The Evolution Of Evolution

Suppose, just suppose human life as we know it were to end on planet earth today. While your imagination is working imagine creatures with superior intelligence to us do exist in deep outer space. On one of their space voyages they visit the late great planet earth in what would be our year 4001. Their landing sight is Manhattan.

Not only is there one space mission in 4001 to earth but two. The second lands in the deepest part of the Amazon jungle inhabited today by a primitive tribe willfully cut off from modern society.

Can you imagine their consternation when they return to their home base and report on how humans lived on planet earth in the 21st Century? With only those two samples they would have conflicting concepts. Press the issue further. Suppose the sample specimens were of Homo Sapiens and a bonobo chimpanzee. What conclusion might they reach as to which form of life was superior? What the norm?

Presently there are paleontologists at work experiencing similar conflicts. Since 1974 when a partial skeleton called “Lucy” was found by Richard Leakey in Ethiopia, it has been generally accepted as the oldest known human ancestor by evolutionists. Now Richard’s widow, Meave, has found Kenyanthropus platyops. Mrs. Leakey has concluded her find, not that of her late husband, is the true ancestor on mankind. However, she goes even further and says neither her find nor Lucy is necessarily “the one.” She asserts, “I and many others believe Lucy needs to be replaced, but I’m not sure Kenyanthropus is the one,” says Rick Potts of the Smithsonian Institution’s Museum of Natural History. He further concluded, “What is clear is that human evolution is much more complicated than we thought.”

Science often changes. If you don’t believe that read a science text book written in 1940, or for that matter 1990.

Now play “What If” and project into the future. Suppose within a few years it is verified that carbon dating is valid up to about 7000 years but no more, as many believe. Contributing to this conclusion are specimens within specimens that are carbon dated as younger than the outer ones. What if, at that time a new specimen is found that looks exactly like modern New Yorkers? Rewrite!

Whole theories have been concluded from an artists concept based on a fragment of a skeleton. That is not science. A number of these theories once taught as scientific fact have been disputed by more current paleontologists. Many of the new breed are still evolutionists but they have better more recent data and are honest enough to correct the errors of their predecessors.

The science is young and susceptible to error. Many in the field know that the science itself is evolving. The grief is that some second or third echelon of educators pick up on these inconclusive evidences and teach them as the ultimate fact. The jury is still out on the subject. Leakey and Potts are to be commended on consenting to this in their statements.

All concepts of origins are faith based. A rule of science is for a principle to be acceptable as a science it must be observable and reproducible. Neither creationists nor evolutionists can do either. Both are faith based. That is why many persons with advanced scientific degrees still hold to the concept of creation as viable.

What if in 4001 a space ship lands and its occupants read a 1922 science text. That sampling would be evidence too limited to reach a valid conclusion related to the advanced culture on earth in 2004. The same principle is applicable in the field of paleontology today. As they keep digging there will be many rewrites and perhaps ultimately conclude:

“In the beginning God…”

[Source of some of this data: USATODAY.com, March 22. 2001, Tim Friend]