To begin is some general questions in brief with the research that talks about that question. Then I have my writing on the topic from the Naturalistic view and the Creation view.
Is this right? Do you evolutionists agree with your position? I tried to write it as you believe it. Do you have any disagreements or concerns or additions?
1.
Missing Links
a. Missing
Links are the hypothetical intermediates between two differing types of
organisms, like between humans and apes. They are termed “Missing” because they
are…missing. “There are missing links
all over the evolutionary tree”[i] between
different kinds of organisms. How many missing links are there? Are they still missing? Why are they missing?
b. There
should be more transitional fossils than the number of fossils already found.
c. Water to Land initially? (Fish – Amphibian)
iii.
Tiktaalik?
d. Amphibian – Reptile?
e. Reptile to Mammal?
f.
Land to Water? (Cow-like à whales)
g. Giraffe?
iv.
Giraffe, Incredible Creatures that Defy Evolution
Vol 1 http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v5/n2/giraffe-video
h. Elephant?
i.
Platypus?
j.
Dinosaurs?
k. Dinosaurs to Birds? (Reptile to Bird)
l.
Archaeopteryx?
m. Australopithecus afarensis?
n. Many known hoaxed missing links or improperly identified (Piltdown
Man, Nebraska Man, Java Man, Pakicetus, Ida, and Archaeoraptor)
o. Horse Evolution?
p. “The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages between major
transitions in organic design…has been a persistent and nagging problem for
gradualistic accounts of evolution.”
-Evolutionist Stephen Jay Gould
q. “Most species, including most horses, appear abruptly in the fossil
record, change very little over their entire history and then disappear just as
unceremoniously.” -Evolutionist
Johnhoe McFadden
i.
Johnjoe McFadden (Professor of Molecular Biology
and Quantum Physics), Quantum Evolution, 2000, p. 71.
r.
“All 32 mammal orders appear abruptly and fully
formed in the fossil record.”
-Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D.
s. “If a bat or
bird evolved from a land animal, the transitional forms would have forelimbs
that were neither good legs nor good wings. So how would such things be
selected?” -Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D.
t.
More Resources:
[i] John D.
Morris, Ph.D., What’s a Missing Link?, Institute for Creation Research, http://www.icr.org/article/2709/,
accessed October 7, 2013.
Title: Missing Links by Brian
Mariani and others
Introduction:
Missing Links are the
hypothetical intermediates between two differing types of organisms, like
between humans and apes. They are termed “Missing” because they are…missing. “There are missing links all
over the evolutionary tree”[i]
between different kinds of organisms. How many missing links are there? Are they still missing? Why are they missing?
Naturalistic/Evolutionary
Answer:
“There
are many transitional fossils.”[ii]
Darwin’s tree of life explains
how all current organisms are related to each other. Undiscovered transitional
forms (Missing links) are the bridges or branches backward in time. Species
evolve over time and branch out evolving into different species. So there
should be a lot of transitional forms. Practically speaking, every fossil that
we are lucky enough to find is a transitional fossil as organisms evolve from a
previous ancestor into new species.
The number of transitional
fossils is unknown. There are many factors as to why all of them have not been
found. Fossilization only happens when the conditions are just right, so it is
pretty rare. So fossils are pretty rare. Only a small portion of organisms even
fossilize. Then most fossils are shells, but the larger organisms are more rare.
[iii]
Also, only a small fraction of
the available fossils have been found due to the incompleteness of the fossil
record, the amount of rock to look through, and the small amount of scientists
actually looking and digging for fossils. Erosion, the movement of the rocks,
and non-scientific digging endeavors can cause many fossils to be destroyed and
lost forever.
It is even possible that as ancient
environments change, the ancient organisms tend to change or evolve rapidly to
survive. The change happens so rapidly that fossils are just not preserved
since again, conditions in the environment are not right to be able to
fossilize and therefore preserve the organism.
More links between different
animal kinds are expected to be found. Just because they have not been found
yet, doesn’t mean that they are not in the fossil record.
Every year, we are finding more
and more fossils. In recent years, there have been many specific transitional
fossils that have been found and here are five examples among others that could
be named.
Fish
to Amphibian Link: Tiktaalik Rosae
Reptile
to Mammal Link: Thrinaxodon
Reptile
to Bird Link: Archaeopteryx
Land
Mammal to Aquatic Mammal Link: Ambulocetus natans
Quadrupedal
Primate to Bipedal Primate Link: Australopithecus
afarensis[iv]
Creation Answer:
Evolution
assumes that every organism has evolved and so ultimately the burden of proof
should be on them to show the transitions of every type of organism. It is okay
to hypothesize that there are transitional forms in the fossil record, but at a
certain point, if evidence is not found, the hypothesis should be disregarded.
There is little to no evidence
for the transitions of: giraffes, elephants, the platypus, dinosaurs,
Precambrian to Cambrian, Invertebrate to Vertebrae, Fish to Amphibian,
Amphibian to Reptile, and Reptile to Birds and Mammals.[v]
Granted every once in a while, a new fossil comes out that supposedly links
organisms together, but with the amount of organisms alive today, there should
be more transitional fossils than the number of fossils already found.[vi]
Evolution is a process of slow
change, so there should be a lot of transitions. Evolutionists solve this by
saying that there was “punctuated equilibrium” meaning that evolution happened
rapidly and therefore the conditions weren’t right to fossilize the transitions
during that time. The lack of evidence (fossils) is their evidence for this
hypothesis.
The evidence of transitions has
often consisted of hoaxes or misunderstood fossils before they could be
properly identified such as Piltdown Man, Nebraska Man, Java Man, Pakicetus, Ida,
and Archaeoraptor. [vii]
Even Tiktaalik and Archaeopteryx
are highly debated as links. There are 4-footed land animal footprints 18
million years before Tiktaalik which would show that Tiktaalik wasn’t the first
link to land dwelling animals.[viii]
And there have been fully formed birds found before Archaeopteryx, so
Archaeopteryx wasn’t the link between dinosaur and bird. Some even say that
Archaeopteryx is simply just a bird with no evidence of being part dinosaur.[ix]
Many even debate if Australopithecus afarensis is a human ancestor.[x]
“The renowned evolutionist Stephen
Jay Gould wrote:
The absence of fossil evidence for intermediary stages
between major transitions in organic design, indeed our inability, even in our
imagination, to construct functional intermediates in many cases, has been a
persistent and nagging problem for gradualistic accounts of evolution.”[xi]
Here is an interesting quote
from Johnjoe McFadden, an evolutionist professor of Molecular Genetics:
“Most species, including most horses, appear abruptly in the fossil record, change very little over their entire
history and then disappear just as unceremoniously. This pattern is well known to paleontologists who have actually
attributed it to the imperfection of
the fossil record: the missing links between one species and another
have all died without the decency to leave their remains as fossils.”[xii]
Ph.D.
creation researcher Jonathan Sarfati continues this thought in saying that “All 32 mammal orders appear abruptly
and fully formed in the fossil record.”[xiii]
Transitional organisms may not
be as well suited for their environment. For example, “If a bat or bird evolved from a land animal,
the transitional forms would have forelimbs that were neither good legs nor
good wings. So how would such things be selected?”[xiv]
God designed everything in the
beginning, as they still are today. There is fossil evidence that living organisms
have changed very little or not at all in supposed millions of years. There are
small changes, but only within kinds as is already allowed for in their DNA.
What the Bible
Says: Creation - Gen 1 (“after their kind”), Flood - Gen. 7-9
Add Pictures of: Missing
Link Charts, Elephant Evolution, Dinosaur Evolution Chart from AiG, Platypus on
the tree, Tiktaalik, Archaeopteryx, Human Ancestors,
[i] John D.
Morris, Ph.D., What’s a Missing Link?, Institute for Creation Research, http://www.icr.org/article/2709/,
accessed October 7, 2013.
[ii] Claim
CC200, http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CC/CC200.html, Accessed October 5,
2013.
[iii] Prothero, Donald R.
(2007). Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why it Matters. Columbia University
Press.
[iv] Fossil
Evidence, NOVA, PBS, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/id/tran-nf.html, accessed
October 5, 2013.
[v] Wolf-Ekkehard Lönnig, The
Evolution of the Long-Necked Giraffe, last updated October 19, 2010, http://www.weloennig.de/Giraffe.pdf,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Elephant
Evolution, http://www.himandus.net/elefunteria/library/science+nature/evolution.html,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Paula
Weston, The Platypus: Still More Questions Than Answers for Evolutionists,
March 1, 2002, Answers in Genesis, http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v24/n2/platypus,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Dinosaurs: Phylogenetic Chart, July 2, 1998, Answers in
Genesis, http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/1998/07/02/phylogenetic-chart,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D., F.M., Refuting Evolution,
August 23, 2008, Creation Book Publishers, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/refuting-evolution-chapter-3-the-links-are-missing,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[vi] John D.
Morris, Ph.D., What’s a Missing Link?, Institute for Creation Research, http://www.icr.org/article/2709/,
accessed October 7, 2013.
[vii]
Archaeoraptor hoax update – National Geographiic
recants!, March 2, 2000, http://creation.com/archaeoraptor-hoax-updatenational-geographic-recants,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Carl Wieland, The evolutionary parade of ‘missing links’:
The floats keep changing!, May 29, 2012, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/missing-links-parade,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Don Batten, Darwin fossil hyper-hype, May 23, 2009,
Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/darwin-fossil-ida-hype,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[viii]
Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D., F.M., Tiktaalik roseae – a fishy ‘missing link’, April
15, 2006, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/tiktaalik-roseae-a-fishy-missing-link,
accessed October 8, 2013.
Carl Wieland, The evolutionary parade of ‘missing links’:
The floats keep changing!, May 29, 2012, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/missing-links-parade,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[ix] Gary
Bates, That quote! – about the missing transitional fossils: Embarrassed
evolutionists try to ‘muddy the waters’, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/That-quotemdashabout-the-missing-transitional-fossils,
October 8, 2013.
[x] “Lucy”
isn’t the “Missing Link!”, June 1, 1990, Answers in Genesis, http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v12/n3/lucy,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[xi]
Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D., F.M., Refuting Evolution, August 23, 2008, Creation
Book Publishers, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/refuting-evolution-chapter-3-the-links-are-missing,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[xii] Johnjoe
McFadden (Professor of Molecular Biology and Quantum Physics), Quantum
Evolution, 2000, p. 71.
[xiii] Jonathan
Sarfati, Ph.D., F.M., Refuting Evolution, August 23, 2008, Creation Book
Publishers, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/refuting-evolution-chapter-3-the-links-are-missing,
accessed October 8, 2013.
[xiv]
Jonathan Sarfati, Ph.D., F.M., Refuting Evolution, August 23, 2008, Creation
Book Publishers, Creation Ministries International, http://creation.com/refuting-evolution-chapter-3-the-links-are-missing,
accessed October 8, 2013.
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