The Fault of Man (Tiktaalik and the Fossil Record)

"if tiktaalik was  discovered in a cenozoic era,It could have been a blow to evolution,but it has been discovered between the strata of fish and amphibians and the amazing part is if you look at tiktaalik anatomically it's head resembles a croc with a body of a fish which leads us to a logical conclusion that a fish is going out of water around 375 million years ago,again two seperate fields of science,geology and anatomy going in concordance with each other." - (identity of person concealed)




              I was not aware that having a resemblance to something proves anything. This shows an assumption or implied interpretation on the part of scientists. Claiming that tiktaalik's placement in the fossil record and its resemblance to both fish and crocodile proves evolution as a fact is quite a large assumption. If a person resembles a primate, does that then mean they are closer to monkeys than man? Variations within species does not prove that overtime a species changes into another, and it certainly does not prove evolution to be fact, no more than the existence of Christ proves His divinity. This argument, however, is considered a "typical creationist argument" a nice ad hominim attack in an attempt to villify any who dare question evolution. May I then use evidence that clearly supports my religion and the existence of Christ to prove that God exists? History, scripture, and archaeology are all in concordance with one another, so logically we can conclude that God is fact. I am only using the same logic that is used by this gentleman, and other scientists, to prove that evolution is fact.


            I am not trying to attack evolution itself, what I am criticizing is the mentality of those who feel that evolution is a fact. If you wish to believe it, I am not going to criticize anyone for that. However to say scientifically that something is a fact, when in reality you must assume these bones came from another species, would not be fact but assumption. If that is enough for a person to believe, then so be it, that is not my business, but to parade this as fact is downright absurd, just as many atheists believe that proclaiming God is absurd.

          What is most amazing to me about the fossil record is that it does not show, as many claim, a pattern of transitional forms but explosions of mass biological diversity without plausible evolutionary transition. There are many fossils appear abruptly in the fossil record, fully formed, with no evidence to link it to any other previous fossil. At first look, a diagram of the fossil record looks to prove exactly what evolutionists have been saying, but upon further investigation we are left scratching our heads. Often times there are millions of years in between so called "transitional fossils", as if these animals lept from one variation to another over night, as opposed to a slow change over time.


           I love it when new "missing links" are discovered, because it's then--and only then--that Darwinists admit how precious little evidence had previously existed for the evolutionary transition in question. When reports came out of an alleged example of a fossil representative of the stock that might have led from fish to tetrapods -- Tiktaalik roseae -- evolutionists finally came clean about the previous lack of fossil evidence for such a transition:

"The relationship of limbed vertebrates (tetrapods) to lobe-finned fish (sarcopterygians) is well established, but the origin of major tetrapod features has remained obscure for lack of fossils that document the sequence of evolutionary changes."

(Edward B. Daeschler, Neil H. Shubin, and Farish A. Jenkins, "A Devonian tetrapod-like fish and the evolution of the tetrapod body plan," Nature Vol 440: 757-763 (April 6, 2006))

Authority Jennifer Clack even admits that before finding Tiktaalik, the large morphological gap between fish and true tetrapods was "frustratingly wide":

"It has long been clear that limbed vertebrates (tetrapods) evolved from osteolepiform lobefinned fishes3, but until recently the morphological gap between the two groups remained frustratingly wide. The gap was bounded at the top by primitive Devonian tetrapods such as Ichthyostega and Acanthostega from Greenland, and at the bottom byPanderichthys, a tetrapod-like predatory fish from the latest Middle Devonian of Latvia."(Jennifer A. Clack & Per Erik Ahlberg, "A firm step from water to land," Nature440:747-749 (April 6, 2006); emphasis added)

Again Daeschler et al. reiterate the lack of evidence previous fossils provide for a transition, focusing on deficiencies in what was previously considered to be the closest fish to tetrapods (see the diagram below as well):

"Panderichthys possesses relatively few tetrapod synapomorphies, and provides only partial insight into the origin of major features of the skull, limbs and axial skeleton of early tetrapods. In view of the morphological gap between elpistostegalian fish and tetrapods, the phylogenetic framework for the immediate sister group of tetrapods has been incomplete and our understanding of major anatomical transformations at the fish-tetrapod transition has remained limited."

(Edward B. Daeschler, Neil H. Shubin, and Farish A. Jenkins, "A Devonian tetrapod-like fish and the evolution of the tetrapod body plan," Nature Vol 440: 757-763 (April 6, 2006)

               Again, I believe the fossil record to be a matter of perspective. It is not "obvious" that anything evolved into another species over time and it is certainly NOT clear. We cannot even logically assume that evolution occurred, based on the fossil record, as demonstrated by Tiktaalik and the millions of years that separate its ancestors. These claims made by science are perspective being pushed as fact, and darwinian interpretation forced onto finds in all areas of science. Simply put, the fossil record does not prove evolution in any way shape or form.