HURDLE NUMBER 49. THE EVOLUTIONARY STASIS HURDLE.
The following quote is from the book The Myths of Human Evolution, by Niles Eldredge and Ian Tattersall (In 1969, Niles Eldredge became a curator in the Department of Invertebrates at the American Museum of Natural History, and subsequently a curator in the Invertebrate Paleontology section. He was also an Adjunct Professor at the City University of New York.), pages 45 to 48:-
“The overwhelming majority of animal and plant species are tremendously conservative (ie:- resistant to evolutionary change) throughout their history. - - - - - Darwin - - - troubled by - - - - THE FOSSIL RECORD - - - - (which was) REFUSING TO YIELD - - - EXAMPLES OF GRADUAL CHANGE - - - THE FOSSIL RECORD WILL NOT CONFIRM - - - - - DARWIN’S PREDICTION - - - - THE FOSSIL RECORD SHOWS THAT THIS PREDICTION WAS WRONG - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - The observation that species are amazingly CONSERVATIVE AND STATIC throughout long periods of time has all the qualities of THE EMPEROR’S NEW CLOTHES. EVERYONE KNEW IT, BUT PREFERRED TO IGNORE IT. Paleontologists, faced with a recalcitrant record obstinately refusing to yield Darwin’s predicted patterns SIMPLY LOOKED THE OTHER WAY. - - - - Rather than challenge WELL-ENTRENCHED EVOLUTIONARY THEORY, paleontologists tacitly agreed that the fossil record was too poor. - - - - Only recently has a substantial number of paleontologists BLOWN THE WHISTLE. - - - - - - - Change in the manner Darwin expected is just not found in the fossil record.” (My capitals and highlighting.)
My comment:- What he is saying here is that scientists have DELIBERATELY LIED TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. This can only breed distrust for science in general. Science is supposed to be “The disinterested pursuit of objective truth.” In practice, however, scientists are prepared to lie in an absolutely shameless and barefaced manner in order to protect their own vested interests and DEEPLY ENTRENCHED views and paradigms.
The next quote is from the book The Biotic Message, by Walter ReMine, published by St Paul Science, 1993, page 307:-
The author provides a quote from an article by Stephen Jay Gould (Harvard University promoted Gould to Professor of Geology and Curator of Invertebrate Paleontology at the institution's Museum of Comparative Zoology.):-
“The overwhelming prevalence of STASIS became an embarrassing feature of the fossil record.” (My capitals.)
The next quote is from the book Beyond Natural Selection, by Robert Wesson, published by MIT Press, 1993, page 87:-
(The author explains that) Darwinism insists that environmental changes, must alter morphology. However, many facts contradict this supposition. The author then cites the following facts:-
(A). The water-ouzel dives into water to get its food, but looks like an ordinary bird.
(B). The MARINE iguana does NOT HAVE WEBBED FEET.
(C). Sea otters are thoroughly aquatic in habit, but they look much like land mammals.
(D). Many wasps hunt for food UNDER WATER, but they still look like normal wasps.
(E). Water spiders are morphologically similar to land spiders.
My comment:- It appears that species are extremely resistant to “evolutionary” change. Such a change, by random mutations, would require a massive amount of re-organization of body parts that could not come about by the “selection” of random changes. Hence the “stasis” that we see in the fossil record. The above quote shows that even a drastic change of habitat or life-style cannot produce a metamorphosis in the morphology of a species. Clearly species are deeply resistant to any kind of morphological change whatsoever, even when such a change might be of considerable advantage to the species.
The next quote is from the book Hen’s Teeth and Horses Toes, by Stephen Jay Gould (Professor of Zoology at Harvard University), published by Penguin Books, reprint, 1986, Page 344:-
“Most species are extraordinarily resistant to major evolutionary change.”
The next quote is from the book Everything You Know is Wrong – Book One – Human Origins, by Lloyd Pye, published by Adamu press, 1997, page 25:-
“A 30 million year old - - - - termite recovered from a piece of amber had enough of its genes intact to allow them to be sequenced. They turned out to be almost identical to a living descendant, with only eight base-pair changes out of several million – over 30 million years. SUCH INFINITESIMAL CHANGE SCREAMS “STASIS” RATHER THAN - - - - - EVOLUTION.” (My capitals.)
My comment:- Darwinism suggests that species should “evolve” or change into other different species. However, the evidence suggests that species, over long time periods, and even when their environment or habitat or life-style alters, do NOT change or “evolve”, but simply remain the same (or go extinct, if they cannot handle the life-style alterations).