5. From Bacteria to Human Beings

☼ Exhibit #7: The Fossil Record and the Cambrian Explosion

Fossils are the mineralized or otherwise preserved remains or traces of animals, plants and other organisms. Fossils are found in rock formations and sedimentary layers (also called strata).  Are there remains of the earliest life in the fossil record? In many school books the fossil record is heralded as strong and objective evidence for the evolution model. Evolutionists claim that the presence of fossils of simpler life forms in older rocks and strata than fossils of more complex life forms proves evolution over time from simple to complex organisms.

However, the fact that older organisms are less developed than more recent life forms is not exclusive evidence for the evolutionary model, but also consistent with a Creator model.

The fossil record however does reveal two major discrepancies between the observed fossils and those fossils one would expect to see according to the evolution model: the lack of fossils of intermediate species and the so called Cambrian explosion.

Where Are the Intermediate Species?

If evolution is correct, new species gradually develop through subsequent small mutations. If so, it would logically follow that the fossil record would overflow with evidence of a long series of organisms revealing minor changes over time. Yet the evidence shows only the opposite. The fossils reveal the abrupt appearance of new species with no evidence of prior, gradual development. Additionally, most fossils found are not of extinct animals or organisms, but are very similar (and often identical) to creatures living today. All in all, the fossil record shows no signs of change – any change – in species whatsoever. In Darwin ’s time this was common knowledge, and Charles Darwin himself considered this the most serious challenge to his fabled theory. In his words:

“Why 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 is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory.” [20]

Darwin hoped that over time, with more detailed research through more sophisticated means, the fossil record would expand to include fossils of the intermediate links. However, despite the millions and millions of fossils found and studied (“97.7 percent of living orders of land vertebrates are represented as fossils

”[21]), fossils of intermediate species have never been found! As Darwin himself acknowledged, this is the most obvious and serious objection against his theory, showing it is flawed! If he would be alive today, based on this statement, he himself would be hard pressed to believe in evolution.

This, however, has not stopped the authors of evolutionary textbooks. As an example, one textbook boldly claims:

“Fishes are considered to be the most primitive living vertebrates……similarities in structure and embryological development show that fishes and modern invertebrate chordates probably did evolve from common invertebrate ancestors that lived many millions of years ago.” [23]

Not a single intermediate fossil is identified in the textbook to support this claim!

The same is true of the famous “missing link” or “common ancestor” between ape (chimp) and man as claimed by many textbooks and even the above mentioned Time Magazine article. If man and ape evolved from a common ancestor millions of years ago, where are the fossils of these ancestors and the transitional life forms, the half ape/half man? Yes, some bones, teeth and other claimed remains have been found of alleged human ancestors, but closer analysis has shown that they are either very similar to modern men, or apes, or inconclusive or even hoaxes. Available material is very scarce and highly questionable. The scientific community seems unable to reach any consensus about how to interpret and how to date these findings. In fact, in the absence of the many transitional forms demanded by evolution, most often presented is the “discovery” of a tooth or partial bone fragment, then pronounced to be a transitional form. This is flimsy evidence for what should be untold millions of transitional fossils!

As Jonathan Wells explains in his interview with Lee Strobel in Case for a Creator (2004): [24]

“One of the major problems with paleo-anthropology is that compared to all fossils we have, only a minuscule number are believed to be of creatures ancestral to humans. Often, it’s just skull fragments or teeth. So this gives a lot of elasticity in reconstructing the specimens to fit evolutionary theory. Of course, this lack of fossil evidence also makes it virtually impossible to reconstruct supposed relationships between ancestors and descendents. One anthropologist likened the task to trying to reconstruct the plot of ‘War and Peace’ by using just thirteen random pages from the book.”

Despite the abundance of fossils and remains of “ancient” apes, men and even dinosaurs, evolutionists have yet to find even one of the evolutionary human ancestors!

The Cambrian Explosion – Biology’s Big Bang

Surprisingly, the recovered fossil record provides compelling evidence for the case of the Creator model, by revealing the Cambrian Explosion, or Biology’s Big Bang.

The Cambrian Explosion was a geological period of about 5-10 million years that started about 530 million years ago. It is called Biology’s Big Bang because during this period, suddenly the body design/plans (phyla) of most all the living animals known today came into existence as well as some now extinct. The fossil record shows jellyfish, sponges and worms prior to the Cambrian Explosion (however no evidence of gradual development). Then in the beginning of the Cambrian period, like a Big Bang, suddenly representatives of all the major body plans turn up in the fossils.

This completely defies Darwin ’s common ancestor theory. These animals, fundamentally very different from one another in their body plans, appear fully developed, all of a sudden, in what evolutionary paleontologists have called “the single most spectacular phenomenon of the fossil record.” Renowned paleontologist James Valentine agrees the Cambrian explosion “is real; it is too big to be masked by flaws in the fossil record.” Indeed as more fossils are discovered, it becomes clear that the Cambrian Explosion was “even more abrupt and extensive than previously envisioned.”[25]

Paleontologist Harry Whittington, who extensively studied the Cambrian Explosion in the Burgess Shale in the Rocky Mountains in Western Canada wrote:

“I look skeptically upon diagrams that show the branching diversity of animal life through time, and come down at the base to a single kind of animal….Animals may have originated more than once, in different places at different times.” [26]