves to dogs). The original kinds that God created had the potential for a certain amount of diversity within them, but not enough to change the kinds into a different kind. Other often cited examples of microevolutionary change would include peppered moth varieties, bacteria “evolving” resistance to antibiotics, and fruit fly varieties. Mutated flies are still flies, resistant bacteria are still bacteria, and dark peppered moths are every bit as much moths as are light colored peppered moths. Microevolutionary evidences are irrelevant evidences in trying to prove that single-celled organisms can evolve into humans over millions of years.⁵⁰

Category 3: Inadequate Evidences

Admittedly, one category of alleged evidence for evolution stands as unrefuted potential evidence for evolution. The evidence is not adequate evidence, however, considering that the same evidence can be used with better consistency in support of biblical Creation as well.

• Homologous structures: Evolutionists argue that similarities in different life are every bit as much evidence for our relation to them as is our similarities to our human ancestors. It is true that if we are related to someone, we would predict there to be similarities between us (we share similarities with our parents, for example). However, as Darwin himself observed (see Geographic distribution above), similarities are often seen in species that clearly share no common ancestor. That concession begs the question: how do evolutionists really know which species are actually related and which are not? Similar bone structures between birds and dinosaurs, or chimps and humans, for example, do not necessarily suggest relationship. Could there be a different explanation? Actually, yes: there is a perfect explanation that fits the evidence better.
  
  If Creation, rather than evolution, is true, then similarities seen between different kinds would suggest a common Designer, rather than a common ancestor. Car manufacturers often use the same features and car parts on multiple models (e.g., tires, brake systems, windshield wipers, bolts, light bulbs, etc.), rather than “re-inventing the wheel” with each model. If a particular part has proven to be the most effective part and it can be used multiple times in other applications, it would be extremely inefficient of an engineer to use a different part or design a new part in all new designs. Car manufacturers often even design their various car models with a similar “look” that distinguishes their brand from others.
  
  Similarly, one would expect God, if He is an efficient Engineer, to use similar structures in many life forms on Earth, since they were all designed to live on the same planet. Those designed to live in similar environments on Earth and do similar things would be expected to be even more similar than other species. Those creatures who would be breathing air would be expected to have similar lungs. Many of those creatures designed for swimming in water would be expected to have fins, and so on. If the same Designer was behind the different kinds of animals of the Earth, one would expect similarities between them—and, of course, there are.
  
  Which view—common ancestry or common design—fits the evidence better and more consistently? Several evidences could be highlighted which reveal the superiority of the Creation model in explaining the evidence, but let’s look at one. Recall again the above section on “Geographic distribution.” While similarities between those species living in the same relative environment—species that are distinctive from those found elsewhere—is admittedly suggestive of possible common ancestry (though, once again, not macroevolutionary ancestry), the second category of similarity observed by Darwin (i.e., creatures similar though not related) is a problem for macroevolution. In the case of descent from a common ancestor, the genetic potential for similarities between descendants is at least possible (though Someone would have to create the “heritable variation” in the first place), but when common ancestry has been ruled out, there is no means of creating the observed similar features between creatures. A common Designer, therefore, is the reasonable conclusion from the evidence for both of Darwin’s observations.⁵¹

Conclusion

Even if the Big Bang could create the Universe and explain away all of the inconsistencies we see when studying the cosmos, at some point, in order for biological evolution to occur, life had to come from non-life. If that feat was not difficult enough, that life had to be extremely complex—more complex than we might typically even realize. It had to have an operating program that told it how to function. It had to be able to replicate itself and be homochiral. It had to be equipped with the necessary genome to allow life to continue. That pool of genetic information had to be continually increased spontaneously over millions of years in order to allow that single-celled organism to turn into all of the species on the planet, ending with the genetically complex species we call homo sapiens. The pool had to increase in spite of the fact that there is no known way to spontaneously generate such information in a natural way.

With such facts established, it should come as no surprise to find that evolution has never been able to be substantiated by solid evidence. Its alleged evidences are always, without exception, erroneous, irrelevant or, at the very least, inadequate. Belief in evolution, therefore, requires one to hold a blind “faith” in a superstitious fairytale. It’s no wonder that the late Colin Patterson, senior paleontologist at the British Museum of Natural History in London, said about evolution, “One morning I woke up and something had happened in the night, and it struck me that I had been working on this stuff for twenty years and there was not one thing I knew about it. That’s quite a shock to learn that one can be misled so long. Either there was something wrong with me, or there was something wrong with evolutionary theory.”⁵²

Endnotes

¹ See Jeff Miller (2022), “Should Christians Accept Evolution and an Old Earth to Win Converts?” Reason & Revelation, 42[4]:38-44, April.

² See Jeff Miller (2017), Science vs. Evolution (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), 2nd edition, pp. 9-38.

³ See Jeff Miller (2019), “21 Reasons to Believe the Earth is Young,” Reason & Revelation, 39[1]:2-11, January.

⁴ Ibid.

⁵ Biological evolution, macroevolution, and Darwinian evolution all refer to the theory that all species on the planet evolved from previous species, leading back to original common ancestors of all life.

⁶ Gerald A. Kerkut (1960), The Implications of Evolution (London: Pergamon), p. 6.

⁷ Kenneth R. Miller and Joseph Levine (1991), Biology (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall), p. 341, emp. added.

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ George G. Simpson and William Beck (1965), Life: An Introduction to Biology (New York: Harcourt, Brace, & World), 2nd edition, p. 144, emp. added.

¹⁰ See Jeff Miller (2017), Science vs. Evolution (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), pp. 61-109.

¹¹ George Wald (1962), “Theories on the Origin of Life” in Frontiers of Modern Biology (Boston, MA: Houghton-Mifflin), p. 187, emp. added.

¹² George Wald (1954), “The Origin of Life,” Scientific American, 191[2]:44-53, August, p. 47, emp. added.

¹³ Robert Hazen (2005), Origins of Life (Chantilly, VA: The Teaching Company).

¹⁴ Paul Davies (2006), New Scientist, 192[2578]:35, November 18, emp. added.

¹⁵ John Horgan (2011), “Pssst! Don’t Tell the Creationists, but Scientists Don’t Have a Clue How Life Began,” Scientific American, http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=pssst-dont-tell-the-creationists-bu-2011-02-28, emp. added.

¹⁶ For an in depth study on the Law of Biogenesis and its implications, see Miller, 2017, pp. 61-109.

¹⁷ Fred Hoyle (1981), “The Big Bang in Astronomy,” New Scientist, 92:527, November 19, first emp. in orig.

¹⁸ Ben Stein and Kevin Miller (2008), Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed (Premise Media), emp. added.

¹⁹ John Keosian (1964), The Origin of Life (New York: Reinhold), pp. 69-70, emp. added.

²⁰ Joe Deweese (2023), “Homochirality and the Origin of Life,” Reason & Revelation, 43[11]:122-124, November, emp. added.

²¹ See Miller (2017), pp. 61-109.

²² John Maddox (1994), “The Genesis Code by Numbers,” Nature, 367:111, January 13, emp. added.

²³ Hugo De Vries (1905), Species and Varieties: Their Origin by Mutation, ed. Daniel Trembly MacDougal (Chicago, IL: Open Court), pp. 825-826, emp. added.

²⁴ Stephen J. Gould (1980), “Is a New and General Theory of Evolution Emerging?,” Hobart College speech, 2-14-80; quoted in Luther Sunderland (1984), Darwin’s Enigma (San Diego, CA: Master Books).

²⁵ Stephen C. Meyer (2009), Signature in the Cell (New York: Harper Collins), Kindle file, Ch. 1, emp. added.

²⁶ Werner Gitt (2007), In the Beginning was Information (Green Forest, AR: Master Books), Kindle file, Ch. 6.

²⁷ For an in depth study of the problem of the origin of genetic information, see Miller (2017), pp. 111-132.

²⁸ Lionel Ruby (1960), Logic: An Introduction (Chicago, IL: J.B. Lippincott), pp. 130-131.

²⁹ See Kyle Butt (2022), Is the Bible God’s Word? (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press); Dave Miller (2020), The Bible is from God: A Sampling of Proofs (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

³⁰ Aaron O. Wasserman (1973), Biology (New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts), p. 497; George G. Simpson and William S. Beck (1965), Life: An Introduction to Biology (New York: Harcourt, Brace, & World), pp. 240-241; Erich Blechschmidt (1977), The Beginnings of Human Life (New York: Sringer-Verlag), p. 32; Sir Arthur Keith (1932), The Human Body (London: Thornton and Butterworth), p. 94.

³¹ W.R. Thompson (1956), “Introduction,” Origin of Species, by Charles Darwin (London: Dent, Everyman’s Library edition),  p. xvi; Jane M. Oppenheimer (1988), “Haeckel’s Variations on Darwin,” Biological Metaphor and Cladistic Classification, ed. H.M. Hoenigswald and L.F. Wiener (Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press), p. 134; Kenneth R. Miller and Joseph S. Levine (2006), Biology (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall), p. 385.

³² As quoted in Malcolm Bowden (1977), Ape-Men: Fact or Fallacy? (Bromley, England: Sovereign Publications), p. 76.

³³ George Gaylord Simpson (1953), Life of the Past (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press), p. 125, emp. added.

³⁴ Stephen Jay Gould (2000), “Abscheulich! (Atrocious),” Natural History, 109[2]:42-50, March, paren. in orig., p. 45.

³⁵ See also D. Raup (1979), “Conflicts Between Darwin and Paleontology,” Field Museum of Natural History Bulletin, 50[1]:24-25.

³⁶ “Whales Descended from Tiny Deer-like Creature” (2007), ScienceDaily, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071220220241.htm.

³⁷ Jeff Miller (2019), “Does the Fossil Record Support Creation and the Flood?” Reason & Revelation, 39[7]:74-80.

³⁸ Colin Patterson (1979), Letter of April 10, 1979 to Luther Sunderland: reprinted in Bible-Science Newsletter, 19[8]:8, August, 1981, emp. added.

³⁹ E.g., Stephen Jay Gould (1980), The Panda’s Thumb (New York: W.W. Norton & Co.), pp. 181-182.

⁴⁰ “Ancient Four-Legged Beasts Leave Their Mark” (2010), Science on-line, January 6, http://news.sciencemag.org/evolution/2010/01/ancient-four-legged-beasts-leave-their-mark.

⁴¹ E.g., the ostrich, African Turaco, and young South American Hoatzin.

⁴² E.g., Ichthyornis [see  The Editors of Encyclopaedia, “Ichthyornis” (2020), Encyclopedia Britannica, March 4, https://www.britannica.com/animal/Ichthyornis.], Hesperornis [The Editors of Encyclopaedia, “Hesperornis” (2021), Encyclopedia Britannica, December 16, https://www.britannica.com/animal/Hesperornis.], Hongshanornis [Riley Black (2014), “Feathery Fossil Offers Insights into the Flight and Diet of an Early Bird,” National Geographic on-line, January 8, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/feathery-fossil-offers-insights-into-the-flight-and-diet-of-an-early-bird.], and Sulcavis [see Riley Black (2013), “Fossil Bird Had Tough Teeth,” National Geographic on-line, January 13, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/fossil-bird-had-tough-teeth.]. See also the descriptions of Deinonychus and Cryptovolans in “Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origins of Flight” (2024), Arizona Museum of Natural History, https://www.arizonamuseumofnaturalhistory.org/explore-the-museum/exhibitions/previous-exhibitions/feathered-dinosaurs-and-the-origins-of-flight. See also “Pictures: Giant Fossil Bird Found With Spiky ‘Teeth’” (2010), National Geographic on-line, September 16, https://www.nationalgeographic.com/history/article/100915-giant-bird-wingspan-science-chilensis-teeth-pictures.

⁴³ E.g., Anchiornis (see Black, 2014) and Protoavis [see Sankar Chatterjee (1999), “Protoavis and the Early Evolution of Birds,” Palaeontographica A, 254:1-100].

⁴⁴ Henry Gee (1999), In Search of Deep Time (New York: The Free Press), pp. 195,197.

⁴⁵ In regard to human evolution in particular, typical inadequate evidences would include the lack of necessary transitional forms to substantiate Darwinian evolution [see Jeff Miller (2023a), “Does the Evidence REALLY Support Human Evolution? (Part 1),” Reason & Revelation, 43[8]86-88, August]. Other inadequate evidences would include human-chimp DNA similarities [see Jeff Miller (2023b), “Does the Evidence REALLY Support Human Evolution? (Part 2),” Reason & Revelation, 43[9]:99, September].

⁴⁶ Hans Hansen (2015), “Fallacies,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, ed. Edward N. Zalta & Uri Nodelman, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/fallacies/. 

⁴⁷ Richard Dawkins (1989), “In Short: Nonfiction,” The New York Times, April 9, https://www.nytimes.com/1989/04/09/books/in-short-nonfiction.html.

⁴⁸ Kenneth R. Miller and Joseph S. Levine (2010), Biology (Boston, MA: Pearson), p. 472.

⁴⁹ Steven Stanley (1977), Macroevolution (San Francisco, CA: Freeman), p. 39, emp. added.

⁵⁰ In regard to human evolution in particular, typical irrelevant evidences would include the examples of species among the Australopithecines, which are now regarded as belonging on a side branch of the human evolutionary tree, rather than being our ancestors. Also included among the irrelevant evidences would be species from the genus Homo, which are generally all regarded as being varieties of human and, therefore, examples of micro-, not macroevolution  (see Miller (2023a), pp. 89-92).

⁵¹ In regard to human evolution in particular, typical erroneous evidences would include the many rash claims of transitional forms from the fossil record that have proved to be hoaxes and blunders (see Miller (2023a), pp. 88-89). Another erroneous evidence would include vestigial organs and genes, human-chimp chromosome fusion, mitochondrial DNA and “Eve” (see Miller (2023b), pp. 98-100).

⁵² Colin Patterson (1981), Written transcript made from audio tape of lecture presented at the American Museum of Natural History, November, emp. added.

The post 4 Reasons to Believe Evolution is NOT True appeared first on Apologetics Press.

[EDITORS’ NOTE: Part I of this two-part series appeared in the August issue. Part II follows below and continues, without introductory comments, where the first article ended.]

What About Other Alleged Evidences of Human Evolution?

Even if the fossil record doesn’t support human evolution, what about the other evidences discussed in textbooks?

Vestigial Organs—Erroneous Evidence

“Vestigial” organs are parts of the human body that, in many cases, were once thought by many evolutionists to be virtually useless leftovers from previous species in the human evolutionary ancestry that have yet to be eliminated from the body. In 1895, German anatomist Robert Wiedersheim made a list of 86 organs that he considered “wholly” or at least “in part functionless,” which have subsequently been shown to be useful as more study has been conducted on those organs over the decades.¹ Evolutionary theory long argued that such vestigial organs exist and are proof of evolution (i.e., such organs would be expected to exist, if evolution were true), and yet, after well over a century of further investigation since Wiedersheim, not one organ on the human body can be argued not to have a legitimate function.

Vestigial organs are still listed among the alleged evidences for human evolution in most textbooks, even though the examples given have, long ago, been shown to be useful components of the human body. For example:

• Wisdom teeth—useful in cultures with a less processed diet²
• Tonsils—useful for fighting off germs³
• Coccyx—serves as a shock absorber and connection point for pelvic muscles⁴
• Appendix—important aspect of immune system, especially when young;⁵ also serves “as a reservoir for beneficial gut bacteria”⁶
• Parathyroid—regulates calcium intake⁷
• Hair—useful for protection (from, for example, solar radiation, temperature extremes, and potentially harmful insects)⁸
• Male nipple—a product of embryological development (not evolutionary development) that is equipped with sensitive nervous tissue, it is a useful component of the human reproductive system during intercourse⁹

“Junk” DNA: Vestigial Genes—Erroneous Evidence

As the 20^th-century vestigial organ evidence for human evolution has fallen on hard times, many evolutionists have replaced it with a 21^st-century version. Evolutionists argue:

[W]hen a trait is no longer used, or becomes reduced, the genes that make it don’t instantly disappear from the genome: Evolution stops their action by inactivating them, not snipping them out of the DNA. From this we can make a prediction. We expect to find, in the genomes of many species, silenced, or “dead,” genes: genes that once were useful but are no longer intact or expressed. In other words, there should be vestigial genes.¹⁰

As with the vestigial organ argument, the vestigial gene argument is now falling on hard times as well. Jonathan Wells is a molecular and cell biologist of the Center for Science and Culture at the Discovery Institute in Seattle. In his book, The Myth of Junk DNA, he cites several prominent evolutionists who use the “Junk DNA” argument. He responded:

The arguments by Dawkins, Miller, Shermer, Collins, Kitcher, Coyne and Avise rest on the premise that most non-protein-coding DNA is junk, without any significant biological function. Yet a virtual flood of recent evidence shows that they are mistaken: Much of the DNA they claim to be “junk” actually performs important functions in living cells. The following chapters cite hundreds of scientific articles…that testify to those functions—and those articles are only a small sample of a large and growing body of literature on the subject.¹¹

The evidence for the usefulness of supposed “junk” DNA has continued to pour in over the past decade.¹² Don’t miss the significance of this point: evolutionists predicted that there should be vestigial genes if evolution is true. While verified predictions do not necessarily prove a theory, if the predictions are found to be false upon examination of the evidence, the theory is falsified (at least, that version of the theory). The evidence for vestigial genes is evaporating, falsifying evolutionary theory yet again.

Human/Chimp Chromosome Fusion—Erroneous Evidence

Humans have 46 chromosomes while apes have 48. However, when we look closely at human chromosomes, chromosome 2 appears to be a hybrid of two different ape chromosomes, suggesting to some the possibility that humans evolved from a common 48-chromosome ancestor with apes. Chromosome 2 is claimed to be due to an “end-to-end” fusion of two small, ape-like chromosomes, forming one human chromosome, allegedly explaining why we have 46 (23 pairs) and apes have 48 (24 pairs). However, geneticists have now discovered that the alleged fusion site is in the incorrect location for it to have occurred and that the DNA sequences between chimps and humans do not match at the fusion site.¹³ Human-chimp chromosome fusion did not occur.

Human-Chimp DNA Similarities—Inadequate Evidence

Evolutionists have long argued that humans and chimpanzees have DNA sequences that are 98-99% identical, supposedly suggesting our close evolutionary relationship. However, Jonathan Marks, evolutionary anthropologist, geneticist, and professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, warns evolutionists about the dangers of misinterpreting the genetic evidence and reading too much into the DNA similarities between chimps and humans. In his book, What it Means to Be 98% Chimpanzee, he discusses the misleading tendency to compare long chains of genetic subunits in DNA. He explains that “such comparisons of DNA sequence ignore qualitative differences, those of kind rather than amount.”¹⁴ In other words, the reported chimp-human DNA comparisons are like comparing two side-by-side lines of people, only counting the order in which men and women appear in the lines, with no consideration for any distinguishing characteristics of those men and women (e.g., whether they are dark skinned, light skinned, tall, short, red-haired, blue-eyed, underweight, overweight, etc.).

He also explains,

Because DNA is a linear array of those four bases—A,G,C, and T—only four possibilities exist at any specific point in a DNA sequence. The laws of chance tell us that two random sequences from species that have no ancestry in common will match at about one in every four sites. Thus even two unrelated DNA sequences will be 25 percent identical, not 0 percent identical.¹⁵

In other words, the DNA of a human and any other creature that has DNA (e.g., a daffodil) will be at least 25% identical, even though they share no common ancestry.

Further, geneticists have highlighted the fact that previous human-chimp DNA comparisons have not accounted for unalignable regions of the compared genomes and also fail to account for human DNA contamination that is common in sequencing. Accounting for these issues, the human-chimp DNA similarity is roughly 84%, not 98-99%.¹⁶ Clearly, human-chimp DNA comparisons often are misleading.

That said, certain genetic similarities between humans and chimps should be completely expected given similarities between our body structures, physiologies, biochemistries, intended diets, and habitats. Humans and chimps are both mammals and have similar types of internal organs. We both eat fruits and vegetables, which means our mouths and digestive systems have some similar characteristics. We both have eyes, ears, noses, mouths, and fingers, and get sensory information from these body structures. Thus, there is little doubt that there will be many similarities between human and chimp DNA. However, such similarities are better explained as indicative of a common Designer, not common ancestor. Further, such DNA similarities do not consider the most important distinction between humans and chimps: the fact that humans, unlike chimps, have an immortal soul.¹⁷

Mitochondrial DNA and “Eve”—Erroneous Evidence

DNA in humans is stored in the nucleus and mitochondria of a cell. The DNA in a nucleus comes from both the father and the mother, but the DNA in mitochondria is usually passed down only from the mother.¹⁸ As the DNA is copied and passed on, genetic mutations happen.

The first female (Eve) would have had an original DNA sequence. Over time, however, the DNA that was copied and passed on would have gathered more and more mutations. By comparing the variations of mitochondrial DNA that we see in many different nationalities of people, scientists used an estimated mutation rate to make a “molecular clock” to try to trace our genetic lines back in history to a single common ancestor of all of the human nationalities—an ancestor that didn’t have any of those variations from mutations.

Beginning in the 1980s, evolutionary scientists argued that they had proven that all humans could trace their genetic ancestry back to a single woman in Africa that lived 180,000-200,000 years ago—a far cry from the Bible’s timeline, but matching the evolutionary timeframe regarding when homo sapiens evolved onto the scene.¹⁹ However, in order to estimate when “Eve” lived, evolutionists estimated a mutation rate—not using actual data—but using the assumed evolutionary timescale. Obviously, using the evolutionary time frame to prove the evolutionary time frame is circular reasoning.

If we instead use the actual, observed rate that human mitochondria mutate²⁰ and the actual, average number of mitochondrial mutations there are in humans, we can calculate a more likely estimate for when Eve lived. We find that it was less than 10,000 years ago, just like the Bible implies.²¹

The Problem Is Worse Than That

The idea of a human somehow emerging from a non-human is a tall order, in and of itself. After all, according to the Law of Biogenesis, in nature, life comes only from life of its kind. Non-humans don’t give rise to humans—a problem for evolution. But, once again, the problem for evolution is actually much larger than the evolution of a single human.

It’s not merely a single human that had to come into existence from a non-human giving birth to or transforming into a human. Neither is it the case that merely two human beings had to evolve onto the scene. Rather, at least one male and one distinctly different human being—the female, equipped with a significantly different anatomy—had to evolve simultaneously on the Earth in order for the human species to propagate itself. In other words, one male human could not have randomly come into existence one day, and a female two hundred years later. No, there had to be representatives of both genders on the Earth simultaneously, doubling the impossibility of the event. Notable is the fact that evolutionists argue for the necessity of an even larger initial pool of humans—compounding the problem even more.

Further, those male and female human bodies had to also contain the fully functional reproductive components that would be necessary to replicate humanity. And even further, those male and female human beings had to find each other on planet Earth—a sphere with a surface area of 196,900,000 square miles. They had to find each other in what is thought to have been a very hostile and primitive earthly environment as well—without first starving or being eaten by the ferocious animals that evolutionary images of early man portray.

They had to find each other while they were in the childbearing years, as well—not too old or young to reproduce before the other individual died. Assuming the two were able to find each other at the right time (and were willing and able to reproduce with each other), mother and child then had to survive the ordeal of childbirth in those allegedly primitive circumstances—a time and situation when, most certainly, miscarriage would be highly likely.

Running into any one of these significant barriers to success would have killed off humans before we got started. If the accidental emergence of a single human being from a non-human being seems untenable to you, surely the other requirements necessary to make the species continue reveals the evolutionary proposition to be beyond implausible. Simply put, human evolution would require a miracle.

Endnotes

¹ Cf. Jeff Miller (2022), “More Evidence that the ‘Junk’ DNA Argument is Junk,” Reason & Revelation, 42[2]:14-15, February, https://apologeticspress.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/2202-web.pdf. As discussed therein, note that even if there were examples of organs which do not have a function today, it is possible that the pre-Flood world was so different from the post-Flood world that some features of the human body or genome do not function in the way they were originally designed to function due to an environment change. In other words, some aspects of the human body may be corrupted remnants of original humans, not evolutionary ancestors. Also, some alleged vestigial organs are thought to have a diminished or changed, rather than non-existent, function. If they have a function at all, however, regardless of how important those functions may seem to scientists today, they are not evidence of poor design or pointless, evolutionary leftovers. The existence of organs that are apparently not as important/essential in function today compared to other organs does not prove that those organs were once more functional than they are now. They may have always had the same functionality they do today. For example, while a “pinkie” finger may not be as “useful” or essential as a heart (or index finger), that does not mean that the pinkie is unimportant or proof of diminished function. Does the fact that carpet in the floorboard of a car is not as useful/important as a car motor mean that floorboard carpet has a diminished function compared to an alleged evolutionary ancestor of that car model? Or, rather, is floorboard carpet evidence that engineers include non-essential components in their designs that are still useful for other purposes (e.g., aesthetics, comfort, convenience, etc.)?

² V. Lombardi (1982), “The Adaptive Value of Dental Crowding: A Consideration of the Biologic Basis of Malocclusion,” American Journal of Orthodontics, [81]:38-42 January; Cf. Jerry Bergman (2000), “Do Any Vestigial Organs Exist in Humans?,” Answers in Genesis, https://answersingenesis.org/human-body/vestigial-organs/do-any-vestigial-organs-exist-in-humans/; David Menton (2014), “Vestigial Organs—Evidence for Evolution?,” Answers in Genesis, https://answersingenesis.org/human-body/vestigial-organs/vestigial-organs-evidence-for-evolution/; “Wisdom Teeth” (2019), Healthline.com, Accessed 4/6/23, https://www.healthline.com/health/why-do-we-have-wisdom-teeth.

³ Bergman; “Tonsils” (2022), Cleveland Clinic, Accessed 4/6/23, https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/body/23459-tonsils.

⁴ Eric Lyons (2008), “Leftovers…Again!,” Apologetics Press, https://apologeticspress.org/leftovers-again-2500/; Menton; “Coccyx” (2018), Healthline.com, Accessed 4/6/23, https://www.healthline.com/human-body-maps/coccyx#1.

⁵ Warwick Glover (1988), “The Human Vermiform Appendix: A General Surgeon’s Reflections,” Journal of Creation, 3[1]:34-35; “Appendicitis” (n.d.), Johns Hopkins Medicine on-line, Accessed 4/6/23, https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/appendicitis.

⁶ Midwestern University (2017), “Appendix May Have Important Function, New Research Suggests,” ScienceDaily, January 9, https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170109162333.htm.

⁷ “The Parathyroid Glands” (n.d.), Johns Hopkins Medicine on-line, Accessed 4/6/23, https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions-and-diseases/the-parathyroid-glands.

⁸ Menton.

⁹ Ibid; Jerry Bergman (2001), “Is the Human Male Nipple Vestigial?,” Journal of Creation, 15[2]:38-41, August, http://creation.com/is-the-human-male-nipple-vestigial#txtRef4.

¹⁰ Jerry A. Coyne (2009), Why Evolution is True (New York: Viking), pp. 66-67.

¹¹ Jonathan Wells (2011), The Myth of Junk DNA (Seattle, WA: Discovery Institute in Seattle), Kindle file, Chapter 2.

¹² Cf. Miller, 2022.

¹³ Jeffrey P. Tomkins (2020), “Human Chromosome 2 Fusion Never Happened,” Acts & Facts, 49[5], https://www.icr.org/article/human-chromosome-2-fusion-never-happened.

¹⁴ Jonathan Marks (2002), What it Means to Be 98% Chimpanzee (Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press), pp. 25-27.

¹⁵ Jonathan Marks (2000), “98% Alike? (What Similarity to Apes Tells Us About Our Understanding of Genetics),” The Chronicle of Higher Education, May 12, p. B-7, emp. added.

¹⁶ Jeffrey P. Tomkins (2018), “Comparison of 18,000 De Novo Assembled Chimpanzee Contigs to the Human Genome Yields Average BLASTN Alignment Identities of 84%,” Answers Research Journal, 11:205-209, https://answersresearchjournal.org/comparison-chimp-contigs-human-genome/.

¹⁷ A truth to which both science and Scripture testify. Cf. Eric Lyons and AP Staff (2002), “In the ‘Image and Likeness of God,’” Reason & Revelation, 22[3]:17-23, https://apologeticspress.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/0203.pdf; Bert Thompson and Brad Harrub (2004), “The Origin of Consciousness [Part 1],” Reason & Revelation, 24[4]:25-39.

¹⁸ Although there are rare occasions where a father contributes Mitochondrial DNA as well [cf. Anna Asvolinski (2018), “Fathers Can Pass Mitochondrial DNA to Children,” The Scientist, https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/fathers-can-pass-mitochondrial-dna-to-children-65165; Brad Harrub and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), pp. 116-120], adding further uncertainty to evolutionary claims about Mitochondrial DNA.

19 Note that evolutionists argue the genus Homo evolved onto the scene two-to-three million years ago (i.e., Homo habilis). Homo sapiens, however, did not arrive until 180,000-200,000 years ago, according to the evolutionary timeline.

²⁰ And assume the rate has been constant. It may have been faster immediately after the Flood, however, which would decrease the timespan between when Eve lived and today, causing it to fit with Scripture even better.

²¹ Nathaniel T. Jeanson and Jeffrey P. Tomkins (2018), “Genetics Confirms the Recent, Supernatural Creation of Adam and Eve,” Answers in Genesis, https://answersingenesis.org/adam-and-eve/genetics-confirms-recent-supernatural-creation-adam-and-eve/.

The post Does the Evidence REALLY Support Human Evolution? (Part II) appeared first on Apologetics Press.

[EDITORS’ NOTE: This article is the first installment in a two-part series. Part II will follow next month.]

Macroevolution¹ is the belief that all extant species emerged from previous species, beginning with a simple, single-celled organism. Macroevolution is accepted as true by the bulk of mainstream scientists, even though, without a God, it does not even have the means to get started on its path from single-celled organisms to humans. No sufficient evidence exists to support the blind belief that life could come from non-life, much less life that is equipped with an operating program, genetic information, and the ability to reproduce itself. The evidences which are claimed to support biological evolution, without fail, end up being irrelevant, inadequate, or even erroneous upon deeper investigation. But what about these supposed evidences of human evolution?

We as humans tend to have a special interest in human evolution, since the subject directly pertains to us. This truth no doubt explains why much of the hype over new alleged evidences for evolution focuses on human evolution, in particular. Upon deeper examination, are the oft-used evidences in support of human evolution legitimate?

Does the Fossil Record Support Human Evolution?

The fossil record is proclaimed by many to be decisive proof of human evolution. However, while evolution would predict the existence of billions of transitional fossils connecting all species (including humans) to their evolutionary precursors,² that evidence is conspicuously absent in the fossil record. Each new fossil thought to be a potential candidate for a transitional form is, without exception, heavily debated amongst evolutionists themselves. Eventually, once other paleontologists have examined the fossil, and other fossils have been discovered that shed more light on previous fossils, the fossil is often agreed upon by evolutionists themselves not to be a transitional form towards humans. As in the case of alleged evidences for macroevolution in general, proclaimed fossil record evidences of human evolution are either inadequate, erroneous, or irrelevant in nature.

Inadequate Evidence

As we discuss elsewhere,³ the fossil evidence for Darwinian evolution in general, much less human evolution, simply is not available. If evolution happened, there should be fossil evidence of the transition of the original single-celled organism into its evolutionary descendants—i.e., there should be transitional fossils between the supposed common ancestors of all species on the planet. However, the late, well-known Harvard University evolutionary paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould admitted years ago that evolutionists “have no direct evidence for smooth transitions.” He acknowledged: “All paleontologists know that the fossil record contains precious little in the way of intermediate forms; transitions between major groups are characteristically abrupt.”⁴ Writing in Paleobiology he explained: “The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution.”⁵ “[T]he extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches: the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of the fossils.”⁶

Colin Patterson literally “wrote the textbook” on evolution. He was the paleontologist who served as the editor of the professional journal published by the British Museum of Natural History in London. In response to a letter asking why he did not include examples of transitional fossils in his book, he responded,

I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them…. Yet [Stephen Jay] Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils…. I will lay it on the line—there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument.⁷

Even after over a century of searching for homo fossils, one evolutionary scientist admitted several years ago, “The fossils that decorate our family tree are so scarce that there are still more scientists than specimens. The remarkable fact is that all the physical evidence we have for human evolution can still be placed, with room to spare, inside a single coffin.”⁸ According to evolutionists, themselves, the fossil evidence for human evolution is meager at best. Kate Wong, evolutionist and senior science writer for Scientific American, said, “The origin of our genus, Homo, is one of the biggest mysteries facing scholars of human evolution. Based on the meager evidence available, scientists have surmised that Homo arose in East Africa…”⁹ Paleontologists often rely on a few isolated fossil bones (or bone fragments), found here and there around the world, to construct their alleged tree of human evolutionary proof. Wong went on to say:

For decades paleoanthropologists have combed remote corners of Africa on hand and knee for fossils of Homo’s earliest representatives…. Their efforts have brought only modest gains—a jawbone here, and handful of teeth there. Most of the recovered fossils instead belong to either ancestral australopithecines or later members of Homo—creatures too advanced to illuminate the order in which our distinctive traits arose…. [W]ith so little to go on, the origin of our genus has remained as mysterious as ever.¹⁰

Mariette DiChristina, editor-in-chief of Scientific American, also admitted that “[p]ieces of our ancient forebears generally are hard to come by…. Scientists working to interpret our evolution often have had to make do with studying a fossil toe bone here or a jaw there.”¹¹ New Scientist described the available fossil evidence for humans as “part of a face here” or “a jawbone fragment there.”¹² Supposed human evolution fossils “generally amount to just a few fragments rather than complete skeletons.”¹³ Are fragments of toe bones, faces, and jawbones sufficient evidence to substantiate human evolution?

In their 2023 article in American Scientist, “The Inevitably Incomplete Story of Human Evolution,” Bernard Wood, a paleoanthropologist and professor at George Washington University, as well as adjunct senior scientist at the National Museum of Natural History, and paleoanthropologist Alexis Uluutku of George Washington University, acknowledged: “Reconstructing that braided rope [of human evolutionary lineage—JM] would be a scientific challenge in any case, but it is all the more difficult because of major gaps in the fossil record.”¹⁴ Warning all modern paleoanthropologists, they explain that, “the existing human fossil record is incomplete in almost all respects, with little chance that any narrative explanation offered today can be the right one.”¹⁵ Mentioning creationists as capitalizing on evolutionary paleoanthropologist blunders over the years, they explain, “Accounts based on incomplete data sets can sometimes, misleadingly sound definitive,” and yet,

It is accepted practice in paleoanthropology to present detailed reconstructions of human evolutionary history that rarely acknowledge the extent to which they are incomplete and bound to change. But this practice does a disservice to all concerned. It would be more helpful as well as more accurate, to acknowledge that the hominin fossil record is incomplete and that there are therefore limits to what can be said about it.¹⁶

“The bottom line,” they explain, “is that taxonomic proposals, phylogenetic reconstructions, and classifications are all hypotheses. They are all subject to testing and will inevitably be corroborated or revised as new evidence accumulates.”¹⁷ Sadly, although the typical fossil evidences for human evolution are based on very few samples and, therefore, are inconclusive, mainstream evolutionists proclaim their scant evidence as though it is authoritative. However, Wood and Uluutku warn: “The smaller the sample, the greater the opportunity for the observed value of a trait to be biased by random sampling and measurement error,” which disallows results from being “reproduced by others” and causes “mistrust between scientists and the public.”¹⁸

They further acknowledge: “Hypotheses involving extinct taxa inevitably rest on evidence from the bones and teeth that are preserved in the fossil record. Unfortunately, the hard tissues of some types of living monkeys and apes can look so similar that it is almost impossible to tell which bone or tooth comes from which species.”¹⁹ Which species does the fossil belong to: an extinct hominid or a living ape or monkey? Oftentimes, according to Wood and Uluutku, the selected interpretation is the result of “confirmation bias”—

the all-too-human tendency to see what we expect (or hope) to see, sometimes at the cost of seeing accurately. Rarely operating at a conscious level, confirmation bias involves focusing on and giving excessive weight to evidence that supports an already-favored conclusion while overlooking or devaluing evidence to the contrary. Probably the best known example of confirmation bias in this field centers on a fossil that eventually proved to be no more than a hoax, the notorious Piltdown Man…. One of the dangers of confirmation bias is that it can lead individuals, including researchers, to reach conclusions prematurely, stopping the search for objective evidence because they perceive the case for an outcome…to be stronger than it actually is. The result can be to prop up incorrect hypotheses or to promote overconfidence in a hypothesis…²⁰

The evidence for human evolution is inadequate at best. Does that truth dissuade many evolutionists from accepting evolution? Since their acceptance of evolution is already based on blind, evidence-less faith in many other areas,²¹ why would it? Evolutionary paleoanthropologist Lee Berger, from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, has become famous over the past decade for discovering hominid fossils (e.g., Australopithecus sediba and Homo naledi). He admitted that there is a lack of human evolutionary evidence in the fossil record. However, his blind faith in evolution isn’t shaken by the fossil record’s failure to provide necessary evidence. He baselessly stated: “[W]e really need a better record—and it’s out there.”²²

Erroneous Evidence

Notably, to his credit, Berger subtly chided other paleontologists for their standard practice of assigning fossil fragments to a particular genus, since isolated bones are not enough evidence to know where a species belongs. He explained that his fossil discoveries show “that one can no longer assign isolated bones to a genus.”²³ He said that “you can’t take a mandible [lower jaw], a maxilla [upper jaw] or a collection of teeth and try to predict what the rest of the body looks like.”²⁴ If a paleontologist does so, he is likely to make a mistake. Bernard Wood, again, agreed that Berger is “absolutely right.”²⁵ One should not expect the paleoanthropology community to stop such unwise practices, since the human evolutionary “tree” would have to be essentially cut down and used as firewood, considering that the bulk of the evidence for human evolution is comprised of such isolated bones.

One would suspect that, if Berger and Wood are right, evolutionists might be prone to misidentification of fossils at first glance. Enter the parade of human evolution blunders and hoaxes that have been championed over the past two centuries. Here are but a few:²⁶

• Java Man—a supposed human ancestor later found to have been erroneously based on the skull cap of a gibbon and fossilized teeth and thigh bone of a modern human
• Piltdown Man—mentioned earlier, was originally thought to be a human evolutionary ancestor, but later found to be a forgery using a modified orangutan jawbone and a portion of a modern human skull
• Nebraska Man—an alleged human ancestor based on a single tooth, later found to be from a wild pig
• Flipper Man—another alleged human evolutionary ancestor based on what was later acknowledged to be a fossilized rib of a dolphin
• Orce Man—an alleged ancestor based on a skull cap, later found to be from a donkey
• Java Man 2—A few years after the Java Man find, but before the mistake had been discovered, in 1926, Professor Heberlein of the Dutch Medical Service, found what appeared to be a complete Java Man cranium in the same area that Java Man had been discovered. Again, the fossil was hailed as more evidence of this transitional creature—until Time magazine ran a retraction in 1927. In the retraction, the Smithsonian Institute said that the cranium was actually the kneecap of an elephant.²⁷
• Southwestern Colorado Man—In the same Java Man 2 retraction, Dr. Ales Hrdlicka of the Smithsonian Institution noted that, “The ‘Southwestern Colorado Man,’ lately deduced from a set of Eocene teeth, was a myth, the teeth having proved to be those of an antique horse.”²⁸
• Calaveras Man—In July of 1866, Josiah Whitney, the head of California’s geological survey, unveiled his discovery of a skull that had been found in Calaveras County, presenting a paper to the California Academy of Natural Sciences. It was discovered in a mineshaft beneath volcanic deposits believed to be a million years old—making it, at the time, the oldest known human ancestor on the continent. Eventually, once again, it was determined to be a hoax—planted by local miners in the mine. Carbon dating revealed that the skull was approximately 1,000 years old.²⁹
• Neanderthal Man—Neanderthals are often depicted as having sub-human intelligence: cave men grunting and hitting things with clubs. However, in the words of evolutionary anthropologist of Washington University in St. Louis (one of the world’s foremost authorities on the Neanderthals), “Detailed comparisons of Neanderthal skeletal remains with those of modern humans have shown that there is nothing in Neanderthal anatomy that conclusively indicates locomotor, manipulative, intellectual or linguistic abilities inferior to those of modern humans.”³⁰ Further, genetic evidence suggests that modern humans (i.e., Homo sapiens), Neanderthals, and Denisovans all had children together in the past, proving that they are all human (i.e., part of the “human kind”).³¹ Concerning the results of sequencing the Neanderthal Genome, Ed Green (Assistant Professor of Biomolecular Engineering at UC Santa Cruz) explained: “Two chimpanzees are roughly as different in DNA sequence as a human and a Neanderthal.”³² In other words, a human and Neanderthal are both just as much human as two chimpanzees are chimpanzee.
• Hobbit Man—In 2004, paleontologists discovered bones from seven individuals on the island of Flores. By giving “Hobbit Man” (Homo floresiensis) a name that distinguishes him from a normal man, evolutionists leave the impression with the public that another ancient “sub-human” has been discovered. More recent evidence, however, has revealed that Homo floresiensis is likely merely another human, possibly even merely a human suffering from Down Syndrome.³³
• Cro-Magnon Man—Once again, by giving 1868 Cro-Magnon fossils a special name, evolutionists leave the impression that primitive, “sub-human” missing links have been found, substantiating evolution. Further analysis of Cro-Magnon fossils, however, has revealed that Cro-Magnon Man is both anatomically and even genetically like modern man.³⁴ If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, looks like a duck…and, in this case, bleeds like a duck, it’s a duck.

Are creationists making these instances up? Hardly. In the words of famous skeptic Michael Shermer, executive director of the Skeptics Society and prior monthly contributor to Scientific American, “Hoaxes like Piltdown Man and honest mistakes like Nebraska Man, Calaveras Man, and Hesperopithecus are in time exposed. In fact, it was not creationists who exposed these errors, it was scientists who did so.”³⁵ While we disagree with his implication that creationists are not scientists, we very much agree that it is generally evolutionists themselves, to their credit, who uncover their own fossil blunders and hoaxes. Since they are unwilling to change their practices, expect more such mistakes as the years roll by.

Irrelevant Evidence

What about the many supposed “species” found on human evolutionary trees in textbooks and museums that are not (yet) acknowledged to be hoaxes and mistakes? Are they proof of evolution?

Human evolutionary ancestry trees generally include the hominins, species whose Latin names begin with “homo” or “australopithecus” (i.e., the “australopithecines”). Many evolutionists believe that the australopithecines are the transitional species in the ancestry of humans, connecting us back to the common ancestor we supposedly shared with modern apes. As you study these charts, you will likely see in the human “family tree,” for example:

• Homo erectus
• Homo neanderthalensis
• Homo habilis
• Homo naledi
• Homo floresiensis
• Homo heidelbergensis
• Homo rudolfensis
• Homo sapiens
• Homo ergaster
• Australopithecus africanus
• Australopithecus afarensis
• Australopithecus (or Paranthropus) robustus
• Australopithecus (or Paranthropus) boisei
• Australopithecus anamensis
• Australopithecus sediba

Upon closer examination of these species and others, creationists have determined from statistical analysis that virtually all of the Homo species³⁶ are likely varieties of humans that have walked the Earth in the past.³⁷ While they are related to one another, the Homo varieties provide no evidence of having evolved from non-humans (e.g., the australopithecines). Notable is the fact that the creationist classification system (called baraminology) is more likely to detect true relationship, since it is designed to detect both similarities and distinctions between creatures. Evolutionary classification (e.g., cladistics), on the other hand, assumes all life to be related through common descent and, therefore, only detects similarities between species, even if the species have separate lineages in reality.

When God created “kinds” of life during Creation week (not to be confused with the modern term “species”—a biblical “kind” is thought to roughly correlate to the modern taxonomic category of “family” or “genus”), He created their genomes with enough potential variability to bring about immense diversity within each kind over time. For example, modern foxes, wolves, jackals, coyotes, dingoes, and all varieties of domestic dogs are thought to be descended from the originally created single “dog kind” that was created on Day 6 of Creation week. That “kind” would have been represented by two individuals on the Ark during the Flood. Similarly, the bulk of the many Homo varieties group together statistically in similarity and are thought to have descended from Noah and his family after the Flood.

The australopithecines, on the other hand, are found by Creation studies to group together, but separately from the Homo varieties—apparently their own created kind, with no ancestral relationship to humans.³⁸ This prediction and subsequent verification by creationists is being acknowledged by more and more of the evolutionary community as well. Years ago, many in the evolutionary community began to reject all australopithecines as being ancestral to man at all: they are their own, separate group. Lord Solly Zuckerman, the famous British anatomist who studied australopithecines for over 15 years, concluded that if man did descend from an ape-like ancestor, he did so “without leaving any fossil traces of the steps of the transformation.”³⁹ The late evolutionist, Ashley Montagu, said, “[T]he skull form of all australopithecines shows too many specialized and ape-like characters to be either the direct ancestor of man or of the line that led to man.”⁴⁰ Based largely on the nature of Orrorin tugenensis teeth, Martin Pickford, evolutionary geologist from the College de France in Paris, and Brigitte Senut, French evolutionary paleontologist of France’s National Museum of Natural History, believe that all australopithecines should be placed in a side branch of the “evolutionary tree” leading to Orrorin tugenensis and dying out 1.5 million years ago, rather than in the evolutionary line leading to Homo sapiens.⁴¹

Today, this acknowledgement has become accepted to the point that the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. now depicts the australopithecines as being their own, separate branch from Homo in their depiction of the human evolutionary tree.⁴² Dembo, et al. demonstrated using statistical analysis of cranial features that the australopithecines group separately from members of Homo, rather than being their ancestors.⁴³ Anthropologist Paul Szpak of McMaster University noted: “Determining which species of australopithecine (if any) is ancestral to the genus Homo is a question that is a top priority for many paleoanthropologists, but one that will likely elude any conclusive answers for years to come. Nearly every possible species has been suggested as a likely candidate, but none are overwhelmingly convincing.”⁴⁴ Simply put, many evolutionists acknowledge that the evidence simply does not support the contention that humans descended from the australopithecines. So, the gap of evidence linking humans to an alleged ape-like ancestor is now more like a chasm. To believe in evolution requires, once again, a blind faith.

Bottom line: fossils which have long been used by evolutionists to provide evidence of the macroevolution of humans, bridging the gap between humans and the supposed human-ape common ancestor, are actually mere evidences of microevolution in the case of the Homo varieties (i.e., diversification within a single kind), and not evidence of human evolutionary ancestry at all in the case of the australopithecines. Ultimately, therefore, they are irrelevant evidences in determining the validity of human evolution.

[to be continued]

Endnotes

¹ Or the General Theory of Evolution/Darwinian Evolution.

² Jeff Miller (2019), “Does the Fossil Record Support Creation and the Flood?” Reason & Revelation, 39[7]:74-80, https://apologeticspress.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/1907w.pdf.

³ Cf. Ibid.

⁴ Stephen Jay Gould (1977), “Evolution’s Erratic Pace,” Natural History, 86[6]:24, emp. added.

⁵ Stephen Jay Gould (1980), “Is a New and General Theory of Evolution Emerging?,” Paleobiology, 6[1]:119-130, Winter, p. 127, emp. added.

⁶ Gould (1977), p. 13, emp. added.

⁷ Colin Patterson (1979), Letter of April 10, 1979 to Luther Sunderland: reprinted in Bible-Science Newsletter, 19[8]:8, August, 1981, emp. added.

⁸ Lyall Watson (1982), “The Water People,” Science Digest, 90[5]:44, May, emp. added.

⁹ Kate Wong (2012), “First of Our Kind,” Scientific American, 306[4]:30-39, April, p. 31, emp. added.

¹⁰ Ibid., p. 32, emp. added.

¹¹ Mariette DiChristina (2012), “The Story Begins,” Scientific American, 306[4]:4, April, emp. added.

¹² Colin Barras (2015), “New Species of Extinct Human Found in Cave May Rewrite History,” NewScientist.com, September 10, https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22730383-700-new-species-extinct-human-found-in-cave-may-rewrite-history/.

¹³ Ibid., emp. added.

¹⁴ Bernard Wood and Alexis Uluutku (2023), “The Inevitably Incomplete Story of Human Evolution,” American Scientist, 111[2]:108, March-April, emp. added.

¹⁵ Ibid., 111[2]:106, emp. added.

¹⁶ Ibid., 111[2]:113, emp. added.

¹⁷ Ibid., 111[2]:112, emp. added.

¹⁸ Ibid., 111[2]:113, emp. added.

¹⁹ Ibid., 111[2]:109, emp. added.

²⁰ Ibid., 111[2]:111, emp. added.

²¹ Jeff Miller (2017), “Evolutionists Have a Blind Faith,” Reason & Revelation, 37[11]:131, https://apologeticspress.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/1711w.pdf.

²² As quoted in Wong, p. 39, emp. added.

²³ Ibid., p. 34.

²⁴ As quoted in Barras.

²⁵ Wong, p. 36.

²⁶ Bert Thompson and Brad Harrub (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), pp. 88-91; I. Anderson (1983), “Humanoid Collarbone Exposed as Dolphin’s Rib,” New Scientist, April 28, p. 199; Miquel Carandell Baruzzi (2020), The Orce Man (Leiden, Netherlands: Koninklijke Brill NV).

²⁷ “Science: A.A.A.S.” (1927), Time, January 10, https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,881620-2,00.html.

²⁸ Ibid.

²⁹ “The Notorious Calaveras Skull” (2009),  Archaeology on-line, https://archive.archaeology.org/online/features/hoaxes/calaveras.html.

³⁰ Erik Trinkaus (1978), “Hard Times Among the Neanderthals,” Natural History, 87[10]:58-63, December, p. 58.

³¹ Cf. Kate Wong (2010), “Neandertal Genome Study Reveals that We Have a Little Caveman in Us,” Scientific American, 6 May, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/neandertal-genome-study-r/; V. Slon, et al. (2018), “The Genome of the Offspring of a Neanderthal Mother and a Denisovan Father,” Nature, 561:113-116, 22 August, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0455-x.

³² “Neanderthals: Expert Q&A” (2012), NOVA ScienceNOW, October 4, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/evolution/green-neanderthals.html.

³³ Jeff Miller (2015), “Hobbit Man: Another Blunder…And An Insult,” Reason & Revelation, 35[4]:46-47, April, https://apologeticspress.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/1504_ws.pdf; note that Creation scientists are still in disagreement about the placement of Homo floresiensis.

³⁴ Jeff Miller (2011), “Cro-Magnon Man: Nothing but a ‘Modern’ Man,” Apologetics Press, https://apologeticspress.org/cro-magnon-man-nothing-but-a-modern-man-3501/.

³⁵ Michael Shermer (2007), Why Darwin Matters: The Case Against Intelligent Design (New York: Henry Holt), Kindle edition, p. 85.

³⁶ There is debate over whether or not Homo habilis actually exists as a distinct species.

³⁷ T.C. Wood (2016), “An Evaluation of Homo naledi and ‘Early’ Homo from a Young-Age Creationist Perspective,” Journal of Creation Theology and Science Series B: Life Sciences, 6:14-30; note that the Australopithecus sediba, Homo naledi, and Homo floresiensis discoveries are still too recent to know with certainty where they belong.

³⁸ Ibid.

³⁹ Solly Zuckerman (1970), Beyond the Ivory Tower (New York: Taplinger), p. 64.

⁴⁰ Ashley Montagu (1957), Man: His First Two Million Years (Yonkers, NY: World Publishers), emp. added.

⁴¹ Cf. Brigitte Senut, Martin Pickford, Dominique Gommery, Pierre Mein, Kiptalam Cheboi, Yves Coppens (2001), “First Hominid From the Miocene,” Comptes Rendus de l’Academie des Science, Series IIA-Earth and Planetary Science, 332[2]:137-144, January 30; cf. Michael Balter (2001), “Early Hominid Sows Division,” ScienceNOW, February 22, http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2001/02/22-03.html, and Angela M.H. Schuster (2001), “Special Report: Ancient Ancestors?,” Archaeology, 54[4]:24-25, July/August.

⁴² “Human Family Tree” (2020), What Does It Mean to Be Human?, Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History on-line, https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/human-family-tree. The American Museum of Natural History in New York does as well [cf. “Anne and Bernard Spitzer Hall of Human Origins Educator’s Guide” (2007), American Museum of Natural History, https://www.amnh.org/content/download/58856/954173/version/5/file/human_origins_educators_guide.pdf, p. 5].

⁴³ Mana Dembo, et al. (2016), “The Evolutionary Relationships and Age of Homo naledi: An Assessment Using Dated Bayesian Phylogenic Methods,” Journal of Human Evolution, 97:22. Again, Australopithecus sediba is the exception. The authors found that it may or may not group with Homo—insufficient evidence is currently available. Note also that the authors considered only cranial characters in their analysis.

⁴⁴ Paul Szpak (2007), “Evolution of the Australopithecines,” Tree of Life Web Project, http://tolweb.org/treehouses/?treehouse_id=4438#AboutThisPage, emp. added: Specifically concerning the famous Australopithecus africanus, the Australian Museum admits that it “was once considered to be a direct ancestor of modern humans but new finds have challenged this position. Many scientists now believe this species represents a side branch in our evolutionary family tree but there is disagreement about its exact relationship to other species” [Fran Dorey (2018), “Australopithecus africanus,” Australian Museum on-line, 11 November, https://australian.museum/learn/science/human-evolution/australopithecus-africanus/]. Concerning the robust australopithecine species (robustus and boisei), the Encyclopedia Britannica explains that Robert Broom was the first to discover their existence: “Broom’s choice of the name Paranthropus (meaning ‘to the side of humans’) reflects his view that this genus was not directly ancestral to later hominins, and it has long been viewed as a distant side branch on the human evolutionary tree” [Donald C. Johanson and Henry McHenry (2018), “Australopithecus: Fossil Hominin Genus,” Encyclopedia Britannica on-line, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Australopithecus].

The post Does the Evidence REALLY Support Human Evolution? (Part I) appeared first on Apologetics Press.

A prominent argument used in favor of Darwinian evolution and against biblical Creation, with its account of the global Deluge of Noah’s day, centers on the nature of the fossil record recorded in the layers of rock beneath and around us. Does the fossil record indeed conflict with biblical Creation?

In order for a scientific theory to be validated, it should be able to make predictions about what research would discover if the theory is true. If gradual Darwinian evolution accounts for the origin of all current species from previous, less complex species, starting with an original, simple common ancestor that was a single-celled organism, one would make certain predictions that would be verified upon examining the fossil record. For example, the fossil record should show single-celled organisms at the base of the fossil record, followed by fossils of other simple organisms. Billions of fossils of intermediary organisms would be predicted to exist that connect the single-celled organism to the next species. Every species thereafter would follow suit in its representation in the fossil record, with its own billions of transitional fossils linking it to a previous species. Further, since Darwinian evolution would predict “survival of the fittest,” with a constant upward trend in the evolution of species, extinction of any species thought to be millions of years old would be inevitable. As a new, more fit species evolved onto the scene, it would survive, pushing out its previous, less fit form.

On the other hand, if biblical Creation and the Flood are true, completely different predictions would be made concerning the fossil record. Since God initially created representatives of all kinds, rather than their evolving from previous forms, since fossil forming phenomena are rare, and since the Earth is young, the bulk of the fossil record would be, not a record of past life and evolution on a billions of years old Earth, but a record of death as the year-long Flood progressed. Few fossils would be found below the Flood layers, with many of those having likely been destroyed when the Flood began. The Flood layers, on the other hand, would be the equivalent of a worldwide graveyard—a record of the destruction of “all living things which were on the face of the ground” (Genesis 7:23).

Creationists would predict that when the Flood began, mass destruction of life occurred worldwide, and therefore the fossil record would begin with an explosion of fossil forms that were fully formed and functional, with no evidence of having evolved from previous forms. The bulk of these fossils would be in sedimentary rock, since the Flood was an aqueous event. Both simple and complex creatures would be mixed throughout the fossil record, while larger, faster, and/or “smarter” creatures would sometimes be found higher in the record, since they could more easily escape fossil forming phenomena and survive longer. If much of the Flood waters came from the oceans, as the text and scientific evidence seem to imply,¹ the fossils at the base of the fossil record would be of creatures found on the ocean floor, followed by marine creatures. As the Flood waters continued to rise and the cataclysm hit the coasts, shallow water organisms and coastline creatures would be killed and buried, followed by creatures further and further inland. Marine fossils would be interspersed throughout the fossil record, since the ocean waters moving onto the land would have carried swimming creatures with them. After the Flood ended, since fossil forming phenomena are rare, those creatures that were unable to rebound after the Flood (or which were hunted, etc.) would gradually go extinct, often with no record of having even survived the Flood. While the fossils of the year-long Flood would show no evidence of change throughout the year, the layers after the Flood would be predicted to show evidence of the diversifying of creatures after they left the Ark to repopulate the Earth.

Which model’s predictions best fit the physical evidence gleaned from paleontology? Paleontologists have long acknowledged three general characteristics of the fossil record in its totality: (1) abrupt appearance; (2) stasis; and (3) extinction.² Each of these characteristics fit the Creation/Flood paradigm well, but create an “uncomfortable paradox” for the Darwinian gradual evolution paradigm.³

Characteristic #1: Abrupt Appearance

This general characteristic refers to the fact that when fossils first appear in the fossil record, they appear fully formed without any evolutionary history. The Cambrian Explosion, for example, refers to the many fully formed creatures that abruptly appear at the base of the fossil record with no ancestors. Reporting on research at the University of Texas at Austin, UT News reported: “This rapid diversification, known as the Cambrian explosion, puzzled Charles Darwin and remains one of the biggest questions in animal evolution to this day. Very few fossils exist of organisms that could be the Precambrian ancestors of bilateral animals, and even those are highly controversial.”⁴ Osorio, et al., writing in American Scientist, acknowledged,

As Darwin noted in the Origin of Species, the abrupt emergence of arthropods in the fossil record during the Cambrian presents a problem for evolutionary biology. There are no obvious simpler or intermediate forms—either living or in the fossil record—that show convincingly how modern arthropods evolved from worm-like ancestors. Consequently there has been a wealth of speculation and contention.⁵

The late, well known evolutionary paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould admitted: “The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life.”⁶ Famous evolutionary biologist of Oxford University, Richard Dawkins, described the Cambrian Explosion this way:

The Cambrian strata of rocks, vintage about 600 million years [secular geologists are now dating the beginning of the Cambrian at about 540 million years—JM], are the oldest in which we find most of the major invertebrate groups. And we find many of them already in an advanced state of evolution, the very first time they appear. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history.⁷

Long ago, the late, famous paleontologist of Columbia University, the American Museum of Natural History, and the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard, George Gaylord Simpson, admitted: “Most new species, genera, and families, and nearly all categories above the level of families, appear in the records suddenly, and are not led up to by known, gradual, completely transitional sequences.”⁸ The Cambrian Explosion is an acknowledged problem for evolutionary theory—a falsified prediction—and yet the abrupt appearance of fully formed and functional species is an obvious, pervasive trait of the entire fossil record, from beginning to end.

The abrupt appearance of living organisms, however, is not the extent of the problem for evolution. Not only are the species of the fossil record fully formed and functional from the beginning of the record, but they are also complex when they abruptly appear. The trilobite, for example, is characteristic of the Cambrian strata at the base of the fossil record—a creature equipped with an extremely complex vision system, using aplanatic lenses that are more complex than the human eye, which is equipped with a single refractive lens.⁹ The fossil record provides no evidence for the evolution of the trilobite, and yet its complexity is stunning. Complexity at the commencement of the fossil record is a falsification of a fundamental evolutionary prediction, but coincides perfectly with Creation and Flood predictions.

Evolution would also predict that diversity would precede disparity in the fossil record. In other words, varieties of a single body type (diversity) would be found in the fossil record at its base, and over time (moving up through the record), other body types would eventually emerge (disparity). One calls to mind the well-known sketches of the evolutionary tree of life, with a single-celled organism at its base gradually giving rise to the many branches and twigs that characterize all life. The biblical Creation model predicts the opposite: God initially created distinct kinds (disparity) from which came variety and diversity within those kinds. Instead of the evolutionary tree of life, one calls to mind an orchard of trees representing distinct kinds with their branches and twigs representing mere diversification and variety within those kinds. The fossil record, once again, supports the creationist contention. Biologists have pinpointed a few dozen distinct phyla—the level of organization used to group organisms based on their basic body plans. Of the 27 phyla represented in the fossil record, roughly 20 appear immediately in the Cambrian explosion (disparity) with no evidence of having evolved.¹⁰ Variety within those phyla—species diversity—does not show up until higher in the fossil record, just as biblical Creation would predict: disparity before diversity.

Abrupt appearance of fully formed and functional, complex organisms with immense disparity is a sweeping characteristic of the fossil record. That truth is severely problematic for evolution, but it is precisely what would be predicted if biblical Creation and the Flood occurred.

Characteristic #2: Stasis

Stasis in the fossil record refers to the observation that after creatures appear in the fossil record, they remain virtually the same throughout their tenure in the rock layers.¹¹ While Darwinian evolution would predict a gradual change of species over millions of years, the fossil record does not reflect that prediction: transitional fossils linking one species to a distinctly different species do not exist.

Gould admitted that evolutionists “have no direct evidence for smooth transitions.” He acknowledged: “All paleontologists know that the fossil record contains precious little in the way of intermediate forms; transitions between major groups are characteristically abrupt.”¹² Writing in Paleobiology he explained: “The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution.”¹³ “[T]he extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches: the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of the fossils.”¹⁴

Evolutionary paleontologist Steven Stanley explained: “The known fossil record fails to document a single example of phyletic evolution [i.e., evolution of a new phylum—JM] accomplishing a major morphological transition and hence offers no evidence that the gradualistic model can be valid.”¹⁵ Evolutionary anthropologist and emeritus professor of the University of Oxford Robert Barnes acknowledged that “the fossil record tells us almost nothing about the evolutionary origin of phyla and classes. Intermediate forms are non-existent, undiscovered, or not recognized.”¹⁶ Evolutionary biologists James Valentine and Douglas Erwin wrote: “If ever we were to expect to find ancestors to or intermediates between higher taxa, it would be in the rocks of the late Precambrian to Ordovician times, when the bulk of the world’s higher animal taxa evolved. Yet transitional alliances are unknown or unconfirmed for any of the phyla or classes appearing then.”¹⁷

So clear is the lack of evidence of evolutionary transition in the fossil record that evolutionary zoologist of Oxford University Mark Ridley went so far as to say, “[N]o real evolutionist, whether gradualistic or punctuationist, uses the fossil record as evidence in favor of the theory of evolution as opposed to special creation.”¹⁸ Why? Because the fossil record does not support evolution; it supports Creation. Even Charles Darwin saw the problem in the 1800s that persists today:

[T]he number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, [must] be truly enormous. Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be argued against this theory [i.e., evolution—JM].¹⁹

Colin Patterson literally “wrote the textbook” on evolution. He was the paleontologist who served as the editor of the professional journal published by the British Museum of Natural History in London. In response to a letter asking why he did not include examples of transitional fossils in his book, he responded,

I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them…. Yet [Stephen Jay] Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils…. I will lay it on the line—there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument.²⁰

Notable is the fact that when paleontologists uncover a fossil that they hope will pass as a legitimate transitional form, not only is it still controversial, but the championed fossil is inevitably from a vertebrate organism. Vertebrate fossils, however, comprise roughly only 0.0125% of the fossil record—they are virtually irrelevant indicators of whether or not evolution occurred.²¹ Since well over 99.9% of the fossil record is made up of invertebrate fossils, one would think that if evolution happened, transitional fossils would be easy to find among the invertebrates, especially since their remains tend to preserve more easily. Rarely, if ever, however, do evolutionists even claim to find alleged invertebrate transitional forms. If species evolve in the manner described by mainstream evolutionists, (1) transitional forms should not be difficult to find, and (2) they would be invertebrates most of the time. Neither of those predictions hold true.

Further verification that stasis—a lack of significant evolutionary change—reflects the fossil record pertains to what Darwin termed “living fossils.” Countless times over many years evolutionists have discovered fossils in strata laid down millions of years ago (according to the evolutionary timeline) that were thought to be extinct, presumably from having evolved into something else. According to evolution, species are the result of “descent with modification” from other species, so it would be virtually inconceivable that a species would remain essentially the same after millions of years. After all, according to evolution, evolution happens! “Living fossils,” however, have been discovered many times over the years. “Living fossils” (a self-contradictory notion at best) are species thought to have lived millions of years ago, that have been discovered alive in modern times, virtually the same as their fossil counterpart. Consider the following sample of living fossils with the number of alleged evolutionary years since their alleged extinctions²²:

• Coelacanths (300-400 million years)
• Graptolites (300 million years)
• Tuatara (over 65 million years)
• Metasequoia tree (over 20 million years)
• Heliopora coral (over 65 million years)
• Crocodiles (over 150 million years)
• Various teleost fishes (over 100 million years)
• Sturgeons (over 65 million years)
• Bowfin fish (70 million years)
• Gar fish (100 million years)
• Pleurotomaria gastropod (500 million years)
• Neotrigonia mollusk (100 million years)
• Chambered Nautilus (500 million years)
• Neopilina mollusk (280 million years)
• Lingula brachiopod (450 million years)
• Wollemi pine trees (over 65 million years)
• Horseshoe crabs (over 400 million years)
• Monoplacophorans mollusks (over 500 million years)

Once again, the predictions of the evolutionary paradigm fall woefully short. Stasis is a verified prediction of the Creation model—not the evolutionary paradigm. A lack of transitional fossils, especially among the invertebrates, along with the prevalence of “living fossils,” supports Creation—not evolution.

Characteristic #3: Extinction

Five “mass extinction” events are said to have occurred in history, according to the evolutionary paradigm.²³

• In the Ordovician extinction (445 million years ago), 60-70 percent of the Earth’s species went extinct.
• In the Devonian extinction (360-375 million years ago), up to 75 percent of the Earth’s species disappeared from the Earth.
• In the Permian extinction (252 million years ago), 95 percent of the Earth’s species went extinct.
• In the Triassic extinction (200 million years ago), 70-80 percent of the Earth’s species disappeared.
• In the Cretaceous extinction (65-66 million years ago), 75 percent of the Earth’s species went extinct.

According to evolutionists, the causes of these alleged worldwide extinction events are still unknown.

Creationists interpret the same data differently. First, the dates of the extinction events are incorrect, since they rely on radiometric dating.²⁴ All dates in millions of years can be telescoped to the biblical timeframe upon realization that, for example, the nuclear decay rates were apparently accelerated during the Flood. The Flood likely corresponds roughly to the Cambrian through Cretaceous periods (i.e., 540 million years ago to 66 million years ago, using the evolutionary timescale). Each of the extinction events, therefore, fall within the year-long Flood that occurred a few thousand years ago. The geologic column and fossil record provide an account of the Flood’s progression.²⁵ Hence, each of the major extinction events noted by evolutionists merely report the destruction of another of Earth’s major habitats/ecosystems as the waters of the Flood continued to rise.

Regardless of one’s explanation of the evidence, extinction—not evolution—is a major trait of the fossil record. The biblical global Flood provides a powerful explanation for why worldwide death and extinction occurred in the fossil record and, at the same time, why fossils are typically found in sedimentary rock (which is typically formed from aqueous events).

Conclusion

The fossil record is a compilation of creatures that abruptly appear, fully formed, in the rock layers of the Earth with no evolutionary history. They remain virtually the same throughout the record, and then oftentimes disappear from the surface of the Earth. Do these pervasive, endemic traits of the fossil record support the biblical accounts of Creation and the Flood, or is the naturalistic paradigm the better explanation for the origin of the fossils? Clearly, the Theory of Evolution does not fit the physical evidence. Many of its most fundamental predictions are consistently falsified through observation of the evidence left for us in the fossil record. Evolution, therefore, has been effectively falsified. Upon assessing the evidence, it seems that one must be determined to ignore it, blindly holding to naturalism, to accept evolution. Biblical Creation and the Flood fit the evidence. They happened, whether or not we appreciate their implications regarding how we should live in order to please God and receive His eternal blessings (2 Peter 3:3-11).

Endnotes

The post Does the Fossil Record Support Creation and the Flood? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Consider Darwinian Evolution, the currently popular theory for how all life came to be, from goo to you. If life on Earth today is the result of countless tiny changes over 3.8 billion years, a clear chain of fossils extending back to that original single-celled organism should be present in the fossil record. There should be billions of fossils documenting the transitions between billions of creatures throughout the record. Yet this prediction has not been verified in the fossil record, effectively falsifying Darwinian Evolution. Decades ago, the late, famous evolutionary paleontologist of Harvard, Stephen J. Gould, acknowledged this problem. He said, “The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution” (1980, p. 127). “All paleontologists know that the fossil record contains precious little in the way of intermediate forms; transitions between major groups are characteristically abrupt” (1977, p. 24). “[T]he extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches: the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of the fossils” (1977, p. 13). His study of the fossil record led to his rejection of gradualistic evolution altogether.

David B. Kitts, the late evolutionary geologist, paleontologist, and professor of geology and the history of science at Oklahoma University, said, “Despite the bright promise that paleontology provides a means of ‘seeing’ evolution, it has presented some nasty difficulties for evolutionists, the most notorious of which is the presence of ‘gaps’ in the fossil record. Evolution requires intermediate forms between species, and paleontology does not provide them” (1974, p. 466, emp. added). Concerning the evolution of humans, Richard Lewontin, research professor at the Museum of Comparitive Zoology at Harvard, admitted, “The main problem is the poor fossil record. Despite a handful of hominid fossils stretching back 4m [million—JM] years or so, we can’t be sure that any of them are on the main ancestral line to us. Many of them could have been evolutionary side branches” (2008, emp. added). Evolutionist and senior science writer for Scientific American, Kate Wong, admitted, “The origin of our genus, Homo, is…[b]ased on…meager evidence…. [W]ith so little to go on, the origin of our genus has remained as mysterious as ever” (2012, pp. 31-32). Editor-in-chief of Scientific American, Mariette DiChristina, said, “Pieces of our ancient forebears generally are hard to come by, however. Scientists working to interpret our evolution often have had to make do with studying a fossil toe bone here or a jaw there” (2012, 306[4]:4). Colin Patterson literally “wrote the textbook” on evolution. He was the paleontologist who served as the editor of the professional journal published by the British Museum of Natural History in London. In response to a letter asking why he did not include examples of transitional fossils in his book, he responded, “I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them…. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils…. I will lay it on the line—there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument” (1979, emp. added). Evolutionary zoologist of Oxford University, Mark Ridley, went so far as to say, “[N]o real evolutionist, whether gradualistic or punctuationist, uses the fossil record as evidence in favor of the theory of evolution as opposed to special creation” (1981, 90:832).

One glaring area of the fossil record that effectively falsifies the predictions of Darwinian Evolution is, interestingly enough, deep in the Earth where the fossil record in essence begins. Very little is found in the Pre-Cambrian strata with regard to fossils—namely stromatolites—but beginning at the Cambrian strata, an explosion of fossils can be found. These fossils appear with absolutely no evolutionary history preserved in the fossil record. Here’s how a middle school science textbook describes the event: “During the Cambrian Period life took a big leap forward. At the beginning of the Paleozoic Era, a great number of different kinds of organisms evolved. Paleontologists call this event the Cambrian Explosion because so many new life forms appeared within a relatively short time”(Jenner, et al., 2006, p. 335, first emp. in orig.). So the Cambrian Explosion was a “big leap forward,” with “many new life forms” appearing “within a relatively short time”—i.e., they appear rapidly with no evidence of gradual evolution, as predicted by evolutionary theory. Charles Darwin even recognized the Cambrian Explosion as a problem for his theory. Reporting on research at the University of Texas at Austin, UT News reported, “This rapid diversification, known as the Cambrian explosion, puzzled Charles Darwin and remains one of the biggest questions in animal evolution to this day. Very few fossils exist of organisms that could be the Precambrian ancestors of bilateral animals, and even those are highly controversial” (“Discovery of Giant…,” 2008). Osorio, et al., writing in American Scientist, said,

As Darwin noted in the Origin of Species, the abrupt emergence of arthropods in the fossil record during the Cambrian presents a problem for evolutionary biology. There are no obvious simpler or intermediate forms—either living or in the fossil record—that show convincingly how modern arthropods evolved from worm-like ancestors. Consequently there has been a wealth of speculation and contention (1997, 85[3]:244, emp. added).

The trilobite, for example, is characteristic of the Cambrian strata—a creature equipped with an extremely complex vision system, using aplanatic lenses—more complex than the human eye, equipped with a single refractive lens. The fossil record provides no evidence for the evolution of the trilobite. No wonder Gould admitted, “The Cambrian explosion was the most remarkable and puzzling event in the history of life” (1994, 271:86).

Famous evolutionary biologist of Oxford University, Richard Dawkins, describes the Cambrian Explosion this way:

The Cambrian strata of rocks, vintage about 600 million years [evolutionists are now dating the beginning of the Cambrian at about 530 million years], are the oldest in which we find most of the major invertebrate groups. And we find many of them already in an advanced state of evolution, the very first time they appear. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history (1986, bracketed comment in orig., emp. added, p. 229).

Atheistic evolutionist Blair Scott, Communications Director of American Atheists, Inc. admitted, “[I]f I take the Cambrian Explosion, on its own, the logical conclusion I would draw is, ‘Wow! It was created’” (Butt and Scott, 2011). Long ago, the late, famous paleontologist of Columbia University, the American Museum of Natural History, and the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard, George Gaylord Simpson, admitted, “Most new species, genera, and families, and nearly all categories above the level of families, appear in the records suddenly, and are not led up to by known, gradual, completely transitional sequences” (1953, p. 360). So not only is the Cambrian Explosion a problem for evolutionary theory, but prominent evolutionists even admit it.

Now consider another theory: if the Bible is true, then according to Genesis chapter one and following, a few thousand years ago, God directly created all “kinds” of life within four days, not by evolution over four billion years. Approximately 1,650 years after that initial Creation, a global Flood ensued that is said to have destroyed all birds and land-living creatures that were not on the vessel prepared by the eight survivors of that catastrophic event (Genesis 6-9). Based on that information, creationists can develop theories about the details of what might have happened, make predictions based on those theories, and verify or falsify those predictions by studying the Earth.

Creation scientists, for example, would predict that, since the Earth is young and God did not create life through gradual evolution, very few fossils likely would have been formed prior to the Flood. Since the Flood was apparently the first major catastrophic event on the Earth, and catastrophic events are generally the cause of fossilization, transitional fossils between major phylogenic groups would be non-existent. When the Flood began, however, creationists would predict a significant marker inthe geologic column that represents the commencement of the worldwide Flood event. They would further predict an explosion of fossils above that line, representing the deaths of living creatures due to mud slides and other fossil-forming processes during the event. When we examine the Cambrian Explosion, sure enough, at the base of the Cambrian strata we find a distinct line, called the “Great Unconformity.” That line, curiously, stretches across the planet and marks the beginning of the Cambrian and underlies the explosion of life—exactly as creationists would predict to be the case if the Cambrian marked the beginning of the Flood. No wonder Dawkins said regarding the Cambrian Explosion, “Needless to say, this appearance of sudden planting [of life without any evolutionary history—JM] has delighted creationists” (p. 229). He understands the implications of the Cambrian Explosion. Indeed, it falsifies gradualistic evolution and verifies the predictions of biblical creationists.

[NOTE: For a thorough study of the Cambrian Explosion, see Darwin’s Doubt by Stephen C. Meyer.]

REFERENCES

Butt, Kyle and Blair Scott (2011), The Butt/Scott Debate: Does God Exist? (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press), September 29.

Dawkins, Richard (1986), The Blind Watchmaker (New York: W.W. Norton).

DiChristina, Mariette (2012), “The Story Begins,” Scientific American, 306[4]:4, April.

“Discovery Of Giant Roaming Deep Sea Protist Provides New Perspective On Animal Evolution,” (2008), UT News, November 20, http://news.utexas.edu/2008/11/20/giant_protist.

Gould, Stephen J. (1977), “Evolution’s Erratic Pace,” Natural History, 86[5]:12-16, May.

Gould, Stephen J. (1980), “Is a New and General Theory of Evolution Emerging?,” Paleobiology, 6[1]:119-130, Winter.

Gould, Stephen J. (1994), “The Evolution of Life on Earth,” Scientific American, 271:85-91, October.

Jenner, Jan, et al. (2006), Science Explorer (Boston, MA: Prentice Hall).

Kitts, David G. (1974), “Paleontology and Evolutionary Theory,” Evolution, 28:458-472, September.

Lewontin, Richard (2008), “We Know Nothing about the Evolution of Cognition,” 2008 AAAS Annual Meeting: Science and Technology from a Global Perspective. Speech paraphrased by James Randerson in The Guardian, “We Know Nothing, about Brain Evolution” (2008), February 19, http://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2008/feb/19/thedistinguishedbiologistpr.

Osorio, Daniel, Jonathan P. Bacon, and Paul M. Whitington (1997), “The Evolution of Arthropod Nervous Systems,” 85[3]:244-253.

Patterson, Colin (1979), Letter of April 10, 1979 to Luther Sunderland: reprinted in Bible-Science Newsletter, 19[8]:8, August, 1981.

Ridley, Mark (1981), “Who Doubts Evolution?” New Scientist, June 25, 90:832.

Simpson, George G. (1953), The Major Features of Evolution (New York: Columbia University Press).

Wong, Kate (2012), “First of Our Kind,” Scientific American, 306[4]:30-39, April.

The post The Cambrian Explosion: Falsification of Darwinian Evolution appeared first on Apologetics Press.

On September 10^th the media began highlighting the latest fossil find which is argued, once again, to be representative of an ancient ancestor of humans—Homo naledi. We are wary about how we respond to brand new discoveries, since always the “jury is still out” when these stories are first splashed in the media and portrayed as conclusive proof of various claims. We have documented their rashness time and again (e.g., Miller, 2015a; Miller, 2015b; Miller, 2015c), and this story is no exception. Fox News highlighted South African deputy president Cyril Ramaphosa’s statement that “history books will have to be rewritten” based on this discovery (Tilsley, 2015), a statement very reminiscent of how the media viewed the Homo floresiensis fossils when they were discovered in 2004. In 2014 a new study suggested that the fossils were merely modern humans with Down Syndrome (Miller, 2015b). In keeping with previous trends among naturalists and the media, it seems likely that this newest discovery will again, in the long run, prove not to be what the media is currently claiming it to be, once further study has been done on the fossils—as was the case with Homo floresiensis,Australopithecus sediba (Miller, 2015c), and the Big Bang inflation debacle last year (Miller, 2015a). With these facts in mind, here are some of the details we can gather at this initial stage.

Lee Berger is the evolutionary paleoanthropologist of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa who has been in the media a lot the past few years due to the discovery of the Australopithecus sediba fossils (Miller, 2012a; Miller, 2012b; Miller, 2015c). Once again, his team has been at the heart of the newest discovery. Though the find is only now being broadcast, the discovery took place in 2013 and was kept secret for two years. They discovered ancient bones and teeth in a cave system in Africa that now number over 1,500 in specimens—an unheard of cache of “human-like” fossils from a single site (Callaway, 2015). The bones are thought to be representative of some 15 individuals.

Credit: Lee Roger Berger research team  (http://elifesciences.org/content/4/e09560) [CC BY 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons

The first thing you will likely notice in many of the articles splashing the find is the paleoartist depiction of what Homo naledi is thought to have looked like (e.g., Shreeve, 2015; Barras, 2015; Watson, 2015). This portrait should immediately cause skepticism, since mere bones do not tell you what a person’s facial expressions, eye color, skin color, facial wrinkles, hair color, or lips would have looked like, even if a complete skull had been found. Yet all of these features are brazenly depicted in the naledi reconstruction (and even emphasized in the case of National Geographic’s home Web page the day after running the story, which featured a close-up of nadeli’s eye region, complete with freckles around the eyes and red blood vessels in the whites of its eyes). When such liberties are taken and brazenly broadcast to the media’s audience as solid science, the effect is powerful. As we reported earlier this year regarding the sediba fossils (Miller, 2015c), paleoartists have been extremely influential in shaping the minds of the masses in whether they view evolution as true or false, in spite of the fact that their artistic depictions are typically created based on meager evidence—what New Scientist calls “part of a face here” or “a jawbone fragment there” (Barras). USA Today described the nadeli discovery as “1,550-plus bits of fossil” (Watson, emp. added). New Scientist highlighted Berger’s contention that the naledi discovery “has implications for how we interpret the other early human fossil finds…. These fossils generally amount to just a few fragments rather than complete skeletons” (Barras, emp. added). As he pointed out after discovering the sediba fossils, Berger now adds, “Both sediba and naledi say you can’t take a mandible [lower jaw], a maxilla [upper jaw] or a collection of teeth and try to predict what the rest of the body looks like” (as quoted in Barras). Based on what happened in the case of the sediba fossils, having more than said evidence still does not guarantee correct depictions (Miller, 2015c). Apparently the paleoartists are still not getting the message from leading paleoanthropologists.

There are other curiosities already being highlighted at this early stage of the discovery: the age of the fossils is unclear—anywhere between 200,000 and 2,800,000 years (Tilsley), based on evolutionary dating schemes, and where the fossils fall in that range is significant from an evolutionary perspective. [NOTE: Creationists would argue that those dates correlate to the post-Flood period a few thousand years ago.] USA Today quoted Berger’s thoughts regarding the fossils:

[T]he bodies may have been deliberately placed in the cave, suggesting that long-ago, human relatives were engaged in ritual disposals of their dead. “It’s enormously surprising to see a very primitive member of the genus, something with this small a brain,” engaged in activity that was thought to be unique to modern humans (as quoted in Watson).

Fox News quoted Berger saying, “‘This is a new species of human that deliberately disposed of bodies in this chamber.’…Up until now, Berger adds, it was thought that Homo sapiens were the first beings to choose to dispose of their dead. ‘Now, with Homo naledi, we have evidence of the world’s first burial site,’ he said” (Tilsley).

This claim is, as Berger notes, completely inconsistent with the paleoanthropology community’s previous claims about Homo sapiens. If Berger is right that the naledi buried their dead, and if the fossils are dated by evolutionists to be over a million years old (using their time scales), then paleoanthropologists have been wrong in their bold claims about Homo sapiens. Previously, the oldest evidence of human burial was dated by evolutionists as 430,000 years ago (Callaway). Since burial of dead bodies is considered a mark of intelligence that distinguishes humans from the animal kingdom, Berger’s find could provide tangible evidence that what we would call “humans” (roughly the genus “Homo”) have always been intelligent, rather than that trait evolving within humans. [NOTE: Creationists argue that there would have been a few thousand “proto-species” (called “kinds” in the Bible—cf. Genesis 7:14), on Noah’s Ark with immense genetic capability for creating the diversity we see on the planet today within those kinds, including the diversity we see within Homo sapiens. Humans, therefore, would not have necessarily looked exactly as we do today, but would have still been humans (just as caucasoid, mongoloid, and negroid physiologies today do not look exactly the same). Legitimate examples of ancient humans are likely representative of the humans flourishing in the centuries immediately following the Flood a few thousand years ago. Dating schemes that expand that time scale to hundreds of thousands or millions of years suffer from flawed assumptions—cf. Houts, 2015; Miller, 2013.]

Another inconsistency in the naledi discovery: the jumble of fossils that were found in the shaft, if they all belong to the same species, seem to represent a species with a strange hodgepodge of characteristics that do not seem plausible. The skull seems to have harbored a smaller, ape-like brain, while the lower limbs, feet, and hands that were discovered, according to paleoanthropologists, seem to be more like that of modern humans. New Scientist reported,

The species the bones belonged to had a unique mix of characteristics. Look at its pelvis or shoulders, says Berger, and you would think it was an apelike Australopithecus which appeared in Africa about 4 million years ago and is thought to be an ancestor of Homo. But look at its foot and you could think it belonged to our species…. Its skull, though, makes clear that the brain was less than half the size of ours, and more like that of some species of Homo that lived about 2 million years ago. “It doesn’t look a lot like us,” says Berger (Barras).

Quoting John Hawks, paleoanthropologist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Nature reported, “It is a very strange combination of features, some that we’ve never seen before and some that we would have never expected to find together” (Callaway, emp. added). Of course, the reason for that expectation is justified: the combination of such body components does not make sense. It is very possible that in actuality the bones might not actually belong together at all—a contention that was argued by paleoanthropologists against Berger’s sediba fossils last year (Miller, 2015c). As with sediba, they may be merely a jumble of bones from different species. After all, Hawks, who helped coordinate the dig for naledi, admitted that “the team took flak for its unorthodox approach. ‘There’s a lot of the field that really believed we’re just a couple of cowboys who don’t know how things should be done’” (as quoted in Callaway). Of course, when the strange inconsistencies of this find are added to the previously botched assertions of Berger in the sediba find, it provides evidence that the critics may have a point.

Berger argues that “the bodies appear to have been dropped from above down a chute formed by rocks which forms the entrance to the chamber” (Tilsley). Could it, instead, be the case that the bodies of several different people and animals all fell down the chute and were trapped there, rather than having been intentionally dropped down the chute? Science highlighted that possibility (Gibbons, 2015, p. 1150). Such would explain why there’s a hodgepodge of bones from apparently different species. Remains from rodents and an owl were also found (p. 1150). Since the hundreds of bones were found disarticulated (i.e., separated from one another rather than in skeletal frame position), there is no conclusive way to know which bones go with which species—and by implication, no way to know if there are or are not multiple species represented.

No wonder, even at this early stage, paleoanthropologists who are critical of Berger’s claims are not hard to find. USA Today reported reactions by two of them:

Other scientists find the new trove of fossils tantalizing but don’t necessarily agree with Berger and his team on what, exactly, has been found. The fossils are “fabulous and a bit confusing,” says New York University’s Susan Anton via email. “There are some things in this that just don’t look like early Homo,” or at least the fossils of early Homo from east Africa. “The material is spectacular,” says the University of Pittsubrgh’s [sic] Jeffrey Schwartz….” But “the interpretation of it … is doubtful.” He points out varying skull shapes, among other features, among the Naledi specimens and argues the Homo family is so poorly defined that it’s not clear Naledi fits into it (Watson, emp. added).

Apparently the find isn’t as clear as it is being portrayed. Nature quoted Schwartz as well: “However, Jeffrey Schwartz, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, thinks that the material is too varied to represent a single species. ‘I could show those images to my students and they would say that they’re not the same,’ he says. One of the skulls looks more like it comes from an australopithecine, he says, as do certain features of the femurs” (Callaway). Apparently, Schwartz agrees with my first take on the evidence: there’s more than one species represented by the fossils. Fox News admitted that “[n]ot everybody agreed that the discovery revealed a new species. Tim White of the University of California, Berkeley [who is most known for his work on the famous “Lucy” fossils—JM], told The Associated Press the claim is questionable. ‘From what is presented here, (the fossils) belong to a primitive Homo erectus, a species named in the 1800s,’ he said” (Tilsley, parenthetical statement in orig.). New Scientist included its disclaimers as well:

Inevitably, though, there are dissenting views. “To me, having studied virtually the entire human fossil record, the specimens lumped together as Homo naledi represent two cranial morphs,” says Jeffrey Schwartz at the University of Pittsburgh in Philadelphia. Ian Tattersall at the American Museum of Natural History in New York shares that view. Last month, he and Schwartz wrote an article calling for researchers to think carefully about classifying new fossils as belonging to Homo. As for the Dinaledi finds, Schwartz and Tattersall point out that although the foreheads of some of the new skulls are gently sloped, one skull has a taller forehead with a distinct brow ridge—suggesting two species are present. “Putting these fossils in the genus Homo adds to the lack of clarity in trying to sort out human evolution,” says Schwartz (Barras).

Bottom line: the evolutionary community must continue its search for conclusive evidence of its claims that we evolved from an ape-like creature. On a positive note, it is refreshing that Lee Berger, unlike the bulk of the paleoanthropological community, is insistent about not hoarding his fossil finds where few can examine them to see the evidence for themselves. Noting the change in practice that Berger is creating in the community by being so open, paleoanthropologist of the University of Kent in Canterbury, UK, Tracy Kivell, said, “There’s lots of fossils out there no one has ever seen, except for a few select people. Palaeoanthropology is really rotten that way” (Callaway). Is it possible that if the paleoanthropological community was more forthcoming with their alleged evidences for evolution, more scientists would be able to assess the evidence and more quickly discover flaws in claims being made? In so doing, would they not highlight for the world, before the world forgets the previous flawed claims, how unsupported by solid evidence the theory of evolution truly is?

REFERENCES

Barras, Colin (2015), “New Species of Extinct Human Found in Cave May Rewrite History,” NewScientist.com, September 10, https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22730383-700-new-species-extinct-human-found-in-cave-may-rewrite-history/.

Callaway, Ewen (2015), “Crowdsourcing Digs Up an Early Human Species,” Nature.com, September 10, http://www.nature.com/news/crowdsourcing-digs-up-an-early-human-species-1.18305.

Gibbons, Ann (2015), “New Human Species Discovered,” Science, 349[6253]:1149-1150, September 11.

Houts, Michael G. (2015), “Assumptions and the Age of the Earth,” Reason & Revelation, 35[3]:26-34, March, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1185.

Miller, Jeff (2012a), “Australopithecus Sediba: Evolutionary Game Changer?” Reason & Revelation, 32[3]:33-35, March, http://apologeticspress.org/APPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1024&article=1741#.

Miller, Jeff (2012b), “Sediba Hype Continues,” Reason & Revelation, 32[9]:92-93, September, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1093&article=2039.

Miller, Jeff (2013), “Don’t Assume Too Much: Not All Assumptions in Science Are Bad,” Reason & Revelation, 33[6]:62-70, June, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1122.

Miller, Jeff (2015a), “Big Bang Inflation Officially Bites the Dust,” Reason & Revelation, 35[6]:62-65, June, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1195&article=2514.

Miller, Jeff (2015b), “Hobbit Man: Another Blunder…And an Insult,” Reason & Revelation, 35[4]:46-47, April, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1188&article=2503.

Miller, Jeff (2015c), “Sediba: Yet Another Paleo-Blunder,” Reason & Revelation, 35[6]:66, June, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1195&article=2516.

Shreeve, Jamie (2015), “This Face Changes the Human Story. But How?” NationalGeographic.com, September 10, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/09/150910-human-evolution-change/.

Tilsley, Paul (2015), “Mass Grave of New Human Relative Discovered in South Africa, Claim Scientists,” FoxNews.com, September 10, http://www.foxnews.com/science/2015/09/10/mass-grave-new-human-relative-discovered-in-south-africa-claim-scientists/?intcmp=hpbt1.

Watson, Traci (2015), “Ancient Fossils in African Cave are Tantalizing Glimpse of Early Man,” USAToday.com, September 10, http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/09/10/fossils-humans-cave-ancient-bones/71966570/?hootPostID=69a85859aa6fa7ba18f77917410b6df1.

The post Homo Naledi—Kind of Shady? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

In fact, once again, a complete 180 degree turnaround is underway. An article appearing in New Scientist in 2014 started with the sentence, “One of our closest long-lost relatives may never have existed. The fossils of Australopithecus sediba, which promised to rewrite the story of human evolution, may actually be the remains of two species jumbled together” (Barras, 2014). Ella Been of Tel Aviv University in Israel studies the spines of ancient hominins and ran across a paper in Science magazine that assessed the spine of sediba. After conducting her own study, Yoel Rak (also of Tel Aviv) and she “conclude that there are not two but four individuals” represented by the sediba fossils—separate individuals whose bones were mixed up during the (catastrophic) event that began the fossilization process (Barras). They presented their study at a meeting of the Paleoanthropology Society in Calgary, Canada in April, 2014. This revelation, once again, highlights how easy it is for evolutionists to be wrong in their conclusions about fossils, especially considering that their conclusions are based on “meager evidence” (Wong, p. 31), like a “toe bone here or a jaw there” (DiChristina, 2012, p. 4).

Recall from our last article addressing sediba that Lee Berger, the evolutionary paleoanthropologist of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa who discovered the sediba fossils, chided the standard practice in the paleontological community of trying to draw too much information from single, isolated bones. The sediba skeletons were thought to be more complete than typical fossil finds (even though the sediba skeletons were nowhere near being even 50% complete). Berger argued that if any of the bones he found had been found isolated, as is the typical scenario in fossil finds, completely different conclusions would have been drawn about the skeletal anatomy. He said, “Sediba shows that one can no longer assign isolated bones to a genus” (as quoted in Wong, p. 34). Ironically, now even his discovery, which was thought to be more complete, has also apparently been shown to be inadequate in determining the anatomy of an ancient skeleton. His assessment appears to have fallen victim to the same erroneous practice in paleontology that he chided. To make matters worse, according to the New Scientist article, “Berger’s latest work hints that the young male’s vertebrae may show signs of disease. If so, they are not representative of the species” (p. 11). That would mean that the sediba fossils cannot even be used as evidence of a transitional species, since the normal anatomy of the species would remain unknown.

The fossil record should be filled with billions of transitional fossils if Darwinian evolution actually occurred, but as we have highlighted time and again—and even many of the evolutionists themselves frequently admit—the evidence for the evolution of humans from an ape-like ancestor is lacking. The fossil record continues to support what creationists predict to be the case if the biblical model is true. God created the original “kinds” (Genesis 1:21,24-25) of creatures, and only diversification within those kinds has occurred over time. Believing that we evolved from a single-celled organism billions of years ago amounts to a wild, irrational leap.

REFERENCES

Barras, Colin (2014), “Missing Link Fossils May Be a Jumble of Species,” New Scientist, 222[2964]:11, April 12.

Butt, Kyle (2010), “Australopithecus Sediba: Another Relative We Never Had,” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=2872.

DiChristina, Mariette (2012), “The Story Begins,” Scientific American, 306[4]:4, April.

Miller, Jeff (2012a), “Australopithecus Sediba: Evolutionary Game Changer?” Reason & Revelation, 32[3]:33-35, March, http://apologeticspress.org/APPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1024&article=1741#.

Miller, Jeff (2012b), “Sediba Hype Continues,” Reason & Revelation, 32[9]:92-93, September, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1093&article=2039.

Potter, Ned (2011), “Evolutionary ‘Game Changer’: Fossil May Be Human Ancestor,” ABC News, September 8, http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/fossils-south-africa-called-evolutionary-game-changer/story?id=14474976#.Tmou Xw8wezs.email.

Wong, Kate (2012), “First of Our Kind,” Scientific American, 306[4]:30-39, April.

The post Sediba: Yet Another Paleo-Blunder appeared first on Apologetics Press.

The media called it Hobbit Man because he was thought to be only 3½ feet tall. Paleoartists quickly went to work depicting what this sub-human creature looked like. Writing in Time magazine, Michael Lemonick said,“What makes the discovery truly shocking is that the beings were not, like the Pygmies of equatorial Africa, just a short variety of modern Homo sapiens. Dubbed Homo floresiensis, they represent an entirely new twig on the human family tree…. The chapter of biology textbooks that describes our family tree will have to be rewritten” (2004, pp. 50-51). His recommendation was heeded. Homo floresiensis was subsequently added to biology textbooks in the section on primate evolution (e.g., Miller and Levine, 2010, p. 770).

This unfortunate series of actions highlights fundamental flaws in the practices of modern paleontologists and paleoartists. Paleoartists presumptuously construct portraits and models of creatures from woefully insufficient evidence from paleontologists, and yet their speculative, conjectured illustrations shape the minds of millions for years to come regarding human origins—even when they are later found to be totally wrong in their depictions. Java Man (based on the upper part of a skull, fossilized teeth, and a thigh bone), Piltdown Man (based on a jaw bone and a portion of a skull), Nebraska Man (based on a single tooth), Flipper Man (based on a fossilized rib), and Orce Man (based on a skull cap) are just a sampling of the infamous alleged missing links of human evolutionary history, grandiosely depicted by paleoartists, that proved to be completely erroneous (cf. Harrub and Thompson, 2003; Anderson, 1983). Writing in Science magazine, Michael Balter discusses his interview with anthropologist Adrienne Zihlman of the University of California, Santa Cruz, who highlighted eye-opening practices of those evolutionists working to sort out human evolution. Balter said, “In her view, much of the work that human evolution researchers do today is based on conjecture as well as hard science. The paleoartists, Zihlman told Science, ‘are doing what the rest of us do. Most of what we do is part art and part science’” (2009, p. 139, emp. added).

There is no doubt that paleoartists have been extremely influential in shaping the public mind about evolution and making people believe that Darwinian evolution is factual, and yet evolutionists admit that at least part of their work is based on conjecture. Only part of their work is science, the other part being “art.” How much of their work can be said to be conjecture and art versus actual science? The aforementioned examples seem to indicate a large part of their work must be the former in order to make such blunders, especially since paleoanthropologists admit that typical fossil finds are comprised of only a handful of isolated bones—fragments and teeth, for example (cf. DiChristina, 2012; Wong, 2012, p. 32).

The paleoartists are not the only ones at fault. Lee Berger is the famous paleoanthropologist of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa who discovered the Australopithecus sediba fossils in 2008 (cf. Miller, 2012). Writing in Scientific American, Berger chided the standard practice in paleontology of trying to draw too much information from single, isolated bones. The sediba skeletons were more complete than typical fossil finds (even though the sediba skeletons were much less than 50% complete skeletons). Berger makes the point that if any of the bones he found had been found isolated, as is the typical scenario in fossil finds, completely different conclusions would have been drawn about the skeletal anatomy. He said, “Sediba shows that one can no longer assign isolated bones to a genus” (as quoted in Wong, p. 34). Paleoanthropologist and professor at George Washington University, as well as adjunct senior scientist at the National Museum of Natural History, Bernard Wood, agrees that Berger is “absolutely right”—that isolated bones cannot be used to predict the appearance of an animal (as quoted in Wong, p. 34). Sadly, it is unlikely that many paleoanthropologists will listen to their admonitions, since most fossils that have been discovered are indeed isolated bones that must be used to conjecture about human evolution. And yet evidence to support their admonitions continues to surface. The announcement in August, 2014 regarding Homo floresiensis highlights that truth yet again.

On August 6^th scientists announced another blunder. The Huffington Post began the announcement of the latest studies on Homo floresiensis with the line, “Were scientists all wrong about prehistoric hobbits?” (Cooper-White, 2014). The skull that influenced the decision to place Hobbit Man in his own species was examined in two studies and found to be merely the skull of a human with Down Syndrome. His facial asymmetry, cranial volume, and skull circumference, as well as the length of his thighbones, were all found to fall perfectly “within the range for a modern human with Down syndrome” (Cooper-White). When measurements of the skull’s cranial volume were compared to previous figures, they were found to be slightly different.Professor of developmental genetics and evolution at Pennsylvania State University, and one of the authors of one of the studies, Robert Eckhardt, said, “The difference is significant, and the revised figure falls in the range predicted for a modern human with Down syndrome from the same geographic region” (as quoted in Cooper-White).

Consider the implications of these recent discoveries: (1) Homo floresiensis has been used as conclusive evidence of human evolution for 10 years to teach the masses, and in particular, students. All the while, the alleged evidence was simply false—even though it was advocated as truth. What might that imply about the other alleged evidences that are currently taught as truth? (2) Paleoartists’ depictions are in large part fantasy, should be taken with a grain of salt, and not be allowed to be used as evidence that shapes the way the population views human origins. (3) Apparently the Down Syndrome population of the world can be mistaken by the paleoanthropology community to be a band of hobbits that are not quite human. How insulting. Would it not be advisable for one to ensure that he has his facts straight before so rashly promoting his evolutionary propaganda?

REFERENCES

Anderson, I. (1983), “Humanoid Collarbone Exposed as Dolphin’s Rib,” New Scientist, April 28.

Balter, Michael (2009), “Bringing Hominins Back to Life,” Science, 325[5937]:136-139, July 10.

Brown, P., T. Sutikna, et al., (2004), “A New Small-bodied Hominin from the Late Pleistocene of Flores, Indonesia,” Nature, 431:1055-1061, October 28.

Cooper-White, Macrina (2014), “Controversial ‘Hobbit Species’ Simply May Have Been Early Human With Down Syndrome,” The Huffington Post, August 6, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/06/hobbit-human-down-syndrome_n_5651429.html?page_version=legacy&view=print&comm_ref=false.

Dalton, Rex (2004), “Little Lady of Flores Forces Rethink of Human Evolution,” Nature, 431:1029, October 28.

DiChristina, Mariette (2012), “The Story Begins,” Scientific American, 306[4]:4, April.

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Lahr, Marta Mirazón and Robert Foley (2004), “Human Evolution Writ Small,” Nature, 431:1043-1044, October 28.

Lemonick, Michael D. (2004), “Hobbits of the South Pacific,” Time, 164[19]:50-52, November 8.

Miller, Jeff (2012), “Sediba Hype Continues,” Reason & Revelation, 32[9]:92-93, September, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1093&article=2039.

Miller, Kenneth R. and Joseph S. Levine (2010), Biology (Boston, MA: Pearson).

Morwood, M.J., R.P. Soejono, et al., (2004), “Archaeology and Age of a New Hominin from Flores in Eastern Indonesia,” Nature, 431:1087-1091, October 28.

Wong, Kate (2012), “First of Our Kind,” Scientific American, 306[4]:30-39, April.

The post Hobbit Man: Another Blunder…And an Insult appeared first on Apologetics Press.

In a speech delivered in Vancouver, Canada in November 2011 by Jack Horner (the most famous dinosaur fossil hunter in the world), he admitted that “scientists have egos” (2011), and those egos have driven evolutionists to “discover” and “allege” things that are not what the evidence actually demands. In fact, Sascha Vongehr summarized Horner’s speech (about the misidentification of several dinosaurs), saying, “Scientists have a big huge ego and are therefore some of the easiest fooled people around” (2012; cf. Proverbs 16:18).

Rex Dalton, a longtime writer for the journal Nature, penned these words in 2008: “One hundred and thirty-five years of questionable judgments, some driven by a lust for headlines, have left dinosaur nomenclature in disarray, according to two new studies” (2008, emp. added). The studies, conducted by paleontologist Michael Benton of the University of Bristol, England, revealed that “there are errors in almost half the names given to dinosaurs” (as quoted in Dalton, emp. added). In fact, of the 1,401 names given to dinosaurs from 1824 to 2004,” 48% were either duplicates or “embodied errors of some other sort,” including “a lack of sufficient fossil material” (Dalton). Just how insufficient? According to Peter Dodson of the University of Pennsylvania, in 1990, almost half (45.3%) of all dinosaur genera were based on a single fossil specimen, and 74% were represented by five specimens or less (1990, 87:7608). No wonder so many errors have been made!

Dalton and the scientists he interviewed referred to the extent of the problems as “scary,” “bad,” and “a shock.” Why so many shocking mistakes regarding the naming and interpretation of dinosaur fossils? Why have scientists attempted to make so much out of so few fossil specimens? It is due in large part to pressures placed upon fossilologists by funding agencies and publishers. “As more public money came to be used for exploration projects…there was a growing risk that funding-agency and journal pressures might lead to unnecessary naming of genera or species” (Dalton; cf. 1 Timothy 6:10). Dalton said this is exactly what happened—in the U.S. and abroad. During the last 30 years of the 19^th century, fossil hunter Othniel Marsh named 80 dinosaurs. Unsurprisingly, this man, who worked so feverishly in hopes of becoming “America’s king of the dinosaurs” (Dalton), had a very poor success rate. Of the 80 dinosaurs he named, only 23 are still valid.

Consider another dinosaur fossil hunter: Dong Zhiming of China. Thirty-six percent of the dinosaurs he named from 1973-2004 are now considered invalid. As might be expected, his early work “was done when there was pressure on Chinese scientists to discover new species” (Dalton).

Sadly, countless erroneous and misleading claims about dinosaurs have come to pass because of “a lust for headlines.” Many interpretations of dinosaur fossils once thought to be iron-clad have been shown time and again to be flawed. “[S]ome species turn out not even to be dinosaurs” (Corbyn, 2010). And those fossils that are from dinosaurs have never been proven to be millions of years older than humans, as is constantly alleged. Evolutionists have never come close to proving that fish evolved into dinosaurs or that dinosaurs evolved into birds (Lyons, 2010). What has repeatedly been the case for the last century is that today’s “great proof for evolution” is often tomorrow’s back-page retraction.

REFERENCES

Corbyn, Zoe (2010), “Top Dinosaur Hunters are Worst at Naming,” Scientific American, September 24, http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=top-dinosaur-hunters-are-worst.

Dalton, Rex (2008), “In Search of Thingummyjigosaurus,” Naturenews, September 17, http://www.nature.com/news/2008/170908/full/news.2008.1111.html.

Dodson, Peter (1990), “Counting Dinosaurs: How Many Kinds Were There?” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 87:7608-7612, October.

Horner, Jack (2011), “Shape-Shifting Dinosaurs,” TED, November, http://www.ted.com/talks/jack_horner_shape_shifting_dinosaurs.html.

Lyons, Eric (2010), “Evolutionary Theory Changes Its Tune…Again,” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=3484.

Lyons, Eric and Kyle Butt (2008), Dinosaur Delusion: Dismantling Evolution’s Most Cherished Icon (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Vongehr, Sascha (2012), “Bad News for Kids: Your Favorite Dinosaur Did Not Exist,” Science 2.0, February 10, http://www.science20.com/alpha_meme/bad_news_kids_your_favorite_dinosaur_did_not_exist-86846.

The post “Driven by a Lust for Headlines” appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Admittedly, at times questions like these appear somewhat puzzling, at least on the surface. We know from the biblical record that dinosaurs and humans coexisted (Genesis 1; Exodus 20:11). Furthermore, many ancient paintings, figurines, rock carvings, and historical references confirm they were contemporaries upon the Earth (see Lyons and Butt, 2008). Still, many wonder why, at first glance, the fossil record seems not to substantiate creationists’ claims that dinosaurs and humans were contemporaries?

Fossilization is Rare

First, one must understand that fossils are rare, relatively speaking. Not every living plant, animal, or human fossilizes after death. In fact, it is extremely rare for things once living to fossilize. Dead animals lying in a field or on the side of the road do not fossilize. In order for something to become fossilized, it must be buried rapidly in just the right place. Consider as an example all the bison that were killed and left to decompose on the Great Plains of the United States. In the late 19^th century, a man could purchase a window seat on a train, have the conductor stop close to a herd of American bison, and pull out his rifle and fire upon the herd until he ran out of ammunition. The locomotive would then move on, leaving behind countless dead and dying animals. By the end of the 19^th century, the bison population in America had been reduced from millions to approximately 500 (Jones, n.d.). What happened to the millions of carcasses? They are not scattered all along the Great Plains today. Why? Because their flesh and bones were scavenged by insects, worms, birds, and other animals. The smallest portions were digested by fungi, bacteria, and enzymatic degradation until the buffalo remains disappeared. Even oxygen plays a role in the breakdown of chemicals that make up living things.

Evolutionary scientist James Powell described another situation where a rather large population of animals died. He wrote:

[I]n the winter after the great Yellowstone fires of 1988, thousands of elk perished from extreme cold coupled with lack of food. Late the following spring, their carcasses were strewn everywhere. Yet only a few years later, bones from the great elk kill are scarce. The odds that a single one will be preserved so that it can be found 65 million years from now approach zero. At best we can expect to find fossil evidence of only a tiny fraction of the animals that once lived. The earth’s normal processes destroy or hide most of the clues (1998, p. xv, emp. added).

Normally, as Powell indicated, living things do not fossilize. Under normal conditions, living things decay and rot. It is atypical for plants and animals to fossilize, because they must avoid even the tiniest of scavengers, bacteria, fungi, etc. For bones to fossilize, they must be buried—the sooner and deeper the better. Mud, silt, and other fine sediments are good for fossilization because they can block out oxygen. In this “protected” environment, bones and teeth may even last long enough to mineralize. But, normally, carcasses do not find themselves in such environments.

Not as Many Dinosaur Fossils as You Think

Although dinosaur graveyards have been discovered in various countries around the world (e.g., Tanzania, Africa; Jenson, Utah [USA]) where thousands of dinosaur bones are jumbled together (obviously due to some sort of catastrophe—e.g., a flood), most people are unaware of the fact that, in museums, “in spite of the intense popular and scientific interest in the dinosaurs and the well-publicized efforts of generations of dinosaur hunters, only about 2,100 articulated dinosaur bones (two or more aligned in the same position as in life)” exist (Powell, 1998, p. xv, parenthetical comment in orig.; see also Dodson, 1990, 87:7608; Lewin, 1990). Furthermore, in an article in the October 1990 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Peter Dodson of the University of Pennsylvania reported that almost half (45.3%) of all dinosaur genera are based on a single specimen, and 74% are represented by five specimens or less (87:7608). Even some of the most famous dinosaurs are based on a fraction of what they were originally. For example, the 120-foot-long Argentinosaurus replica (housed in the Fernbank Museum of Natural History in Atlanta, Georgia) is based on only 10 percent of its remains (a dozen backbone vertebrae, a few limb bones and part of the hips) [Meyer, 2002]. Truthfully, although dinosaurs have captured the attention of scientists for more than 150 years, their fossilized remains are not as prevalent as many would think.

Human Fossils—Extremely Scarce!

Humans make up an infinitesimal portion of the fossil record. Due to the number of drawings of our alleged human ancestors that appear in the news on a regular basis, one might get the feeling that hominoid and human fossils are ubiquitous. But such is not the case. In a 1981 New Scientistarticle, John Reader wrote: “The entire hominid collection known today would barely cover a billiard table” (89:802). One year later, Lyall Watson similarly stated: “The fossils that decorate our family tree are so scarce that there are still more scientists than specimens. The remarkable fact is that all the physical evidence we have for human evolution can still be placed, with room to spare, inside a single coffin” (1982, 90:44, emp. added). In a conversation with James Powell, president and director of the Los Angeles County Museum of Natural History, renowned evolutionary paleoanthropologist Meave Leakey gave some insight into her frustrations in searching for hominid (or human) fossils when she described her “nearly futile hunt for human bone in a new field area as four years of hard work producing only three nondescript scraps” (see Powell, 1998, p. xv, emp. added). In 2004, David Begun concluded an article in Science titled “The Earliest Hominins—Is Less More?” by admitting: “[T]he level of uncertainty in the available direct evidence at this time renders irreconcilable differences of opinion inevitable. The solution is in the mantra of all paleontologists: We need more fossils!” (303:1479-1480, emp. added). Although hominid/human fossils are among the most sought-after fossils in the world, scientists readily admit that few such fossils have been found.

As you can see, the question “Why don’t we find dinosaur and human fossils together?” is extremely misleading. The truth is, fossils themselves are rare. And, of all those things that do fossilize, it appears that less than 1% are vertebrates (fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, or mammals) [see Snelling, 1991, p. 30]. Furthermore, human fossils make up a microscopic part of the fossil record. Searching for one is like trying to find the one proverbial needle in a haystack. The real question then, is not, “Why don’t we find dinosaur and human fossils together?” but, “Where are all of the human fossils?”

Simply because human fossils apparently have not been found with dinosaur fossils does not make the case for the coexistence of dinosaurs and humans any less credible. Think about it. Where are the human fossils that have been found with the recently extinct Pyrenean Ibex? Can we prove that Dodo birds and humans once lived together by observing their fossilized remains together in a particular layer of rock? We know that they once coexisted, but can a person point to the fossil record for such information? The chance of finding human fossils is rare. The chance of finding exactly the combination of fossils for which one is searching (in this case, dinosaurs and humans) is even less likely.

A Lesson Learned from “Living Fossils”

We learn from “living fossils” that animals and plants can live long periods of time (allegedly millions of years) without leaving behind fossil evidence. For example, evolutionists believe Gingko trees were thriving 240 million years ago, before dinosaurs allegedly evolved (see Krock, 2003). Interestingly, Gingko fossils are absent in rock layers reportedly representing many millions of years, yet they are alive today (Hodge, 2006, p. 183). Consequently, simply because they are absent in certain rock strata does not mean they were non-existent during the alleged millions of years it took those layers of rock to form. Likewise, simply because human fossils are missing in certain layers of rock does not mean they were not living at the time those rock layers were formed.

Consider also the living fossil known as the coelacanth. From 1839 (when fossil coelacanths were first discovered—Perkins, 2001) to 1938, evolutionists alleged that these fish were the missing link in the evolution of fish to amphibians (“Diver Finds…,” n.d.). Supposedly, coelacanths had existed “for nearly 400 million years” (“Diver Finds…”). Evolutionists firmly believed that “the coelacanth became extinct about 70 million years ago [about the same time dinosaurs died out—EL] because their fossils are not found in any deposits higher than this” (Hodge, 2006, p. 183). Science News declared that coelacanths “disappeared from the fossil record 75 million years ago” (Perkins, 2001, emp. added). Until 1938, evolutionists believed that men and coelacanths could not possibly have lived at the same time. These creatures were known only from rock layers that evolutionists claimed were 70+ million years old.

On December 24, 1938, the scientific world was rocked when an unidentified fish five feet long and over 100 pounds was brought to shore in South Africa. It was caught in the Indian Ocean near Madagascar. The fisherman who netted the fish (having no idea what the creature’s proper name was) called it “the great sea lizard” because its pectoral fins looked more like little fringed legs. Once scientists examined this strange creature, however, they confirmed what formerly was thought impossible—a live coelacanth had been caught in modern times (see “Coelacanth,” n.d.)! It was as shocking as if a living T. rex had been found. After all, they supposedly became extinct at the same time.

Since 1938, more than 100 coelacanths have been caught and many more sighted (see “Coelacanth”). In 1952, they were seen swimming near the Comoro Islands in the Indian Ocean. Another population was found in 1998 off the coast of Indonesia. Surprisingly, local Indonesian fishermen were quite familiar with this fish, having been catching them for years; though scientists were totally unaware they lived in that region.

Modern-day coelacanths look exactly like their fossil counterparts (which are mistakenly dated as being millions of years old). This living fossil is a thorn in the side of evolutionists. It makes a mockery of evolutionary dating methods, provides further proof of the myths of missing links, and exposes their “facts” for what they really are—unproven assumptions.

Moreover, consider that evolutionists admit that the fossil record of the past “70 million years” shows no evidence of coelacanths. Yet, we know they lived during these alleged “70 million years,” because they are still alive today. Like Gingko trees, coelacanths’ absence in certain rock strata does not mean they were not living during the alleged millions of years it took the rock layers to form; it simply means that they were not buried and fossilized in those layers of rock. Similarly, humans just as easily could have been alive when the various rock layers were formed, without leaving human fossils. Think about it: we have just as much fossil evidence for humans living the past “70 million years” on Earth as we do coelacanths and Gingkos. In short, living fossils help us understand that simply because human fossils are missing in certain layers of rock does not mean humans were not living at the time those rock layers were formed.

Slim Chance

Considering that sedimentary rock (the type of rock in which fossils are most likely to be discovered) covers about 75% of Earth’s land area and much of the ocean floor, and is tens of thousands of feet thick in certain places (Crawford, 1988, 17:278), even if there are dinosaur and human remains fossilized in the same rock, the chance of them being exposed, discovered, recognized, and reported together is very improbable. They might be exposed somewhere in the world today (like in a mine, cliff, or road cutting), but unless they are discovered before the Sun, wind, and rain turn them to dust, such exposure is useless to scientists.

Humans and the Flood

It could be that in the time of Noah, the human population was confined mainly to the Middle East, while most dinosaurs roamed in other parts of the world. If this was the case, and the global Flood of Noah’s day caused most of the fossils on Earth (as creationists believe), then one would not expect to find many (if any) humans buried with dinosaurs. What’s more, humans would have been less likely (than various animals) to be buried rapidly and fossilized during the Flood. As Bodie Hodge noted:

Since the rains of Noah’s Flood took weeks to cover the earth, many people [unlike dinosaurs—EL] could have made it to boats, grabbed on to floating debris, and so on. Some may have made it to higher ground. Although they wouldn’t have lasted long and would have eventually perished, they might not fossilize (Hodge, 2006, p. 179).

The fact is, in most cases, living things do not fossilize.

[D]ead things decompose or get eaten. They just disappear and nothing is left. The 2004 tsunami in Southeast Asia was a shocking reminder of the speed with which water and other forces can eliminate all trace of bodies, even when we know where to look. According to the United Nation’s Office of the Special Envoy for Tsunami Recovery, nearly 43,000 tsunami victims were never found (Hodge, p. 180).

Could it be…?

It may very well be the case that human and dinosaur fossilized footprints have been discovered together, or at the very least in the same vicinity or in the same layer of rock in which dinosaur tracks are found (see Woetzel, 2013, p. 28). It may also be that human and dinosaur bones have been discovered together in times past, but for at least two reasons, were not reported. First, someone who might have found these bones in a quarry could react by saying, “Look at these old bones. Fascinating!… Okay, now, hurry up and hand me another explosive so we can meet our quota of coal for the day.” It could be that the fossil evidence for the cohabitation of men and dinosaurs went up in smoke long ago. Second, it may be possible that human bones have been found by scientists alongside dinosaur fossils, yet simply have not been reported widely. We are not suggesting that all evolutionary scientists are dishonest. Rather, we simply believe they are blinded by presuppositions that affect their judgment (even as many “Christians” are). Since evolutionists seem so certain that hominid/human fossils should never be found in layers of rock more than a few million years old, if they ever did, likely they would just explain away the evidence. “It just cannot be, if evolution is true…. There must be some explanation other than humans and dinosaurs really lived together.” If evolutionists can “confuse” a dolphin’s rib for a human collarbone (Anderson, 1983, p. 199), or an extinct pig’s tooth for a human tooth (e.g., Nebraska Man; see Harrub and Thompson, 2003, pp. 88-89), then similar mistakes could easily be made concerning human and dinosaur fossils. If one ever has been found with another, scientists could have misinterpreted the “anomaly.”

Conclusion

It may be that dinosaur and human fossils are never found together. But, whether they are or not, the evidence for the coexistence of humans and dinosaurs at one time in the past is undeniable to the unbiased truth seeker (see Lyons and Butt, 2008). Indeed, there is a mountain of biblical, historical, and physical evidence which indicates that dinosaurs and humans once walked this Earth at the same time.

REFERENCES

Anderson, I. (1983), “Humanoid Collarbone Exposed as Dolphin’s Rib,” New Scientist, April 28.

Begun, David (2004), “The Earliest Hominins—Is Less More?” Science, 3003:1478-1480, March 5.

“Coelacanth” (no date), American Museum of Natural History, http://www.sciencenews.org/articles/20010505/bob13.asp.

Crawford, Maria Luisa (1988), “Sedimentary Rock,” The World Book Encyclopedia (Chicago, IL: World Book).

“Diver Finds ‘Living Fossil’” (no date), Science Now, http://www.calacademy.org/science_now/archive/headline_science/coelacanth_010601.php.

Dodson, Peter (1990), “Counting Dinosaurs: How Many Kinds Were There?” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 87:7608-7612, October.

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Hodge, Bodie (2006), The New Answers Book (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Jones, Alvin T. (no date), “The American Bison,” http://www.texasbison.org/bisonstory.html.

Krock, Lexi (2003), “Other Fish in the Sea,” NOVA, January, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/fish/other.html.

Lewin, Roger (1990), “Science: Dinosaur Count Reveals Surprisingly Few Species,” New Scientist Archive, 128[1745], December, http://archive.newscientist.com/secure/article/article.jsp?rp=1&id=mg12817452.700.

Lyons, Eric and Kyle Butt (2008), The Dinosaur Delusion: Dismantling Evolution’s Most Cherished Icon (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Meyer, Pedro (2002), “Does the Original Matter?” WashingtonPost.com, http://media.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/photo/essays/zonezero/jan_02.htm.

Perkins, Sid (2001), “The Latest Pisces of an Evolutionary Puzzle—Discovery of Coelacanth off Coast of South Africa,” Science News, May 5, 159:282, www. sciencenews.org/articles/20010505/bob13.asp.

Powell, James Lawrence (1998), Night Comes to the Cretaceous (New York: Harcourt Brace).

Reader, John (1981), “Whatever Happened to Zinjanthropus?” New Scientist, 89:802, March 26.

Snelling, Andrew (1991), “Where are All the Human Fossils?” Creation Ex Nihilo, 14[1]:28-33, December 1991-February 1992.

Watson, Lyall (1982), “The Water People,” Science Digest, 90[5]:44, May.

Woetzel, Dave (2013), Chronicles of Dinosauria (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

The post Have Dinosaur and Human Fossils Been Found Together? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) is currently developing the science standard for some 26 states. Now is the time to take action and speak out against the indoctrination of young minds with the bad science of evolutionary theory. If the science standards pass as they are written now, Darwinian evolution will be a required topic in your child’s science education, if you live in one of the states that adopts this standard. The NGSS is currently accepting input from the public over the next few days (until January 29, 2013) on the second draft of their proposed science standards in the form of a survey on their website (www.nextgenscience.org). We strongly recommend that you take five minutes and speak out for God and the biblical view of origins. Now may be the only time for many years (or ever) to let your voice be heard in a direct, effective way on this matter.

The Villa Rica church of Christ in Georgia is taking a lead in this effort, and has developed a website to help you in this process. If you need help getting straight to the critical issues in the science standard, click here (http://www.unity-in-christ.org/Articles/christians4science_is_an_apologe.html). At the top of that Web page are two red rectangular links that will be helpful to you in sifting through the information on the NGSS website.

Please let your voice be heard. There is absolutely no doubt that the promulgation of evolutionary theory in America’s school system is one of the most effective ways that Satan has “taken advantage of us” (2 Corinthians 2:11) over the last 50 years, turning Americans and the world away from the God of the Bible. But we are not “ignorant of his devices” (2 Corinthians 2:11). Remember the famous words of exhortation credited to Edmund Burke, a British statesman from the 1700s: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Take up the sword of truth, and fight with us.

The post Affecting the Next Generation Science Standards for the Lord (Update) appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Although the millions-of-years time frame is inherently flawed (see DeYoung, 2005), I will use it in this article just as the evolutionists use it. I will do so to show that, even using their own thinking, their conclusions are illogical. First, evolutionists remind us of the fact that the record of the rocks and the fossils it contains are a mere scintilla of the animals that actually lived on the planet. Since the chances of a particular organism actually fossilizing are so low, Coyne concluded: “[W]e can estimate that we have fossil evidence of only 0.1 percent to 1 percent of all species—hardly a good sample of the history of life!” (2009, p. 22). Evolutionists often insert this kind of statement into their writings to explain away the billions of “transitional” fossils that should fill the record if Darwinian evolution were true. Yet, in spite of this admission, evolutionists such as Coyne treat the fossil record as a perfect representation of life when it is in their “best interests.” Then they proceed to use it to tell us when certain organisms arose or disappeared from our planet.

For instance, Coyne stated: “Until about 390 million years ago, the only vertebrates were fish. But, 30 million years later, we find creatures that are clearly tetrapods: four-footed vertebrates that walked on land” (p. 36). Coyne is alleging, based on when certain fossils “appear” in the record, that no tetrapods existed “390 million years ago.” The fossil record, however, could only be used to date the “appearance” of an organism if it were perfectly complete. Could it be that tetrapods lived much earlier but did not fossilize? Certainly. In fact, we discover on a regular basis that when a fossil “appears” or “disappears” in the fossil record tells us absolutely nothing about when it actually lived.

Take the coelacanth fish as an example. Supposedly, this lobe-finned fish “disappeared” from the Earth about 70 million years ago. This thinking was based on the idea that the fish did not appear in the fossil record that “dated” from 70 million years ago to the present. In 1938, however, fishermen found a living coelacanth (Lyons, 2007). Coyne stated: “Groups like whales and humans have evolved rapidly, while others, like the coelacanth ‘living fossils,’ look almost identical to ancestors that lived hundreds of millions of years ago” (2009, p. 4, emp. added). So, we have a fish that lived “70 million” years ago, is still alive today, and left no trace in the fossil record for “70 million” years. Thinking critically about this, could it also be that these fish lived “70 million” years before they appear in the fossil record? Absolutely.

In his discussion of lobe-finned fish and land living vertebrates, Coyne wrote: “If there were lobe-finned fishes but no terrestrial vertebrates 390 million years ago, and clearly terrestrial vertebrates 360 million years ago, where would you expect to find transitional forms? Somewhere in between” (p. 37). But wait, why does Coyne suggest there were no terrestrial vertebrates 390 million years ago? Because we have not found any in the fossil record. But that means nothing due to the limitations of the fossil record, which Coyne and host are quick to point out when they are explaining the lack of transitional fossils. Could it be that terrestrial vertebrates lived “70 million years” before we find them in the fossil record? Definitely. “When” we see an organism in the fossil records gives us zero understanding of when it actually appeared or disappeared from the Earth.

Again, Coyne suggests: “Humans are newcomers to the scene—our lineage branches off from that of other primates only about 7 million years ago, the merest sliver of evolutionary time” (p. 28). Yet in order to remain consistent, Coyne and others can tell us nothing about our lineage “branching off” based on the lack of human fossils in certain layers. In fact, from their admission about the incomplete fossil record, could we surmise that humans might have lived “millions of years” before we find them preserved in the record? Yes, indeed.

This flaw in evolutionary thinking manifests itself remarkably well in Coyne’s assessment of the Laotoli footprints. In 1976, Andrew Hill found an 80-foot trail of footprints that were “virtually identical to those made by modern humans walking on soft ground” (Coyne, 2009, p. 202). Even though these footprints match those of modern humans, they were attributed to Australopithecus afarensis. Coyne explained: “the trail dates from around 3.6 million years ago, a time when A. afarensis was the only hominin on record” (p. 202, emp. added). If the fossil record is so sketchy that lobe-finned fish can squeak by unnoticed for 70 million years, could it be that “modern humans” were around three or four “million” years earlier than their initial appearance in the fossil record? Yes. So, which makes more sense: (1) that modern humans lived “before” their first appearance in the fossil record, or (2) that a chimp-like creature such as A. afarensis made an 80-foot trail of footprints that is “virtually identical to those made by modern humans walking on soft ground”? Since we know that a creature’s appearance in the fossil record can tell us nothing about the time a creature appeared on Earth, the reasonable conclusion is that “modern” humans were around before evolutionists assert they were—and therefore are not relatives of the Australopithecines.

In February 2006, the media was awash with news about Castorocauda lutrasimilis, a beaver-like animal that supposedly lived 164 million years ago. The creature was so interesting because it was over 100 million years out of place. According to the evolutionary thinkers, such creatures did not exist until 64 million years ago based on their absence from the fossil record (Butt, 2006). Coyne stated: “Sixty million years ago there were plenty of fossil mammals, but no fossil whales. Creatures that resemble modern whales show up 30 million years later” (2009, p. 49). Of course, all this statement can mean is that whales don’t “show up” in the fossil record until 30 million years later. But that means absolutely nothing about when they lived. They could have been on the Earth “70 million years” before they show up in the fossil record (using their flawed millions-of-years scheme). For Coyne to state that he knows when they arose on Earth based on when they are found in the fossil record is nothing short of deception, based on his own acknowledgement that the fossil record is incomplete.

We see, then, that evolutionists cannot tell us one thing about when a creature arose on Earth—based on its fossils. Neither can evolutionists tell us one thing about when a creature went extinct—based on fossils. A fossil can never tell you a beginning “date” or extinction “date.” And yet the most educated and applauded evolutionists in the world, such as Jerry Coyne, persist in falsifying their information by stating that they know when a certain creature arose or disappeared—based on the fossil record.  For Coyne to assert: “all the evidence—both old and new—leads ineluctably to the conclusion that evolution is a fact,” but then use such irrational “evidence” as proof of evolution, shows a glaring misconception in his idea of what a “fact” is.

REFERENCES

Butt, Kyle (2006), “One Little Beaver Demolishes 100 Million Years,” http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=1787.

Coyne, Jerry (2009), Why Evolution Is True (New York: Viking).

DeYoung, Don (2005), Thousands…Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Lyons, Eric (2007), “What Else ‘Living Fossils’ Reveal,” http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=2294.

The post What You Can Never Know Based on a Fossil appeared first on Apologetics Press.

No essential new evidence was presented in this article, which attempted again to prove that humans evolved from sediba, beyond what was discussed in our previous articles. What is new in this article is a further exposition of the dissent in the evolutionary community over their alleged fossil evidence for evolution. The evolutionary community simply cannot come to a consensus about the implications of its fossil finds, which illustrates the fact thatthe fossils cannot be definitively used as proof of evolution, since they can be interpreted in so many ways.

Lee Berger of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa holding the cranium of Australopithecus sediba

While Berger and others contend that the sediba fossils are representative of the ancestor of Homo, others vehemently disagree. William Kimbel of Arizona State University is known for leading the team that found the alleged 2.3 million-year-old upper jawbone in Hadar, Ethiopia that many evolutionists, up to this point, have believed to be the earliest evidence of the genus Homo. Kimbel responded to Berger’s assertion, saying, “I don’t see how a taxon with a few characteristics that look like Homo in South Africa can be the ancestor (of Homo) when there’s something in East Africa that is clearly Homo 300,000 years earlier [i.e., the jawbone he discovered—JM]” (as quoted in Wong, p. 36). Meave Leakey, of the famous fossil finding Leakey family, said, “There are too many things that do not fit, particularly the dates and geography. It is much more likely that the South African hominins are a separate radiation that took place in the south of the continent” (as quoted in Wong, p. 36). René Bobe, a biological anthropologist at George Washington University, believes the sediba fossils to be “too primitive in their overall form” to be the claimed ancestors (Wong, p. 36). Bernard Wood, a paleoanthropologist and professor at George Washington University, as well as adjunct senior scientist at the National Museum of Natural History, said, “There are not many characters linking it to Homo…. I just think sediba has got too much to do in order to evolve into [erectus]” (as quoted in Wong, bracketed item in orig., p. 36). If leading evolutionists cannot agree with each other about what their fossil evidence proves, how can their evidence be used to definitively prove anything?

One of the fascinating admissions that was made in this article by the evolutionists is that, contrary to the picture painted by many, the alleged evidence for human evolution is meager at best. Kate Wong, evolutionist and senior science writer for Scientific American, said, “The origin of our genus, Homo, is one of the biggest mysteries facing scholars of human evolution. Based on themeager evidence available, scientists have surmised that Homo arose in East Africa…” (Wong, p. 31, emp. added). Paleontologists often rely on a few isolated fossil bones, found here and there around the world, to construct their alleged tree of human evolutionary proof. Wong went on to say:

For decades paleoanthropologists have combed remote corners of Africa on hand and knee for fossils of Homo’s earliest representatives…. Their efforts have brought only modest gains—a jawbone here, and handful of teeth there. Most of the recovered fossils instead belong to either ancestral australopithecines or later members of Homo—creatures too advanced to illuminate the order in which our distinctive traits arose…. [W]ith so little to go on, the origin of our genus has remained as mysterious as ever (Wong, p. 32, emp. added).

Mariette DiChristina, editor-in-chief of Scientific American, also admitted that “[p]ieces of our ancient forebears generally are hard to come by…. Scientists working to interpret our evolution often have had to make do with studying a fossil toe bone here or a jaw there” (DiChristina, 2012, p. 4). Lee Berger, himself, admitted that there is a lack of human evolutionary evidence in the fossil record, although he tried to shine the light of hope on the issue. He stated: “[W]e really need a better record—and it’s out there” (as quoted in Wong, 2012, p. 39). Such a statement is strongly reminiscent of the admission and hopes of Charles Darwin over a century ago:

[T]he number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, [must] be truly enormous…. Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be argued against this theory. The explanation lies, I believe, in the extreme imperfection of the geological record (1956, pp. 292-293, emp. added).

He, of course, hoped that further fossil exploration would help to validate his theory, but over 150 years of continued research has left the evolutionary community with the same result: “We really need a better record.” Others have admitted the fact that the alleged evidence for human evolution in the fossil record is scarce and controversial (see Thompson, 2004, pp. 209-236), but it is nice to see other evolutionary scientists admitting the truth, at least on this point.

A final point made by Lee Berger that deserves highlighting is the fact that Berger chided the standard practice in paleontology of drawing too much from isolated bone discoveries. The sediba skeletons were more complete than typical fossil finds (even though the sediba skeletons are nowhere near being even 50% complete). According to Berger, if any of the bones he found had been found in different locations, isolated from one another, as is the typical scenario in fossil finds, completely different conclusions would have been drawn about the anatomy of the creature. He said, “Sediba shows that one can no longer assign isolated bones to a genus” (as quoted in Wong, 2012, p. 34). Bernard Wood agreed that Berger is “absolutely right” (as quoted in Wong, p. 36). The creationist community has made this contention all along, but Berger’s point is highly controversial in the evolutionary community, to say the least, considering that the bulk of the alleged evidence for human evolution ultimately comes down to such “isolated bones.” If Berger is right, the evolutionary “tree” would be essentially cut down and used as firewood. We wouldn’t expect the evolutionary community to agree with him, but Berger’s honesty on this point, in spite of its controversial nature, is certainly commendable.

Note that the Creation model would not be harmed in the least by an axe being taken to the human evolutionary tree. The evolutionary community, however, is reluctant to follow the evidence where it leads on this point because of the establishment’s clear bias against the Creation model. However, the Creation model contends, in keeping with the evidence, that humans did not evolve over millions of years from an ape-like ancestor, but rather, were created separately from all other creatures, on day six of Creation. While minor changes can occur within kinds over time (e.g., changes in beak size, color, etc.), evolution between “kinds” (Genesis 1:25) simply does not occur—according to the scientific evidence. Creatures were created from the beginning according to their kinds, and the fossil evidence supports this truth.

REFERENCES

Butt, Kyle (2010), “Australopithecus Sediba: Another Relative We Never Had,” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=2872.

Darwin, Charles (1956 edition), The Origin of Species (London: J.M. Dent & Sons).

DiChristina, Mariette (2012), “The Story Begins,” Scientific American, 306[4]:4, April.

Miller, Jeff (2012), “Australopithecus Sediba: Evolutionary Game Changer?” Reason & Revelation, 32[3]:33-35, March, http://apologeticspress.org/APPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=1024&article=1741#.

Thompson, Bert (2004), The Scientific Case for Creation (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Wong, Kate (2012), “First of Our Kind,” Scientific American, 306[4]:30-39, April.

The post Sediba Hype Continues appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) is currently developing the science standard for some 26 states. Now is the time to take action and speak out against the indoctrination of young minds with the bad science of evolutionary theory. If the science standards pass as they are written now, Darwinian evolution will be a required topic in your child’s science education if you live in one of the states that adopts this standard. The NGSS is currently accepting input from the public over the next few days (until June 1) on their proposed science standards in the form of a survey on their website (www.nextgenscience.org/next-generation-science-standards). We strongly recommend that you take five minutes and speak out for God and the biblical view of origins. Now may be the only time for many years (or ever) to let your voice be heard in an effective way on this matter.

The Villa Rica church of Christ in Georgia is taking a lead in this effort, and have developed a website to help you in this process. If you need help getting straight to the critical issues in the science standard, click here (http://www.unity-in-christ.org/Articles/christians4science_is_an_apologe.html). At the top of that Web page are two red rectangle links that will be helpful to you in sifting through the information on the NGSS website.

Please let your voice be heard. There is absolutely no doubt that the promulgation of evolutionary theory in America’s school system is one of the most effective ways that Satan has “taken advantage of us” (2 Corinthians 2:11) over the last 50 years, turning Americans and the world away from the God of the Bible. But we are not “ignorant of his devices” (2 Corinthians 2:11). Remember the famous words of exhortation credited to Edmund Burke, a British statesman from the 1700s: “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” Take up the sword of truth, and fight with us.

The post Affecting the "Next Generation Science Standards" for the Lord appeared first on Apologetics Press.

Lee Berger of the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa holding the cranium of Australopithecus sediba

The truth is, as we have documented time and time again (e.g., Harrub and Thompson, 2003; Thompson, et al., 2002), the fossil evidence that is desperately needed to prove the theory of evolution is simply not there. As ABC News writer, Ned Potter, admitted in the article splashing the fossil find, researchers know that “[t]here is a gap in the fossil record, so far unexplained” (2011). This admission ultimately results in the media and many scientists jumping to quick conclusions when a hopeful find is made, as is the case in this instance. One would think that scientists and media personnel would be more cautious, remembering the many blunders that have been made by paleontologists over the years in their quick claims to have found missing links, including Java Man, Piltdown Man, Nebraska Man, Flipper Man, and Orce Man (cf. Thompson and Harrub, 2002). Potter conceded that “researchers in the past have made many finds that turned out to be dead ends” (2011). That is certainly an understatement. Some scientists appear to be getting the picture. Science writer and biologist, Michael Balter, admitted that “few scientists are ready to believe” that these fossils represent the immediate ancestor of the genus, Homo (2010, 328[5975]:154). After all, caution must be taken when all of the hype and alleged “game changer” status of the species is based entirely on only a foot, hand, and small parts of a pelvis and skull.

It is important to watch for small—but significant—disclaimers that appear throughout evolutionary literature and the media’s coverage of fossil finds, like the present specimen. While some evolutionists use decisive terminology when discussing macroevolution, as if it has been proven to be true (e.g., Potter quotes Darryl De Ruiter of Texas A&M University as saying, “It’s strong confirmation of evolutionary theory,” 2011, emp. added), the truth is, it is an unproven theory, and those “in the know” in the evolutionary community realize this problem. In fact, it is a theory that will never be proven, (1) since there is no evidence in the fossil record that transitional evolution between kinds of living organisms ever occurred, (2) since the scientific evidence indicates that life cannot come from non-life, much less could the laws governing that life write themselves into existence, and (3) since no one was around to witness the origin of life, even if atheistic evolution were true, which means the question of origins is ultimately immune to the test of empirical science. Some, at least, like Potter, have learned to use more cautious terminology when discussing evolution and the fossil record. Phrases such as “may be,” “might,” and “could be” are important, because they highlight the fact that the speaker or writer, in this case, is stating an assertion or conjecture—not a proven fact. Such words highlight the fact that even the evolutionists themselves know they have not proven their case and that their belief in evolutionary theory is a blind belief—not based on the facts.

Disclaimers are often skipped over by Americans when reading about science, because the climate in America—as promoted in large part by many in our school system—lends itself to believing scientists no matter what. A person is pressured to believe scientists, whose theories can pretty much be taken as “gospel,” regardless of the evidence. They are demi-gods. Their “maybes” are equivalent to the common man’s certainty. This unquestioning, blind belief should never have been granted to the scientific community, and especially not in the last 50 years. As morality and ethical integrity in America erodes, less and less confidence should be placed in the “elite” minds of our society, who are often biased against the truth because of the desire for prestige, money, and because of the desire to eliminate that which gives them accountability in their personal lives.

If macroevolution ever occurred, there should be millions of transitional fossils, if not billions, documenting the evolution of the various species, including man. Darwin, himself, believed that “the number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, [must] be truly enormous” (1956, p. 292). After well over a century of fossil digging and analyzing the geologic strata, such proof has simply not come forth, and frankly, that truth puts to rest the General Theory ofEvolution. Finding only sporadic, questionable fossils, that even the evolutionary community itself cannot agree upon, only further proves the fact that evolutionary theory is inadequate in explaining what is seen in the fossil record. The evolutionary community is in constant chaos and disagreement over fossils and the fossil record. If the evolutionary community cannot agree with itself, how can the student, listener, or reader be expected to believe what they allege?

One of the two sets of allegedly two-million-year-old bones from Australopithecus sediba found in South Africa

Years ago, many in the evolutionary community began to reject all australopithecines, which would include sediba, as being ancestral to man at all. Lord Solly Zuckerman, the famous British anatomist who studied australopithecines for over 15 years, concluded that if man did descend from an ape-like ancestor, he did so “without leaving any fossil traces of the steps of the transformation” (1970, p. 64). The late evolutionist, Ashley Montagu, said, “[T]he skull form of all australopithecines shows too many specialized and ape-like characters to be either the direct ancestor of man or of the line that led to man” (1957, emp. added). Based largely on the nature of Orrorin tugenensis teeth, Martin Pickford, evolutionary geologist from the College de France in Paris, and Brigitte Senut, French evolutionary paleontologist of France’s National Museum of Natural History, believe that all australopithecines should be placed in a side branch of the “evolutionary tree” leading to Orrorin tugenensis and dying out 1.5 million years ago, rather than in the evolutionary line leading to Homo sapiens (cf. Senut, et al., 2001; Balter, 2001; Schuster, 2001).  If it be the case that the australopithecines do not lead to man—and it is—then Australopithecus sediba is totally irrelevant in a discussion of human evolution altogether, regardless of the media hype.

Time will tell whether the majority of evolutionists themselves deem this new find to be of importance to them, but regardless, the truth will still stand firm: if evolution is true, it should not be so hard to verify it. If atheistic explanations for the origin of the Universe were true, we should be witnessing the spontaneous generation of life and matter all over the place, or at least once somewhere, as well as witnessing transitions between kinds of living organisms. But true science simply does not support such things. [NOTE: See Butt, 2010 for more on Australopithecus sediba]

REFERENCES

Balter, Michael (2001), “Early Hominid Sows Division,” ScienceNOW, February 22, http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2001/02/22-03.html.

Balter, Michael (2010), “Candidate Human Ancestor from South Africa Sparks Praise and Debate,” Science, 328[5975]:154-155, April.

Butt, Kyle (2010), “Australopithecus Sediba: Another Relative We Never Had,” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=2872.

Darwin, Charles (1956 edition), The Origin of Species (London: J.M. Dent & Sons).

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Montagu, Ashley (1957), Man: His First Two Million Years (Yonkers, NY: World Publishers).

Pickering, Robyn, Paul H.G.M. Dirks, Zubair Jinnah, Darryl J. de Ruiter, Steven E. Churchill, Andy I.R. Herries, Jon D. Woodhead, John C. Hellstrom, and Lee R. Berger (2011), “Australopithecus sediba at 1.977 Ma and Implications for the Origins of the Genus Homo,” Science, 333[6048]:1421-1423, September 9.

Potter, Ned (2011), “Evolutionary ‘Game Changer’: Fossil May Be Human Ancestor,” ABC News, September 8, http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/fossils-south-africa-called-evolutionary-game-changer/story?id=14474976#.TmouXw8wezs.email.

Schuster, Angela M.H. (2001), “Special Report: Ancient Ancestors?” Archaeology, 54[4]:24-25, July/August.

Senut, Brigitte, Martin Pickford, Dominique Gommery, Pierre Mein, Kiptalam Cheboi, Yves Coppens (2001), “First Hominid From the Miocene,” Comptes Rendus de l’Academie des Science, Series IIA-Earth and Planetary Science, 332[2]:137-144, January 30.

Thompson, Bert and Brad Harrub (2002), “No Missing Links Here…,” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=1353.

Thompson, Bert, Brad Harrub, and Eric Lyons (2002), “Human Evolution and the ‘Record of the Rocks,’” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=153.

Zuckerman, Solly (1970), Beyond the Ivory Tower (New York: Taplinger).

The post Australopithecus Sediba: Evolutionary Game Changer? appeared first on Apologetics Press.

The media and the evolutionist-flooded paleontology community are notoriously quick to make grandiose claims about fossil finds when they appear potentially to support the idea of human evolution. As has proven to be the case time and time again, further scientific investigation often elicits retractions by the paleontology community about their initial conclusions concerning fossil finds—and this instance is no exception. However, by the time the appropriate retractions are made, and the initial proclaimers of the error run in the opposite direction with their proverbial tails between their legs, typically throwing the researchers under the bus in an attempt to save themselves, the damage has already been done. New Latin species names have already been designated and printed, people are made famous, and the textbooks have picked up the alleged evidence in support of evolution and printed it. Hardly anyone hears the soft little admission of “whoops” coming from the corner. The media does not want to announce it too loudly, because they are often at fault in spreading the error, and many in the evolutionary community do not want to announce the error too loudly because of the fear of more bad publicity for the false theory of evolution. The loudest proclamations of truth are left to the competitors of the paleontologists (i.e., other paleontologists), who are themselves often biased in one way or another. And, of course, there are the creationists standing on the street corners yelling to all who will hear, “The evidence still supports the creation model. The truth needs no retractions!”

In November of 2010, evolutionary anthropologists Blythe Williams and Richard Kay of Duke University, Chris Kirk, associate professor of anthropology at the University of Texas at Austin, and evolutionary biologist Callum Ross of the University of Chicago, announced the findings of their own research on Ida and responded to the work of Franzen, et al. (Williams, et al.). Their findings? Ida is not a missing link as was claimed. What was Ida? According to this new research, Ida was, in fact, a forebearer of modern-day lemurs and lorises. The authors note that the research of Franzen, et al. “ignores two decades of published research showing that similar fossils [i.e., to the Ida fossil—JM] are actually strepsirrhines, the primate group that includes lemurs and lorises,” according to ScienceDaily, in direct contradiction with the thrust of their article published a year earlier (Public Library of Science, 2010). Chris Kirk unequivocally stated, “Many lines of evidence indicate that Darwinius [i.e., Ida—JM] has nothing at all to do with human evolution” (Public Library of Science, 2010). ScienceDaily, overtly distancing themselves from the conclusions of Franzen, et al., in spite of their clear support of the team’s conclusions a year earlier, note concerning their work: “Anthropologists were immediately skeptical of the conclusions and began writing the responses that are being published this month” (2010). Williams, et al. argue that Ida does not contain key anatomical features that would prove it to be a close relative of haplorhines (i.e., apes, monkeys, humans, and tarsiers), like “a middle ear with two chambers and a plate of bone that shields the eyes from the chewing muscles” (Public Library of Science, 2010). Kirk said, “There is no evidence that Darwinius shared these features with living haplorhines. And if you can’t even make that case, you can forget about Darwinius being a close relative of humans or other anthropoids” (Public Library of Science, 2010).

There is no solid, substantiated evidence in support of the theory of evolution. Even the evolutionists themselves cannot come to an agreement on any of the proposed evidence. Why? Because all of the alleged evidence is a matter of interpretation. The key in scientific investigation is to determine an interpretation of the facts that harmonizes with all of the scientific evidence. When a theory proves itself time and again to be in contradiction with the evidence, the unbiased, scientific response should be to scrap the theory and find a model in keeping with the evidence. The creation model is in keeping with all of the scientific evidence. Why reject it in support of a failed theory? If you believe that the bulk of the evolutionary community will pay any attention to this latest memo casting further doubt on the veracity of evolutionary interpretation techniques, I strongly advise you not to hold your breath as you wait. [NOTE: See Butt, 2009; Lyons, 2009; and Lyons and Butt (2009) for further discussion on the Ida fossil]

REFERENCES

Butt, Kyle (2009), “Following Up On a Messy, and Still Missing, Link,”Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=2729.

Lyons, Eric (2009), “Ida, One More Time,” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=2726.

Lyons, Eric and Kyle Butt (2009), “Ida—A Missing Link?” Apologetics Press, http://www.apologeticspress.org/apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=347.

Franzen, Jens L., Philip D. Gingerich, Jorg Habersetzer, Jorn H. Hurum, Wighart von Koenigswald, B. Holly Smith (2009), “Complete Primate Skeleton from the Middle Eocene of Messel in Germany: Morphology and Paleobiology,” PLoS ONE, 4[5]:e5723, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0005723.

Public Library of Science (2009), “Common Ancestor of Humans, Modern Primates? ‘Extraordinary’ Fossil Is 47 Million Years Old,” ScienceDaily, May 19, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519104643.htm.

Public Library of Science (2010), “‘Missing Link’ Fossil Was Not Human Ancestor as Claimed, Anthropologists Say,” ScienceDaily, March 2, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100302131719.htm.

Williams, Blythe A., Richard F. Kay, E. Christopher Kirk, and Callum F. Ross (2010), “Darwinius Masillae Is a Strepsirrhine—A Reply to Franzen et al. (2009),” Journal of Human Evolution, 29[5]:567-573, November.

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Who or what was Peking Man?

A:

If it is true that human beings are the latest product in a long line of evolutionary ancestors that were part human and part ape-like creature, there should be clear and decisive evidence in the fossil record to substantiate it. Billions of fossils should exist that illustrate the evolutionary progression of man from alleged ape-like ancestors. However, as we have conclusively proven elsewhere (cf. Harrub and Thompson, 2003; Thompson, et al., 2002), such evidence is lacking. As Colin Patterson, the late paleontologist, admitted several years ago, try though they might, with over a century of fossil searching by evolutionists, “there is not one…[transitional—JM] fossil for which one could make a watertight argument” (as quoted in Sunderland, 1984, p. 89). The elusive Peking Man is no exception.

Wikipedia (Mutt) 2011	Alleged replica of missing Peking Man skull

In the 1920s and 30s, a few fossils were discovered near Beijing, China, which evolutionists believed were the remains of a transitional creature they dubbed Peking Man. Evolutionists were quick to call the fossils proof of transitional creatures on the road to “modern” man and proof of evolution—dating the fossils from between 300,000 and 800,000 years ago. However, scientists have found conflicting evidence from the same site. In 1933 several fossils of “modern” humans were also discovered, who were not supposed to be on the scene yet (“Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian,” 2011; “The Peking Man…,” 2011). Bottom line: though many evolutionists, in their desperation, still point to Peking Man as proof of evolution, there is literally no evidence to substantiate their claims. In 1941, the fossils mysteriously went missing. Gao Xing, a paleontologist and member of the Working Committee to Search for the Lost Skullcaps of Peking Man, said, “We don’t know where the bones are. They may well have been destroyed. But we have to look” (Melvin, 2005). How ironic it is, that the more evolution is examined, the more its alleged evidence goes mysteriously missing.

REFERENCES

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Melvin, Sheila (2005), “Archaeology: Peking Man, Still Missing and Missed,” The New York Times: Healthscience, http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/10/health/10iht-melvin.html.

Sunderland, Luther D. (1984), Evolution’s Enigma (San Diego, CA: Master Books).

“Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian” (2011), United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization: World Heritage Convention, http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/449.

“The Peking Man World Heritage Site at Zhoukoudian” (2011), Unesco and World Heritage Patrimoinemondial, http://www.unesco.org/ext/field/beijing/whc/pkm-site.htm.

Thompson, Bert, Brad Harrub, and Eric Lyons (2002), “Human Evolution and the ‘Record of the Rocks,’” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/apPubPage.aspx?pub=1&issue=529.

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Heidelberg Man, named Homo heidelbergensis, was based on a single jawbone (known as the “Mauer Jaw”) discovered near Heidelberg in Germany in 1907 by Daniel Hartmann (Raymond, 1947, pp. 280-281; Foley, 2001). The fossil was recognized by Hartmann to be very human-like, though bigger and more “robust” (Foley, 2001). Concerning Heidelberg Man, Donald Johanson, American paleoanthropologist and discoverer of the famous “Lucy” fossil, explained that Hartmann, like the founders of other famous fossils, thought his “fossil was something special, deserving at least a distinct species name,” even though “[h]is finder recognized that he was a man” (Johanson and Edey, 1981, p. 36, emp. added). In spite of the jawbone’s strong similarity to a human jawbone, Hartmann decided to give its owner a special name and put him in “a species of his own” (Johanson, p. 36), thus giving him immediate notoriety and giving evolutionists immediate glee.

Observe, however, that just because a fossil is a little bigger does not mean it is not a human. If paleontologists recognize the fossil to be very man-like, only bigger, why not just call it a big man? The popular atheistic website, TalkOrigins, even notes that Homo heidelbergensis is also known by some evolutionists as Homo sapiens, but an “archaic” version (Foley). One has to wonder what the late wrestler, Andre the Giant’s, or Goliath’s jawbone (1 Samuel 17:4) would look like beside a “modern” human jawbone. Should Andre have been designated Homo heidelbergensis instead of Homo sapiens because of his size?

Consider: why might evolutionists be so reluctant to admit that Heidelberg Man is simply a big, “modern” man? Could it possibly be that they are so desperate to find transitional fossils that their fossil finds tend to be tainted and interpreted in such a way as to support their agenda? This would explain why the discovery of a single jawbone could cause such elation and ultimately unsubstantiated claims, especially by evolutionists in the news media. The claim that a “missing link” fossil has been found and evolution has been further proved is quickly spread far and wide, when in actuality, a single human-like jawbone creates quite a meager case as a transitional fossil in support of evolutionary theory. Might evolutionists also refuse to admit that Heidelberg was a simple, “modern” man because such a being could not have existed in the time period they believe Heidelberg Man lived, according to their assumed evolutionary timelines? Regardless of the reason, the result is that the bulk of the scientific community exhibits a bias against alternate, plausible interpretations of the fossil evidence (e.g., the creation perspective on fossil finds) due to their unfounded assumption that the Creation model is somehow not scientific. Such alternatives are not even considered. Instead of being open-minded in drawing conclusions from the scientific evidence—allowing it to lead him where it will—the evolutionist interprets all the evidence through tainted lenses. Without such evolutionary bias and assumption in place, the conclusion one would draw upon finding the “Mauer Jaw” would be totally different.

The truth is, God placed a certain amount of potential variation in the human genetic code when He wrote it, as He did in all living beings. That variation allows for differences in bone size and small variations in bone structures as well. But there is no evidence that that variation leads to evolution between kinds. A quick glance at the differences in skull structures of people living today highlights the fact that God made the human anatomy with the potential for small distinctions in skeletal structure. Every species on the planet comes with a variety of shapes and sizes, and yet those differences do not call for species distinctions, and certainly do not prove organic evolution. Humans have always been humans, and humans have always produced humans. Heidelberg Man is just another misnamed “modern” man with a special name.

REFERENCES

Darwin, Charles (1956 edition), The Origin of Species (London: J.M. Dent & Sons).

Foley, Jim (2001), “Heidelberg Man,” http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/mauer.html.

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Johanson, Donald C. and Maitland A. Edey (1981), Lucy: The Beginnings of Humankind (New York: Simon and Schuster).

Raymond, Percy E. (1947), Prehistoric Life (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press).

Thompson, Bert, Brad Harrub, and Eric Lyons (2002), “Human Evolution and the ‘Record of the Rocks,’” Apologetics Press, /apcontent.aspx?category=9&article=153.

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The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been apersistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution (Gould, 1980, 6[1]:127, emp. added).

Colin Patterson, the late paleontologist who served as the editor of the professional journal published by the British Museum of Natural History in London, even conceded:

I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them…. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional forms…. I will it lay it on the line—there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument (Patterson, 1979, 19[8]:8, emp. added).

Thus, it comes as no surprise that the evolutionary community, with the help of the news media, jumps at any mention of a potential transitional fossil find. The media is quick to broadcast the fossil find far and wide–yet without adequate evidence to substantiate the evolutionists’ claims. Perhaps you have heard mention of “Cro-Magnon Man” by evolutionists. Who is Cro-Magnon Man? Are the Cro-Magnon fossils proof of evolution? Are they transitional fossils that provide a “missing link” in the evolution of man from ape-like ancestors?

In 1868, near the village of Les Eyzies in southwestern France, a rock shelter dated to be 23,000-27,000 years old (using evolutionary dating techniques) known as “Abri de Cro-Magnon” was investigated. In it, the first Cro-Magnon fossils were discovered (O’Neil, 2011). According to evolutionists, the fossils were considered to be of “early modern humans,” who “were very similar in appearance to modern Europeans” (O’Neil). Some scientists have decided that the Cro-Magnons “are not sufficiently different enough from modern humans to warrant a separate designation. Scientists today use ‘Anatomically Modern Human’ (AMH) or ‘Early Modern Human’ (EMH) to designate the Upper Paleolithic human beings who looked a lot like us…” (Hirst, 2011). ScienceDaily reports that the Cro-Magnoids were “the first people who had a skeleton that looked anatomically modern” (Public Library of Science, 2008, emp. added). So clearly, according to evolutionists themselves, the Cro-Magnons looked like modern man.

Recent research indicates that the Cro-Magnons were also genetically the same as modern Europeans (Caramelli, et al., 2008). So, if it looks like a modern man anatomically, and if it even looks like a man genetically…what’s the difference? Ultimately, there is no difference. However, according to the theory of evolution, there must be a difference, because the human brain has been a product of evolution. Thus, according to evolutionary thinking, the assumption must be made that humans living thousands of years ago would have been less intelligent and capable, since their brains had not yet fully developed. With this in mind, they define a “modern man” as one who is considered to be more recent. The problem is that there is no evidence that human beings evolved in such a manner. The transitional fossils are lacking. What the evidence indicates is that humans have always been humans. Humans have always been “modern man.” Humans have always had the intelligence to do great things that are not understood even today—from the pyramids of Giza to the Egyptian embalming abilities; from the Paracas civilization of South America who amazingly conducted successful brain surgery over 2,000 years ago (“The Inca…,” 2010), to the Maya astronomers, studying the stars over 1,000 years ago and creating a calendar using a sophisticated gear system of such precision that eclipses could be anticipated and the cycles of the Moon documented with an error of only 33 seconds (“The Maya…,” 2010); from the Moche people, living 1,500 years ago and engineering enormous structures, including the “Temple of the Sun,” constructed with over 140,000,000 adobe bricks (“The Inca…”), to the Nazca people, also living over 1,500 years ago, who developed sophisticated irrigation systems and who made enormous pictures in the ground which are only viewable by air. The lines which comprise the pictures are barely visible at all by ground. These lines—covering some 135 miles—include a 450 feet long bird, an enormous spider, and a killer whale (“The Lost City of Nasca,” 2000; “Nazca Lines and Cahuachi Culture, 2011; “The Inca…”). Historians are at a loss as to how or why these pictures were made. Some have speculated that they were made for extraterrestrials to see from space. Some believe they were for irrigation purposes. In 1975, Jim Woodman built a hot air balloon using materials that the Nazca were believed to have in their day and flew it over the images, illustrating that the Nazca may have been able to fly (“The Inca…”).

The truth is, humans have always been “modern man.” Scientific breakthroughs may be made at different times in history that cause technology to surge forward and give humanity more insight into the created order, but such breakthroughs are not an indication of the evolving brain of mankind. Such breakthroughs are due to the fact that God’s beneficent hand is involved in the affairs of men, causing it to “rain on the just and the unjust” (Matthew 5:45). Bottom line: Cro-Magnon Man is not a missing link. Cro-Magnon Man is just an evolutionary name for a “modern” man. [Note: see Thompson, et al., 2002 for a thorough examination of many of the alleged transitional fossils.]

REFERENCES

Caramelli, D., L. Milani, S. Vai, A. Modi, E. Pecchioli, M. Girardi, et al. (2008), “A 28,000 Years Old Cro-Magnon mtDNA Sequence Differs from All Potentially Contaminating Modern Sequences,” PLoS One, 3[7]:e2700, http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0002700.

Gould, Stephen Jay (1980), “Is a New and General Theory of Evolution Emerging?,” Paleobiology, 6[1]:119-130, Winter.

Hirst, K. Kris (2011), “Why Don’t We Call Them Cro-Magnon Anymore? What Are ‘Anatomically Modern Humans’?,” About.com: Archaeology, http://archaeology.about.com/od/earlymansites/a/cro_magnon.htm.

“The Inca: Secrets of the Ancestors—Part 8” (2010), Time Life’s Lost Civilizations Series, http://www.documentarystream.com/time-lifes-lost-civilizations/.

“The Lost City of Nasca” (2000), BBC Home, http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/1999/nasca.shtml.

“The Maya: The Blood of Kings—Part 7” (2010), Time Life’s Lost Civilizations Series, http://www.documentarystream.com/time-lifes-lost-civilizations/.

“Nasca Lines and Cahuachi Culture” (2011), http://www.crystalinks.com/nazca.html.

O’Neil, Dennis (2011), “Early Modern Homo Sapiens,” Palomar College, http://anthro.palomar.edu/homo2/mod_homo_4.htm.

Patterson, Colin (1979), Letter on April 10, 1979 to Luther Sunderland: reprinted in Bible-Science Newsletter, 19[8]:8, August, 1981.

Public Library of Science (2008), “Europe’s Ancestors: Cro-Magnon 28,000 Years Old Had DNA Like Modern Humans,” ScienceDaily, July 16, http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080715204741.htm.

Thompson, Bert, Brad Harrub, and Eric Lyons (2002), “Human Evolution and the ‘Record of the Rocks,’” Apologetics Press, http://apologeticspress.org/APContent.aspx?category=9&article=153.

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It is a fact that alleged human evolution defies all the known, provable, testable laws of nature (Harrub and Thompson, 2003). This fact has not dissuaded the evolutionary community from parading yet another “human ancestor” before the world. The latest creature has been dubbed Australopithecus sediba, which means “southern ape, wellspring” (Schmid, 2010). Two skeletons, purportedly of a female, in her late 20s or early 30s, and a male, who may have been eight or nine years old, were discovered in a pit in South Africa (2010).

Are these creatures “links” between monkeys and man? Richard Potts stated: “The ‘missing link’ made sense when we could take the earliest fossils and the latest ones and line them up in a row. It was easy back then” (as quoted in Schmid, 2010). But Schmid went on to write: “But now researchers know there was great diversity of branches in the human family tree rather than a single smooth line” (2010, emp. added). [NOTE: Ironically, just last year, the evolutionary community was using the “missing link” terminology to describe Ida. So, Potts’ “back then” was not so far back as he would like us to believe.] In truth, however, researchers know no such thing. The “single smooth line” idea was jettisoned, not because evolutionists learned more about an alleged human-ape ancestry, but because it became impossible to fit the fossils together in a rational way that could be sustained by the evidence. There were so many contradictions, overlapping dates, and incorrect conclusions, the evolutionary “bush” idea was interjected to “keep the dream alive.”

Australopithicus sediba is yet another example of the mess we have been seeing in the past. For instance, the fossils are supposedly dated at 1.95-1.78 million years ago. Yet this date cannot be scientifically validated. The dating methods used to pinpoint such a precise figure are fraught with error, and have been shown to be incorrect (Morris, 1994; DeYoung, 2005). Furthermore, we are told that the creature has a mosaic of primitive and advanced features. One of the “primitive” features is a small brain, but the researchers noted that “the shape of the brain seems to be more advanced than that of Australophithecines” (Schmid, 2010). What, exactly, does an “advanced brain shape” look like? The only way to determine an “advanced” shape would be to assume that humans evolved from apes and then to suggest that anything closer to the human shape is “advanced.” Yet, if researchers are trying to use these fossils to prove that humans are related to apes, they cannot be granted that assumption in order to link humans to apes. In addition, many modern monkeys have “primitive,” small brains. If there are monkeys alive right now that have small brains like the one found, how can such be considered a “primitive” characteristic, without assuming human evolution—the concept that is purportedly being proven.

Furthermore, since only a few of these creatures have been discovered, “there is no way to know if the gene pool died out or was passed on to others” (Schmid, 2010). Basically, then, we are told that we cannot know if these creatures evolved into humans, or if they simply went extinct. Yet if they have such an “advanced brain” and then they died out, where would our “advanced brains” come from—if not from these creatures? You see the way evolutionists cover their tracks. If they do not find means to link this creature to humans in a way that the public will swallow, then they will relegate it to a side branch, so it is not in-line with true human ancestry, and parade another creature before the public in a few months (or weeks at the current rate).

The amount of speculation and lack of substantiation in the field of paleontology is exasperating. Words and phrases such as “may have,” “might show,” “possibly are,” “could probably show,” “there is no way to know for sure, but,” are the tell-tale signs of unsubstantiated opinion that pepper the human-evolution writings like spots on a Dalmatian. Let’s cut through such mealy-mouth jargon and confidently affirm what we know scientifically as fact. Every experiment ever done on life in nature shows that life can come only from previously existing life of its own kind. No known mechanism exists by which genetic information can be added to a single-celled organism in order for it to eventually evolve into a human. Human consciousness defies all evolutionary based explanations, as does human morality. All available scientific, historic, and biblical information forces an honest observer to conclude that humans were created by a supernatural Creator, and they did not evolve from lower mammals. We will keep repeating these truths as long as the evolutionary community keeps trumpeting new “relatives” we never had.

REFERENCES

Butt, Kyle (2009), “Ardi Joins a Long, Infamous List of Losers,” [On-line], URL: http://apologeticspress.org/articles/240241.

Butt, Kyle (2010), “Evolution Wrapped Around the Pinky Finger of Woman X,” [On-line], URL: http://apologeticspress.org/articles/240342.

DeYoung, Don (2005), Thousands…Not Billions (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Harrub, Brad and Bert Thompson (2003), The Truth About Human Origins (Montgomery, AL: Apologetics Press).

Lyons, Eric and Kyle Butt (2009), “Ida—A Missing Link,” [On-line], URL: http://apologeticspress.org/articles/240160.

Morris, John D. (1994), The Young Earth (Green Forest, AR: Master Books).

Schmid, Randolph (2010), “New Fossils May Fit in Gap Between Apes and Humans,” Yahoo!, [On-line], URL: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100408/ap_on_sc/us_sci_new_hominid/print;_ ylt=AhT.dv9Gh0zQIfXB7BQyKz1xieAA;_ylu=X3oDMTBvajZzaTFyBHBvcwMxNQRzZWMDdG9wBH NsawNwcmludA–.

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