The Evidence for Evolution in the Fossil Record

[Guy Threepwood]

Quote-mining is a dishonest tactic:

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution - Richard Dawkins - Google Books

it's not out of context at all, he acknowledges the Cambrian explosion, much of life simply showed up in the record with no apparent ancestors as he stated, not controversial either.

 

[jonathan180iq]

Quote-mining is a dishonest tactic:

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution - Richard Dawkins - Google Books

Glad you said something first...

Here's the entire quote, in context:

• 
  "This great phylum of worms includes the parasitic flukes and tapeworms, which are of great medical importance. My favourites, however, are the free-living tubellarian worms, of which there are more than four thousand species; that’s about as numerous as all the mammal species put together…They are common, both in water and on land, and presumably have been common for a very long time. You’d expect, therefore, to see a rich fossil history. Unfortunately, there is almost nothing. Apart from a handful of ambiguous trace fossils, not a single fossil flatworm has ever been found. The Platyhelminthes, to a worm, are ‘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.’ But in this case, ‘the very first time they appear’ is not the Cambrian but today. Do you see what this means, or at least ought to mean for creationists? Creationists believe that flatworms were created in the same week as all other creatures. They have therefore had exactly the same time in which to fossilise as all other animals. During all the centuries when all those bony or shelly animals were depositing happily alongside them, but without leaving any significant trace of their presence in the rocks. What, then, is so special about gaps in the record of these animals that do fossilise, given that the past history of the flatworms amounts to one big gap: even though the flatworms, by the creationists’ own account, have been living for the same length of time? If the gap before the Cambrian Explosion is used as evidence that most animals suddenly sprang into existence in the Cambrian, exactly the same ‘logic’ should be used to prove that the flatworms sprang into existence yesterday. Yet this contradicts the creationist’s belief that flatworms were created during the same creative week as everything else. You cannot have it both ways. This argument, at a stroke, completely destroys the creationist case that the Precambrian gap in the fossil record weakens the evidence for evolution."

 

[jonathan180iq]

it's not out of context at all, he acknowledges the Cambrian explosion, much of life simply showed up in the record with no apparent ancestors as he stated, not controversial either.

Let's not forget, to those following along at home, that the Cambrian Explosion spans a time frame of tens of millions of years, and the pre-cambrian era was not devoid of life or anything like that...

 

[ImmortalFlame]

it's not out of context at all,

Yes it is. You took a single sentence out of an entire book, without giving the source or the context, to give the impression that Dawkins stated or believes something that he does not believe. That is a dishonest tactic, and I expect a retraction.

he acknowledges the Cambrian explosion, much of life simply showed up in the record with no apparent ancestors as he stated, not controversial either.

That is not what he stated. Read the link I provided and see for yourself. There were ancestors to the species found in the Cambrian explosion. It was not a "sudden appearance of living organisms without apparent ancestors", it was a relatively rapid speciation event that took place over millions of years.

 

[leibowde84]

So who created that something?

That something came from another something. No reason to assume that other something was God or even supernatural.

 

[leibowde84]

it's not out of context at all, he acknowledges the Cambrian explosion, much of life simply showed up in the record with no apparent ancestors as he stated, not controversial either.

That is an extremely misleading way of describing the Cambrian Explosion, which lasted for tens of millions of years. Dawkins also points to possible ancestors, so it really isn't that controversial, if understood correctly.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

sorry id

Yes it is. You took a single sentence out of an entire book, without giving the source or the context, to give the impression that Dawkins stated or believes something that he does not believe. That is a dishonest tactic, and I expect a retraction.


That is not what he stated. Read the link I provided and see for yourself. There were ancestors to the species found in the Cambrian explosion. It was not a "sudden appearance of live without ancestors", it was a relatively rapid speciation event that took place over millions of years.

His quote not mine, not really practical to quote the entire book here... but of course I don't think this was an admission of being a closet skeptic!
But he does state the unambiguous, uncontroversial observation that phylum largely appeared suddenly in the fossil record, without direct evolutionary history in a geological blink of an eye. There's no way around this observation- It's a great point of debate among all scientists- skeptics of evolution or not
Of course he defends this with a litany of excuses for the lack of transitional fossils.. which is fine, but excuses do not serve in lieu of missing evidence do they?, no matter how good- even if you CAN prove your dog ate your homework, it doesn't entitle you to a passing grade, the burden of proof is still on you.

 

[leibowde84]

sorry id

His quote not mine, not really practical to quote the entire book here... but of course I don't think this was an admission of being a closet skeptic!
But he does state the unambiguous, uncontroversial observation that phylum largely appeared suddenly in the fossil record, without direct evolutionary history in a geological blink of an eye. There's no way around this observation- It's a great point of debate among all scientists- skeptics of evolution or not
Of course he defends this with a litany of excuses for the lack of transitional fossils.. which is fine, but excuses do not serve in lieu of missing evidence do they?, no matter how good- even if you CAN prove your dog ate your homework, it doesn't entitle you to a passing grade, the burden of proof is still on you.

I think the most reasonable excuse would be "we just haven't found those fossils yet"? Unless one were under the incredibly ignorant view that all fossils have been unearthed, this should be a go-to assumption.

 

[ImmortalFlame]

His quote not mine,

... That YOU took out of context to intentionally misrepresent him.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

not really practical to quote the entire book here...

You don't have to quote an entire book in order to give context and link to a source. If you'll notice, I managed to do just that when I posted the link that demonstrated that you were quote-mining.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

But he does state the unambiguous, uncontroversial observation that phylum largely appeared suddenly in the fossil record, without direct evolutionary history in a geological blink of an eye.

No he does not, and that is not "uncontroversial observation". That's what's called a lie.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

There's no way around this observation- It's a great point of debate among all scientists- skeptics of evolution or not

On the contrary, there is a very easy way around it: it's not true.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

Of course he defends this with a litany of excuses for the lack of transitional fossils.. which is fine, but excuses do not serve in lieu of missing evidence do they?

Changing the subject does nothing to diminish your blatant and proven dishonesty.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

no matter how good- even if you CAN prove your dog ate your homework, it doesn't entitle you to a passing grade, the burden of proof is still on you.

Non-sequiturs won't help you either.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

I think the most reasonable excuse would be "we just haven't found those fossils yet"? Unless one were under the incredibly ignorant view that all fossils have been unearthed, this should be a go-to assumption.

it's certainly the go- to argument from the gaps, to be happy with not understanding how it happened

 

[Guy Threepwood]

... That YOU took out of context to intentionally misrepresent him.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.


You don't have to quote an entire book in order to give context and link to a source. If you'll notice, I managed to do just that when I posted the link that demonstrated that you were quote-mining.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.


No he does not, and that is not "uncontroversial observation". That's what's called a lie.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.


On the contrary, there is a very easy way around it: it's not true.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.


Changing the subject does nothing to diminish your blatant and proven dishonesty.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.


Non-sequiturs won't help you either.

I'm still awaiting your retraction.

Not sure which phrase you are referring to,

do you mean when Dawkins said about the Cambrian fossil record- "It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history"?

 

[leibowde84]

it's certainly the go- to argument from the gaps, to be happy with not understanding how it happened

Not sure where you got that erroneous misclassification of my point, but I'll try to make it more simple for you. I in no way mean that anyone should be "happy with not understanding". That is ridiculous. I am saying that the absense of fossils proving an aspect of evolution would much more reasonably be attributed to fossils not having yet been discovered than the entirety of evolution being flawed.

 

[Guy Threepwood]

Not sure where you got that erroneous misclassification of my point, but I'll try to make it more simple for you. I in no way mean that anyone should be "happy with not understanding". That is ridiculous. I am saying that the absense of fossils proving an aspect of evolution would much more reasonably be attributed to fossils not having yet been discovered than the entirety of evolution being flawed.

well I was paraphrasing the Dawkins quote about religion that started this discourse just for fun..

But it's been >120 years since Darwin noted the sudden appearances in the fossil record, and the same thing was said then, the transitionals will show up eventually...

similarly it was considered much more reasonable to attribute anomalies in the motions of planets and wavelengths of light to incomplete measurements, rather than suggest the entirety of classical physics was flawed.

Only this resistance is far greater with evolution

 

[jonathan180iq]

You don't even have to follow the link... I've pasted the entire paragraph in my above post.

Here is a second reference to Dawkins talking about his intent of that quote and how often it has been incorrectly referenced by Creationists. (For the record, turns out 80% of the google searches on that sentence from his book turned out to be quote-mined)

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution - Richard Dawkins - Google Books

Read the bottom half of page 147, and all of page 148.

 

[jonathan180iq]

But it's been >120 years since Darwin noted the sudden appearances in the fossil record, and the same thing was said then, the transitionals will show up eventually...

Darwin's original intent and understanding of Transitional forms was not up the standard that we have today. He was a pioneer, not an unquestionable expert on the entire process. Why this argument keeps coming up, as if only Darwin could understand evolution fully, is really weak.

similarly it was considered much more reasonable to attribute anomalies in the motions of planets and wavelengths of light to incomplete measurements, rather than suggest the entirety of classical physics was flawed.

Not sure what you're saying here.
Physics isn't flawed. We do wobble and oscillate. Physics helps us understand how much and why. Similarly, Evolutionary theory isn't flawed. Contrarily, it helps us understand how and why certain voids in the record would exist.

 

[leibowde84]

well I was paraphrasing the Dawkins quote about religion that started this discourse just for fun..

But it's been >120 years since Darwin noted the sudden appearances in the fossil record, and the same thing was said then, the transitionals will show up eventually...

similarly it was considered much more reasonable to attribute anomalies in the motions of planets and wavelengths of light to incomplete measurements, rather than suggest the entirety of classical physics was flawed.

Only this resistance is far greater with evolution

You are saying that the "resistance to evolution" in the scientific community is "far greater" than those that contended that the "entirety of classical physics was flawed"? Was the entirety of classical physics proved false?

 

[leibowde84]

Darwin's original intent and understanding of Transitional forms was not up the standard that we have today. He was a pioneer, not an unquestionable expert on the entire process. Why this argument keeps coming up, as if only Darwin could understand evolution fully, is really weak.



Not sure what you're saying here.
Physics isn't flawed. We do wobble and oscillate. Physics helps us understand how much and why. Similarly, Evolutionary theory isn't flawed. Contrarily, it helps us understand how and why certain voids in the record would exist.

That's what I thought. I've never heard of "the entirety of Classical Physics" being falsified. Was that just made up?

 

[leibowde84]

well I was paraphrasing the Dawkins quote about religion that started this discourse just for fun..

But it's been >120 years since Darwin noted the sudden appearances in the fossil record, and the same thing was said then, the transitionals will show up eventually...

similarly it was considered much more reasonable to attribute anomalies in the motions of planets and wavelengths of light to incomplete measurements, rather than suggest the entirety of classical physics was flawed.

Only this resistance is far greater with evolution

Honestly, I don't think it is reasonable to think we will ever find all of the fossils necessary to fill in the gaps in the fossil record, proving evolution beyond a doubt. It shouldn't be necessary though. An inference can be made without a 100% clear picture.

 

[jonathan180iq]

That's what I thought. I've never heard of "the entirety of Classical Physics" being falsified. Was that just made up?

I honestly have no idea what he meant, so I assume so.

 

[jonathan180iq]

Honestly, I don't think it is reasonable to think we will ever find all of the fossils necessary to fill in the gaps in the fossil record, proving evolution beyond a doubt. It shouldn't be necessary though. An inference can be made without a 100% clear picture.

I don't have to see $1,000,000 in order to know it exists so long as 1+1=2. When I have all but a handful of numbers, following the same theoretical pattern, I can pretty much bank on that pattern being accurate for other areas of math, right?