Haeckel’s embryo drawings — as of 2004 still going strong!

_{William Dembski

January 11, 2006

Evolution}

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Two biology textbooks with 2004 copyright dates feature Haeckel’s faked drawings (slightly redrawn and colorized). They are:

Raven & Johnson, Biology Sixth Edition (ISBN: 0072921641)
Voet & Voet, Biochemistry (ISBN: 047119350X)

Further evidence for the longevity of evolutionary theory.

Comments

The wiki.cotch link is empty. The other wiki entry shows the embryo illustration, although I am still unclear as to how the similarities have been exaggerated. I have no beef with his recapitulationist ideas being wrong. To me, his drawings seem a fair representative of what one might see down a microscope at the different embryo stages. http://www.mk-richardson.com/images/science%20medium%20res.jpg What am I missing? - Dave WattDaveWatt_{January 17, 2006
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Dave, Haeckel's drawings exaggerated the similarities between the embryos of fish, reptiles, birds, and several species of mammals. He was a big fan of the idea that ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny: in other words, that embryos pass through stages of development that are analogous to the stages their ancestors passed through in evolving to the present form. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recapitulation_theory Modern evolutionists now know of many exceptions to this idea. Nothing about evolution restricts it to operating on later stages of development. For more on Haeckel's embryo drawings, and links to examples of other embryo drawings and photographs, see http://wiki.cotch.net/index.php/Haeckel's_embryoswoctor_{January 17, 2006
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Woctor, Thank you - but neither article mentions what it is about the drawings that are faked. Can you tell me? - Dave WattDaveWatt_{January 17, 2006
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Dave Watt, For two opposing discussions of Haeckel's embryo drawings, see: Pro Jonathan Wells: http://www.arn.org/docs/wells/jw_tbookreport900.htm#he Anti Jonathan Wells: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/wells/haeckel.htmlwoctor_{January 16, 2006
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Can someone tell me what it is about Haeckel's drawings that are faked? -Dave WattDaveWatt_{January 16, 2006
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I am guessing that such "evidence" for evolution was in the genesis of the book "Icons of Evolution". Where is the NCSE when we need them ?!!Mats_{January 13, 2006
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http://www.angelfire.com/nt/fairytales/emb.html shows Haekel's drawings were suspected as being fake in 1868, almost as soon as they were published. 138 years later...Maurice Westerbrook_{January 12, 2006
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I wonder if they'll use Dan Rather's defense of the forged memos: "Fake but accurate"?russ_{January 11, 2006
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But fake drawings suit General Theory of Evolution just fine. Why change? Like the House of Cards, you don't dare remove or disturb anything, the whole edifice might crumble. I wonder, what has to happen for these editors in order to remove or rectify the error?Srdjan_{January 11, 2006
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