Biblical Creation vs. Evolution

[nChrist]

AMEN AND AMEN PASTOR ROGER!

THANKS BROTHER for posting some fascinating articles of PROOF!

[Soldier4Christ]

"Missing Link" Is Missing Some Parts
by Frank Sherwin, M.A.*

On the heels of other "missing link" stories comes an Associated Press (AP) report on a "365-million-year-old" fossil uncovered in Latvia. Ventastega curonica is supposedly "the most primitive four-legged creature in Earth's history."1 Evolutionists are excited because they believe it is an evolutionary link from fish to tetrapods. However, like virtually all fossil discoveries, this one is incomplete--and an apparent "evolutionary dead-end."

The skull, shoulders, and part of the pelvis of this alleged water-dweller were unearthed and described in detail in a June 2008 issue of Nature. However, one should keep in mind that Darwinists "don't think four-legged creatures are directly evolved from Ventastega."2 Indeed, much of this news story is speculative. Lead author Per Ahlberg was quoted as saying, "I imagine this is an animal that could haul itself over sand banks without any difficulty."2 There is an obvious danger in making an imagination-based observation regarding a scientific discovery. Creation scientists would never be forgiven for this kind of assumption.

University of Chicago biologist Neil Shubin, who was not part of the study, remarked, "Ventastega is the most primitive of these transitional animals, but there are older ones that are oddly more advanced."1 Is evolution going forwards and backwards? It would seem that evolution is so plastic that there's nothing this philosophy cannot do.

Also, why has this been given "transitional" status when it does not have any transitional features, such as a half-fin/half-foot? This is supposedly a key point in "the evolutionary transition from fish to animals that eventually walked on land."1 A big problem with this assertion is that they found "limbs, not fins!"1 Evolutionists have yet to find a fossil that documents a fish with quasi-feet where their fins used to be.3 Indeed, the author of the AP report admitted, "One question that scientists are trying to figure out is why fish started to develop what would later become legs."1 That is a good question.

Another question would be why those fish with transitional "flegs" were not quickly eaten by their more fit fully-finned friends. This is just one more evolutionary roadblock: how could such awkward intermediate stages survive amidst their specialized neighbors? Being at a disadvantage, natural selection would cull out these individuals.

"Even though Ventastega is likely an evolutionary dead-end, the finding sheds new details on the evolutionary transition from fish to tetrapods," the AP report stated.2 However, since this extinct creature, being a "dead-end," was not even in the imagined mammalian lineage, all this finding really does is serve as a platform for evolutionary imagination and provide another opportunity to reiterate evolutionary dogma. The use of words such as "probably," "likely," "seem," "deduce," and "theorizes" reveals the speculative nature of the reports surrounding this incomplete fossil find.

The reports also exclude the possibility that there were no evolutionary transitions at all. More than a century of fervent searching has not revealed the hundreds of clear examples of gradually morphing transitional forms that Darwin's theory predicts.

What do creation scientists make of the "evolutionary dead-end" Ventastega? We would call it an extinct animal with no half-fins, just fully-formed, functional feet--and therefore, no transitional features and no evidence supporting macroevolution.

References

   1. Borenstein, S. Fossil of primitive 4-limbed creature found. Associated Press, June 25, 2008.
   2. Ahlberg, P. E. et al. 2008. Ventastega curonica and the origin of tetrapod morphology. Nature 453: 1199-1204.
   3. Sherwin, F. Tiktaalik: Our Ancestor? News. ICR.org. Posted April 11, 2006.

[Soldier4Christ]

GIANT HYENAS AND OLDEST GOAT FOUND according to a report in BBC News Online, 31 Oct 2007.

Palaeontologists in Fonelas in the Granada region of southern Spain have found a "vast fossil hoard" containing about 4,000 fossils including 24 species of large mammal, eight species of small mammal, two species of reptile and one species of bird. Some of the animals are large creatures that no longer live in Europe, including giant hyenas, sabre-toothed cats, mammoths, an Asian wolf, lynx, zebras, gazelles and a giraffe resembling the modern day okapi. Among the European animals are wild boars and "the oldest goat ever found and the earliest badger discovered in Europe." The bones are remarkably well preserved. Alfonso Arribas, who directed the excavation, said the animals had been scavenged by giant hyenas, discarded and then rapidly buried. The palaeontologists claim the region where the fossils were found was a "crossroads where European animals mixed with species from Africa and Asia." The fossils are believed to be 1.8 million years old and are being exhibited at the Archaeological Museum of Cartagena in Spain.

ED. COM. A massive fossil graveyard containing well preserved, but chewed on animal bones from creatures that are now either extinct, smaller, or less widespread, is powerful evidence that the world was once a better place to live with a more even climate.

The fact that the oldest goat and earliest European badger are the same as living goats and badgers is evidence that since the time these rocks were laid down, these animals have reproduced after their kind - just as Genesis said they would.

[Soldier4Christ]

National Geographic's Flatfish Story Falls Flat
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Evolutionists are praising research recently conducted on flatfish fossils, and one banner publication went a bold step further in claiming that the find contradicts intelligent design and creation arguments.

National Geographic posted the story1 based on Chicago paleontologist Matt Friedman's research on the "incomplete orbital transit" of two flatfish fossils found in northern Italy.2 One of the fossilized fish, Heteronectes, has one eye in the middle of one side of its skull and the other eye near the top of the other side. Some scientists believe that the finds represent evolutionary transitions from fish with eyes on either side of their heads to flatfish such as the flounder.

NG News writer Anne Minard stated, "Intelligent design advocates often cite the relative scarcity of transitional species in the fossil record as evidence of the intentional creation of species….The new discovery, however, is unlikely to change the minds of many creationists."1

Before the publication of her article, Minard spoke to zoologist and ICR science lecturer Frank Sherwin, who called Friedman's findings "underwhelming."

"We have no problem with the variation within flatfish. What we're asking is, Show me how a fish came from a nonfish ancestor," Sherwin said.

Minard failed to answer Sherwin's challenge, focusing instead on Friedman's arguments: "Fossils from excavations in northern Italy and Paris revealed that the intermediate specimens once lived together with flatfishes having both eyes on one side of the skull, [Friedman] said. It's possible that the more modern forms eventually outcompeted the intermediate versions, he added."1

It is also possible that there were no intermediate versions at all, just extinct variations within the created flatfish kind. It is well-known that these fish show a wide range of adaptation—more than the other vertebrates.3 Larval flatfish undergo a unique transformation whereby one eye (and its socket, etc.) migrates over the top of its skull to the other side, so the adults have both eyes on one side of the skull.

Transitional forms would possess true transitional features such as half scales, half feathers, or half feet/ half wings, not merely eye displacement. The absence of transitions in the fossil record remains strong evidence against evolutionary origins.4

Friedman's research reveals additional reasons why these fossils may not represent transitional forms. In Nature, Freidman refers to "the sudden appearance of anatomically modern pleuronectiform [flatfish] groups in the Palaeogene period."2 Thus, these newly-discovered forms were found in the same rock layers with the fish they allegedly evolved into! If they were transitional, they should be in rock layers above regular fish but below flatfish.

He then concludes, "Stem representatives…have yet to be identified for many acanthomorph clades, but their recognition might prove invaluable in delivering a stable hypothesis of interrelationships for this exceptional vertebrate radiation" (emphasis added).2 Is this not an admission that the evolutionary hypothesis ("vertebrate radiation") is not stable, and that transitional forms ("stem representatives") are so lacking that the discovery of a genuine one would be "invaluable"?

It is unfathomable that a large, reputable media group like National Geographic would claim that this evidence contradicts origin by design. Clearly, this fish is no help for evolution because it is not transitional. Its features could easily have been intentionally designed—provided that we allow a Creator into the realm of possible causes.

References

   1. Minard, A. Odd Fish Find Contradicts Intelligent-Design Argument. National Geographic News. Posted online July 9, 2008, accessed July 9, 2008.
   2. Friedman, M. 2008. The evolutionary origin of flatfish asymmetry. Nature. 454: 209-212.
   3. Colbert, E. et al. 2001. Colbert's Evolution of the Vertebrates. New York: Wiley-Liss, 71.
   4. Gish, D. 2006. Evolution: The Fossils Still say No! El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 333.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

[Soldier4Christ]

Tasmanian Devils: Extinction, not Macroevolution
by Frank Sherwin, M.A.*

Tasmanian devils are breeding at younger ages, and researchers at the University of Tasmania in Australia believe the phenomenon is caused by an evolutionary response to the cancer that is devastating these small marsupials.

Devil facial tumor disease (DFTD) is a contagious form of cancer that has been infecting the animals since 1996.1 Tasmanian devils are carnivorous marsupials of the family Dasyuridae. These nocturnal predators are found exclusively on the island of Tasmania and are comprised of about 50 species. They have a normal life span of five to six years, usually breeding around the ages of two or three. However, since the disease is cutting their total years down to two or three, most females would ordinarily not live to rear their first litter.

Since the onset of the epidemic, Tasmanian devils have begun to breed as early as age one. “We could be seeing evolution occurring before our eyes. Watch this space!” zoologist Menna Jones of the university said in an interview with the Associated Press (AP).2 She has been studying the animals’ life cycles since before the disease outbreak and recently reported her findings in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.3 “What we are suggesting in this paper is that there is likely to be strong selection for rapid evolution…It was an exciting discovery,” she told the AP reporter.

Rather than acknowledging the detrimental pathological conditions such as cancer or mutations encountered in this particular population, Jones and other scientists interpret the situation as a demonstration of the upward-and-onward process of macroevolution. From the non-Darwinian standpoint, however, what we are seeing is not evolutionary progress in Tasmanian devils, but tragic extinction. Some zoologists feel there will be no more Tasmanian devils in a quarter century due to DFTD.

Jones believes that the population decline may be slowed by the animals’ breeding at a younger age. Even if that happens, the Tasmanian devils will remain Tasmanian devils—the same genus, the same species. A more logical explanation for the earlier breeding may be that the Creator provided this type of adaptive response to the threat of disease, just as He provided for adaptability within each animal kind for climate, diet, and other conditions.

Does the life and death struggle of the Tasmanian devil demonstrate “strong selection for rapid evolution”? On the contrary, what the evidence actually shows is not “evolution occurring before our eyes,” but the slow extinction of a created kind.

References

   1. Siddle, H. et al. 2007. Transmission of a fatal clonal tumor by biting occurs due to depleted MHC diversity in a threatened carnivorous marsupial. Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences 104 (41): 16221-16226.
   2. Schmid, R. Cancer forces Tasmanian devils to breed earlier. Associated Press. Posted online July 15, 2008, accessed July 17, 2008.
   3. Jones, M. et al. 2008. Life-history change in disease-ravaged Tasmanian devil populations. Proceeding of the National Academy of Sciences. Published ahead of print July 14, 2008, accessed July 17, 2008.

* Mr. Sherwin is Senior Science Lecturer.

[Soldier4Christ]

ABC News: Camels Are American Emigrants
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Some scientists believe that camels originated in North America around 20 million years ago and migrated from there. Paleoecologist Guy Robinson, a professor at Fordham University, told ABC World News, "The original camel was North American. And it gave rise to all the camels you find throughout the world."1

According to this theory, some of these camel-kinds migrated to South America to become llamas. Other clans migrated across the then-existing Bering land bridge into Asia 13 million years ago and developed into the familiar dromedary camels of the Middle East. The ABC news story declared that "the fossil record, from over 20 million years ago, shows that every camel came exclusively from |North America|."1

However, what the fossil record really shows are…fossilized camels. The reported migratory patterns and dates do not come from the fossil record, but from a set of assumptions that are used as a framework to interpret the data. Robinson is quoted on the Fordham University website as saying, "I don't deal with direct evidence, but with proxy evidence. If you find a kill site, it just tells you that this particular animal was killed, but that doesn't necessarily lead to extinction. Indirect evidence can show a profound change in the population.…Science is detective work."2

Robinson's final statement is true of forensics, geology, or paleoecology, but not all science is detective work. Empirical science relies on fewer interpretive concepts and is more strictly based on observation of repeatable phenomena. Origin science, on the other hand, does involve detective work. Since history is not repeatable, a good detective ought to avail himself of the most reliable historical framework. Unfortunately, many scientists automatically use the unproven concepts of billions of years and evolution in their interpretations instead of, and in contrast to, the plainly understood history given in the Bible.

Probably two individuals3 of the camel kind began their journeys across the newly sculpted surface of the post-Flood earth. They started not in North America, but in "the mountains of Ararat."4 During the post-Flood Ice Age, some of these camels evidently migrated across the Bering land bridge into the Americas, while others migrated west and south. While there may not be a fossil record of camels in Turkey,5 there is a reliable eyewitness-written record right under our noses. The question of the origin of the first camels is better understood from the Genesis account of creation than from a long line of non-existent transitional forms.

References

   1. Krulwich, R. Camels Are Original American Emigrants. ABC World News, posted online July 4, 2008, accessed July 7, 2008.
   2. Renner, P. Guy Robinson, Ecological Sleuth. Interview posted on Fordham University website, accessed July 7, 2008.
   3. Genesis 7:2
   4. Genesis 8:4
   5. The absence of camel fossils in Turkey is not an indication that camels were not there in ancient times. If, as many creation scientists believe, fossils largely resulted from Noah's Flood, then animal migrations after the Flood could not be traced through the fossil record. See "Are Fossils the Result of Noah's Flood?" (John Morris, 2004, Acts & Facts, 33 |11|). See also "Ten Misconceptions about the Geologic Column" (Steven Austin, 1984, Acts & Facts, 12 |11|).

*Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

[MangoMan]

Hey,
I'd like to visit the website that was mentioned at the start of this thread.  Bronzesnake had put a lot of effort into it.  Unfortunately, the link is bad.  Has his sight moved.
Sincerely,
MangoMan

[Soldier4Christ]

Hey,
I'd like to visit the website that was mentioned at the start of this thread.  Bronzesnake had put a lot of effort into it.  Unfortunately, the link is bad.  Has his sight moved.
Sincerely,
MangoMan

He did get a new web site I don't have the link to. The last I heard was his main site had been hacked and it was down. With his health problems I'm not sure if he has had the time to bring it back on-line yet.

Besides the information here in this thread though I suggest the following web sites for more detailed information that is quite excellent:

http://www.icr.org/

http://www.answersingenesis.org/

[MangoMan]

Hello,
Thank you for the update.  Curious, is there a chance you could pass me his email address or forward mine to him.  Is there a possibility, one can pick up the torch and carry it on?  Why let a lifetime of work be dissipated like vapor on the wind?  I am seriously interested here.
Sincerely,
MangoMan

[Soldier4Christ]

He has a forum still online but there is rarely anyone posting there anymore.

http://xsorbit27.com/users5/thefifthday/index.php

[Soldier4Christ]

Dinosaur Soft Tissue: Biofilm or Blood Vessels?
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Over a decade ago, paleontologist Dr. Mary Schweitzer accidentally discovered soft tissues preserved inside dinosaur bone.1 While examining the bone structure from an incompletely fossilized T. rex nicknamed "B. rex," she came upon what appeared to be blood vessels and blood cells on her microscope slides. In an interview years later, she recalled, "I looked at this and I looked at this and I thought, this can't be. Red blood cells don't preserve."2

Evolutionary scientists have had a very difficult time fitting this evidence into a neo-Darwinian framework. After the soft tissues were verified, creation scientists interpreted them as confirmation of a young earth. "Evidence of hemoglobin, and the still-recognizable shapes of red blood cells, in unfossilized dinosaur bone is powerful testimony against the whole idea of dinosaurs living millions of years ago," Creation magazine reported.3

Of course, questioning the paradigm of eons of time seems nonsensical to most scientists because "geologists have established that the Hell Creek Formation, where B. rex was found, is 68 million years old, and so are the bones buried in it."2 However, this appeal to authority ignores the possibility that the geologists themselves "established" this age based not on science, but on assumptions of millions of years of earth history, the authority of the biologists who date fossils based on their alleged evolutionary path, and the veracity of the geologic column itself, which was defined in the 19th century, prior to the accumulation of 90 percent of current geologic data.

The belief that "millions of years" is established fact seems here to trump the empirical evidence that biomolecules should not last longer than 100,000 years. One resilient biomolecule found in many fossils, including B. rex, is collagen. However, "in bones, hydrolysis [breakdown] of the main protein component, collagen, is even more rapid and little intact collagen remains after only 1-3x104 [10,000 to 30,000] years, except in bones in cool or dry depositional environmnents."4

With a lifespan of 30,000 or so years, collagen should not exist in a 68-million-year-old sample. To get around this, some evolutionary scientists challenge the measured molecular decay rates. "Schweitzer's work is 'showing us we really don't understand decay,'" paleontologist Thomas Holtz said in Smithsonian magazine.2 But even allowing 100,000 years for collagen longevity, perhaps due to superior preservation, this is still only 1/680th of B. rex's assumed age. It would seem that the natural preservation of collagen for 68 million years would have required a miracle on the same scale as creation.

A new possible solution was published in July 2008. Researchers took electron micrographs of the "soft tissues," and concluded that they are bacterial secretions called "biofilms."5 Though this is possible, the weight of evidence still seems to favor the interpretation that they are genuine dinosaurian tissue. First, collagen protein sequence data is not a bacterial product, but "colleagues at Harvard successfully sequenced the dinosaur protein that Schweitzer had extracted from the tissue, identifying the amino acids and confirming that the material from the T. rex was collagen. 'From a paleo standpoint, sequence data really is the nail in the coffin that confirms the preservation of these tissues,' Schweitzer says."6

Second, as Dr. Schweitzer pointed out for National Geographic, no biofilms have been observed with hollow, branching tubes. Third, biofilms would have been thicker at the bottom, pulled down by gravity.7 And fourth, the flimsy biofilms themselves could never have retained the shape of the original dinosaur blood vessels, to which they allegedly conformed, for 68 million years.

Not only should the unfossilized bone and its collagen have turned to dust long ago, but there should certainly be no vestige of blood vessels, or even bacterial slime still shaped like vessels. These tissues remain a pesky enigma for long-age thinking, but they fit right in with the young world viewpoint that an unbiased Bible reader would understand.

References

   1. Schweitzer, M. and T. Staedter. 1997. The Real Jurassic Park. Earth. 6 (3): 55-57.
   2. Fields, H. 2006. Dinosaur Shocker. Smithsonian Magazine online. Published May 2006, accessed August 22, 2008.
   3. Wieland, C. 1997. Sensational dinosaur blood report! Creation. 19 (4): 42-43.
   4. Bada, J. et al. 1999. Preservation of key biomolecules in the fossil record: current knowledge and future challenges. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 354 (1379): 77-87.
   5. Kaye, T. et al. 2008. Dinosaurian Soft Tissues Interpreted as Bacterial Biofilms. PloS One. Published online July 30, 2008.
   6. Peake, T. Small Foot, Big Impression. North Carolina State University online feature, July 24, 2007.
   7. Roach, J. 2008. Dinosaur Slime Sparks Debate over Soft Tissue Finds. National Geographic News, posted on-line July 30, 2008, accessed August 22, 2008.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

Thomas, B. 2008. Dinosaur Soft Tissue: Biofilm or Blood Vessels? Acts & Facts. 37 (10): 14.

[Soldier4Christ]

The Call of the Hadrosaur
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Duck-billed dinosaurs have puzzled paleontologists for years, particularly because certain chambers in some of their skulls did not seem to have a clear purpose. But CT-scanning, originally designed for medical use, seems to support scientific speculation that the chambers played some role in communication between the animals.

Three-dimensional renderings of a Corythosaurus fossil revealed the shapes of inner skull cavities, including the ear, brain, nasal, and the mystery chambers, which are connected to the nasal passages and housed within oddly-shaped bony protrusions atop the dinosaur’s head.1

The scan results seem to confirm what one researcher, David Evans of the University of Toronto, has suspected for a long time: These strange chambers were used as sounding horns, “notably acoustic resonance for intraspecific communication.”2 “The CT scans documented a delicate inner ear that confirms that the dinosaurs could hear low-frequency calls produced by the crest,” according to a Ohio University press release.1

The study concludes that “computer models done by other researchers suggest that the crests could have been used to make low, eerie bellowing calls that could have been used in communication.”1 Creation biochemist Dr. Duane Gish advanced this possibility in his 1992 book Dinosaurs by Design: “The function of this hollow, skin-covered spike-like crest is uncertain, but perhaps it helped to amplify sound.”3

Following David Weishampel’s published analyses of vocal resonance chambers in lambeosaurine dinosaurs,4 one creation researcher suggested in 1991 a possible reason for the preponderance of the duck-billed dinosaurs in North America: “If Dr. Weishampel’s theory is correct with regard to the vocalizations of the crested hadrosaur, the sounds they produced may have been so irritating to the other animals that they were left quite to themselves.”5

In addition to the sound chambers, the CT scans of the Corythosaurus skull revealed “large…centers of the brain associated with higher cognitive functions.”1 The find surprised the researchers, since according to the evolutionary timeline, the dinosaurs lived when animals had not yet evolved complex brains that were capable of advanced functions. “But now we see that they had the brain power,” said Lawrence Witmer of Ohio University.1

Like all other fossils that have been discovered, the crested, duck-billed dinosaur demonstrates physiological features that are fully formed, with integrated skeletal, vocal, and nervous systems that apparently were fully functional. The combined communicative and cognitive capabilities suggested by this study do not reflect simple-to-complex evolutionary progression.

However, neither the sound chambers nor the large brain cavities that housed the appropriate auditory processors surprise scientists who employ the creation model, because it predicts the presence of coordinated elements like these, as well as the absence of transitional forms.

References

   1. Brain structure provides key to unraveling function of bizarre dinosaur crests. Ohio University press release, October 16, 2008. =
   2. Evans, D. C. 2006. Nasal cavity homologies and cranial crest function in lambeosaurine dinosaurs. Paleobiology. 32 (1): 109-125.
   3. Gish, D. 1992. Dinosaurs by Design. Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 39.
   4. Weishampel, D. B. 1981. Acoustic analyses of potential vocalization in lambeosaurine dinosaurs. Paleobiology. 7 (2): 252-261.
   5. Baker, M. 1991. Dinosaurs. Redding, CA: New Century Books, 95.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

[Soldier4Christ]

Cambrian Clash: Fossils and Molecular Clocks Disagree
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

In a recent issue of the journal BioScience, ecologist Jeffrey Levinton of Stony Brook University, New York, offered a well-written review of the current status of the “Cambrian Explosion” hypothesis and presented at least two enigmas in evolutionary thinking.1

First, Levinton noted that the sudden appearance of a vast array of fully-functional life forms in “Cambrian” rock strata is not the result of any known evolutionary process, though he provided several possible evolutionary scenarios using the words “might,” “perhaps,” “may,” and “speculate.” Second, he also bravely admitted that the designated evolutionary time of arrival for the first animal life grossly conflicts with the extrapolated times given by “molecular clock” analyses, which use assumptions about DNA or protein sequence similarities between kinds to determine age.

Evolutionary geologists have “dated” Cambrian rock at 542 million years. According to their model, which exclusively selects long ages and rejects otherwise legitimate young ages for rocks,2 the most radical diversification of life forms occurred within a “geological” blink of an eye near the lowermost sedimentary strata. After a review of the fossil and molecular data, Levinton said, “The presence of genomic complexity, right at the dawn of bilaterian animal life [i.e., animals with bilateral symmetry], is inescapable.”3

He summarized the contrasting molecular clock ages: “All major studies consistently produce a date of divergence [emergence of animal life]…considerably before the beginning of the Cambrian.”4 How long before? The estimates range from 586 to over 1200 million years!5 Either the molecular clocks are wrong, the rock dates are inaccurate, or both.

The sheer width of this range of dates justifies the author’s conclusion that “it is likely that the assumptions of the models of molecular evolution may influence the outcomes too strongly to allow any significant confidence in estimates of molecular dates for the divergence of the Bilateria.”5 Whereas Levinton suggests that the biological dates should defer to the authority of the geological dates, creation scientists would suggest that assumptions of evolution may influence both of them too strongly to allow any confidence in either.

How might the mainstream evolutionary model find harmony? According to Levinton, “We can only hope that better evidence will emerge.”6 Despite the fossil record’s lack of supporting evidence, and despite the disparity between the fossil data and molecular clock analyses, many scientists nonetheless cling to evolutionary explanations.

The creation model, on the whole, is not in a desperate need of “better evidence.” The sudden appearance of fully-formed fossilized creatures is consistent with the creation of all animals during one week—not over millions of years. Further, the appearance of fossil sea creatures at the bottom of an earth-encompassing set of sedimentary rocks must, in most locations, correspond with the onset of the Genesis Flood. Third, both the internal and external inconsistencies of widely-varying molecular clock ages lead us to agree with Levinton’s skeptical attitude toward those dates. These all combine to give us great confidence in the accuracy and authority of the biblical record, complete with its young-earth dates.

References

   1. Levinton, J. S. 2008. The Cambrian Explosion: How Do We Use the Evidence. BioScience. 58 (9): 862.
   2. Humphreys, D. R. 2003. New RATE Data Support a Young World. Acts & Facts. 32 (12).
   3. Levinton, The Cambrian Explosion, 860.
   4. Ibid, 857.
   5. Ibid, 858.
   6. Ibid, 862.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

[Soldier4Christ]

Cichlid Coloration Corroborates Creation
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Biologists are having a difficult time figuring out how to fit a tropical fish’s rapid coloration changes into the story of evolution. A new study examined the role these changes play in the fish’s mating habits, and concluded that they could contribute to the development of different species. However, the researchers admitted that “the role of selection in the formation of new species has yet to be fully explained in evolutionary biology.”1 The observations of these fish fit quite well, however, within the creation biology model.

Published in a recent edition of Nature, the study suggests that African cichlid fish in Lake Victoria undergo natural selection, contributing to the formation of a new species (a process called “speciation”). They describe how deeper water favors the selection of female fish that are better able to see the color red and therefore prefer red males. In shallow water, the females see blue, so males that display blue colors populate these zones more often.2 “These mating preferences can be strong enough to drive the formation of new species,” the researchers suggest.1

However, they also found that the bluish and reddish cichlids interbreed. Due to agricultural runoff, the waters of Lake Victoria are often too murky for the cichlids to notice subtle differences in coloration. In these cases, the fish were “not specifically adapted” to blue or red anymore.2 In other words, the cichlids can rapidly favor certain colors, but then rapidly change back to having no particular preference if the environment is no longer color selective.

Does this represent onward and upward evolutionary progress? Variation within a kind is not evidence for the origin of that kind. These fish do not demonstrate macroevolutionary processes (the progression from simpler to more complex forms), but rather reflect microevolution (variation within an interbreeding kind). This fits well with the Genesis account, in which all living creatures were created “after their kind.”3 Not surprisingly, the researchers ignore the Creator’s Word, and attribute this “trove of genetic variation for sensory systems and male signals” to “distant ancestors.”2

The capacity for shifting coloration is a reflection of a purposeful, aesthetically-minded Maker, so it is no wonder that evolution has a difficult time accommodating the rapidity, beauty, variety, and very origin of cichlid color oscillations, let alone the origin of the cichlids themselves. Thus, like Darwin’s finches on the Galapagos Islands—where fluctuation in beak shape over generations oscillates from skinny to fat and the finches remain finches4—these cichlids remain cichlids. Moreover, they have an ingeniously integrated capacity to adapt into and out of ecological niches, which is consistent with the wisdom of the Creator God of the Bible.

References

   1. New species thanks to different ways of seeing. Eawag: Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology press release, October 1, 2008.
   2. Kirkpatrick, M. and T. Price. 2008. Sensory ecology: In sight of speciation. Nature. 455 (7213): 601-602.
   3. Genesis 1:21.
   4. Morris, J. 1994. Does “The Beak of the Finch” Prove Darwin Was Right? Acts & Facts. 23 (12).

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.

[Soldier4Christ]

Fossil Footprints Trample Evolution's Timeline
by Brian Thomas, M.S.*

Researchers accidentally discovered what appears to be tiny footprints in Precambrian rock. Loren Babcock, Professor of Earth Sciences at Ohio State University, was turning over samples from a Nevada outcrop when he found a series of small, parallel impressions that looked like dots.1 Discovered in 2000, the fossil finding was presented on October 5, 2008, in a poster session at the Geological Society of America meeting in Houston, Texas.2

These prints were likely caused by a small marine multi-limbed creature and were upturned in Precambrian strata, which are located below the rock layers of the “Cambrian Explosion,” where fossils of almost all living phyla suddenly appear as fully-formed organisms. “Scientists once thought that it was primarily microbes and simple multicellular animals that existed prior to the Cambrian, but that notion is changing,” Dr. Babcock explained in an Ohio State University press release.1

The morphing of living forms from microbes to walking animals would require too many precise additions of information for any currently observable natural process to have accomplished it. This fossil discovery single-handedly and instantly removes 30 million years from the standard evolutionary timeline, which must be re-warped to accommodate the new data. In contrast, biblical history remains the same even after this find, because there were no vast eons separating the creation of microbes from the creation of other living things, so no additional explanations are needed as to why their fossils would be located in close proximity.

Putting together the pieces of the past into a highly detailed sequence is difficult for anyone, because of the incomplete historical data that are available. The reliable framework provided by Scripture, however, not only accommodates the most paleontological data with the fewest assumptions, but its history can be used to predict what we see in the rocks. If there really was a worldwide flood, what might the earth’s surface show? Regionally extending, fossil-bearing, catastrophically-emplaced sedimentary rocks are a visible testimony.

So, both the newly discovered fossil tracks and the sudden appearance, without transitions, of fossil life forms conflict with the millions of years required by evolution. The appearance of walking creatures in any rock stratum does not confute that “by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished.”3

References

   1. Earliest footprints ever found – discovered in Nevada. The Ohio State University press release, October 5, 2008.
   2. Ahn, S.-Y. et al. 2008. Body and Trace Fossils from the Deep Spring Formation (Ediacaran), Western Nevada. Presented at the 2008 Joint Annual Meeting, October 5-9, in Houston, TX.
   3. 2 Peter 3:5-6.

Photo by Kevin Fitzsimons, Ohio State University.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer.