Transitional fossils are lacking

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Contents

Claim

There are no transitional fossils.

Source

Responses

  1. Generally, this claim is based on a misunderstanding of the way "transitional" fossil is or can be used as a term, or confusing the different possible meanings. It's important to note that outside of a layperson discussion, what really matters to biologists and paleontologists is not so much "transitional fossils," but the transitional features OF fossils.
  2. As often envisioned by creationists, the meaning of the statement is absolutely correct in that there are no transitional fossils in the sense of the very narrow definition used by creationists (i.e. a half-lizard/half-pig creature). The point to remember here is that all creatures that have existed are fully formed and functional organisms, suited to their own particular environment. Just to name a few of the more well known examples, Archaeopteryx, Hyracotherium, and Ambulocetus are all excellent, textbook, examples of a so-called "transitional" species, which were nevertheless well adapted to their own particular environments.
  3. Creationists who make this claim are often not really asking for any single example, as biologists generally are used to using the term. Instead, the request is really for a full series intermediate fossils: a request that is both unnecessary and also generally impossible to satisfy. When you show a transitional form between Fossil A and Z (let’s call the new fossil ‘G’) creationists can always ask for fossil C and P. When C and P are dug up, then they ask for B, F, Q and W, and so on. This continues until you show a fossil from every individual organism from every population that ever existed on this planet: until then they can always ask for more intermediate forms. We know from how fossilization works that this expectation is simply wrong: we should never expect to see such a complete fossil record, and the validity of evolution does not rest on finding this impossible circumstance and never has.
  4. In another sense of the word, all species that have ever lived are "transitional," except for the ones who have gone extinct and left no descendants. They are one species in the middle of a past and future species, thereby making them transitional.
  5. Creationwiki lists this claim as "doubtful, hence inadvisable" on their their list of arguments creationists should not use.

Fallacies contained in this claim

External Links

  • Mark Isaak's page for this claim on Talk.Origins [1]
  • Hunt, Kathleen, 1994-1997. Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ. [2]
  • Thompson, Tim, 1999. On creation science and transitional fossils. [3]
  • Keith B. Miller, n.d., Taxonomy, transitional forms, and the fossil record. [4]
  • Patterson, Bob, 2002. Transitional Fossil Species And Modes of Speciation. [5]

References

  1. Caldwell, M.W. & Lee, M.S.Y., 1997. A snake with legs from the marine Cretaceous of the Middle East. Nature 386: 705-709.
  2. Conway Morris, Simon, 1999. The Crucible of Creation, Oxford University Press, pp. 185-195.
  3. Eldredge, Niles, 1972. Systematics and evolution of Phacops rana (Green, 1832) and Phacops iowensis) Delo, 1935 (Trilobita) from the middle Devonian of North America. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 147(2): 47-113.
  4. Eldredge, Niles, 1974. Stability, diversity, and speciation in Paleozoic epeiric seas. Journal of Paleontology 48(3): 540-548.
  5. Leakey, M. & Walker, A., 1997 (June). Early hominid fossils from Africa. Scientific American 276(6): 74-79.
  6. Lee, Michael S. Y., Gorden L. Bell Jr & Michael W. Caldwell, 2000 (12 Aug.) The origin of snake feeding. Nature 400: 655-659.
  7. Lindsay, Don, 1997. A Smooth Fossil Transition: Orbulina, a foram. http://www.cs.colorado.edu/~lindsay/creation/orbulina.html
  8. Miller, Kenneth R., 1999. Finding Darwin's God, HarperCollins, NY, pp. 44-45.
  9. Pearson, PN, Shckleton, NJ, and Hall, MA. 1997. Stable isotopic evidence for the sympatric divergence of Globigerinoides trilobus and Orbulina universa (planktonic foraminifera). Journal of the Geological Society, London 154: 295-302.
  10. Stokstad, Erik, 2000 (24 Mar.). Hominid ancestors may have knuckle walked. Science 287: 2131-2132. [refers to work in "this week's Nature"]
  11. Strapple, R. R., 1978. Tracing three trilobites. Earth Science 31(4): 149-152.
  12. Tchernov, E. et al., 2000. A fossil snake with limbs. Science 287: 2010-2012. See also Greene, H.W. & Cundall, D., 2000. Limbless tetrapods and snakes with legs. Science 287: 1939-1941.
  13. Ward, L.W., and Blackwelder, B.W. 1975. Chesapecten, A New Genus of Pectinidae (Mollusca: Bivalvia) from the Miocene and Pliocene of Eastern North America. U.S. Geological Survey, Professional Paper 861, 24p. Cited in Pojeta & Springer, below.

Further Reading

  • Godfrey, L.R. (ed.), 1983. Scientists Confront Creationism, p. 206.
  • Zimmer, Carl, 2000. In search of vertebrate origins: Beyond brain and bone. Science 287: 1576-1579.
  • Cuffey, Clifford A., 2000. The fossil record: Evolution or "scientific creation". [6]
  • Shermer, M., 2005. "The Fossil Fallacy" in Scientific American [7]
  • Strahler, 1987. Science and Earth History, pp. 398-400.
  • Pojeta, John Jr. and Springer, Dale A., 2001. Evolution and the Fossil Record, American Geological Institute, Alexandria, VA. [8] [9] , pg. 2.
  • Cohn, Martin J. and Cheryll Tickle, 1999. Developmental basis of limblessness and axial patterning in snakes Nature 399: 474-479.
  • Morton, Glenn R., 2000. Phylum Level Evolution. [10]

See Also

Acknowledgments

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