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No fossil rabbits in the Precambrian, but what about complex cells?

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Asked what might disconfirm their theories about how speciation occurs, Darwinian evolutionists reply, “fossil rabbits in the Cambrian”. How about Precambrian? Dave Coppedge (yes, him) observes that

No such fossil has ever been found, partly because any stratum containing a rabbit fossil would never have been labeled Precambrian in the first place. – “Precambrian Rabbit or Evolutionary Transition?” (05/25/2011)

That said,

… evolutionists would be surprised at finding complex non-marine multicellular eukaryotes in Precambrian strata, and this has just been announced in Nature.A team led by Paul Strother of Boston College with help from Oxford University and University of Sheffield has announced “Earth’s earliest non-marine eukaryotes.”1 “Direct evidence of fossils within rocks of non-marine origin in the Precambrian is exceedingly rare,” they said. In Arizona, they found not only ambiguous traces, but oodles of clear evidence for freshwater eukaryotes:

Here we report the recovery of large populations of diverse organic-walled microfossils extracted by acid maceration, complemented by studies using thin sections of phosphatic nodules that yield exceptionally detailed three-dimensional preservation. These assemblages contain multicellular structures, complex-walled cysts, asymmetric organic structures, and dorsiventral, compressed organic thalli, some approaching one millimetre in diameter. They offer direct evidence of eukaryotes living in freshwater aquatic and subaerially exposed habitats during the Proterozoic era. The apparent dominance of eukaryotes in non-marine settings by 1?Gyr ago indicates that eukaryotic evolution on land may have commenced far earlier than previously thought.

The date of one billion years is nearly twice as long ago as the Cambrian explosion. More

Hmmm. NO, they’re not rabbits, but they certainly render Darwinism more doubtful. It might be wiser to bet against Darwin than against dat dastardly wabbit. Or at least, realize that this is a time for exploration, not dogma.

Comments
Whoops, missed that one: Complexity is a straw man?Elizabeth Liddle
May 27, 2011
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Thanks, Mung (#10)
The problem is not that there were no living things prior to the Cambrian. We all know that there were. All evidence indicates that life appeared almost as soon as conditions on earth allowed. It also has nothing to do with how “complex” life in the Cambrian was, or prior to the Cambrian. The problem is that the Cambrian shows the exact opposite pattern from that which is predicted by Darwin’s theory.
OK,but in that case I still don't understand. In what sense does Darwin's theory not predict the Cambrian? Radiation from earlier forms? Radiation, it seems to me, is exactly what Darwin's theory predicts. Can you explain why you think it predicts the opposite?
Ab initio is a straw man. Complexity is a straw man. ID is not a theory of creationism. Understood?
Sure. As I understand it, ID is a theory that states that life bears the hallmarks of intelligent design. But I've never understood what ID proponents actually propose as the time-course of the design process. I know some talk about "front loading" and I assumed the idea was that at some point, a genome (or several, I'm not sure to what extent common descent is assumed among IDists)was created ab initio, which then contained the Information necessary for subsequent speciation and evolution (in its broadest sense, I assume intelligent guidance of evolutionary processes may also be considered as part of the picture).
ID predicts that as facr back as you care to find living organisms, those organisms will show characterics of design. ID would not be impacted one bit if scientists began to believe that eukaryotes preceeded prokaryotes.
No, I understand that. But nor is standard biological science impacted by the discovery of pre-Cambrian species of considerable complexity. In fact, given that anything fossilisable and self-replicating is going to be widely agreed to have been a fairly complex living thing, predictions about what we will find in the fossil record don't diverge that much.Elizabeth Liddle
May 27, 2011
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"Complexity is a straw man." ??? I thought.....ehh, never mind....DrREC
May 27, 2011
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The problem is not that there were no living things prior to the Cambrian. We all know that there were. All evidence indicates that life appeared almost as soon as conditions on earth allowed. It also has nothing to do with how "complex" life in the Cambrian was, or prior to the Cambrian. The problem is that the Cambrian shows the exact opposite pattern from that which is predicted by Darwin's theory. Ab initio is a straw man. Complexity is a straw man. ID is not a theory of creationism. Understood? ID predicts that as facr back as you care to find living organisms, those organisms will show characterics of design. ID would not be impacted one bit if scientists began to believe that eukaryotes preceeded prokaryotes.Mung
May 27, 2011
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I don't think I understand the problem either. I always thought that those who point to the Cambrian "explosion" as evidence against "Darwinism" did so because they interpret it as evidence that a huge variety of living forms were created ab initio at that time. I'd have thought evidence of a precursor from which that "explosion" might have radiated would have tended to infirm that interpretation rather than support it. So is the OP suggesting that eukaryotes were created ab initio in the Pre-Cambrian, and the Cambrian critters descended from those?Elizabeth Liddle
May 27, 2011
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Mung: It happens. I make lots of mistakes. Enlighten me. You're very good at hovering around the edges, making funny comments . . . . step up to the plate and take a swing. I'm a lousy pitcher as it happens. You'll probably get a base hit.ellazimm
May 27, 2011
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I don’t understand the problem:
Hi ellazimm, You are mis-stating the problem.Mung
May 27, 2011
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I don't understand the problem: you're always saying there is very little pre-Cambrian evidence for complex life forms, that during the Cambrian explosions whole families of organisms just popped into existence according to the fossil record. And now that some precursors have been found you complain that they're so old they are an argument against common descent with modification. Earth is 4.5 billion years old and now we may have evidence of eukaryotic cells 1 billion years ago. Seems to fit the proposed scenario pretty well.ellazimm
May 26, 2011
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You can't be serious. The Moot Pre-Cambrian RabbitMung
May 26, 2011
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Asked what might disconfirm their theories about how speciation occurs, Darwinian evolutionists reply, “fossil rabbits in the Cambrian” News, can you clarify why you think evolutionists would accept such fossil bunnies as evidence against their theories of speciation? Because your post suggests you're talking past them...AMW
May 26, 2011
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And still no evidence for the proposed Darwinian mechanism to account for them. If there were evidence, say, on the level of gravity, we ID types might just be a little more cautious in adopting ID. But there isn't, so. ID remains, as always, the best explanation.Mung
May 26, 2011
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Yes, DrREC at 1, if Earth itself also turned out to be older. What we actually have is staggering specified complexity occurring in an even earlier window. No long-running glop show. It's the same principle as the Cambrian explosion: No long-running glop show.News
May 26, 2011
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"NO, they’re not rabbits, but they certainly render Darwinism more doubtful." A longer, more gradual history of Eukaryotes and of colonization of land renders Darwinism more doubtful? Interesting, I always thought the sharp transitions were favored evidence for ID?DrREC
May 26, 2011
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