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Saturday 3 February 2018

On considering a career in the skilled trades

Economists Say Millennials Should Consider Careers In Trades


This story is part of the New Boom series on millennials in America.

As the economy continues to recover, economists are seeing stark differences between people with high school and college degrees. The unemployment rate is nearly twice as high for Americans with a high school diploma as for those with a four-year college degree or more.

But economists say that doesn't mean everybody needs a four-year degree. In fact, millions of good-paying jobs are opening up in the trades. And some pay better than what the average college graduate makes.

Learning A Trade

When 18-year-old Haley Hughes graduated from high school this past summer, she had good grades; she was on the honor roll every year. So she applied to a bunch of four-year colleges and got accepted to every one of them. But she says, "I wasn't excited about it really, I guess."

"The baby-boom workers are retiring and leaving lots of openings for millennials."
Anthony Carnevale, Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce
So instead of going that route, Hughes is taking a different path: an apprenticeship through the big New England power utility company NStar. In one of her recent classes at an NStar facility outside Boston, the classroom work was actually more exciting than some people might like.

Haley Hughes (right) and Kristen Sabino stand in the meter training room at an NStar learning facility. The two are part of an apprenticeship program with the utility company, something economists say the U.S. needs more of in order to fill open trade jobs.i
Haley Hughes (right) and Kristen Sabino stand in the meter training room at an NStar learning facility. The two are part of an apprenticeship program with the utility company, something economists say the U.S. needs more of in order to fill open trade jobs.
Courtesy of Earl Benders
Lara Allison is one of the instructors. On a recent morning, she was teaching Hughes and the other utility worker apprentices how to protect themselves if something bad happens while they're down under a manhole cover in an underground electrical substation.

"An arc flash — that's the thing we worry the most about," Allison says.

An arc flash is a highly energized bolt of electricity, an explosion of electricity in a sense, that jumps from an energy source to another spot that's grounded or that the energy can flow into. Allison tells the students that if they wear the wrong clothing and they get hit by an arc flash, their clothes can catch on fire and get seared into their skin. "It's really, really hot," she says.

On her apprenticeship, Hughes already has been down working in those underground substations.

"I loved it, it was great," she says.

Hughes says another thing that's great is that taking this path into the high-skilled trades is a lot cheaper than a four-year college would have been.

$40,000 Vs. $2,400 Per Year

"The student loans would be ridiculous," Hughes says during a break from class. "The schools I was looking at ... were like $40,000 a year." In the long run she thought that was just too much.

By comparison, NStar is partnering with nearby Bunker Hill Community College to offer students the opportunity to earn a two-year associate degree. Hughes has some scholarships and NStar pays some of the cost, so for Hughes, the price tag works out to about $1,200 a semester. Hughes says she's been paying that herself, and so she expects to graduate with no debt.

Hughes is also getting a lot of on-the-job training and taking a wide range of courses at the community college: English, math, a computer science course and even a psychology group dynamics class. Then there are the classes directly related to power utility work: DC theory, AC theory, physics, engineering and business etiquette. Not bad for $1,200 a semester.

'Averages Lie'

After graduating, 90 percent of the students get jobs with the power utility NStar (which is in the process of changing its name to Eversource Energy). Starting base pay is about $58,000 a year.

On average, it is certainly true that people with a four-year college degree make more money than those with a two-year degree or less. But there is plenty of nuance behind that truth.

"Averages lie," says Anthony Carnevale, the director of the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

He says the problem with those averages is that people who work at RadioShack or Target get lumped in with master carpenters and electricians.

"You can get a particular skill in a particular field and make more than a college graduate," he says. For example, he says the average electrician makes $5,000 a year more than the average college graduate. And the country is going to need a lot more skilled tradespeople.

A Different Road To Work, Bypassing College Dreams

Unlike the smoky, eardrum-damaging factories of yesterday, today's manufacturing is going high-tech. That can mean more robots and automated machines than workers. But companies like Machine Inc. in Stoughton, Mass., are still growing and hiring.
ECONOMY
Manufacturing 2.0: Old Industry Creating New High-Tech Jobs
"The baby-boom workers are retiring and leaving lots of openings for millennials," Carnevale says. He says there are 600,000 jobs for electricians in the country today, and about half of those will open up over the next decade. Carnevale says it is a big opportunity for that millennial generation born between 1980 and 2000.

With so many boomers retiring from the trades, the U.S. is going to need a lot more pipe-fitters, nuclear power plant operators, carpenters, welders, utility workers — the list is long. But the problem is not enough young people are getting that kind of training.

Not Enough Training

Hughes says she chose to work in the trades, in large part, because she went to a vocational high school. A lot of her friends are going into the trades. She got comfortable there with wiring light switches and doing basic electrical work and learning about the industry. But there aren't nearly as many of these types of programs in high schools as there used to be.

"We made a mistake," Carnevale says. "Back in 1983, there was the 'Nation at Risk' report in which, quite rightly, we all were appalled at the quality of education in America."

After that, he says, most high schools focused on academics and getting students ready for college. For a lot of parents, they wanted their kids to have a four-year degree. But Carnevale says, in the process "we basically obliterated the modernization of the old vocational education programs and they've been set aside."

Carnevale says we should bring those programs back and we need to be preparing a lot more young people for good, well-paying jobs in the trades. And he says that means we need better training programs at high schools and community colleges in partnership with businesses in scores of different industries around the country.

The trinity according to the encyclopaedia britannica.

Last Updated 

Trinity, in Christian doctrine, the unity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three persons in one Godhead.

Neither the word Trinity nor the explicit doctrine appears in the New Testament, nor did Jesus and his followers intend to contradict the Shema in the Hebrew Scriptures: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord” (Deuteronomy 6:4). The earliest Christians, however, had to cope with the implications of the coming of Jesus Christ and of the presumed presence and power of God among them—i.e., the Holy Spirit, whose coming was connected with the celebration of the Pentecost. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were associated in such New Testament passages as the Great Commission: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19); and in the apostolic benediction: “The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all” (2 Corinthians 13:14). Thus, the New Testament established the basis for the doctrine of the Trinity.


The doctrine developed gradually over several centuries and through many controversies. Initially, both the requirements of monotheism inherited from the Hebrew Scriptures and the implications of the need to interpret the biblical teaching to Greco-Roman religions seemed to demand that the divine in Christ as the Word, or Logos, be interpreted as subordinate to the Supreme Being. An alternative solution was to interpret Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as three modes of the self-disclosure of the one God but not as distinct within the being of God itself. The first tendency recognized the distinctness among the three, but at the cost of their equality and hence of their unity (subordinationism); the second came to terms with their unity, but at the cost of their distinctness as “persons” (modalism). It was not until the 4th century that the distinctness of the three and their unity were brought together in a single orthodox doctrine of one essence and three persons.
The Council of Nicaea in 325 stated the crucial formula for that doctrine in its confession that the Son is “of the same substance [homoousios] as the Father,” even though it said very little about the Holy Spirit. Over the next half century, Athanasius defended and refined the Nicene formula, and, by the end of the 4th century, under the leadership of Basil of Caesarea, Gregory of Nyssa, and Gregory of Nazianzus (the Cappadocian Fathers), the doctrine of the Trinity took substantially the form it has maintained ever since. It is accepted in all of the historic confessions of Christianity, even though the impact of the Enlightenment decreased its importance.

On the Rome of the bible:The Watchtower Society's commentary.

ROME

The once-small city in Latium that became the government seat of the greatest world empire in ancient Bible times; today, it is the capital of Italy. Rome is located inland about 25 km (16 mi) up the Tiber River, on both banks, about halfway down the W side of the 1,130-km-long (700 mi) Italian peninsula.

Just when Rome was founded, and by whom, is shrouded in legend and mythology. Tradition says it was in 753 B.C.E. by a certain Romulus, its first king, but there are graves and other evidence indicating it was inhabited at a much earlier time.

The first known settlements were built on seven hills on the E side of the Tiber River. According to tradition the Palatine hill was the site of the oldest settlement. The other six hills located around Palatine (beginning in the N and turning clockwise) were Quirinal, Viminal, Esquiline, Caelian, Aventine, and Capitoline. In time the marshy valleys between the hills were drained, and in these valuable areas dwellings, forums, and circuses were built. According to Pliny the Elder, in 73 C.E. the walls surrounding the city were some 21 km (13 mi) long. In time the hills and valleys to the W side of the Tiber were annexed, including the more than 40 ha (100 acres) occupied today by the Vatican. Before the great fire of Nero’s time, according to conservative estimates, the population of the city was well over a million people.

Rome’s Political Image. Over the centuries Rome experimented with many types of political rule. Some institutions were adaptations from other nations; some were innovations of her own. In his Pocket History of the World, H. G. Wells observed: “This new Roman power which arose to dominate the western world in the second and first centuries B.C. was in several respects a different thing from any of the great empires that had hitherto prevailed in the civilised world.” (1943, p. 149) Rome’s political complexion kept changing as various styles of rule came and went. These included coalitions of patriarchal chieftains, kingships, governments concentrated in the hands of a few families of noble birth, dictatorships, and different forms of republican rule in which the power conferred on the senators, consuls, and triumvirates (three-man governmental coalitions) varied, with typical party struggles between classes and factions. In the latter years of the empire there was a series of emperors. As is common with human governments, Rome’s political history was mottled with hatred, jealousy, intrigue, and murder, with many plots and counterplots generated from internal friction and external wars.

Domination of the world by Rome was a gradual development. First, her influence spread over the entire Italian Peninsula and eventually around the Mediterranean and far beyond. The name of the city became practically synonymous with that of the empire.

In international affairs Rome reached the zenith of her glory under the Caesars. Heading this list was Julius Caesar, appointed dictator for ten years in 46 B.C.E. but murdered by conspirators in 44 B.C.E. After an interval in which a triumvirate attempted to hold the reins of power, Octavian finally became the sole ruler of the Roman Empire (31 B.C.E.–14 C.E.). In 27 B.C.E. he succeeded in becoming emperor, having himself proclaimed “Augustus.” It was during the rule of Augustus that Jesus was born in 2 B.C.E. (Lu 2:1-7) The successor to Augustus, Tiberius (14-37 C.E.), was ruling during Jesus’ ministry. (Lu 3:1, 2, 21-23) Next came Gaius (Caligula) (37-41 C.E.) and Claudius (41-54 C.E.), the latter issuing a decree expelling the Jews from Rome. (Ac 18:1, 2) Nero’s rule followed (54-68 C.E.), and it was to him that Paul appealed his case.​—Ac 25:11, 12, 21; PICTURES, Vol. 2, p. 534.

Roman emperors in the order of succession after Nero (through the first century) were Galba (68-69 C.E.); Otho and Vitellius (69 C.E.); Vespasian (69-79 C.E.), during whose reign Jerusalem was destroyed; Titus (79-81 C.E.), who previously had directed the successful assault on Jerusalem; Domitian (81-96 C.E.), under whose rule, tradition says, John was exiled to the penal island of Patmos; Nerva (96-98 C.E.); and Trajan (98-117 C.E.). It was under Trajan that the empire reached its greatest limits, the boundaries by then extending far out in all directions​—to the Rhine and the North Sea, the Danube, the Euphrates, the cataracts of the Nile, the great African Desert, and the Atlantic on the W.​—MAP, Vol. 2, p. 533.

During the declining years of the Roman Empire, Constantine the Great was emperor (306-337 C.E.). After seizing control, he transferred the capital to Byzantium (Constantinople). In the next century Rome fell, in 476 C.E., and the German warlord Odoacer became its first “barbarian” king.

City Life and Conditions. Administration of city government was divided into 14 districts under Augustus, with a magistrate chosen annually by lot to govern each district. Seven fire-fighting brigades called vigiles were organized, each responsible for two of the districts. Just outside the NE city limits was stationed a special force of about 10,000, known as the Praetorian, or Imperial, Guard, for the protection of the emperor. There were also three “urban cohorts,” a kind of city police force, to maintain law and order in Rome.

The wealthy and influential often lived in palatial homes on the hills; their homes were maintained by large households of servants and slaves, sometimes numbering into the hundreds. Down in the valleys the common people were crowded together in enormous insulae, or tenement houses, several stories high, limited in height by Augustus to 21 m (70 ft). These tenement blocks were separated by narrow, crooked, dirty streets filled with the customary traffic and corruption prevalent in big cities.

It was in these poor sections that the historic fire of 64 C.E. resulted in the greatest suffering and loss of life. Tacitus describes the plight of “shrieking and terrified women; fugitives stricken or immature in years.” (The Annals, XV, XXXVIII) Only 4 out of the 14 districts of Rome were spared.

There were very few persons in Rome who could be called middle class; the wealth rested with a small minority. When Paul first reached Rome, perhaps half the population were slaves, brought there as prisoners of war, as condemned criminals, or as children sold by parents, slaves with no legal rights. The greater part of the free half of the population were paupers who practically lived off government subsidies.

Two things, food and entertainment, were provided by the state to keep these poor people from rioting, hence the satirical phrase, panem et circenses (bread and circuses), implying that this was all that was needed to satisfy the poor of Rome. From 58 B.C.E. on, grain was generally distributed free as well as water, which was brought many miles into the city by aqueducts. Wine was a cheap commodity. For the enjoyment of those so inclined, there were libraries available. For the entertainment of the general populace, there were public baths and gymnasiums, as well as the theaters and circuses. The theatrical performances consisted of Greek and Roman plays, dances, and pantomimes. In the great amphitheaters and circuses exciting games were held, chiefly spectacular chariot races and desperate gladiatorial contests in which men and beasts fought to the death. The Circus Maximus had a capacity of more than 150,000 persons. Admission to the games was free.

The high cost of these government expenses was not borne by the populace of Rome, for after the conquest of Macedonia in 168 B.C.E., Roman citizens were tax free. Instead, the provinces were heavily taxed, both directly and indirectly.​—Mt 22:17-21.

Foreign Influence. In many ways Rome proved to be a great melting pot of races, languages, cultures, and ideas. Out of the forge of Roman politics the code of Roman law gradually emerged​—laws that defined the rights and limitations of governments, courts, and magistrates and that provided legal devices such as citizenship for the protection of human rights. (Ac 25:16) Citizenship was extended to Rome’s confederate cities and to various colonies of the empire. It carried with it many advantages. (Ac 16:37-39; 22:25, 26) If not obtained by birth, it could be purchased. (Ac 22:28) In this and other ways, Rome sought to Romanize the territories she won and thus to strengthen her position as mistress of the empire.

One of the best examples of outside influence on Rome is found in her ruins of past architectural glories. Everywhere, the visitor to this museum city sees how she borrowed from the Greeks and others. The so-called Roman arch, which she used to great advantage, was not her own engineering discovery. Rome’s successes as a builder were also due in large measure to her use of a primitive form of concrete as mortar and as a major ingredient in making artificial stones.

The building program of Rome began in earnest in the last century of the republic and was thereafter given special impetus by the emperors. Augustus said he found Rome a city of bricks but left it a city of marble. For the most part, the marble was a veneer over the structural brick or concrete. There was a second rebuilding of the city, after the conflagration of 64 C.E. Among the more notable Roman structures were the forums, temples, palaces, amphitheaters, baths, aqueducts, sewers, and monuments. The great Colosseum and some monuments, like Titus’ archway depicting the fall of Jerusalem, either are still standing or are partly standing. (PICTURES, Vol. 2, p. 536) The Romans also made a name for themselves as builders of roads and bridges throughout the empire.

There was such an influx of foreigners that the Romans complained Rome was no longer Roman. Gravitating from all quarters of the empire, they brought with them their trades, customs, traditions, and religions. Whereas Latin was the official language, the international language was common Greek (Koine). That is why the apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Romans in Greek. Greek influence had its impact on the literature and methods of education too. Boys, and sometimes girls, were formally educated according to the Athenian system, being schooled in Greek literature and oratory, and the sons of those who could afford it were sent to one of the schools of philosophy in Athens.

Religion. Rome also became the recipient of every form of false worship. As historian John Lord described it: “Superstition culminated at Rome, for there were seen the priests and devotees of all the countries that it governed,​—‘the dark-skinned daughters of Isis, with drum and timbrel and wanton mien; devotees of the Persian Mithras; emasculated Asiatics; priests of Cybele, with their wild dances and discordant cries; worshippers of the great goddess Diana; barbarian captives with the rites of Teuton priests; Syrians, Jews, Chaldaean astrologers, and Thessalian sorcerers.’”​—Beacon Lights of History, 1912, Vol. III, pp. 366, 367.

Devotion to these religions, and indulgence in their wanton sex orgies, opened the door to total abandonment of moral virtue and righteousness among Romans of both low and high rank. According to Tacitus, among the latter, Messalina, the adulterous, murderous wife of Emperor Claudius, is an example.​—The Annals, XI, I-XXXIV.

Outstanding among the religions of Rome was emperor worship. The Roman ruler was deified. Emperor worship was recognized especially in the provinces, temples being built in which they sacrificed to him as to a god. (PICTURE, Vol. 2, p. 536) In A History of Rome, George Botsford says: “The worship of the emperor was to be the most vital force in the religion of the Roman world till the adoption of Christianity.” An inscription found in Asia Minor says of the emperor: “He is the paternal Zeus and the saviour of the whole race of man, who fulfils all prayers, even more than we ask. For land and sea enjoy peace; cities flourish; everywhere are harmony and prosperity and happiness.” This cult proved to be a chief instrument of persecution for Christians, concerning whom this writer says: “Their refusal to worship the Genius, or guardian spirit, of the emperor was naturally construed as impiety and treason.”​—1905, pp. 214, 215, 263.

Christianity Comes to Rome. On the day of Pentecost, 33 C.E., there were “sojourners from Rome, both Jews and proselytes,” present to witness the results of the outpouring of the holy spirit, and some of them were no doubt among the 3,000 baptized on that occasion. (Ac 2:1, 10, 41) Upon returning to Rome, they doubtless preached, resulting in the formation of a very strong, active Christian congregation whose faith the apostle Paul mentioned as being “talked about throughout the whole world.” (Ro 1:7, 8) Both Tacitus (The Annals, XV, XLIV) and Suetonius (The Lives of the Caesars, Nero, XVI, 2) referred to the Christians in Rome.

Paul wrote to the Christian congregation in Rome about 56 C.E., and about three years later he arrived in Rome as a prisoner. Although he had entertained desires of visiting there sooner and under different circumstances (Ac 19:21; Ro 1:15; 15:22-24), he was able, even though a prisoner, to give a thorough witness by having people come to his house. For two years, under these conditions, he continued “preaching the kingdom of God to them and teaching the things concerning the Lord Jesus Christ with the greatest freeness of speech, without hindrance.” (Ac 28:14-31) Even the emperor’s Praetorian Guard became acquainted with the Kingdom message. (Php 1:12, 13) So, as it had been foretold of him, Paul ‘gave a thorough witness even in Rome.’​—Ac 23:11.

During this two-year detention in Rome Paul found time to write letters, those to the Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon. Evidently about the same time, Mark wrote his Gospel account in Rome. Shortly before or immediately after Paul’s release, he penned his letter to the Hebrews in about 61 C.E. (Heb 13:23, 24) It was during his second imprisonment in Rome, in about 65 C.E., that Onesiphorus visited him and that Paul wrote his second letter to Timothy.​—2Ti 1:15-17.

Though Paul, Luke, Mark, Timothy, and other first-century Christians visited Rome (Php 1:1; Col 4:10, 14), there is no conclusive evidence that Peter was ever in Rome, as some traditions would have it. The stories about Peter’s martyrdom in Rome are based on tradition.​—See PETER, LETTERS OF.


The city of Rome developed a very bad reputation for its persecution of Christians, particularly during the reigns of Nero and Domitian. These persecutions were attributed to two causes: (1) the great evangelizing zeal of Christians to convert others, and (2) Christians’ uncompromising stand in giving to God the things that are God’s rather than giving them to Caesar.​—Mr 12:17.

Frankenstein's heirs?

Macaque Monkeys and Human Dignity
David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

Why does the evolution debate matter so intensely? In an  interview with P.J. Media‘s Tyler O’Neil our biologist colleague Ann Gauger hits the nail on the head. The profound importance of the controversy lies in human dignity, and our rapidly dissolving sensitivity to it. She spoke in the context of news about the cloning of macaque monkeys by Chinese researchers, a major and disquieting step toward human cloning.

Will scientists take it that far? The present culture certainly gives reasons to think they won’t stop at monkeys.

“I connect it to the issues of euthanasia and abortion because it all boils down to what value we place on human life,” Ann Gauger, a senior research scientist at the Biologic Institute who earned her Ph.D. in biology at the University of Washington and did post-doctorate work at Harvard, told PJ Media.

“It’s a question of how you view human life. If you view it as starting from conception to natural death, then for cloning it involves the creation of a new human being, although by artificial means,” Gauger explained.

The kind of cloning discussed here involves introducing a somatic cell nucleus into the egg, which then develops into an embryo. The Chinese study itself seemed rather wasteful and problematic. Out of 127 eggs injected with somatic cell nuclei, 79 were transferred into surrogate mothers, leading to six pregnancies, and two live births. Another part of the experiment involved 290 eggs, resulting in 22 pregnancies, 2 live births, and no surviving monkeys.

In the case of humans, each embryo is genetically an individual, with the potential to grow into an adult human being. After an embryo is created, it can be implanted in a womb for birth — “reproductive cloning” — or it can be harvested for stem cells and medical research — “therapeutic cloning.”

Gauger called both kinds of cloning “problematic.”

Why problematic? Dr. Gauger presented the issue in very personal terms:

“I have a disabled daughter, and I know people who have Down syndrome children. Most Down syndrome children — if they’re diagnosed in utero — end up being aborted,” the biologist lamented. “Is all human life of value or is it only valuable if it’s of use to the society?”

She connected the selling of baby parts from abortion to this issue as well — using human beings for research.

Gauger suggested a deep disconnect between scientists’ research and their consciences.

Go back and read Richard Weikart reflections here the other day on the 200th anniversary of the publication of Frankenstein. O’Neil goes on:

This suppression of conscience is terrifying, and combined with the curiosity and rush to achieve something new, it may present a powerful incentive for scientists to delve into human cloning.

“The push in the human direction comes mainly from the scientist’s desire to be the first to do something, to meet a challenge, to be curious about ‘what would happen if I did this,’“ Gauger explained. “It’s an intrinsic human thing to want to explore and to want to control and to be the first.”

Another “personal revelation” from Dr. Gauger:

“I probably know scientists who are now working on this issue and most of them have not considered seriously the ethical questions. I know some who have and who have left that area of research.”


What’s the source of it all? “She pointed to Darwinism as the key threat behind the loss of understanding of human dignity.” That seems hard to deny. The whole agenda of evolutionary thinking is to erase the exceptional status of human beings in nature, considering us as one among many animals competing for existence amid the blind churning of the cosmos and of terrestrial biology. From Darwin’s visions to nightmare scenarios of human cloning, it’s a straight shot from premise to conclusion.

Yet more damage control re:the Cambrian explosion.

Cambrian Explosion Blues
Evolution News @DiscoveryCSC


What else is new in the campaign to explain the Cambrian explosion in Darwinian terms, despite the evidence? An article in The Australian says, “Fossils found in Gabon rewrite timeline of life on Earth,” as if finding earlier complexity is going to help the evolutionary story.

Fossils discovered in west Africa have pushed back the dawn of multicellular life on Earth by at least 1.5 billion years, scientists believe.

Just how complex the newly discovered organisms are is sure to be hotly debated.

But there can be no doubt that the creatures unearthed from the hills of Gabon, visible to the naked eye, have upended standard evolutionary timelines.

“The cursor on the origin of complex multicellular life is no longer 600 million years ago, as has long been maintained, but more like 2.1 billion years,” said Abderrazak El Albani, a researcher at the University of Poitiers and lead author of the study. 

The fossils, appearing to represent colonial organisms, vary from 12 centimeters to five inches. What are they? Ediacarans? The cookie-shaped fossils certainly don’t represent anything familiar, and the authors don’t draw any connections with what came later.

Up to now, conventional scientific wisdom held that the planet was populated only by single-celled microbes until the so-called Cambrian explosion, a major surge of biodiversity that began some 600 million years ago [actually, more like 530 million or 540 at most].

Ever-more complex life forms emerged rapidly from there, eventually creating an evolutionary tree with homo sapiens atop one of its branches.

“Multicellularity represents one of the principle thresholds in evolutionary history,” Philip Donoghue and Jonathan Antcliffe from the University of Bristol said in a commentary, also in Nature.

But the new organism, which appears to have lived in colonies, shows that the drive toward complexity began much sooner.

The article also claims that these organisms had a membrane-bound nucleus protecting its chromosomes! This announcement cannot help the Darwinian story. Earlier complexity, with no affinity to what followed, does not fit what Darwin had in mind. Perhaps the dating of the strata is wrong. If not, it looks like a proverbial Precambrian Rabbit that will have “upended standard evolutionary timelines” until the Darwin damage control committee can come up with a new story.

Fast-forwarding to the Ediacaran era, NASA put out another positivist spin at  Astrobiology Magazine about the enigmatic animals that flourished before the Cambrian explosion:

Microbial mats that existed on sea floors prior to the “Cambrian explosion” provided the foundation for early animal life to arise, new research looking at trace fossils of that early life has found.

When Charles Darwin wrote On the Origin of Species and for decades thereafter, scientists ascribed the beginning of animal life to the Cambrian, eventually pinned to about 540 million years ago when trilobites and other multicellular organisms emerged in a relatively short timeframe.

In recent years, however, astonishing complexity has been discovered in the period right before the advent of the Cambrian explosion, revising the scientific view of the origins of the most complex, multicellular life on Earth.

“By the time we get to the Cambrian — which has much more familiar organisms — a lot of the evolution had already happened on Earth,” says paleobiologist Mary Droser at the NASA Astrobiology Institute at the University of California, Riverside.

Droser presents a queer idea that microbial mats caused animals to appear.

The range and diversity of microbial mats that served as the foothold for Ediacara biota would prove even more pivotal to the ecology of these ancient habitats. The mats offered an alternative path from the free-floating lifestyle of microscopic algae and bacteria as something for the new and enterprising species to attach to or feed from on a shifting seafloor. The stability and environmental complexity provided by the sticky mats made the extensive seafloor habitable.

In this magical world, microbial mats made animals evolve, and the animals returned the favor:

The appearance, diversification, and evolution of Ediacara biota are inextricably linked to these mats. Researchers have found that with the rise of complex animals comes advancements in the microbial mats themselves, revealing the ecological interplay between the species, Droser says.

And so, the story goes, the evolving life could ride out the storms and exploit the shared benefits they provided each other. “Earth’s first vertebrates, mobility, early mollusks, skeletons, plant-like reproduction and population struggles such as competition over resources and space, which are all vital components of modern animal ecosystems today” were just a matter of time.

What is her evidence for this tale? Droser only presents Dickinsonia, Spriggina, and various “evolutionary dead ends” with no clear connection to the twenty new phyla appearing in the Cambrian explosion.

“We would argue that the beginning of animal life as we know it begins in the Precambrian,” says Droser. “By the time that you get to the Cambrian, all of the major groups are established.”

What? There’s a blatant falsehood for you Where are her arthropods? Where are the ctenophores? echinoderms? brachiopods? Where are bilaterian animals with eyes, guts, and articulated limbs? Her only empirical evidence for this claim is an inference from patterns in microbial mats that might indicate mobility of some Ediacarans like Dickinsonia and Spriggina. “Sprigginia [sic] fossils are some of the most complex fossils found in the Ediacaran period,” she says enthusiastically. “Vaguely resembling soft-bodied trilobites, Sprigginia has a head-like region and repeating segments running the length of its body.”

This greatly overstates the evidence. They are not true segments, and a head-like region is not a head. Meyer dealt with Spriggina in detail in his book (pp. 82-85), quoting numerous authorities such as Conway Morris, Valentine, and Erwin who do not believe a connection exists with any Ediacaran animal to the Cambrian biota. In fact, as Meyer explains on page 86 and following, the Ediacarans themselves exploded onto the scene. Most paleontologists believe the Ediacarans went extinct before the sudden appearance of twenty new animal phyla in the Cambrian. The NASA astrobiologists make a fake bridge across the divide that cannot hold the weight of all the new body plans needing to get across.

Ironically, another entry in  Astrobiology Magazine undermines the “oxygen theory” for the rise of Cambrian animals.

A study by University of California, Berkeley geochemists presents new evidence that high levels of oxygen were not critical to the origin of animals.

The researchers found that the transition to a world with an oxygenated deep ocean occurred between 540 and 420 million years ago. They attribute this to an increase in atmospheric O2 to levels comparable to the 21 percent oxygen in the atmosphere today.

This inferred rise comes hundreds of millions of years after the origination of animals, which occurred between 700 and 800 million years ago.


Basically, animals already had arrived before dissolved oxygen was sufficient to contribute to the “emergence” of animals. So much for that explanation.

On beating higher Ed.