A bone to pick: Missing link is evolutionists' weakest

It has been said that if anyone wants to see something badly enough, they can see anything, in anything. Such was the case recently, but unlike some ghostly visage of the Madonna in a coffee stain, this was a vision of our ancestral past in the form of one recently discovered prehistoric skull, dubbed Sahelanthropus tchadensis.

Papers across the globe heralded the news with great fanfare. With words like "scientists hailed" and "startling find" sprinkled into the news coverage, who couldn't help but think evolutionists had finally found their holy grail of missing links?

For those of us with more than a passing interest in such topics as, "Where did we come from? And how did we get here?," this recent discovery and its subsequent coverage fall far short of its lofty claims. A healthy criticism is in order.

Practically before the fossil's discoverer, the French paleoanthropologist Michel Brunet, could come out of the heat of a Chadian desert, a number of his evolutionary colleagues had questioned his conclusions.

In spite of the obvious national pride, Brigitte Senut of the Natural History of Paris sees Brunet's skull as probably that of an ancient female gorilla and not the head of man's earliest ancestor. While looking at the same evidence, such as the skull's flattened face and shorter canine teeth, she draws a completely different conclusion.

Of course, one might be inclined to ask why such critiques never seem to get the same front-page coverage? It's also important to point out that throughout history, various species, such as cats, have had varying lengths of canine teeth. That does not make them any closer to evolving into another species.

A Washington Post article goes on to describe this latest fossil as having human-like traits, such as tooth enamel thicker than a chimpanzee's. This apparently indicates that it did not dine exclusively on the fruit diet common to apes. But apes don't dine exclusively on fruit; rather, their diet is supplemented with insects, birds, lizards and even the flesh of monkeys. The article attempted to further link this fossil to humans by stating that it probably walked upright. Never mind the fact that no bones were found below the head! For all we know, it could have had the body of a centaur, but that would hardly stop an overzealous scientist (or reporter) from trying to add a little meat to these skimpy bones. Could it not simply be a primate similar to today's Bonobo? For those not keeping track of their primates, Bonobos (sp. Pan paniscus) are chimpanzee-like creatures found only in the rain forests of Zaire. Their frame is slighter than that of a chimpanzee's and their face does not protrude as much. They also walked upright about 5 percent of the time. Sound familiar?

Whether it is tooth enamel, length of canines or the ability to walk upright, none of these factors makes this recent discovery any more our ancestral candidate than it does a modern-day Bonobo.

So why does every new fossil discovery seem to get crammed into some evolutionary scenario? Isn't it possible to simply find new, yet extinct, species? The answer, of course, is yes; but there is great pressure to prove evolution.

That leads us to perhaps the most troubling and perplexing aspect of this latest evolutionary hoopla. While on one hand sighting the evolutionary importance of this latest discovery, a preponderance of these articles leave the notion that somehow missing links are not all that important any more.

According to Harvard anthropologist Dan Lieberman, missing links are pretty much myths. That might be a convenient conclusion for those who have been unable to prove evolution via the fossil record. Unfortunately for them, links are absolutely essential to evolution. It is impossible for anything to evolve into another without a linear progression of these such links.

The prevailing evolutionary view of minute changes, over millions of years, is wholly inadequate for the explanation of such a critical piece of basic locomotion as the ball-and-socket joint. Until such questions can be resolved, superficial similarities between various species are not going to prove anything. No matter how bad someone wants to see it.

Farmer is a professional artist living in Houston. He can can be contacted via his Web site, www.theglobalzoo.com

That's something that always struck me about evolution and eventually led me to my skepticism. The burden to prove should be on the one holding a theory, not on the one disputing it.

Yes, you're right. As we've pointed out many times, theories aren't literally "proven," but if they're accepted by scientists as useful models, they must explain the existing evidence, and they must survive experimental efforts to dis-prove them. You might think of the burden more accurately as the burden of coming forward with the evidence to support the theory, which is why Darwin amassed as much evidence as he could in his day and reported it in his published work. And of course, in the 150 years since, mountains of additional evidence have been piled up, all consistent with the theory. Are there areas where the evidence is thin? Sure. This is inevitable in any endeavour to find evidence about past events. But evolution does very well in meeting its burden of proof, as any respectable theory must.

The problem in that regard is with the "creation scientists," who have zero credible evidence. Their so-called theory is not a scientific theory at all.

You have closed your mind. You are treating common descent and "macro-evolution" -- by which I do not mean speciation but the change into a new (at least ) family classification -- as an axiom. That's what I object to.

The evidence I have seen so far is consistent with common descent from some very simple start. I'm unaware of a better fit, especially one which has any sort of common-sense, ordinary-experience foundation.

Common descent may not have happened. In fact, I can not see how it could have happened. A few weeks back I was reading about an abiogenesist who is now claiming life sprang from three seperate abiogenetically formed organisms. So much for the common-descent united front among naturalists.

You distort Woese. Before you're so sure he helps you, you need to learn what he says. He's saying that cellular organization may have been invented three independent times by precellular life (RNA world) rather as eyes have been independently invented several times. The three separate types of cellulars (archaea, prokaryotes, and eukaryotes) still exhibit the telltale signs of common descent. So much for your argument from distortion.

As far as macro-evolution goes, I wouldn't be surprised if it -- in its broadest meaning -- wasn't a factor in Earth's biodiversity.

You have no other explanation except for a magical being (or maybe little green men) running around making separate critters. That such a thing would not surprise you is unaccountable.

But, here's the difference, I wouldn't be surprised if if wasn't either.

Did you mean to say earlier that you wouldn't be surprised if it was? But your mental block wouldn't let you say it on either branch of your decision tree. Tsk! Tsk! It's that same horror that prevented anyone but No-Kin-To-Monkeys from trying to reason out a problem with evo logic last spring. You failed dismally there. No-Kin was revealed to be somebody's--but whose?--alter-ego, so his credentials as a real C are in question.

As Max noted, macro-evolution has never been observed.

Taxonomic orders do not spring up from nothing in a few years. We should not expect to have observed such a thing in the time we've been looking. Pakicetus and Ambulocetus were too related to be placed in a separate order from each other. Ditto Ambulocetus and Rhodocetus. There was already a separate order Cetacea when those fossils were found, however. In the extant species, it's easy to group all those completely marine-aquatic mammals as there are no ambiguous cases to consider. But what would Linnaeus have made of Ambulocetus? Pakicetus?

It starts with speciation. That diverges two lineages, never to rejoin. Later on, their descendants are classed in a separate genus. Later on, it's at the family level. Later on, they're in separate orders. E-siders explain this stuff over and over but you guys keep coming back dumb as a stump. That's your main weapon. No one can make you understand what evolution even says. The strawmen versions are easier to knock over.

Now the reason could be simply that it has never been observed. Or the reason could be that it can't happen.

It can't happen between 1859 and 2002. Capeesh?

Go back and read posts 928 and 930. They are dang near rants.

I'm on the verge of another one.

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