On the Darwinian thought police.

All Those Darwinian Doubts

David Berlinski
Wichita Eagle
March 9, 2005

The defense of Darwin's theory of evolution has now fallen into the hands of biologists who believe in suppressing criticism when possible and ignoring it when not. It is not a strategy calculated in induce confidence in the scientific method. A paper published recently in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington concluded that the events taking place during the Cambrian era could best be understood in terms of an intelligent design—hardly a position unknown in the history of western science. The paper was, of course, peer-reviewed by three prominent evolutionary biologists. Wise men attend to the publication of every one of the Proceeding's papers, but in the case of Steven Meyer's "The origin of biological information and the higher taxonomic categories," the Board of Editors was at once given to understand that they had done a bad thing. Their indecent capitulation followed at once. 

Publication of the paper, they confessed, was a mistake. It would never happen again. It had barely happened at all. And peer review?

The hell with it.

"If scientists do not oppose antievolutionism," Eugenie Scott, the Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education, remarked, "it will reach more people with the mistaken idea that evolution is scientifically weak." Scott's understanding of "opposition" had nothing to do with reasoned discussion. It had nothing to do with reason at all. Discussing the issue was out of the question. Her advice to her colleagues was considerably more to the point: "Avoid debates." 

Everyone else had better shut up. 

In this country, at least, no one is ever going to shut up, the more so since the case against Darwin's theory retains an almost lunatic vitality. 

Look — The suggestion that Darwin's theory of evolution is like theories in the serious sciences — quantum electrodynamics, say — is grotesque. Quantum electrodynamics is accurate to thirteen unyielding decimal places. Darwin's theory makes no tight quantitative predictions at all.

Look — Field studies attempting to measure natural selection inevitably report weak to non-existent selection effects. 

Look — Darwin's theory is open at one end since there are no plausible account for the origins of life.

Look — The astonishing and irreducible complexity of various cellular structures has not yet successfully been described, let alone explained.

Look — A great many species enter the fossil record trailing no obvious ancestors and depart for Valhalla leaving no obvious descendents. 

Look — Where attempts to replicate Darwinian evolution on the computer have been successful, they have not used classical Darwinian principles, and where they have used such principles, they have not been successful. 

Look — Tens of thousands of fruit flies have come and gone in laboratory experiments, and every last one of them has remained a fruit fly to the end, all efforts to see the miracle of speciation unavailing. 

Look — The remarkable similarity in the genome of a great many organisms suggests that there is at bottom only one living system; but how then to account for the astonishing differences between human beings and their near relatives — differences that remain obvious to anyone who has visited a zoo?

But look again — If the differences between organisms are scientifically more interesting than their genomic similarities, of what use is Darwin's theory since its otherwise mysterious operations take place by genetic variations?

These are hardly trivial questions. Each suggests a dozen others. These are hardly circumstances that do much to support the view that there are "no valid criticisms of Darwin's theory," as so many recent editorials have suggested.

Serious biologists quite understand all this. They rather regard Darwin's theory as an elderly uncle invited to a family dinner. The old boy has no hair, he has no teeth, he is hard of hearing, and he often drools. Addressing even senior members at table as Sonny, he is inordinately eager to tell the same story over and over again.

But he's family. What can you do?

David Berlinski holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University. He is the author of On Systems Analysis, A Tour of the Calculus, The Advent of the Algorithm, Newton's Gift, The Secrets of the Vaulted Sky, and, most recently, Infinite Ascent: A Short History of Mathematics.

Where some see a canyon..

Keeping an Eye on Evolution: Richard Dawkins, a relentless Darwinian spear carrier, trips over Mount Improbable.

Review of Climbing Mount Improbable by Richard Dawkins (W. H. Norton & Company, Inc. 1996)
David Berlinski


The theory of evolution is the great white elephant of contemporary thought. It is large, almost entirely useless, and the object of superstitious awe. Richard Dawkins is widely known as the theory's uncompromising champion. Having made his case in The Blind Watchmaker and River out of Eden, Dawkins proposes to make it yet again in Climbing Mount Improbable. He is not a man given to tiring himself by repetition. 

Darwin's theory has a double aspect. The first is the doctrine of descent with modification; the second, the doctrine of random variation and natural selection. Descent with modification provides the pattern; random variation and natural selection, the mechanism. Dawkins' concern is with the mechanism; the pattern he takes for granted. 

Biological structures such as the mammalian eye are complex in the sense that they contain many parts arranged in specific ways. It is unlikely that such structures could have been discovered by chance. No one, the astrophysicist N. C. Wickramasinghe once observed with some asperity, expects a tornado touching on a junkyard to produce a Boeing 747. This may suggest--it has suggested to some physicists--a disturbing gap between what life has accomplished and what the theory of evolution can explain. The suggestion provokes Dawkins to indignation. "It is grindingly, creakingly, crashingly obvious," he writes, mixing three metaphors joyously, that the discovery by chance of a complex object is improbable; but the Darwinian mechanism, he adds, "acts by breaking the improbability up into small manageable parts, smearing out the luck needed, going round the back of Mount Improbable and crawling up the gentle slopes...." 

This is a fine image, one introduced originally by the American bio-mathematician Sewell Wright. Random variation offers the mountaineer an allowance of small changes. Chance is at work. Natural selection freezes the successful changes in place. And this process owes nothing to chance. In time, the successful changes form a connected path, a staircase to complexity. 

The example that Dawkins pursues in greatest detail is the eye. Darwin himself wondered at its complexity, remarking in a letter to an American colleague that "the eye...gives me a cold shudder." That shudder notwithstanding, Darwin resolved his doubts in his own favor; the eye, he concluded, was created by a single-step series of improvements, what he called 'fine gradations.' Where Darwin went, Dawkins follows. 

It is one thing, however, to appeal to a path up Mount Improbable, quite another to demonstrate its existence. Dawkins has persuaded himself that because such a path might exist, further argument is unnecessary. Impediments are simply directed to disappear: "There is no difficulty"; "there is a definite tendency in the right direction"; "It is easy to see that..."; "it is not at all difficult to imagine...." 

In fact, the difficulties are very considerable. A single retinal cell of the human eye consists of a nucleus, a mitochondrial rod, and a rectangular array containing discrete layers of photon-trapping pigment. The evolutionary development of the eye evidently required an increase in such layers. An inferential staircase being required, the thing virtually constructs itself, Dawkins believes, one layer at a time. "The point," he writes, "is that ninety-one membranes are more effective...than ninety, ninety are more effective that eighty-nine, and so on back to one membrane, which is more effective than zero." 

This is a plausible scheme only because Dawkins has considered a single feature of the eye in isolation. The parts of a complex artifact or object typically gain their usefulness as an ensemble. A Dixie Cup consists of a tube joined to a disk. Without the disk, the cup does not hold less water than it might; it cannot hold water at all. And ditto for the tube, the two items, disk and tube, forming an irreducibly complex system. 

What holds for the Dixie Cup holds for the eye as well. Light strikes the eye in the form of photons, but the optic nerve conveys electrical impulses to the brain. Acting as a sophisticated transducer, the eye must mediate between two different physical signals. The retinal cells that figure in Dawkins' account are connected to horizontal cells; these shuttle information laterally between photoreceptors in order to smooth the visual signal. Amacrine cells act to filter the signal. Bipolar cells convey visual information further to ganglion cells, which in turn conduct information to the optic nerve. The system gives every indication of being tightly integrated, its parts mutually dependent. 

The very problem that Darwin's theory was designed to evade now reappears. Like vibrations passing through a spider's web, changes to any part of the eye, if they are to improve vision, must bring about changes throughout the optical system. Without a correlative increase in the size and complexity of the optic nerve, an increase in the number of photoreceptive membranes can have no effect. A change in the optic nerve must in turn induce corresponding neurological changes in the brain. If these changes come about simultaneously, it makes no sense to talk of a gradual ascent of Mount Improbable. If they do not come about simultaneously, it is not clear why they should come about at all. 

The same problem reappears at the level of biochemistry. Dawkins has framed his discussion in terms of gross anatomy. Each anatomical change that he describes requires a number of coordinate biochemical steps. "[T]he anatomical steps and structures that Darwin thought were so simple," the biochemist Mike Behe remarks in a provocative new book (Darwin's Black Box), "actually involve staggeringly complicated biochemical processes." A number of separate biochemical events are required simply to begin the process of curving a layer of proteins to form a lens. What initiates the sequence? How is it coordinated? And how controlled? On these absolutely fundamental matters, Dawkins has nothing whatsoever to say. 

In addition to the eye, Dawkins discusses spiders and their webs, the origin of flight, and the nature of seashells. The natural history is charming. 

Dawkins is a capable if somewhat dry prose stylist, although such expressions as 'designoid' and 'wince-makingly' are themselves wince-making. The science throughout is primitive. Difficulties are resolved by sleight-of-hand. "In real life," Dawkins remarks in a representative passage, "there may be formidable complications of detail." Yes? What of them, those formidable complications? "These emerge simply and without fuss." 

Is the elephant's large nose truly the result of an evolutionary progression? Then some demonstration is required showing that intermediate-sized noses are valuable as well. None is forthcoming. "If a medium sized trunk were always less efficient," Dawkins writes, "than either a small nose or a big trunk, the big trunk would never have evolved." Indeed. The emergence of powered flight is treated as an engaging fable, one in which either arboreal animals glided downward from the tree tops or a primitive dinosaur hopped upward toward the sky. "The beauty of this theory," Dawkins affirms, commending the hopping scenario, "is that the same nervous circuits that were used to control the center of gravity in the jumping ancestor would, rather effortlessly, have lent themselves to controlling the flight surfaces later in the evolutionary story." It is the phrase "rather effortlessly" that gives to this preposterous assertion its antic charm. 

A final note. In a book whose examples are chosen from natural history, it is important to get the details right. Hawks may soar or sail, but they cannot hover like helicopters. Not all organisms share precisely the same genetic code. And Gary Kasparov was defeated by IBM's Big Blue, and not a program entitled Genius 2. 

On teaching Darwinism:more education less indoctrination

How Should We Teach Evolution?

Casey Luskin March 16, 2015 3:38 AM 

In recent posts (here, here, and here), I've considered some of the misinformation directed at students from Darwin-lobbying groups like the National Center for Science Education. Having answered false claims by evolution advocates in the context of science education, it's fair to ask now: How should evolution be taught? Discovery Institute's Center for Science & Culture has made its position clear on many occasions in the past, but since media and advocacy groups continue to advance misunderstandings and distortions, it can't hurt to say it once more.

Darwinian evolution should be fully and completely taught in public schools, and schools need to teach more about evolution, not less. Unfortunately, most biology classrooms teach a one-sided, pro-Darwin-only curriculum that censors serious any scientific critique of neo-Darwinism. This makes for bad science education. It doesn't teach students how to think, just what to think. Instead, schools should teach about both the strengths and weaknesses of neo-Darwinian and chemical evolutionary theories and let students critically evaluate the arguments and evidence in this debate.

Teaching students in such a balanced, objective manner turns classroom instruction away from indoctrination and toward genuine education. Critically analyzing Darwinian evolution teaches students more about the facts of biology and produces scientifically minded students with good critical thinking skills. As Charles Darwin himself wrote in the Origin of Species: "a fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question."¹

Modern biology textbooks have a chronic habit of papering over scientific evidence that dissents from the standard lines of evidence --or "icons" -- that are used to support Darwinian evolution. For example, textbooks often present examples of small-scale "microevolution" and over-extrapolate from this evidence to make unwarranted claims about "macroevolution." They discuss minute changes in the sizes of beaks on the Galápagos finches or small changes in the colors of peppered moths to claim that fundamentally new types of organisms can evolve via Darwinian processes.²

But evolutionary biologist Robert L. Carroll asks: "Can changes in individual characters, such as the relative frequency of genes for light and dark wing color in moths adapting to industrial pollution, simply be multiplied over time to account for the origin of moths and butterflies within insects, the origin of insects from primitive arthropods, or the origin of arthropods from among primitive multicellular organisms?"³ Many scientists feel the answer is no. However, biology textbooks never inform students of this fact. Students need to have access to all of the evidence regarding Darwinian evolution so they can make up their own minds.

Science education theorists agree that students learn science best when they learn about arguments for and against a particular concept. A 2010 paper in the journal Science observes that "[c]ritique is not, therefore, some peripheral feature of science, but rather it is core to its practice." The paper found that students learn science best when they are asked "to discriminate between evidence that supports ... or does not support"⁴ a given scientific concept.

Science education is about teaching students the facts of biology, but also about teaching them how to think like scientists. When students are told that Darwinian evolution is a "settled theory" or that there "is no controversy over evolution," that not only misinforms them about debates taking place among scientists, but it fails to teach students how to use critical thinking on these important scientific questions. When evolution advocates demand that students should not learn about scientific weaknesses in evolution, the real losers are the students who are denied opportunities to learn about all of the evidence and are prevented from studying different legitimate scientific viewpoints regarding Darwinism.

There is a vibrant debate over Darwinian evolution taking place in the scientific community, and the scientists who have signed the Scientific Dissent from Darwinism List invite you to investigate it. As the 900 signers to the list agree: "We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged."

References:

[1.] Charles Darwin, Introduction, The Origin of Species (1859), Literature.org, accessed March 14, 2012, http://literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-origin-of-species-6th-edition/introduction.html.

[2.] See Jonathan Wells, "Second Thoughts about Peppered Moths," The Scientist, Vol. 13(11):13 (1999).

[3.] Robert Carroll, Patterns and Processes of Vertebrate Evolution, pp. 8-10 (Cambridge University Press, 1997).

[4.] Jonathan Osborne, "Arguing to Learn in Science: The Role of Collaborative, Critical Discourse,"Science, Vol. 328: 463-466 (April 23, 2010).

We know.It's not what it looks like.

Minister Creflo Dollar asks for $60 million in donations for a new jet

Creflo Dollar is hoping a few folks will see fit to bless him.

The minister, known for being a prosperity preacher at his Atlanta-area World Changers Church International, is seeking "200,000 people committed to sow $300 or more (to) help achieve our goal to purchase the G650 airplane."

The figures were presented Friday in a nearly six-minute video on the Creflo Dollar Ministries website (the video was not viewable Friday night) and total more than $60 million needed to buy the Gulfstream G650, which goes for a reported $65 million.

The Gulfstream G650 can fly eight passengers and four crew members some 8,000 statue miles at a cruising speed of Mach 0.85, according to specs posted on gulfstream.com.

The project isn't limited to member donations, as the site states that "we are asking members, partners and supporters of this ministry to assist us in acquiring a Gulfstream G650."

The request goes on to detail that the luxury jet will transport Pastors Creflo and Taffi Dollar and member of the Dollars' church around the globe to help them spread the gospel.

Prosperity gospel is a theology that promises wealth and health to those who tithe 10% of their income to the church.

The video includes parishioners, a pilot, a project manager and even the President of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, advocating on behalf of the pastor.

On the video, the pastor chronicles incidents involving his current jet, which has been in service for more than three decades: The right engine went out en route to Australia, but the plane was able to safely land at its destination thanks to the experience of the pilot and crew. During another trip, mechanical failure caused the jet to skid off a runway in London while Taffi Dollar and their three daughters were aboard.

Dollar attributed his family's safe arrival to "a grace working on that airplane, that brought my girls back home to me, you understand what I am saying?" he said from the pulpit to thunderous applause.

Dollar said that after those incidents, he "knew that it was time to begin to believe God for a new airplane."

The Gulfstream G650 would comfortably allow the ministry make its way around the world. It seats up to 14 passengers with berthing for six, according to gulfstream.com. The jet comes with two Rolls-Royce engines, high-speed Internet and two multichannel satellites and allows for a 2½-hour commute from New York to Los Angeles.

"The G650 is the biggest, fastest, most luxurious, longest range and most technologically advanced jet -- by far," according to the site.

In soliciting the donations, Dollar's site states, "We need your help to continue reaching a lost and dying world for the Lord Jesus Christ. Your love gift of any amount will be greatly appreciated."

Attempts to contact Dollar's ministry for comment were unsuccessful.

On Darwinian apologists' doublespeak.

Evolutionary Advocacy as a Confidence Game

David Klinghoffer March 13, 2015 12:12 PM 

Darwin advocacy often gives the appearance of a racket, a confidence scam, a game of Three-card Monte. Go read or listen to John Stonestreet's excellent Breakpoint commentary reflecting on the current cover story in National Geographic, "The War on Science." The magazine links and absurdly lampoons a number of skeptical views, as if they were all of a piece. The cover text reads, giving examples "anti-science":

Climate Change Does Not Exist.

Evolution Never Happened.

The Moon Landing Was Faked.

Vaccinations Can Lead to Autism.

Genetically Modified Food Is Evil.

Now read the brief and informative Wikipedia article on confidence tricks, including the classic "stages of the con," the carefully ordered succession of interactions among con man, shill (accomplice), and mark (victim). Tell me if that doesn't ring a bell. In the context of evolution, it goes something like this:

Con: "You're pro-science, am I right?"

Mark: "Oh, sure I love science. Can't get enough of it."

Con: "So you're not anti-science, correct?"

Mark: "I don't know what that means exactly, but like I said, I love science."

Con: "Well, for example, you agree that the United States landed on the Moon, right? Because there are some loons who doubt that."

Mark: "What? You're kidding. That's ridiculous."

Con: "OK, just wondering. I mean, you said you're pro-science. So you're not one of those anti-vaxxers, right?"

Mark: "Definitely not. I mean, I have some Facebook friends who are pretty voluble about that. They think it causes autism. But we absolutely vaccinate our kids. It's the responsible thing to do."

Con: "Good, good. That's fine, because those guys are nuts. And, just curious, you're not one of those 'climate skeptic' crazies, right?"

Mark: "What do you mean, 'crazies'? I know there are some climatologists and other thoughtful people who think global warming has been hyped."

Con: "What! I thought you said you're pro-science!"

Mark: "I am."

Con: "Don't you know the scientific consensus believes in human-induced catastrophic global warming?"

Mark: "Alright, alright, you win."

Con: "Finally, evolution. You're not a 'Darwin skeptic' are you?"

Mark: "Doesn't that depend on what you mean by evolution? 'Evolution' in what sense?"

Con: "Never mind."

Mark: "Well I know from my reading that the word can mean various things. Microevolution, macroevolution, universal common descent, the sole sufficiency of the Darwinian mechanism for explaining the development of complex life forms."

Con: "I said never mind. You sound like a creationist. You said you're pro-science. So, you think the whole universe is less than 10,000 years old? You think cavemen rode around on dinosaurs?"

Mark: "No, of course not!"

Con: "Alright, then. So you're pro-science, and you believe evolution happened. Good for you."

Mark: "But aren't there are a bunch of very different questions here that you're wrapping up into one overstuffed burrito as if they were all the same? I mean, Moon landing, vaccinations, global warming, age of the universe, evolution in its several different meanings. Shouldn't separate questions be considered separately?"

Shill: "Oh hey guys, I don't mean to interrupt your conversation, but the latest issue of National Geographic just came in the mail, a very distinguished popular scientific journal with a long and storied publication history. It says here some people think 'evolution never happened.' I guess those are the same ones who think climate change doesn't exist and the Moon landing was faked."

Con: "See? I told you. Now do you believe in evolution or not?"

Shill: "Why are you asking him that? Don't tell me you're one of those Intelligent Design Creationists! I thought after centuries of study the question of whether nature gives scientific evidence of design was finally settled by a judge in Pennsylvania back in '05. I heard the judge was even appointed by President George W. Bush, so he should know. You always seemed like a smart guy. Are you one of those anti-science dummies?"

Con: "Tell me, yes or no. Do you think evolution never happened?"

Mark: "No, no, it's just... Oh forget it. Yes, I believe in 'evolution'!"

Am I exaggerating? Not by much, if at all. This morning, Casey Luskin gave a very concrete illustration of an evolution scam -- the bait-and-switch technique, deployed to cast doubt on the (accurate) contention that Darwinian theory is controversial among mainstream scientists.

Understand what I'm saying. Evolutionary biology is not a scam, but some Darwin defenders employ classic tricks from the arsenal of professional hustlers. If the science were as ironclad as we're supposed to believe, why don't they debate us on the science?

A line in the sand IX

Bombing over show about jewelry is just latest blow to free speech in India

New Delhi (CNN)Thankfully, no one was wounded after crude bombs were hurled at a Tamil news station in India on Thursday. But the loud explosions injured a vital part of the world's largest democracy: free speech.

Last week, when India's government and a British documentarian faced off over a film featuring a man imprisoned for a 2012 gang rape in South Delhi, a little-known channel hundreds of miles away in southern India was waging its own battle. Hardline Hindu groups were angry with broadcaster Puthiya Thalaimurai for filming a show about the relevance of a traditional necklace -- called mangalsutra in Hindi and thaali in Tamil -- worn by married Indian women. For them, the contents, as shown in the promos, were offensive to Hindu culture.

The station planned to release the program Sunday, International Women's Day. But it canceled the telecast after demonstrations took place outside its office. Protesters allegedly attacked one of its cameramen.

Four days later, the channel came under fire again, when four men on two motorbikes threw bombs into its compound in a predawn attack, authorities say. Six people involved in the bombing have been arrested, said S. George, the commissioner of the southern Indian city of Chennai. Their leader turned himself in separately, claiming responsibility for the attack, police said.

"The show wanted to give women a platform. We welcome all opinions and thoughts. But you cannot strangle freedom of free expression by violent means and threats," said Shyam Kumar, the CEO of New Generation Media Corp., which runs Puthiya Thalaimurai. "We condemn the attack in the strongest possible terms," he told CNN.

'India's Daughter,' the film banned by India: What did it show?

But India is no stranger to censorship imposed legally or forced by rowdy protesters.

The country's constitution guarantees freedom of expression, but not without restrictions. Communities or people claiming their religious sentiments were hurt by anyone else's opinion can file a lawsuit.

Authorities can seek restraining orders from local courts -- as they did to ban the recent BBC documentary "India's Daughter" -- by citing potential disorder.

Earlier last year, Penguin India withdrew "The Hindus: An Alternative History," a book by American academic Wendy Doniger, after a local advocacy group accused the writer of denigrating Hinduism.

In December, a Bollywood movie, "PK," came under attack over similar accusations when mobs tore apart its posters in parts of India. A satire on religious rituals, "PK" became a roaring success by being one of the country's highest-grossing movies.

But India, home to one of the world's largest film industries, has blocked several movies from screening.

At least two films were not allowed last year. One of them featured the lives of the Sikh assassins of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and the other centered on the violence in Sri Lanka in the closing months of its civil war.

Hounded by protests over his novel, Perumal Murugan, a Tamil author, announced quitting writing in a dramatic post on Facebook in January.

"Perumal Murugan, the writer is dead. As he is no God, he is not going to resurrect himself. He has no faith in rebirth. As an ordinary teacher, he will live as P Murugan. Leave him alone," he said on Facebook two months ago. Religious and caste-based organizations had slammed his novel "Madhorubhagan," which depicted a childless wife taking part in an ancient festival allowing consensual sex between strangers.

Just last week, India blocked the BBC from airing "India's Daughter" because it included comments from one of the men convicted of raping a young student in a moving bus in New Delhi in 2012. The reason: The inmate's views could create unrest.

"There's a growing intolerance towards different shades of opinion. It's a medieval mindset. What India needs is a concerted effort to move beyond it and embrace free expression in totality," said Kumar, the New Generation Media chief executive.

Some more Darwinian shamanism

Stop Me if You've Heard This One Before: Much Ado over "Oldest Human Fossil"

Casey Luskin March 11, 2015 4:43 AM

 

 

 

 

In 2001, the New York Times ran the headline "Fossils May Be Earliest Human Link." In 2009, Discovery Channel announced, "'Ardi,' Oldest Human Ancestor, Unveiled," and Associated Press's story read, "World's oldest humanlinked skeleton found."

Here we go again.

Headlines over the last week have included "'First human' discovered in Ethiopia" (BBC), "Human Origins Just Got a Lot Older" (Slate), and "Jaw Fossil In Ethiopia Likely Oldest Ever Found In Human Line" (NPR), among many others.

As the NPR story suggests, all that paleoanthropologists have found is a couple of bone scraps from a hominid jaw. Next thing you know we're "redrawing" the old "family tree" as National Geographic put it, since these bones are supposed to be the "oldest human fossil found." If reports are correct, these 2.8-million-year-old fossils are the oldest specimens of Homo by about 400,000 years. See here for a photo of the left half of the jaw.

They also found part of the right half of the mandible, which is in even worse condition and is devoid of teeth.

Now I don't necessarily have a particular reason to doubt that these partial jaw scraps came from Homo. But I do know that other paleoanthropologists have warned that teeth and skull scraps (collectively termed craniodental bones) can be highly plastic and make for poor diagnostic features when it comes to hominid classification. As one article stated:

Recent research has cast doubt on the reliability of bones and teeth for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships among higher primate species and genera. ... [R]esearchers have begun to question the reliability of bones and teeth for reconstructing phylogenetic relationships among higher primate species and genera. This skepticism is based partly on the fact that phylogenetic analyses of fossil primates have thus far yielded conflicting and weakly supported hypotheses of relationships, partly on the fact that comparisons between craniodental phylogenies and reliable molecular phylogenies have found that the former disagree with the latter, and partly on the fact that we are developing a better understanding of the processes involved in the generation of osteological and dental similarities and differences among primates. ... [T]ooth morphology is prone to homoplasy and is therefore a poor guide to low-level phylogenetic relationships.
(Sally Gibbs, Mark Collard, and Bernard Wood, "Soft-tissue characters in higher primate phylogenetics," Proceedings of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 97: 11130-11132 (September 26, 2000).)

Another paper similarly reported: "Little confidence can be placed in phylogenies generated solely from higher primate craniodental evidence."

 

Assuming it is Homo, what's driving the hype this story has received is not simply the prospect that it's the "oldest human fossil" but, instead, fantastical suggestions that somehow the specimen represents a transitional form between the australopithecines and later Homo. Yes, that's right, this tiny scrap of jaw is being called a "missing link" -- a Forbes tech writer even ran the headline "Human Missing Link - Fossil Found."

Because this fossil comes from a period of the fossil record when we have very few bones, and because it was found in Ethiopia about ten miles from the site where Lucy (Australopithecus afarensis) was discovered, some are suggesting the jaw shows that early members of Homo that descended directly from Lucy's species. One paleoanthropologist told CNN that these meager jaw scraps represent "an excellent case of a transitional fossil in a critical time period in human evolution."

Again, even though all they found was a tiny scrap of a jaw, here's how BBC News spins it:

The head of the research team told BBC News that the find gives the first insight into "the most important transitions in human evolution".
Prof Brian Villmoare of the University of Nevada in Las Vegas said the discovery makes a clear link between an iconic 3.2 million-year-old hominin (human-like primate) discovered in the same area in 1974, called "Lucy".
Could Lucy's kind -- which belonged to the species Australopithecus afarensis -- have evolved into the very first primitive humans?
"That's what we are arguing," said Prof Villmoare.

National Geographic frames it this way:

The date is tantalizingly close to the last known appearance, around three million years ago, of Australopithecus afarensis, an upright-walking, small-brained species best known from the skeleton called Lucy, believed by many scientists to be the direct ancestor of our genus. The new jaw, known as LD 350-1, was found in January 2013 just a dozen miles from where Lucy was found in 1974.

But once again, bear in mind that all they found was a small scrap of jaw. Paleoanthropologist William Kimbel tries to temper the excitement by reminding us just how little evidence there is to go on:

Fossils attributed to Homo in the period two to three million years ago are exceedingly rare. Bill Kimbel, director of the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University, in Tempe, who co-led the analysis of the new specimen, once said that "You could put them all into a small shoe box and still have room for a good pair of shoes."

If these fossils are indeed from Homo, then that has major implications for evolutionary models that prefer Australopithecus sediba as a transitional form leading to our genus. Au. sediba doesn't appear for another million years after these fossils, meaning that if these jawbones really do belong to Homo, then sediba could not be ancestral to Homo. National Geographic explains:

To the extent that the new jaw underscores an East African origin for the genus Homo, it would seem to confound the argument made by other researchers that the best candidate for our genus's immediate ancestor is a South African australopithecine, Australopithecus sediba.
The authors of the Science paper point out that the only known specimens of A. sediba are almost a million years younger than the new Homo jaw from Ethiopia that they would have had to have given rise to.

But then of course the defenders of Au. Sediba point out that this jaw bone hardly establishes anything:

"The idea that [the new jaw] makes anything else unlikely to be an ancestor is ludicrous," says Grine. "That would pretend that the fossil record is complete. And we know it can't be, since they just discovered something that wasn't there before."

And NPR reports:

Villmoare says he doesn't yet know anything about the creature's brain; there's nothing from the cranium in this find. But he says its jaw and teeth clearly have human traits.

Likewise, Sci-Tech Today reports:

The new paper's analysis is first-rate, but the fossil could reveal only a limited amount of information about the creature, said Eric Delson of Lehman College in New York.
"There's no head, there's no tools, and no limb bones. So we don't know if it was walking any differently from Australopithecus afarensis," which was Lucy's species, he said.

Thus, it's very hard to use this little jaw fragment of poor quality to demonstrate a clear link with just about anything. Amidst the hype, Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London introduce a note of caution, and sanity: "Half a jawbone is not enough to tell just how human it was and does not provide enough evidence to suggest that it was this line that led to us."

 

But that's the point, isn't it? This scrap of bone establishes very little. And so you have defenders of one evolutionary thesis attacking defenders of another evolutionary thesis on the grounds that the fossil record is too poor to derive any conclusions. If that's the case, then how do we know that humans evolved from apelike species (like Lucy's species Australopithecus afarensis) to begin with?

The answer, in case you were wondering, is that we don't. If we had virtually no fossil evidence documenting the evolution of Homo from apelike creatures prior to this find, then arguably after this find, we still have virtually nothing.
 

Malachi 1 ASV

1The burden of the word of Jehovah to Israel by Malachi.

2I have loved you, saith Jehovah. Yet ye say, Wherein hast thou loved us? Was not Esau Jacob's brother, saith Jehovah: yet I loved Jacob; 3but Esau I hated, and made his mountains a desolation, and gave his heritage to the jackals of the wilderness. 4Whereas Edom saith, We are beaten down, but we will return and build the waste places; thus saith Jehovah of hosts, They shall build, but I will throw down; and men shall call them The border of wickedness, and The people against whom Jehovah hath indignation for ever. 5And your eyes shall see, and ye shall say, Jehovah be magnified beyond the border of Israel.

The Polluted Offerings

6A son honoreth his father, and a servant his master: if then I am a father, where is mine honor? and if I am a master, where is my fear? saith Jehovah of hosts unto you, O priests, that despise my name. And ye say, Wherein have we despised thy name? 7Ye offer polluted bread upon mine altar. And ye say, Wherein have we polluted thee? In that ye say, The table of Jehovah is contemptible. 8And when ye offer the blind for sacrifice, it is no evil! and when ye offer the lame and sick, it is no evil! Present it now unto thy governor; will he be pleased with thee? or will he accept thy person? saith Jehovah of hosts. 9And now, I pray you, entreat the favor of God, that he may be gracious unto us: this hath been by your means: will he accept any of your persons? saith Jehovah of hosts. 10Oh that there were one among you that would shut the doors, that ye might not kindle fire on mine altar in vain! I have no pleasure in you, saith Jehovah of hosts, neither will I accept an offering at your hand. 11For from the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same my name'shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense'shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name'shall be great among the Gentiles, saith Jehovah of hosts. 12But ye profane it, in that ye say, The table of Jehovah is polluted, and the fruit thereof, even its food, is contemptible. 13Ye say also, Behold, what a weariness is it! and ye have snuffed at it, saith Jehovah of hosts; and ye have brought that which was taken by violence, and the lame, and the sick; thus ye bring the offering: should I accept this at your hand? saith Jehovah. 14But cursed be the deceiver, who hath in his flock a male, and voweth, and sacrificeth unto the Lord a blemished thing; for I am a great King, saith Jehovah of hosts, and my name is terrible among the Gentiles.