Fixity thru Time
If evolution occurs, we could expect to see only newly evolved forms alive now, grossly
unlike the fossils. Virtually all current living forms are represented in fossil record and
there are both living and fossils forms by the thousands that appear unchanged. (cockroach,
bats, starfish, bacteria, dragonfly, shark, etc.)
This statement likely refers back to Darwin's original hypothesis that each generation was an imperfect copy of the last generation. (Remember he was trying to fit all of life's history in a few tens of millions of years). Actually the oldest unchanged fossil I read about is about 35 million years ago, and is one of a marsh beetle. Cockroaches, and dragonflies, and sharks, had similar creatures around 100 or more million years ago, but the fossils are not exact, it's hard to call them the same species.
Anyway, the current species are made up of survivors, often of great catastrophes. These are the creatures which got through the hard times and had babies. The chances are that they had some characteristics that were very resourcefull, and they were the first to colonize the new landscape and took over the niche they had before, plus more.
They don't mention the trollobites which were the most numereous creatures for hundreds of millions of years and survived great extiction after great extiction, only to die out completely in the last great extinction.
TP |
