Page 132 - The Evolution Impasse 2

130 Origin of Species, The

ac cepts that "The ear ly am ni o tes are ORIGIN OF SPECIES, THE
suf fi cient ly dis tinct from all
In 1859, Charles Darwin pub -
Paleozoic am phib i ans that their spe -
lished a book called The Origin of
cif ic an ces try has not been es tab -
Species, By Means of Natural Selection
lished." 136 Carroll al so makes these
or, The Preservation of Favored Races in
com ments in his book:
The Struggle for Life. In this book,
When they first ap pear in the fos sil Darwin add ed his own er rors of log -
record, both frogs and sal a man ders ap -
ic to Lamarck's the o ry and ad vanced
pear es sen tial ly mod ern in their skel e -
his the sis of nat u ral se lec tion. (See
tal anat o my. . . Despite these sim i lar i -
Natural Selection and
ties, frogs, sal a man ders, and cae cil i ans
Lamarckism.)
are very dif fer ent from one an oth er in
In his book, which he de scribed
skel e tal struc ture and ways of life, both
as a "long ar gu ment," Darwin
now and through out their known fos sil
claimed that all liv ing things on
record . . . we have found no fos sil ev i -
dence of any pos si ble an te ced ents that Earth shared a com mon or i gin and
pos sessed the spe cial ized fea tures com - that liv ing things de scend ed from
mon to all three mod ern or ders. 137 one an oth er by way of nat u ral se lec -
tion.
The most im por tant crea ture that
In ad di tion, Darwin said that on -
ev o lu tion ists have so far sought to
ly those best able to adapt to their
por tray as the "an ces tor of rep tiles"
en vi ron ment hand ed on their char -
is the fos sil am phib i an Seymouria.
ac ter is tics to sub se quent gen er a -
Yet the dis cov ery that rep tiles were
tions. Over the course of time, these
alive 30 mil lion years be fore
ben e fi cial chan ges would ac cu mu -
Seymouria's ap pear ance re vealed
late, and liv ing things would turn in -
that this can not be an in ter me di ate
to oth er forms of life very dif fer ent
spe cies. (See Seymouria.)
from their an ces tral spe cies. Man
It is of course im pos si ble for "the
was the most ad vanced prod uct of
fore run ner of rep tiles" to have first
so-called nat u ral se lec tion. Darwin
ap peared long aft er them. The sci en -
thought he had found the or i gin of
tif ic facts show that rep tiles emerged
spe cies: The or i gin of any one spe -
on Earth not through the grad u al
cies was an oth er, ear li er spe cies.
change main tained by the the o ry of
Darwin's great est dif fi cul ty was
ev o lu tion, but sud den ly, with no an -
that pa le on tol o gy, the sci ence he
te ced ents.
The Evolution Impasse II