Darwin, the Fossil Record, and Invisible Gorillas

_{Barry Arrington

November 21, 2015

Intelligent Design}

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Astoundingly, some of our Darwinist friends continue to insist that Darwin had no problem with the fossil record, that he thought it was in complete agreement with this theory. This is nuts. He spent major portions of his book explaining why we should accept his theory even though the fossil record does not support it. Here is a summary of what Darwin said:

1. My theory predicts that natural selection is working everywhere all the time to effect tiny morphological changes that accumulate over time and result in new species appearing.

2. The result is an extremely gradual process in which new species arise from prior species over eons of time though slow practically imperceptible changes.

3. If that is what happened, there must have existed infinitely many fine gradations between past and present species. IOW “just in proportion as this process of extermination has acted on an enormous scale, so must the number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, be truly enormous.”

4. My theory predicts that “infinitely many fine gradations” (i.e., a “truly enormous” number of intermediate varieties) existed. IOW, the record of life is one of rampant gradual morphological change affecting the vast majority of species the vast majority of the time. Obviously, if my theory is correct the GENERAL record of life cannot possibly be characterized by sudden appearance and stasis. Yes, stasis can sometimes happen with respect to an individual species, but stasis is not the rule. Indeed, my entire project is aimed at undermining the creationist notion of the fixity of species. How could I do that if I were to say that stasis is the rule among life forms generally?

5. The fossil record most assuredly does not reveal “infinitely many fine gradations” (i.e., a “truly enormous” number of intermediate varieties) as the rule.

6. Instead, if we had nothing but the fossil record to go on, we would have to believe that sudden appearance and stasis, not constant gradual morphological change, is the rule.

7. Thus, the fossil record would seem to falsify my theory, because it does not reveal what my theory predicts it should reveal.

8. And that is a serious problem for me. Indeed, it is the “most obvious of the many objections which may be urged against” my theory.

9. The answer lies not in my theory but in the fossil record. My theory is perfect; the history of life is exactly as I said it was, full of an infinite number of transitions. The fossil record is imperfect, because it fails to capture that.

10. Here is why I believe the fossil record is imperfect: blah, blah, blah.

11. If I am wrong about why the fossil record is imperfect, my theory comes falling down around me.

In response to all of this the Darwinists keep coming up with some version of “Darwin knew about stasis; he wrote about it and said it occurs.” Of course Darwin knew about stasis, and yes he did write about it and say that it sometimes occurs. Those facts change nothing. Darwin wrote about stasis not to suggest that stasis is the rule, but in his effort to explain why the fossil record is — his words — “extremely imperfect.”

Look, if Darwin believed that the fossil record revealed what his theory predicted it would reveal, would he have called it “extremely imperfect”? Of course not. The whole point of Darwin’s lengthy discussion of the fossil record is to show that it did NOT reveal what actually happened, and that is why it is “extremely imperfect.”

He wrote:

But just in proportion as this process of extermination has acted on an enormous scale, so must the number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, be truly enormous. Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory. The explanation lies, as I believe, in the extreme imperfection of the geological record.

Then he attempted to show why the record is extremely imperfect. Then — and here is the key to the whole thing — he wagered his entire theory on whether he had successfully explained away the “extremely imperfect” fossil record that does not support his theory. He wrote:

He who rejects these views on the nature of the geological record, will rightly reject my whole theory. For he may ask in vain where are the numberless transitional links which must formerly have connected the closely allied or representative species, found in the several stages of the same great formation.

When Darwin was talking about stasis he was most assuredly not saying that he believed stasis is the general rule of the history of life. How could he have? That would have undermined his entire project. Instead, he was trying to make lemonade out of lemons, and he himself said if the lemonade did not turn out his whole theory would crumble.

None of what I’ve said is the least bit controversial. That the fossil record was an embarrassment to Darwin is no secret. It has been the standard narrative for 157 years. What is truly astounding is that we have Darwinists today who are somehow trying to claim that Darwin believed the fossil record offered perfect support to his theory even though he himself called that record “extremely imperfect” for the very reason that it did not. Revisionism of this magnitude beggars belief.

UPDATE:

This update comes after the first three comments in the comment thread. The Darwinian fundamentalists who wrote these comments cannot see this:

That’s the thing about fundamentalists; their faith commitments have a strangle hold on their reason. What is the 500 pound gorilla here? Perhaps a choice between alternatives will make him more obvious than he already is. Which do you choose:

1. Darwin understood that on its face the fossil record falsified his theory because it does not show what his theory predicts. He attempted to rescue his theory by claiming the problem was with the “extreme imperfection” of the record, not his theory, and he set about arguing for why the record should be extremely imperfect.

2. Darwin warmly embraced the fossil record because it reveals exactly the pattern his theory predicts it would reveal.

If you choose “2,” congratulations, you are a fundamentalist blind to the glaringly obvious. Give yourself a cookie.

Comments

Zachriel:
In that case, you agree that evolution is a strongly supported scientific theory.
Except there isn't any scientific theory of evolution. Zachriel is a liar and a fool. Virgil Cain

Robert Byers: If evolution was true then the next steps in populations would be constantly obvious in the fossil record as your side sees the fossil record. Many transitions are well-represented, such as from therapsid to mammals. Robert Byers: A problem for darwin and later folks. As already shown, Darwin who pointed to several reasons why the fossil record imperfectly preserves transitions, @1. Zachriel

NickMatzke uD you guys have to give way on this, PE was not just a correction, met with resistance from evol circles, but a admittance that the fossil record failed expectations after time enough for digging things up. If evolution was true then the next steps in populations would be constantly obvious in the fossil record as your side sees the fossil record. You didn't see it but jerkyness or rather finished new populations with new traits. No intermediates by the millions. A problem for darwin and later folks. why is creationism wrong to stress this? PE makes a creationist case. PE is a retreat nack to another trench. by the way biology does not recognize species. thats a human myth invention. There is just populations with biological changes different from the parent population. People are case in point. Changed but not new species. Are evolutionists saying they wouldn't love to have the intermediates that Darwin predicted should be there? I bet they would. PE exists because the lack of them suggested population change had to be so quick as to not allow the probability of intermediate stages being fossilized. By the by. All fossil evidence is not biological evidence for biological processes. Another flaw in reasoning. Robert Byers

I wonder when academic bully Nick is going to finish his book that proves macro evolution. I hear it has lots of good stories in. Can't wait to read it. Andre

Calling Nick Matzke’s Bluff (on the fossil record) – DonaldM - June 21, 2013 Excerpt: Today, I want to call out Matzke on another of his famous ploys: the bluff! In earlier days, before he gained his current status among the defenders of the Darwinian Faith, Matzke posted and commented on various ID sites under various pseudonyms. His favorite ploy was to use what we came to refer to as the “literature bluff”, wherein he would post long lists of references to research studies that were supposedly definitive refutations of some point being made by someone questioning evolution or promoting ID. To someone unfamiliar with the literature, it could easily appear as if Matzke gained the upper hand and that the poor critic of evolution was just too uninformed. However, when anyone took the time and trouble to actually peruse his lists looking for articles addressing whatever matter was under discussion it became immediately clear that hardly if ever at all did any of the citations have anything whatsoever to do with the point at issue. It was all a bluff. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/evolution/calling-nick-matzkes-bluff/
Nick Matzke also tried, in response to Michael Behe’s claim about irreducibly complex molecular machines, to literature bluff about the origin of molecular machines by unguided material processes:
Calling Nick Matzke’s literature bluff on molecular machines – DonaldM UD blogger – April 2013 Excerpt: So now, 10 years later in 2006 Matzke and Pallen come along with this review article. The interesting thing about this article is that, despite all the hand waving claims about all these dozens if not hundreds of peer reviewed research studies showing how evolution built a flagellum, Matzke and Pallen didn’t have a single such reference in their bibliography. Nor did they reference any such study in the article. Rather, the article went into great lengths to explain how a researcher might go about conducting a study to show how evolution could have produced the system. Well, if all those articles and studies were already there, why not just point them all out? In shorty, the entire article was a tacit admission that Behe had been right all along. Fast forward to now and Andre’s question directed to Matzke. We’re now some 17 years after Behe’s book came out where he made that famous claim. And, no surprise, there still is not a single peer reviewed research study that provides the Darwinian explanation for a bacterial flagellum (or any of the other irreducibly complex biological systems Behe mentioned in the book). We’re almost 7 years after the Matzke & Pallen article. So where are all these research studies? There’s been ample time for someone to do something in this regard. Matzke will not answer the question because there is no answer he can give…no peer reviewed research study he can reference, other than the usual literature bluffing he’s done in the past. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/irreducible-complexity/andre-asks-an-excellent-question-regarding-dna-as-a-part-of-an-in-cell-irreducibly-complex-communication-system/#comment-453291
And let's not forget Matzke's attempt to have the book 'Biological Information' censored:
Nick Matzke – Book Burner? - June 30, 2013 Excerpt: Nick Matzke famously got the publishing company Springer to suppress the publication of the papers of a conference held at Cornell. (See here). He did this without having seen, much less read, any of the papers. Obviously, his motivation could not have been the content of the papers. He was motivated by the mere fact that several of the conference participants were well-known ID proponents. https://uncommondesc.wpengine.com/intelligent-design/nick-matzke-book-burner/ Biological Information - New Perspectives - Proceedings of the Symposium - published online May 2013 http://www.worldscientific.com/worldscibooks/10.1142/8818#t=toc
Matzke was also involved in a lunch that never came off with a world leading nano-tech engineer. He was going to 'send him some literature' instead to prove to him how macro-evolution really worked. After commenting on the failure of ANY atheist to ever respond to his request for lunch for 8 or 10 years in order to explain macro-evolution to him, Dr Tour comments:
“One graduate student from Berkeley, (i.e. Matzke), said that he would come if he had a ticket so somebody said “I’ll buy you the ticket”, but then he said, “Well, I’m not going to go because Tour doesn’t want it recorded.” The reason I didn’t want it recorded is because I did not want one-ups-man-ship. I said ‘I’ll buy you lunch, just explain it to me’. And then the guy said he would send me some articles on evolution of a complex system from a molecular perspective and I am still waiting. That’s over one year ago he was suppose to send them to me. They don’t exist.” – James Tour – 35:22 minute mark of the video https://youtu.be/CB3ZmLatcUI?t=2122
Perhaps Matzke realized that trying to literature bluff a leading nano-tech engineer in the world was not the brightest of his ideas since that is one bluff that would certainly come back to bite him big time. Frankly, I'm disgusted that anyone who has been so fragrantly dishonest with the scientific evidence, as Matzke clearly has been, could even be given a PhD. in the first place and be allowed to 'practice' science in the first place. If science were the military, he would be stripped of his rank, punished with hard labor, and then thrown out for such flagrant misconduct. But alas, I guess such flagrant dishonesty is expected in Darwinian 'science'. In fact, Darwinian evolution has never, ever, really been about the science but has always been about defending the atheist creation myth.
"The fight against the design inference in biology is motivated by fundamentalist atheism. Darwinists detest intelligent design theory because it is compatible with belief in God. But the evidence is unassailable. The most reasonable scientific explanation for functional biological complexity–the genetic code and the intricate nanotechnology inside living cells–is that they were designed by intelligent agency. There is no scientific evidence that unintelligent processes can create substantial new biological structures and function. There is no unintelligent process known to science that can generate codes and machines. I still consider religious explanations for biology to be unscientific at best, dogma at worst. But I understand now that Darwinism itself is a religious creed that masquerades as science. Darwin’s theory of biological origins is atheism’s creation myth, and atheists defend their dogma with religious fervor." - Michael Egnor is a professor and vice chairman of the department of neurosurgery at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. An Early Critique of Darwin Warned of a Lower Grade of Degradation - Cornelius Hunter - Dec. 22, 2012 Excerpt: "Many of your wide conclusions are based upon assumptions which can neither be proved nor disproved. Why then express them in the language & arrangements of philosophical induction?" (Sedgwick to Darwin - 1859),,, And anticipating the fixity-of-species strawman, Sedgwick explained to the Sage of Kent (Darwin) that he had conflated the observable fact of change of time (development) with the explanation of how it came about. Everyone agreed on development, but the key question of its causes and mechanisms remained. Darwin had used the former as a sort of proof of a particular explanation for the latter. “We all admit development as a fact of history;” explained Sedgwick, “but how came it about?”,,, For Darwin, warned Sedgwick, had made claims well beyond the limits of science. Darwin issued truths that were not likely ever to be found anywhere “but in the fertile womb of man’s imagination.” The fertile womb of man’s imagination. What a cogent summary of evolutionary theory. Sedgwick made more correct predictions in his short letter than all the volumes of evolutionary literature to come. http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2012/12/an-early-critique-of-darwin-warned-of.html
bornagain

Jack Jones at 34: "Darwinists try to engage in politically-motivated damage control" Excellent point! And that is exactly what Matzke has done for years. Matzke is far more concerned with politics that he was, and is, ever concerned with finding the truth. In fact, Matzke has a long history of 'suppressing the truth in unrighteousness' (Romans 1:18). For example, Nick Matzke was instrumental in helping prepare the Dover trial 'literature bluffs'
Nicholas J. Matzke,, served an instrumental role in NCSE's preparation for the 2005 Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District trial. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Matzke
At the Dover trial, a theatrical and fraudulent ‘literature dump’ was orchestrated by Darwinists in the courtroom that purported to show overwhelming evidence for how the immune system evolved by unguided Darwinian processes. Yet, when the literature from that theatrical ‘literature dump’ was carefully gone through, by an expert in immunology, it was found that none of the literature actually supported the claims of the Darwinists, but were merely comparative studies that had nothing at all to do with the evolution of the systems. In this following podcasts, Casey Luskin interviews microbiologist and immunologist Donald Ewert on the Dover fraud, and on the 'comparative' peer reviewed papers on immunology in general:
“A Masterful Feat of Courtroom Deception”: Immunologist Donald Ewert on Dover Trial – audio http://intelligentdesign.podomatic.com/player/web/2010-12-20T15_01_03-08_00 What Does Evolution Have to Do With Immunology? Not Much – Donald Ewert – April 2011 http://intelligentdesign.podomatic.com/entry/2011-04-06T11_39_03-07_00
The deception (literature bluff), from Matzke, and other Darwinists, at Dover did not stop with immunology, but also extended to claims about the origin of functional information;
The NCSE, Judge Jones, and Bluffs About the Origin of New Functional Genetic Information – Casey Luskin – March 2010 http://www.discovery.org/a/14251 Assessing the NCSE’s Citation Bluffs on the Evolution of New Genetic Information – Feb. 2010 http://www.evolutionnews.org/2010/02/assessing_the_ncses_citation_b.html
Nick Matzke also tried to literature bluff about the origin of genetic information, cladistics, and the fossil record, when Stephen Meyer’s book ‘Darwin’s Doubt’ came out. His bogus claims are refuted here:
Hopeless Matzke -David Berlinski & Tyler Hampton (Literature Bluffs on the origin of genetic information) August 18, 2013 http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/08/hopeless_matzke075631.html A One-Man Clade – David Berlinski – July 18, 2013 Excerpt: The relationship between cladistics and Darwin's theory of evolution is thus one of independent origin but convergent confusion. "Phylogenetic systematics," the entomologist Michael Schmitt remarks, "relies on the theory of evolution." To the extent that the theory of evolution relies on phylogenetic systematics, the disciplines resemble two biologists dropped from a great height and clutching at one another in mid-air. Tight fit, major fail.7 No wonder that Schmidt is eager to affirm that "phylogenetics does not claim to prove or explain evolution whatsoever."8 If this is so, a skeptic might be excused for asking what it does prove or might explain? http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/07/a_one_man_clade074601.html Cladistics Made Easy: Why an Arcane Field of Study Fails to Upset Steve Meyer's Argument for Intelligent Design Stephen Meyer - Responding to Critics: Matzke Part 1 - video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jY2B76JbMQ4 A Graduate Student (Nick Matzke) Writes (Literature bluffs on the fossil record) – David Berlinski July 9, 2013 http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/07/a_graduate_stud074221.html
bornagain

zach says "You should send them the excerpt from @1 so they can correct their website. " You should contact them so they can laugh at you when you try and make Darwin's hypothesis as one of discontinuity and stasis. Jack Jones

Barry Arrington: the important part is that he finds it necessary to give an “explanation” in the first place, rather than accept the record on its face. Can't imagine a more classic case of handwaving. You ignore the explanation, and when asked why you ignored the explanation, you say it's because the explanation was given. All science is about explaining evidence. If everything were obvious, there would be no need for science! The only valid question is whether the explanation is properly justified, that is, does it fit the evidence and lead to testable predictions. Seversky: Show me one evolutionist who claims that Darwin believed the fossil record offers “perfect support” Barry Arrington: OK. Zachriel Notably, you didn't provide a quote or citation. Perhaps it's because we rarely use the word perfect with regards to anything scientific. Box: Okay here is my theory: ‘everyone has an uncontrollable desire to kill his neighbors.’ Why don’t we see this everywhere? Several reasons: 1. Because police and news reporting is extremely imperfect. 2. Because often bodies simply disappear and murder cannot be determined. 3. Often murderers go extinct without producing (modified) offspring. 4. And the periods, during which murders take place, though long as measured by months, have probably been short in comparison with the periods spent in prison. Know you're trying to make a point, but it's not working. People are counted, and nearly every death is accounted for unless in a war zone where there really is a great desire among people to kill one another. In other words, your theory can be tested and is found wanting. Now try to address Darwin's explanation @1. Alicia Cartelli: So barry, do you think the fossil record contains every species to ever live on this planet? That would be odd, of course, because scientists keep finding new ones. mahuna: On the other hand, I have to believe that before he died Chuckie himself could see the statistical patterns emerging from each 100 new fossils: no gap fillers, but instead constantly new species. Actually, all sorts of species with intermediate features were found after Origin of Species, many before Darwin's death; such as Archaeopteryx. Barry Arrington: And he wrote that for any given species caught in the fossil record it would probably be in stasis even if the history of life as a whole is not characterized by stasis. The last part of the sentence is wrong in Darwin's view. As he said, "the periods during which species have been undergoing modification, though very long as measured by years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which these same species remained without undergoing any change." Jack Jones: So is the Biological Learning Center, The University Of Arizona according to you. You should send them the excerpt from @1 so they can correct their website. Barry Arrington: If the record had fit his theory he would not have called it extremely imperfect. He would have embraced it warmly. The fossil record is necessarily imperfect because fossilization is rare and happenstance. See @1. Barry Arrington: I’m going with Eldredge, especially given the fact that Eldredge’s opinion is consistent with what Darwin actually wrote and the way in which he has been interpreted for over 150 years. In that case, you agree that evolution is a strongly supported scientific theory. Good for you. Zachriel

I told zach who is still in denial mode to post to me here. He says "The paraphrase does not represent the contents of the page."" No, the next phrase shows that Darwin put the pattern down to the incompleteness of the fossil record and nothing to do with stasis, You couldn't refute it, you admitted that you couldn't refute it when you ended up quote whining, quote whines come from evolutionists when they cannot show anything wrong with the quote. You then went to an earlier quote from a different source which does not support you but debunks you "The only place Mayr refers to Darwin is when he says “All of his life Darwin insisted that this is simply due to the unimaginable incompleteness of the fossil record.” Darwin was correct about the incompleteness of the fossil record, and explictly provided the reasons for its incompleteness. Furthermore, we know that Mayr was aware of this. "Ernst Mayr, Speciational Evolution or Punctuated Equilibria 1992: Even Darwin, for reasons that relate to his struggle against creationism, stressed the transformational aspect of evolution. He was, however, fully aware of highly different rates of evolution, from complete stasis to rates of change so fast that intermediates could not be discovered in the fossil record." He is engaging in special pleading and saying what Darwin was aware of but saying Darwin did not make that his hypothesis as he was arguing against Creationists. But we do not care about special pleading, we are dealing with the fact of what Darwin did propose and animals remaining in stasis is not consistent with his hypothesis. This is further backed up By Mayr in 2002 when he admitted that Darwin put down the lack of transitionals to an imperfect fossil record. Thus the explanation was not because stasis was expected, the explanation for the lack of transitionals was an incomplete fossil record. You resorted to your quote whines and desperately searching for another source because my source debunked you, Though your earlier source debunked you too. The 2002 quote corroborates what i say about the earlier quote, it contradicts what you say and that is why you ignored it and quote whined instead. That was proof that you had no case. You can keep arguing ad infinitum when you fail but repeating your failures is not going to make a successful argument. You must do better. As for your claim on different rates and Darwin. “Gradualism (UNIFORMITY OF RATE), EMBRACED BY DARWIN; later a key assumption of the Modern Synthesis.” Discovering Evolution: II. Before Darwin Biology Learning Center, University Of Arizona _____________________________________________________ “PUNCTUATED EQUILIBRIUM– QUESTIONS EVOLUTIONARY UNIFORMITY OF RATE. ” Darwinism and Wallace Lecture – 3 Biology Learning Center, University Of Arizona Jack Jones

Alicia Cartelli: Ok Barry so if you had to guess, what percentage of species to ever live do you think is represented in the fossil record? Nick Matzke: Good question! I wonder why Barry won’t answer it? Frick and Frack. How wonderful. The correct answer is, who cares. Not every organism that has ever lived has been fossilized. Therefore the fossil record is imperfect. Therefore Darwinian theory predicts that the fossil record will be incomplete. It's hard to see how that actually follows from the theory. So do tell. What does that have to do with Darwin's struggle to explain stasis? Only species which were not in the process of gradual change were fossilized? How likely is that? Is that also a prediction of the theory? Again, do tell. Mung

Here’s another question for Nick. How do you calculate the size of amino acid sequence space? Mung

Nick Matzke: Here’s another question for Barry. Barry, do you think Gould is approximately correct in his description of the fossil record here?
Since we proposed punctuated equilibria to explain trends, it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists — whether through design or stupidity, I do not know — as admitting that the fossil record includes no transitional forms. Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups. [Gould, Stephen Jay 1983. “Evolution as Fact and Theory” in Hens Teeth and Horse’s Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., p. 258-260.]
And here is a question for Nick. Nick, do you think Gould is approximately correct in his description of the fossil record when he states the exact opposite to the quote above?
“All paleontologists know that the fossil record contains precious little in the way of intermediate forms; transitions between the major groups are characteristically abrupt.” [Gould, Stephen Jay. ‘The return of hopeful monsters’. Natural History, vol. LXXXVI(6), June-July 1977, p. 24.]
Box

Nick Matzke, You have the temerity to accuse me of dodging a question because I have had time to get to it since, what, ten minutes ago! Here's a question you've been dodging for 2.5 years. See this brief post. Answer this question: Nick would you have tossed the match? Barry Arrington

@30 says "do you think Gould is approximately correct in his description of the fossil record here? Since we proposed punctuated equilibria to explain trends, it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists — whether through design or stupidity, I do not know — as admitting that the fossil record includes no transitional forms. Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups." "One thing Creationists Don’t Ever Get is that “between-species differences” are the *smallest* differences typically observable in the fossil record. That’s right, punctuated equilibrium was about the jerkiness of small differences between closely similar species. Yes, the kind of differences that creationists in all other contexts just dismiss with “that’s just microevolution/variation within the kind” They along with ID proponents get what Gould said later on which was for political reasons. "Despite the fact that numerous statements could be provided from evolutionary paleontologists admitting the lack of transitional forms in the fossil record, sometimes Darwinists try to engage in politically-motivated damage control to disavow their statements that the fossil record lacks plausible transitional intermediates. For example, Stephen Jay Gould complained about being quoted on the lack of transitional forms in the fossil record, saying “it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists--whether through design or stupidity, I do not know--as admitting that the fossil record includes no transitional forms. Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups.”10 Yet this statement was written during the heat of political battles over teaching creationism in the early 1980s, and it directly contradicts one of Gould’s earlier statements where he clearly admitted that “transitions between major groups are characteristically abrupt.”11 In his earlier quote, Gould plainly admitted that “transitions between major groups are characteristically abrupt” but then later, during the heat of political battles with creationists in the early 1980s, he alleged that transitional forms are “abundant between larger groups.” Which Gould are we to believe? The answer is clear: Gould’s scientific partner in promoting the punctuated equilibrium model, Niles Eldredge, concurs with the former Gould that “[m]ost families, orders, classes, and phyla appear rather suddenly in the fossil record, often without anatomically intermediate forms smoothly interlinking evolutionarily derived descendant taxa with their presumed ancestors.”12 Elsewhere, Eldredge again validates the former Gould, stating that “the higher up the Linnaean hierarchy you look, the fewer transitional forms there seem to be.”13 It seems very clear which Gould we should believe--and it is not the one who made his statements in the heat of political battles with young earth creationists." http://www.ideacenter.org/contentmgr/showdetails.php/id/1473 Jack Jones

a few notes:
disparity [dih-spar-i-tee] noun, plural disparities. 1. lack of similarity or equality; inequality; difference:
Not only is the fossil record discordant with Darwinian claims of gradualism, but the fossil record is now also shown to display an overall pattern of disparity preceding diversity. A pattern that is completely at odds with Darwinian thinking and turns, as some paleontologists have put it, 'evolution on its head'.
Cambrian Explosion Ruins Darwin’s Tree of Life (2 minutes in 24 hour day) – video (2:55 minute mark) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vA2LDiWeWb4
, as Dr. Wells points out in the preceding video, Darwin predicted that minor differences (diversity) between species would gradually appear first and then the differences would grow larger (disparity) between species as time went on. i.e. universal common descent as depicted in Darwin's tree of life. What Darwin predicted should be familiar to everyone and is easily represented in the following graph.
The Theory - Diversity precedes Disparity - graph http://www.veritas-ucsb.org/JOURNEY/IMAGES/F.gif
But that 'tree pattern' that Darwin predicted is not what is found in the fossil record. The fossil record reveals that disparity (the greatest differences) precedes diversity (the smaller differences), which is the exact opposite pattern for what Darwin's theory predicted.
The Actual Fossil Evidence- Disparity precedes Diversity - graph http://www.veritas-ucsb.org/JOURNEY/IMAGES/G.gif Timeline graphic on Cambrian Explosion - from 'Darwin's Doubt' (Disparity preceding Diversity) - infographic http://www.evolutionnews.org/2013/07/its_darwins_dou074341.html Investigating Evolution: The Cambrian Explosion Part 1 – (4:45 minute mark - upside-down fossil record) video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DkbmuRhXRY Part 2 – video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZFM48XIXnk Challenging Fossil of a Little Fish Excerpt: "In Chen’s view, his evidence supports a history of life that runs opposite to the standard evolutionary tree diagrams, a progression he calls top-down evolution." Jun-Yuan Chen is professor at the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology http://www.fredheeren.com/boston.htm “The record of the first appearance of living phyla, classes, and orders can best be described in Wright’s (1) term as ‘from the top down’.” (James W. Valentine, “Late Precambrian bilaterians: Grades and clades,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 91: 6751-6757 (July 1994).) “Darwin had a lot of trouble with the fossil record because if you look at the record of phyla in the rocks as fossils why when they first appear we already see them all. The phyla are fully formed. It’s as if the phyla were created first and they were modified into classes and we see that the number of classes peak later than the number of phyla and the number of orders peak later than that. So it’s kind of a top down succession, you start with this basic body plans, the phyla, and you diversify them into classes, the major sub-divisions of the phyla, and these into orders and so on. So the fossil record is kind of backwards from what you would expect from in that sense from what you would expect from Darwin’s ideas." James W. Valentine - as quoted from "On the Origin of Phyla: Interviews with James W. Valentine" - (as stated at 1:16:36 mark of interview) "In other words, the morphological distances -- gaps -- between body plans of crown phyla were present when body fossils first appeared during the explosion and have been with us ever since. The morphological disparity is so great between most phyla that the homologous reference points or landmarks required for quantitative studies of morphology are absent." Erwin and Valentine (p. 340) Erwin and Valentine's The Cambrian Explosion Affirms Major Points in Darwin's Doubt: The Cambrian Enigma Is "Unresolved" - June 26, 2013 "Taxonomists classify organisms into categories: species are the very lowest taxonomic category. Species are classified into different genera. Genera are classified into different families. Families are classified into different orders. Orders are classified into different classes. And classes are classified into different phyla. Phyla are among the very highest taxonomic categories (only kingdom and domain are higher), and correspond to the high level of morphological disparity that exists between different animal body plans. Phyla include such groupings as chordates, arthropods, mollusks, and echinoderms. Darwin's theory would predict a cone of diversity whereby the major body-plan differences (morphological disparity) would only appear in the fossil record following numerous lower-level speciation events. What is interesting about the fossil record is that it shows the appearance of the higher taxonomic categories first (virtually all of the major skeletonized phyla appear in the Cambrian, with no obvious fossil transitional precursors, within a relatively small span of geological time). As Roger Lewin (1988) explains in Science, "Several possible patterns exist for the establishment of higher taxa, the two most obvious of which are the bottom-up and the top-down approaches. In the first, evolutionary novelties emerge, bit by bit. The Cambrian explosion appears to conform to the second pattern, the top-down effect." Erwin et al. (1987), in their study of marine invertebrates, similarly conclude that, "The fossil record suggests that the major pulse of diversification of phyla occurs before that of classes, classes before that of orders, orders before that of families. The higher taxa do not seem to have diverged through an accumulation of lower taxa." Indeed, the existence of numerous small and soft-bodied animals in the Precambrian strata undermines one of the most popular responses that these missing transitions can be accounted for by them being too small and too-soft bodied to be preserved." Jonathan M. - Jerry Coyne's Chapter on the Fossil Record Fails to Show "Why Evolution is True" - December 4, 2012
Dr. Meyer holds that there are 'yawning chasms' in the 'morphological space' between the phyla which suddenly appeared in the Cambrian Explosion,,,
"Over the past 150 years or so, paleontologists have found many representatives of the phyla that were well-known in Darwin’s time (by analogy, the equivalent of the three primary colors) and a few completely new forms altogether (by analogy, some other distinct colors such as green and orange, perhaps). And, of course, within these phyla, there is a great deal of variety. Nevertheless, the analogy holds at least insofar as the differences in form between any member of one phylum and any member of another phylum are vast, and paleontologists have utterly failed to find forms that would fill these yawning chasms in what biotechnologists call “morphological space.” In other words, they have failed to find the paleolontogical equivalent of the numerous finely graded intermediate colors (Oedleton blue, dusty rose, gun barrel gray, magenta, etc.) that interior designers covet. Instead, extensive sampling of the fossil record has confirmed a strikingly discontinuous pattern in which representatives of the major phyla stand in stark isolation from members of other phyla, without intermediate forms filling the intervening morphological space." Stephen Meyer - Darwin’s Doubt (p. 70)
Moreover, this top down pattern in the fossil record, which is the complete opposite pattern as Darwin predicted for the fossil record, is not just an anomaly of the Cambrian Explosion, but this 'top down', disparity preceding diversity, pattern is found in the fossil record subsequent to the Cambrian explosion as well.
Scientific study turns understanding about evolution on its head – July 30, 2013 Excerpt: evolutionary biologists,,, looked at nearly one hundred fossil groups to test the notion that it takes groups of animals many millions of years to reach their maximum diversity of form. Contrary to popular belief, not all animal groups continued to evolve fundamentally new morphologies through time. The majority actually achieved their greatest diversity of form (disparity) relatively early in their histories. ,,,Dr Matthew Wills said: “This pattern, known as ‘early high disparity’, turns the traditional V-shaped cone model of evolution on its head. What is equally surprising in our findings is that groups of animals are likely to show early-high disparity regardless of when they originated over the last half a billion years. This isn’t a phenomenon particularly associated with the first radiation of animals (in the Cambrian Explosion), or periods in the immediate wake of mass extinctions.”,,, Author Martin Hughes, continued: “Our work implies that there must be constraints on the range of forms within animal groups, and that these limits are often hit relatively early on. Co-author Dr Sylvain Gerber, added: “A key question now is what prevents groups from generating fundamentally new forms later on in their evolution.,,, http://phys.org/news/2013-07-scientific-evolution.html “A recent analysis of disparity in 98 metazoan clades through the Phanerozoic found a preponderance of clades with maximal disparity early in their history. Thus, whether or not taxonomic diversification slows down most studies of disparity reveal a pattern in which the early evolution of a clade defines the morphological boundaries of a group which are then filled in by subsequent diversification. This pattern is inconsistent with that expected of a classic adaptive radiation in which diversity and disparity should be coupled, at least during the early phase of the radiation.” – Doug Erwin What this admits is that disparity is a worse problem than evolutionists had realized: it’s ubiquitous (throughout the history of life on earth), not just in the Cambrian (Explosion). - In Allaying Darwin’s Doubt, Two Cambrian Experts Still Come Up Short – October 16, 2015 “The lack of ancestral or intermediate forms between fossil species is not a bizarre peculiarity of early metazoan history. Gaps are general and prevalent throughout the fossil record.” R.A. Raff and T.C. Kaufman, Embryos, Genes, and Evolution: The Developmental-Genetic Basis of Evolutionary Change (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1991), 34. “In virtually all cases a new taxon appears for the first time in the fossil record with most definitive features already present, and practically no known stem-group forms.” TS Kemp - Fossils and Evolution,– Curator of Zoological Collections, Oxford University, Oxford Uni Press, p246, 1999 “What is missing are the many intermediate forms hypothesized by Darwin, and the continual divergence of major lineages into the morphospace between distinct adaptive types.” Robert L Carroll (born 1938) – vertebrate paleontologist who specialises in Paleozoic and Mesozoic amphibians "Rather than showing gradual Darwinian evolution, the history of life shows a pattern of explosions where new fossil forms come into existence without clear evolutionary precursors. Evolutionary anthropologist Jeffrey Schwartz summarizes the problem: “We are still in the dark about the origin of most major groups of organisms. They appear in the fossil record as Athena did from the head of Zeus — full-blown and raring to go, in contradiction to Darwin’s depiction of evolution as resulting from the gradual accumulation of countless infinitesimally minute variations. . .”98 – Casey Luskin - Problem 5: Abrupt Appearance of Species in the Fossil Record Does Not Support Darwinian Evolution - January 29, 2015 “The point emerges that if we examine the fossil record in detail, whether at the level of orders or of species, we find’ over and over again’ not gradual evolution, but the sudden explosion of one group at the expense of another.” Paleontologist, Derek V. Ager, “The Nature of the Fossil Record,” 87 Proceedings of the British Geological Association 87 (1976): 133. (Department of Geology & Oceanography, University College, Swansea, UK) “The record certainly did not reveal gradual transformations of structure in the course of time. On the contrary, it showed that species generally remained constant throughout their history and were replaced quite suddenly by significantly different forms. New types or classes seemed to appear fully formed, with no sign of an evolutionary trend by which they could have emerged from an earlier type.” Peter Bowler, Evolution: The History of an Idea (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1984), 187. “It is a feature of the known fossil record that most taxa appear abruptly. They are not, as a rule, led up to by a sequence of almost imperceptibly changing forerunners such as Darwin believed should be usual in evolution…This phenomenon becomes more universal and more intense as the hierarchy of categories is ascended. Gaps among known species are sporadic and often small. Gaps among known orders, classes and phyla are systematic and almost always large.” G.G.Simpson – one of the most influential American Paleontologist of the 20th century “The facts of greatest general importance are the following. When a new phylum, class, or order appears, there follows a quick, explosive (in terms of geological time) diversification so that practically all orders or families known appear suddenly and without any apparent transitions. Afterwards, a slow evolution follows; this frequently has the appearance of a gradual change, step by step, though down to the generic level abrupt major steps without transitions occur. At the end of such a series, a kind of evolutionary running-wild frequently is observed. Giant forms appear, and odd or pathological types of different kinds precede the extinction of such a line.” Richard B. Goldschmidt, “Evolution, as Viewed by One Geneticist,” American Scientist 40 (January 1952), 97.
Moreover, much contrary to Charles Darwin's belief that increasing resolution of the fossil record would alleviate his problem with the fossil record, the fact of the matter is that increasing resolution of the fossil record has only made this disparity preceding diversity 'problem' worse for Darwinists since Darwin's day
“Now, after over 120 years of the most extensive and painstaking geological exploration of every continent and ocean bottom, the picture is infinitely more vivid and complete than it was in 1859. Formations have been discovered containing hundreds of billions of fossils and our museums now are filled with over 100 million fossils of 250,000 different species. The availability of this profusion of hard scientific data should permit objective investigators to determine if Darwin was on the right track. What is the picture which the fossils have given us? … The gaps between major groups of organisms have been growing even wider and more undeniable. They can no longer be ignored or rationalized away with appeals to imperfection of the fossil record.” Luther D. Sunderland, Darwin’s Enigma 1988, Fossils and Other Problems, 4th edition, Master Books, p. 9 “The evidence we find in the geological record is not nearly as compatible with Darwinian natural selection as we would like it to be …. We now have a quarter of a million fossil species but the situation hasn't changed much. The record of evolution is surprisingly jerky and, ironically, we have even fewer examples of evolutionary transition than in Darwin’s time … so Darwin’s problem has not been alleviated”. David Raup, Curator of Geology at Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History “With the benefit of hindsight, it is amazing that paleontologists could have accepted gradual evolution as a universal pattern on the basis of a handful of supposedly well-documented lineages (e.g. Gryphaea, Micraster, Zaphrentis) none of which actually withstands close scrutiny.” Christopher R.C. Paul, “Patterns of Evolution and Extinction in Invertebrates,” K.C. Allen and D.E.G. Briggs, eds., Evolution and the Fossil Record (Washington, D.C., Smithsonian Institution Press, 1989), 105. “It must be significant that nearly all the evolutionary stories I learned as a student from Trueman’s Ostrea/Gryphaea to Carruthers’ Zaphrentis delanouei, have now been ‘debunked’. Similarly, my own experience of more than twenty years looking for evolutionary lineages among the Mesozoic Brachiopoda has proved them equally elusive.’ Dr. Derek V. Ager (Department of Geology & Oceonography, University College, Swansea, UK), ‘The nature of the fossil record’. Proceedings of the Geologists’ Association, vol.87(2), 1976,p.132. “No one has found any such in-between creatures. This was long chalked up to ‘gaps’ in the fossil records, gaps that proponents of gradualism confidently expected to fill in someday when rock strata of the proper antiquity were eventually located. But all the fossil evidence to date has failed to turn up any such missing links . . . There is a growing conviction among many scientists that these transitional forms never existed.” Niles Eldredge, quoted in George Alexander, “Alternate Theory of Evolution Considered,” Los Angeles Times, November 19, 1978. Does Lots of Sediment in the Ocean Solve the "Mystery" of the Cambrian Explosion? - Casey Luskin April, 2012 Excerpt: I think the Cambrian fossil record is surprisingly complete. I think it may be more complete than we realize. The reason for that is, for instance, if you look at the stratigraphy of the world, if I go and collect Cambrian rocks in Wales and find certain fossils, if I then go to China, I don't find the same species but I find the same sorts of fossils. If I go into Carboniferous rocks, I go to Canada, they are the same as what I find in this country. So there is a clear set of faunas and floras that take us through geological time. The overall framework is falling into position. - Simon Conway Morris http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/04/lots_of_sedimen059021.html “It is hard for us paleontologists, steeped as we are in a tradition of Darwinian analysis, to admit that neo-Darwinian explanations for the Cambrian explosion have failed miserably. New data acquired in recent years, instead of solving Darwin’s dilemma, have rather made it worse. Meyer describes the dimensions of the problem with clarity and precision. His book, (Darwin's Doubt), is a game changer for the study of evolution and points us in the right direction as we seek a new theory for the origin of animals.” -Dr. Mark McMenamin – 2013 Paleontologist at Mt. Holyoke College and author of The Emergence of Animals “Gradualism is a concept I believe in, not just because of Darwin’s authority, but because my understanding of genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people [i.e., Eldredge] are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a paleontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record. You say that I should at least ‘show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived.’ I will lay it on the line – there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument.” Colin Patterson to Luther Sunderland, April 10, 1979, quoted in Luther .D. Sunderland, Darwin’s Enigma: Fossils and Other Problems, 4th ed. (El Cajon, CA: Master Book Publishers, 1988), 89.
bornagain

Scientific discoveries are rarely made in Laundromats, but at least one great scientific breakthrough—an “aha” moment—occurred in one. The year was 1968, more than a decade before the discovery of the first Chengjiang fossils. The scientist overtaken by the muses was paleontologist Niles Eldredge. One day while standing in a Michigan Laundromat, following months of collecting trilobite fossils for his Ph.D. research, Eldredge happened to reach into his pocket. He removed one of the fossils he had been collecting, a specimen of a trilobite species called Phacops rana. Initially, as he examined the specimen, he felt “depressed.” The fossil closely resembled many others that he had found across layers of strata during his fieldwork in the Midwest. His trilobites showed no evidence of gradual change, as classical neo-Darwinism had taught him to expect.1 As Eldredge explained in a lecture at the University of Pittsburgh in 1983, he then experienced a kind of scientific epiphany. He realized that the “absence of change itself” was “a very interesting pattern.” Or as he later put it, “Stasis is data.”2 “Stasis” is the term that Eldredge and his scientific collaborator, Stephen Jay Gould (see Fig. 7.1), later gave to the pattern in which most species, “during their geological history, either do not change in any appreciable way or else they fluctuate mildly in morphology, with no apparent direction.”3 As Eldredge examined that solitary trilobite, he realized that he had been observing evidence of stasis for some time—however much he might have wanted it otherwise. As he explained, “Stasis . . . was by far the most important pattern to emerge from all my staring at Phacops specimens.” He continued, “Traditionally seen as an artifact of a poor record, as the inability of paleontologists to find what evolutionary biologists going back to Darwin had told them must be there, stasis was, as Stephen Jay Gould put it, ‘paleontology’s trade secret’—an embarrassing one at that.”4 This embarrassing realization proved pivotal, eventually leading Eldredge and Gould to reject both the gradualistic picture of evolutionary change articulated by Darwin and the neo-Darwinian understanding of the mechanism by which such change allegedly takes place. It also led them to formulate, in a series of scientific papers from 1972 to 1980, a new theory of evolution known as “punctuated equilibrium.”5 [Stephen Meyer, ch.7, 'Darwin's Doubt']
Box

Well, transitional forms are certainly 'abundant' in the mythology of evolutionists, and their strained imagination. butifnot

Here's another question for Barry. Barry, do you think Gould is approximately correct in his description of the fossil record here?
Since we proposed punctuated equilibria to explain trends, it is infuriating to be quoted again and again by creationists -- whether through design or stupidity, I do not know -- as admitting that the fossil record includes no transitional forms. Transitional forms are generally lacking at the species level, but they are abundant between larger groups. - Gould, Stephen Jay 1983. "Evolution as Fact and Theory" in Hens Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History. New York: W. W. Norton & Co., p. 258-260.
Do you agree with Gould that transitional forms are abundant between larger groups, even though they are rare between species?* (* One thing Creationists Don't Ever Get is that "between-species differences" are the *smallest* differences typically observable in the fossil record. That's right, punctuated equilibrium was about the jerkiness of small differences between closely similar species. Yes, the kind of differences that creationists in all other contexts just dismiss with "that's just microevolution/variation within the kind")) NickMatzke_UD

19 Alicia CartelliNovember 21, 2015 at 6:28 pm Ok Barry so if you had to guess, what percentage of species to ever live do you think is represented in the fossil record?
Good question! I wonder why Barry won't answer it? NickMatzke_UD

Barry,
What is astounding is that you don’t believe Darwin when he says: “But just in proportion as this process of extermination has acted on an enormous scale, so must the number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, be truly enormous.” How do we reconcile the statement you quote and the one I quote?
I do believe him. But there’s nothing to reconcile. Yes, speciation requires a long time, and many generations. I don’t see how that necessarily means that the length of time a species spends changing has to occupy the majority of a species existence. Apparently neither did Darwin.
I don’t know what he believed in his heart of hearts. I only know what he wrote. He wrote that if his theory were true the actual record of life contained an “infinitude” of transitional species. He wrote that the fossil record does not reflect an “infinitude” of transitional species. He wrote that is a serious problem with his theory. To save his theory he wrote several (again your words) the ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find. And he wrote that for any given species caught in the fossil record it would probably be in stasis even if the history of life as a whole is not characterized by stasis.
I agree with everything you said there up until the second half of the last sentence. So you agree that he recognizes that most fossils of a given species will show stasis. What do you believe is Darwin’s explanation for why most fossils of a given species will show stasis, if the species spent most of its existence changing? Cause the only explanation I see from Darwin for this, is that species spend most of their time in stasis. Is there some other explanation?
I am not sure what you are asking.
Just pointing out that there’s no contradiction between natural selection being active and stasis. In fact, you need natural selection to achieve stasis. Think about fish that live for generations in a dark cave. What they experience is not stasis. Their eyes change dramatically – but not because of natural selection, but due to a lack of it.
For any given species at any given time it may not be producing morphological change. But for life as a whole the theory (Darwin’s word) REQUIRES infinitely many fine gradations.”
Obviously Darwin’s theory requires and infinite (or, at least a whole lot) of many fine gradations. But, again, there’s no reason to assume that that requires a species changing during most of its existence. If a population remains in stasis for 4 million, and then over the next million years changes into a new species, than that population spent most of its existence in stasis. But obviously there’s still plenty of time for countless fine gradations over perhaps a hundred thousand generations. An enormous number of intermediates. But the window of time for intermediate fossils to be left behind is shrunk by 80%, and most fossils left behind by that population will be from the time of stasis. If Darwin gave an example of what he was arguing, I think it would have gone something like that.
Eldredge disagrees with you. He says Darwin predicted “rampant, albeit gradual, change affecting all lineages through time.” Of course you probably believe you are smarter than one of the most famous evolutionary biologists in the last half century. Good for you for being so smart GUN.
Yes, Eldredge would probably agree with you that Darwin didn’t believe that species spent most of their time in stasis. Although he would disagree with you on the interpretation of this quote, and recognize that Darwin was (obviously) arguing that species do, indeed, spend most of their time in stasis. But, perhaps, like Gould he would write it off as an anomalous quote (even though he repeats it elsewhere!) and view it as inconsistent with other statements. But if Eldredge disagrees with me about Darwin, I’m in good company, because, as I mentioned before, of all the controversy and criticism that Eldredge and Gould have received since they proposed Punk Eek, the top complaint has been that of historical revisionism. In particular, that criticism goes for what they say Darwin argued. And I can see why. And it wasn’t just their critics that made such charges, it even came from their allies: “Nothing incensed some evolutionists more than the claims made by Gould and associates that they had been the first to have discovered, or at least to have for the first time properly emphasized, various evolutionary phenomena already widely accepted in the evolutionary literature. G. L. Stebbins and F. J. Ayala (1981), Verne Grant (1982, 1983), and J. S. Levinton (1983) were fully justified in rejecting these claims of novelty. In particular, they showed that an insistence on gradualism by Darwin and his followers was a denial of saltationism but not a denial of different and changing rates of evolution.” That was from Ernst Mayr (perhaps the most respected evolutionary biologists after Darwin, and one of the most respected historians of science). He was (mostly) friendly to Gould and Eldredge and their theory. (And, of course, they created their theory largely as support for Mayr’s theory of speciation. As Gould puts it, Punctuated Equilibrium “was formulated as the expected geological consequence of Mayrian allopatry.") But even Mayr couldn’t avoid the fact that they pulled some shenanigans when it came to their claims of what Darwin believed. They do have a point though that the importance of stasis wasn’t recognized, and that the proponents of the modern synthesis was not expecting so much stasis.
Nonsense. If one’s theory predicts sudden appearance and stasis the fossil record is far from imperfect. It is practically ideal.
Uh, I can’t tell if you’re being serious at this point. When I say that the fossil record is imperfect, I meant it in the same way that every other person in history has meant it. The fossil record is imperfect because the vast majority of organisms that have died don’t leave fossils, and the vast majority of the Earth hasn’t been searched for fossils, etc.
Good for you GUN. For everything you’ve gotten wrong, you are absolutely correct about that main point I’ve been trying to make. You are wrong about the “nobody’s saying” though. That is exactly what your friends are saying. Here is Zach word-for-word: “stasis is more typical than change, so change will be less likely to be preserved.” Sorry, no cookie.
I’ve also been saying the same thing all along. goodusername

Here is Eldredge saying pretty much the same thing as GUN:
But his Chapter 9 (first edition) on the imperfections of the geological record is one long ad hoc, special-pleading argument designed to rationalize, to flat-out explain away, the differences between what he saw as logical predictions derived from his theory and the facts of the fossil record.
Niles Eldredge, Time Frames: The Rethinking of Darwinian Evolution and the Theory of Punctuated Equilibria (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985), 27-28. Barry Arrington

Pete, don't like Eldredge, how about David Raup: The evidence we find in the geologic record is not nearly as compatible with darwinain natural selection as we would like it to be. Darwin was completely aware of this. He was embarrassed by the fossil record because it didn't look the way he predicted it would and, as a result, he devoted a long section of his Origin of Species to an attempt to explain and rationalize the differences Barry Arrington

This is well done, yes lawyer like, analysis of Darwin and the fossil record. Case well made. Darwin smartly saw the fossil record did not show what should be there. This has been admitted by the punctuated equilibrium idea. They retreated to this because the fossil record never showed what darwin wanted and needed. SO they had to come up with a other answer. Stasis had to become a essential part of evolutionary biology new school. Okay. Darwin saw small changes constantly arriving in new populations before they were geneuine new species. HE was wrong about species existing and modern evolutionsts also question species concept. So they see new populations as the important thing and don't see changes as much as Darwin. in fact random drift ideas show this. Darwin did not see stasis as a part of evolutions stiry but only a option for some cases. Case closed. By the way its all wrong to say there is biology evidence for or against evolution by using fossils. They say nothing except by the geology claims and so they say nothing. They are never bio evidence. This is a flaw of reasoning on all sides. Clumbsy thinking. Robert Byers

Pete:
My response was intended to highlight that the reason Darwin called the fossil record imperfect had nothing to do with whether it did or didn’t fit the data.
Of course it does. If the record had fit his theory he would not have called it extremely imperfect. He would have embraced it warmly.
The “problem” he had, was of course, how his theory could predict what is actually found.
No, his problem was that his theory predicted the exact opposite of what was found.
His answer was . . .
To claim that the problem was with the "extremely imperfect" record, not his theory.
I don’t think goodusername and I disagree.
You don't think you have a disagreement with someone who has said the exact opposite of what you just said? That's odd.
This is how he gets his theory to match the data.
No, when the data don't match his theory he attacks the data as "extremely imperfect."
It’s a bit of a stretch to say that someone on your blog can’t disagree with Eldredge
Nonsense. I never said that. I said that as between the opinion of one of the most prominent evolutionary biologists in the last 50 years and someone like you -- some anonymous schmo spewing his uninformed opinions into an internet combox -- I'm going with Eldredge, especially given the fact that Eldredge's opinion is consistent with what Darwin actually wrote and the way in which he has been interpreted for over 150 years.
If Eldredge is stating that Darwin thought the rate of morphological change is constant, he is wrong.
Said the anonymous schmo. Barry Arrington

Ladies and Gentlemen. We may be skeptical of claims that Evolutionists make that are not demonstrated scientifically but we at least expect Professional Evolution Proponents to understand what the Hypothesis they are talking about entail. Now we are being told that Professional advocates of evolution do not even understand what the various evolutionary hypothesis that they are teaching or discussing entail. It is a sad state of affairs for the Evolutionist. Jack Jones

“Gradualism (UNIFORMITY OF RATE), EMBRACED BY DARWIN; later a key assumption of the Modern Synthesis.” Discovering Evolution: II. Before Darwin Biology Learning Center, University Of Arizona _____________________________________________________ “PUNCTUATED EQUILIBRIUM– QUESTIONS EVOLUTIONARY UNIFORMITY OF RATE. ” Darwinism and Wallace Lecture – 3 Biology Learning Center, University Of Arizona Jack Jones

"If Eldredge is stating that Darwin thought the rate of morphological change is constant, he is wrong" So is the Biological Learning Center, The University Of Arizona according to you. Jack Jones

Barry wrote:
Can you help me clue your evo friends in? Thanks.
My response was intended to highlight that the reason Darwin called the fossil record imperfect had nothing to do with whether it did or didn't fit the data. I didn't say he never had a "problem" with the fossil record. The "problem" he had, was of course, how his theory could predict what is actually found. His answer was that the rate of morphological change was highly variable, so stasis might be the lay of the land for vast periods of time, punctuated by relatively short periods of morphological change. In fact, he wrote it pretty clearly:
the periods during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured in years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which they retain the same form.
I don't think goodusername and I disagree.
Nonsense. If one’s theory predicts sudden appearance and stasis the fossil record is far from imperfect. It is practically ideal.
Do you not know what people mean when they say "the fossil record is imperfect"? It seems like you don't understand that that statement is not in reference to any underlying theory - it's a basic fact that fossilization is super rare, most species aren't represented in the fossil record, and fossils are hard to find. That's true if you're a creationist, evolutionist, or last Thursdayist. All of them agree the fossil record is imperfect.
He wrote that if his theory were true the actual record of life contained an “infinitude” of transitional species.
And as we discussed in the previous post there are a LOT of ways to get an infinitude of points in a function over the domain [0 10] taking values in [0 1]. Do you not understand why we had that discussion?
He wrote that the fossil record does not reflect an “infinitude” of transitional species. He wrote that is a serious problem with his theory. To save his theory he wrote several (again your words) the ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find. And he wrote that for any given species caught in the fossil record it would probably be in stasis even if the history of life as a whole is not characterized by stasis.
The "ad hoc" modification he made to his theory is that you cannot assume that the rate of morphological change is a constant! This is how he gets his theory to match the data. I don't know how else to make this point clear to you. Darwin basically wrote: 1) If my theory is true there should be a lot of intermediates. 2) The fossil record doesn't show a lot of intermediates at the species level. 3) Fossilization is rare. But that by itself doesn't help me, if the rate of change is constant, we should still be able to draw a line through the points... 4) OK. What if the rate of change is highly variable, and most species morphology is actually quite stable over time, with changes taking place relatively quickly on geological time-frames? 5) This would mean that A) there were a lot of intermediates (An infinitude of them, one might say), so we're good there. And B) the fossil record is so sparse, and if the rate of change is highly varying, the actual periods of change may be quite quick on a geological time-scale, so will not be clearly identifiable in the fossil record. Ah. That solves it. Or:
the periods during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured in years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which they retain the same form.

Eldredge disagrees with you. He says Darwin predicted “rampant, albeit gradual, change affecting all lineages through time.” Of course you probably believe you are smarter than one of the most famous evolutionary biologists in the last half century. Good for you for being so smart GUN.
Two things: 1) Seriously Barry? It's a bit of a stretch to say that someone on your blog can't disagree with Eldredge because he was so SMART! 2) If Eldredge is stating that Darwin thought the rate of morphological change is constant, he is wrong. At least, I have never seen a quote from Darwin supporting that. Have you? peteFun

Ok Barry so if you had to guess, what percentage of species to ever live do you think is represented in the fossil record? Alicia Cartelli

ACL
So barry, do you think the fossil record contains every species to ever live on this planet?
No.
“If the record agreed with this theory he would have no reason to call it “extremely imperfect” would he.” …just when I thought you couldn’t get any more ignorant.
Calling me names is not an argument. I don't know why you would think that it is. Barry Arrington

Let’s look at some of GUN’s other claims:
He even then goes on to give possible explanations for why stasis is more common than change: “We may infer that this has been the case, from there being no inherent tendency in organic beings to become modified or to progress in structure…” Yet, astonishingly, you don’t believe him that that’s what he believed!
What is astounding is that you don’t believe Darwin when he says: “But just in proportion as this process of extermination has acted on an enormous scale, so must the number of intermediate varieties, which have formerly existed, be truly enormous.” How do we reconcile the statement you quote and the one I quote? Simple. The first quote is about what actually happened and the second quote is about why the fossil record does not reflect what actually happened, or – your words – the second quote is one of the ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find. I don’t know what he believed in his heart of hearts. I only know what he wrote. He wrote that if his theory were true the actual record of life contained an “infinitude” of transitional species. He wrote that the fossil record does not reflect an “infinitude” of transitional species. He wrote that is a serious problem with his theory. To save his theory he wrote several (again your words) the ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find. And he wrote that for any given species caught in the fossil record it would probably be in stasis even if the history of life as a whole is not characterized by stasis.
My theory predicts that natural selection is working everywhere all the time to effect tiny morphological changes that accumulate over time and result in new species appearing. Yes, Darwin believed that natural selection is working everywhere all the time – but why does it necessarily always have to be to affect change?
I am not sure what you are asking. For any given species at any given time it may not be producing morphological change. But for life as a whole the theory (Darwin’s word) REQUIRES infinitely many fine gradations.”
My theory predicts that “infinitely many fine gradations” (i.e., a “truly enormous” number of intermediate varieties) existed. IOW, the record of life is one of rampant gradual morphological change affecting the vast majority of species the vast majority of the time. That’s not an “IOW”.
Eldredge disagrees with you. He says Darwin predicted “rampant, albeit gradual, change affecting all lineages through time.” Of course you probably believe you are smarter than one of the most famous evolutionary biologists in the last half century. Good for you for being so smart GUN.
Indeed, my entire project is aimed at undermining the creationist notion of the fixity of species. How could I do that if I were to say that stasis is the rule among life forms generally? The question is a non sequitur.
You don’t seem to understand what a non sequitur is. Hint: a question can never be one.
Look, if Darwin believed that the fossil record revealed what his theory predicted it would reveal, would he have called it “extremely imperfect”? Of course not. Of course so. Is there anyone who says it isn’t “extremely imperfect”? It’s extremely imperfect regardless of one’s beliefs regarding species. It’s one thing everyone can agree on.
Nonsense. If one’s theory predicts sudden appearance and stasis the fossil record is far from imperfect. It is practically ideal.
And, again, the claim that species spend most of their time in stasis is an ad hoc claim that attributes to the imperfection of the fossil record. No one is saying that his theory predicted that species spend most of their time in stasis – but it doesn’t contradict his theory either.
Good for you GUN. For everything you’ve gotten wrong, you are absolutely correct about that main point I’ve been trying to make. You are wrong about the “nobody’s saying” though. That is exactly what your friends are saying. Here is Zach word-for-word: “stasis is more typical than change, so change will be less likely to be preserved.” Sorry, no cookie. Barry Arrington

It is always amusing when the Darwinists contradict each other on the same thread: Barry:
No, he called it imperfect because it did not show what his theory predicted it would show…
peteFun
This is so wrong-headed it is difficult to know where to start.
Barry
Astoundingly, some of our Darwinist friends continue to insist that Darwin had no problem with the fossil record
goodusername
No one saying that. Of course he had a problem with the fossil record. That’s why he came up with ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find
Good for you GUN for at least getting it right. Can you help me clue your evo friends in? Thanks. Barry Arrington

Peace & joy. I'm glad I finally found the invisible gorilla. I was beginning to be afraid it was one of those "Where's Waldo" things. And I never find Waldo. In Mr. Darwin's defense, when he first wrote, the number of known fossils that had undergone any professional analysis was tiny. So it was reasonable to propose a theory that made assumptions about what would be discovered when 100 times or 10,000 times as many fossils were located and analyzed. Remember that after Galileo determined the speed of sound he attempted to use the same technique to measure the speed of light and failed. But he failed because he simply didn't have any device that could accurately measure millionths of a second, not because there was anything wrong with his theory for how to measure it. On the other hand, I have to believe that before he died Chuckie himself could see the statistical patterns emerging from each 100 new fossils: no gap fillers, but instead constantly new species. We weren't "filling in the gaps"; we were discovering new gaps between new species we didn't know about in 1850. Even the simplest sampling analysis would have suggested that the desired pattern was not there. I tried reading Chuckie's "Origin of Species" once and gave up. The man couldn't write. At some point I intend to read "Descent of Man" because ALL of the evils of Eugenics and scientific racism claim "Descent" as their justification. Clearly the world would be a better place if Chuckie had just spent his declining years raising pigeons. mahuna

So barry, do you think the fossil record contains every species to ever live on this planet? "If the record agreed with this theory he would have no reason to call it “extremely imperfect” would he." ...just when I thought you couldn't get any more ignorant. Alicia Cartelli

Right, Jones. I want to see this "infinitude" of intermediate fossils that they promised us. I will not settle for less. On a slightly different tangent having to do with the newest BS du jour (neutral drift), where was neutral drift during those eons of stasis? Did random mutations go on a holiday? Mapou

Right on the money Mapou. These revisionists are funny though with their desperation in trying to accommodate the stasis with Darwin's view. Jack Jones

So an "imperfect and incomplete fossil record" is given to the rest us unwashed and uneducated troglodytes as an explanation for why the fine gradation expected by Darwin's theory is not falsified by the overwhelming evidence against it? This has got to be the lamest excuse in the book. Does this fossil record also contain the tiny fossilized brains of ancient failed Darwinists? Darn. Where is natural selection when you need it? The truth is that we have huge numbers of fossils from all over the world and they all say the same thing: sudden explosion of new body plans followed by eons of stasis. The number of samples is sufficiently high and sufficiently varied that the Darwinist's gradual evolution nonsense can be safely flushed down the toilet and forgotten. Mapou

"No one is saying that his theory predicted that species spend most of their time in stasis – but it doesn’t contradict his theory either." The way you revisionists have it is that Darwin's hypothesis accommodates change and no change. And yet Eldredge admitted that the fossil record is non Darwinian. "For the most part it has been paleontological reluctance to cross swords with Darwinian tradition that accounts for the failure to inject the empirical reality of stasis into the evolutionary picture" Jack Jones

Barry,
Astoundingly, some of our Darwinist friends continue to insist that Darwin had no problem with the fossil record
No one saying that. Of course he had a problem with the fossil record. That’s why he came up with ad hoc reasons for why intermediate fossils were rare to find, such as, “the periods during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured in years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which they retain the same form.” Or, as nearly repeated word for word in another place (as if for emphasis): “the periods during which species have been undergoing modification, though very long as measured by years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which these same species remained without undergoing any change. “ He even then goes on to give possible explanations for why stasis is more common than change: “We may infer that this has been the case, from there being no inherent tendency in organic beings to become modified or to progress in structure…” Yet, astonishingly, you don’t believe him that that’s what he believed! (Incidentally, the denial that organisms have an “inherent tendency… to progress” has a familiar ring: “Heaven forfend me from Lamarck nonsense of a “tendency to progression”. I wonder if he equated the claim that species are always changing, or usually changing, with "Lamarckian nonsense"?)
My theory predicts that natural selection is working everywhere all the time to effect tiny morphological changes that accumulate over time and result in new species appearing.
Yes, Darwin believed that natural selection is working everywhere all the time – but why does it necessarily always have to be to affect change?
My theory predicts that “infinitely many fine gradations” (i.e., a “truly enormous” number of intermediate varieties) existed. IOW, the record of life is one of rampant gradual morphological change affecting the vast majority of species the vast majority of the time.
That’s not an “IOW”.
Indeed, my entire project is aimed at undermining the creationist notion of the fixity of species. How could I do that if I were to say that stasis is the rule among life forms generally?
The question is a non sequitur.
Here is why I believe the fossil record is imperfect: blah, blah, blah.
To paraphrase Seinfeld: “You blah blah blah'd over the best part!”
Look, if Darwin believed that the fossil record revealed what his theory predicted it would reveal, would he have called it “extremely imperfect”? Of course not.
Of course so. Is there anyone who says it isn’t “extremely imperfect”? It’s extremely imperfect regardless of one’s beliefs regarding species. It’s one thing everyone can agree on. And, again, the claim that species spend most of their time in stasis is an ad hoc claim that attributes to the imperfection of the fossil record. No one is saying that his theory predicted that species spend most of their time in stasis – but it doesn’t contradict his theory either. goodusername

Okay here is my theory: 'everyone has an uncontrollable desire to kill his neighbors.' Why don't we see this everywhere? Several reasons: 1. Because police and news reporting is extremely imperfect. 2. Because often bodies simply disappear and murder cannot be determined. 3. Often murderers go extinct without producing (modified) offspring. 4. And the periods, during which murders take place, though long as measured by months, have probably been short in comparison with the periods spent in prison. Box

No, he called it imperfect because it did not show what his theory predicted it would show...
This is so wrong-headed it is difficult to know where to start. The fossil recordis imperfect because not all animals leave fossils. Darwin noting the "imperfection" of the fossil record is not some admission of guilt - it's stating a well known fact.
4. My theory predicts that “infinitely many fine gradations” (i.e., a “truly enormous” number of intermediate varieties) existed. IOW, the record of life is one of rampant gradual morphological change affecting the vast majority of species the vast majority of the time
Emphasis added. And I don't think this is correct. As far as I know, nowhere does Darwin say that "rampant gradual morphological change affecting the vast majority of species the vast majority of the time" is the rule (in the sense that all species are undergoing morphological change all the time and at the same rate). In fact that is plaint contradicted by the quotes under discussion! Sure - evolution is always acting in the form of mutation and natural selection, but the rate of morphological change may be highly variable which may leave the impression of sudden arrival and stasis in the fossil record. This is a key and important point. Darwin put it pretty clearly:
the periods during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured in years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which they retain the same form.
peteFun

OK, this thread calls for Cheetos, beers and a comfortable chair. Your turn, Zachriel. ahahaha... Mapou

Zach:
That’s hilarious. You leave out Darwin’s explanation. That’s the important part, of course.
No Zach, the important part is that he finds it necessary to give an “explanation” in the first place, rather than accept the record on its face. Alicia:
“Indeed, my entire project is aimed at undermining the creationist notion” It’s here that your train quickly goes off the rails. You made it a whole 16 lines before an absurd statement though, congrats.
Hmmm. What about this:
For that was Darwin’s problem: to establish the plausibility of the very idea of evolution, Darwin felt that he had to undermine the older (and ultimately biblically based) doctrine of species fixity. Stasis, to Darwin, was an ugly inconvenience.
Niles Eldredge, Time Frames: The Rethinking of Darwinian Evolution and the Theory of Punctuated Equilibria(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1985), 188-89. Was Eldredge’s statement saying the same thing also “absurd”?
The reasons for the imperfect fossil record are probably the most important part of the conversation
No AC, the important part is that he finds it necessary to give an “explanation” in the first place rather than accept the record on its face.
Darwin called the fossil record imperfect because it does not provide us with a complete catalog of all species (or the gradations between them) to ever roam the earth. He did not call it imperfect because it disagreed with his theory.
If the record agreed with this theory he would have no reason to call it “extremely imperfect” would he. Sev:
What does Darwin mean by “imperfect” in this context? He means ‘incomplete’.
Of course that is what he means. He is saying that if the record were complete, it would support my theory instead of undermining it.
Show me one evolutionist who claims that Darwin believed the fossil record offers “perfect support”
OK. Zachriel Barry Arrington

You gotta love it. Why is the fossil record incomplete? Well, gee, because not every creature ever born was fossilized, that's why. Surely Darwin knew this. Mung

In response to all of this the Darwinists keep coming up with some version of “Darwin knew about stasis; he wrote about it and said it occurs.” Of course Darwin knew about stasis, and yes he did write about it and say that it sometimes occurs. Those facts change nothing. Darwin wrote about stasis not to suggest that stasis is the rule, but in his effort to explain why the fossil record is — his words — “extremely imperfect.” Look, if Darwin believed that the fossil record revealed what his theory predicted it would reveal, would he have called it “extremely imperfect”? Of course not. The whole point of Darwin’s lengthy discussion of the fossil record is to show that it did NOT reveal what actually happened, and that is why it is “extremely imperfect.”
What does Darwin mean by “imperfect” in this context? He means ‘incomplete’. The fossil record is incomplete today. In Darwin’s day it was even less complete. It will almost certainly always be incomplete because fossilization is such a rare process. The fossils we have today provide a very coarse-grained image of the history of life on Earth and, although some parts are better than others, it may never achieve the resolution that would enable us to see the finely-graded changes that Darwin posited captured in detail in the record. Darwin understood this, just as he understood his theory allowed for long periods of stasis as well as for periods of more rapid change in the evolution of life on Earth. None of this is inconsistent with evolution proceeding mostly in small incremental steps.
What is truly astounding is that we have Darwinists today who are somehow trying to claim that Darwin believed the fossil record offered perfect support to his theory even though he himself called that record “extremely imperfect” for the very reason that it did not. Revisionism of this magnitude beggars belief.
Show me one evolutionist who claims that Darwin believed the fossil record offers “perfect support” for his theory otherwise this reads as rank Alinskyite strawmandering. Seversky

“Indeed, my entire project is aimed at undermining the creationist notion” It’s here that your train quickly goes off the rails. You made it a whole 16 lines before an absurd statement though, congrats. “Here is why I believe the fossil record is imperfect: blah, blah, blah.” Blah, blah, blah? The reasons for the imperfect fossil record are probably the most important part of the conversation and the attention you pay to them amounts to “blah, blah, blah.” Good work. Could you make your bias and ignorance any more obvious? I don’t think it’s possible. “If I am wrong about why the fossil record is imperfect, my theory comes falling down around me.” Well good thing it’s a fact that fossilization is a rare event, preservation of these fossils over millennia is not perfect, and we are yet to find the majority of these fossils. Darwin called the fossil record imperfect because it does not provide us with a complete catalog of all species (or the gradations between them) to ever roam the earth. He did not call it imperfect because it disagreed with his theory. Alicia Cartelli

Barry Arrington: 10. Here is why I believe the fossil record is imperfect: blah, blah, blah. That's hilarious. You leave out Darwin's explanation. That's the important part, of course.
Darwin, Origin of Species 1866: 1. Only a small portion of the world has been geologically explored. 2. Only organic beings of certain classes can be preserved in a fossil condition, at least in any great number. 3. Many species when once formed never undergo any further change, but become extinct without leaving modified descendants; 4. and the periods, during which species have undergone modification, though long as measured by years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which they retained the same form. http://darwin-online.org.uk/Variorum/1860/1860-464-c-1866.html {edited for list format}
Darwin is very clear that periods of stasis are longer than periods of change. Indeed, he repeats the point.
Darwin, Origin of Species 1866: It is a more important consideration, clearly leading to the same result, as lately insisted on by Dr. Falconer, namely, that the periods during which species have been undergoing modification, though very long as measured by years, have probably been short in comparison with the periods during which these same species remained without undergoing any change. http://darwin-online.org.uk/Variorum/1861/1861-323-c-1866.html
Furthermore, he offered a theoretical reason why this should be the case.
Darwin, Origin of Species 1866: We may infer that this has been the case, from there being no inherent tendency in organic beings to become modified or to progress in structure, and from all modifications depending, firstly on long-continued variability, and secondly on changes in the physical conditions of life, or on changes in the habits and structure of competing species, or on the immigration of new forms; and such contingencies will supervene in most cases only after long intervals of time and at a slow rate. These changes, moreover, in the organic and inorganic conditions of life will affect only a limited number of the inhabitants of any one area or country. http://darwin-online.org.uk/Variorum/1861/1861-323-c-1866.html
So, per Darwin, change is limited in time *and* space; hence, one reason for the imperfection of the fossil record. -- Edited to fix link, add clarifying text. Zachriel

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