Posted on 02/01/2013 11:10:25 AM PST by fishtank
Another Cambrian Discovery Discredits Evolution by Jeffrey Tomkins, Ph.D. *
A fossil creature from the phylum Entoprocta (invertebrate animals that have tentacles and lacking a mineralized skeleton) was found in marked abundance (over 400 individuals) in Burgess Shale. The Burgess is a sedimentary layer that's purportedly part of the Cambrian period about a half-billion years ago, according to evolutionists.1 The problem for paleontologists is that the supposedly 520 million year old creature looks exactly like its living counterparts, only up to 8 eight times larger.
The Cambrian geologic system is an enigma for the evolutionary paradigm. If evolution is true, life would have started out simple and then evolved in complexity over time. The Cambrian system is one of the oldest geological layers containing billions of sophisticated fossils, supposedly formed after the Precambrian system. The Precambrian layers contain "simple" single-celled life, but also have jellyfish and annelids (worms).
In the Cambrian system, the fossils represent an explosion of complex multicellular life forms—hence the term "Cambrian Explosion." The problem for evolution is that the Cambrian explosion occurs suddenly with no transitional forms preceding it. Furthermore, many of the types of fossils found in the Cambrian layer are represented by modern organisms, such as entoprocts, that are alive and well today. For a summary of the Cambrian geological system and Burgess Shale, see the excellent review by Dr. John Morris in Acts & Facts.2
This species of entoproct, Cotyledion tylodes, was identified previously, but the specimens were not well preserved and difficult to characterize. The discovery of hundreds of new extremely well preserved fossils in much older strata was a huge surprise. Another shock was the extremely well defined detail of the fossil's mouth, anus, and digestive tract, proving that the previous classification of C. tylodes as a cnidarian (a jellyfish-like creature) was wrong. In fact, not only was the creature postulated to be much older than previously estimated, it was incredibly more complex.
Interestingly, the fossils of C. tylodes also appear to have somewhat more complex features than modern entoprocts. Unlike living entoprocts, the stem and flowerlike feeding cup of the "ancient" version was covered by tiny hardened protuberances (sclerites), and the creatures were much larger.
Clearly, a majority of the fossil record was formed as a result of the year-long global Flood recorded in Genesis, making it one of evolution's greatest enemies.3 The original diversity of organisms were created by God to reproduce "after their kind," which is why fossils like the entoproct are complex, fully formed, and similar to their modern living counterparts.
References
Pappas, S. 2013. 500-Million-Year-Old Animal Looked Like a Tulip. LiveScience. Posted on livescience.com, January 17, 2013, accessed January 23, 2013.
Morris, J. 2008. The Burgess Shale and Complex Life. Acts & Facts. 37 (10): 13.
Morris, J. and F. Sherwin. 2010. The Fossil Record: Unearthing the History of Life. Dallas, TX: Institute for Creation Research.
Image credit: Copyright © 2013 LiveScience. Adapted for use in accordance with federal copyright (fair use doctrine) law. Usage by ICR does not imply endorsement of copyright holders.
* Dr. Tomkins is a Research Associate and received his Ph.D. in Genetics from Clemson University.
Article posted on January 30, 2013.
The premise of this article is flawed. The conclusions are equally flawed.
These “scientists” found 400 examples. Since they did not also find any in the line preceding these examples, they are obviously part a big conspiracy to undermine God.
Isn’t that how it goes?
How dare they not discover fossils of every creature to have every lived half a billion years ago!!! amirite?
The premise is false. We still have bacteria and other single-celled organisms. Evolution does not result in more complex organisms, it results in organisms that are better at surviving in their ecological niche, though the mechanism of less-capable organisms dying off. An organism that does well-enough in its niche will stay mostly unchanged.
....and tomorrow, millions of scientists will go to work and add thousands of new data points that support a world and a universe older than 6,000 years....
Junk non-science in copious largesse.
The Pre-Cambrian resulted an an amazing variety of experimental multi-lateral body arrangements, whereas an intervening major extinction event/s resulted in the loss of the diversity and the survival of a preference fr the bilateral symmetry. The article is painfully false in its many assertions.
If evolution were true, by now they'd look like this:
The premise is accurate if you are discussing Darwinian evolution.
Also, the point is the lack of transitional forms supporting Darwinian e.
When a lifeform becomes successful there is no need for it to evolve any more. Size can be accounted for by availability of food sources and numbers of the creatures competing for them.
Since God created them, I'm sure He will explain it all to us someday.
There are a bazillion transitional forms supporting evolution. Look at the near-complete sequence we have for the evolution of horses, or the now much more complete sequence we have for whales (including whales with legs, whales with vestigal legs, to whales with internal leg remnants, etc.)
Of course the problem is:
Creationist: There's no transitional fossil between A and C!
Paleontologist: I just found B, which is transitional between A and C.
Creationist: Now there's no transitional fossil between A and B, OR B and C! Evolution is disproven!
> Maybe, bur evolution is still a bunch of bullshit..,
the fossils found are NOT the only examples of extremely ancient fossils with extremely close cousins living today
“evolution” theory is not ONLY about some species having “evolved” from some earlier apparently different species, it also is about why some species (or some members of a species) change very little or not at all over long periods of time
if the premise of the article (its assumption of what evolution theory was saying) was true, then no ancient life form would have any extremely close relatives living today (all species “evolve” into something else and disappear), and no living life forms would have any extremely close relatives in ancient fossil records, at least not in any recognizable form (too “evolved” today to recognize the relationships) - but (1) that is not a premise of evolution theory and (2) neither of those conditions are true
now, on the lighter side
whera are all our great pranksters, for comments on the anatomy of the fossilized creature shown in the artistic rendering of it
[PapaBear3625:] The premise is false. We still have bacteria and other single-celled organisms. Evolution does not result in more complex organisms, it results in organisms that are better at surviving in their ecological niche, though the mechanism of less-capable organisms dying off. An organism that does well-enough in its niche will stay mostly unchanged.
The premise is accurate if you are discussing Darwinian evolution.
What PapaBear3625 posted sounds thoroughly Darwinian to me. Do you have a quotation of Darwin where he says life always evolves toward greater complexity?
What is that zipper hiding? Do we really want to know?
Should we pull down its genes, and see what is hiding inside?
I want answers, Mister!
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Why they move the outhouse next to the playground?
"It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent on each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; inheritance which is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and direct action of the external conditions of life, and from use and disuse; a Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."
Characterizing neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory in a way that restricts it to the particular mechanism of adaptation rather than, say, a change in gene frequencies is also a false premise.
Cordially,
Objection. "Successful" and "no need" entail an implication of purpose and direction that is entirely absent from the biological definition of changes in the heritable characteristics of a population over time.
Size can be accounted for by availability of food sources and numbers of the creatures competing for them.
Diet is not evolution either.
Cordially,
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