The Watchtower Society's Commentary on the New Jerusalem.

NEW JERUSALEM

An expression that occurs two times, and only in the highly symbolic book of Revelation. (Re 3:12; 21:2) Near the end of that series of visions, and after seeing Babylon the Great destroyed, the apostle John says: “I saw also the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God and prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”—Re 21:2.

The Bride of the Lamb. In the light of other scriptures, the identity of New Jerusalem is made certain. She is “as a bride.” Farther along, John writes: “One of the seven angels . . . spoke with me and said: ‘Come here, I will show you the bride, the Lamb’s wife.’ So he carried me away in the power of the spirit to a great and lofty mountain, and he showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God and having the glory of God. Its radiance was like a most precious stone, as a jasper stone shining crystal-clear.”—Re 21:9-11.

New Jerusalem is the bride of whom? The Lamb of God, Jesus Christ, who shed his blood sacrificially for mankind. (Joh 1:29; Re 5:6, 12; 7:14; 12:11; 21:14) What is her identity? She is composed of the members of the glorified Christian congregation. The congregation on earth was likened to “a chaste virgin” to be presented to the Christ. (2Co 11:2) Again, the apostle Paul likens the Christian congregation to a wife, with Christ as her Husband and Head.—Eph 5:23-25, 32.

Furthermore, Christ himself addresses the congregation at Revelation 3:12, promising the faithful conqueror that he would have written upon him “the name of my God and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem which descends out of heaven from my God, and that new name of mine.” A wife takes her husband’s name. Therefore those seen standing with the Lamb upon Mount Zion, numbering 144,000, having the Lamb’s name and that of his Father written in their foreheads, are evidently the same group, the bride.—Re 14:1.

Why could “New Jerusalem” not be a city in the Middle East?

New Jerusalem is heavenly, not earthly, for it comes down “out of heaven from God.” (Re 21:10) So this city is not one erected by men and consisting of literal streets and buildings constructed in the Middle East on the site of the ancient city of Jerusalem, which was destroyed in 70 C.E. The members of the bride class when on earth are told that their “citizenship exists in the heavens” and that their hope is to receive “an incorruptible and undefiled and unfading inheritance.” “It is reserved in the heavens for you,” says the apostle Peter.—Php 3:20; 1Pe 1:4.

In 537 B.C.E., Jehovah created “new heavens and a new earth” when the Jewish remnant was restored to Jerusalem from Babylonian exile. (Isa 65:17) Evidently the governorship of Zerubbabel (a descendant of David) aided by High Priest Joshua, at the city of Jerusalem, constituted the “new heavens” then. (Hag 1:1, 14; see HEAVEN [New heavens and new earth].) The New Jerusalem, together with Christ on his throne in this symbolic city, constitutes the “new heavens” that rule over the “new earth,” which is human society on earth.

That the New Jerusalem is indeed a heavenly city is further supported by the vision of her that John beheld. Only a symbolic city could have the dimensions and splendor of New Jerusalem. Its base was foursquare, about 555 km (345 mi) on each side, or about 2,220 km (1,379 mi) completely around, that is, 12,000 furlongs. Being a cube, the city was also as high as it was long and wide. No man-made city could ever reach that far into “outer space.” Round about was a wall 144 cubits (64 m; 210 ft) high. The wall, itself constructed of jasper, in turn rested on 12 foundation stones, precious stones of great beauty—jasper, sapphire, chalcedony, emerald, sardonyx, sardius, chrysolite, beryl, topaz, chrysoprase, hyacinth, and amethyst. On these 12 foundation stones were engraved the names of the 12 apostles of the Lamb. The city proper within these beautiful walls was no less glorious, for it was described as “pure gold like clear glass,” having a broad way of “pure gold, as transparent glass.”—Re 21:12-21.

A Pure, Beneficial Rule. Entrance into the New Jerusalem through its magnificent walls was by means of 12 gates, three on a side, each made of a huge pearl. Although these gates were never closed, “anything not sacred and anyone that carries on a disgusting thing and a lie will in no way enter into it; only those written in the Lamb’s scroll of life will.” A holy and sacred city indeed, yet there was no visible temple of worship, for “Jehovah God the Almighty is its temple, also the Lamb is.” And there was “no need of the sun nor of the moon to shine upon it, for the glory of God lighted it up, and its lamp was the Lamb.” Its rulership over the nations will be beneficial to them, for “the nations will walk by means of its light.”—Re 21:22-27.

Watchtower Society's commentary on the doctrine of eternal torment.

Hell

Definition: The word “hell” is found in many Bible translations. In the same verses other translations read “the grave,” “the world of the dead,” and so forth. Other Bibles simply transliterate the original-language words that are sometimes rendered “hell”; that is, they express them with the letters of our alphabet but leave the words untranslated. What are those words? The Hebrew she’ohl′ and its Greek equivalent hai′des, which refer, not to an individual burial place, but to the common grave of dead mankind; also the Greek ge′en·na, which is used as a symbol of eternal destruction. However, both in Christendom and in many non-Christian religions it is taught that hell is a place inhabited by demons and where the wicked, after death, are punished (and some believe that this is with torment).

Does the Bible indicate whether the dead experience pain?

Eccl. 9:5, 10: “The living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all . . . All that your hand finds to do, do with your very power, for there is no work nor devising nor knowledge nor wisdom in Sheol,* the place to which you are going.” (If they are conscious of nothing, they obviously feel no pain.) (*“Sheol,” AS, RS, NE, JB; “the grave,” KJ, Kx; “hell,” Dy; “the world of the dead,” TEV.)

Ps. 146:4: “His spirit goes out, he goes back to his ground; in that day his thoughts* do perish.” (*“Thoughts,” KJ, 145:4 in Dy; “schemes,” JB; “plans,” RS, TEV.)

Does the Bible indicate that the soul survives the death of the body?

Ezek. 18:4: “The soul* that is sinning—it itself will die.” (*“Soul,” KJ, Dy, RS, NE, Kx; “the man,” JB; “the person,” TEV.)

“The concept of ‘soul,’ meaning a purely spiritual, immaterial reality, separate from the ‘body,’ . . . does not exist in the Bible.”—La Parole de Dieu (Paris, 1960), Georges Auzou, professor of Sacred Scripture, Rouen Seminary, France, p. 128.

“Although the Hebrew word nefesh [in the Hebrew Scriptures] is frequently translated as ‘soul,’ it would be inaccurate to read into it a Greek meaning. Nefesh . . . is never conceived of as operating separately from the body. In the New Testament the Greek word psyche is often translated as ‘soul’ but again should not be readily understood to have the meaning the word had for the Greek philosophers. It usually means ‘life,’ or ‘vitality,’ or, at times, ‘the self.’”—The Encyclopedia Americana (1977), Vol. 25, p. 236.

What sort of people go to the Bible hell?

Does the Bible say that the wicked go to hell?

Ps. 9:17, KJ: “The wicked shall be turned into hell,* and all the nations that forget God.” (*“Hell,” 9:18 in Dy; “death,” TEV; “the place of death,” Kx; “Sheol,” AS, RS, NE, JB, NW.)

Does the Bible also say that upright people go to hell?

Job 14:13, Dy: “[Job prayed:] Who will grant me this, that thou mayst protect me in hell,* and hide me till thy wrath pass, and appoint me a time when thou wilt remember me?” (God himself said that Job was “a man blameless and upright, fearing God and turning aside from bad.”—Job 1:8.) (*“The grave,” KJ; “the world of the dead,” TEV; “Sheol,” AS, RS, NE, JB, NW.)

Acts 2:25-27, KJ: “David speaketh concerning him [Jesus Christ], . . . Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell,* neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.” (The fact that God did not “leave” Jesus in hell implies that Jesus was in hell, or Hades, at least for a time, does it not?) (*“Hell,” Dy; “death,” NE; “the place of death,” Kx; “the world of the dead,” TEV; “Hades,” AS, RS, JB, NW.)

Does anyone ever get out of the Bible hell?

Rev. 20:13, 14, KJ: “The sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell* delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire.” (So the dead will be delivered from hell. Notice also that hell is not the same as the lake of fire but will be cast into the lake of fire.) (*“Hell,” Dy, Kx; “the world of the dead,” TEV; “Hades,” NE, AS, RS, JB, NW.)

Why is there confusion as to what the Bible says about hell?

“Much confusion and misunderstanding has been caused through the early translators of the Bible persistently rendering the Hebrew Sheol and the Greek Hades and Gehenna by the word hell. The simple transliteration of these words by the translators of the revised editions of the Bible has not sufficed to appreciably clear up this confusion and misconception.”—The Encyclopedia Americana (1942), Vol. XIV, p. 81.

Translators have allowed their personal beliefs to color their work instead of being consistent in their rendering of the original-language words. For example: (1) The King James Version rendered she’ohl′ as “hell,” “the grave,” and “the pit”; hai′des is therein rendered both “hell” and “grave”; ge′en·na is also translated “hell.” (2) Today’s English Version transliterates hai′des as “Hades” and also renders it as “hell” and “the world of the dead.” But besides rendering “hell” from hai′des it uses that same translation for ge′en·na. (3) The Jerusalem Bible transliterates hai′des six times, but in other passages it translates it as “hell” and as “the underworld.” It also translates ge′en·na as “hell,” as it does hai′des in two instances. Thus the exact meanings of the original-language words have been obscured.

Is there eternal punishment for the wicked?

Matt. 25:46, KJ: “These shall go away into everlasting punishment [“lopping off,” Int; Greek, ko′la·sin]: but the righteous into life eternal.” (The Emphatic Diaglott reads “cutting-off” instead of “punishment.” A footnote states: “Kolasin . . . is derived from kolazoo, which signifies, 1. To cut off; as lopping off branches of trees, to prune. 2. To restrain, to repress. . . . 3. To chastise, to punish. To cut off an individual from life, or society, or even to restrain, is esteemed as punishment;—hence has arisen this third metaphorical use of the word. The primary signification has been adopted, because it agrees better with the second member of the sentence, thus preserving the force and beauty of the antithesis. The righteous go to life, the wicked to the cutting off from life, or death. See 2 Thess. 1.9.”)

2 Thess. 1:9, RS: “They shall suffer the punishment of eternal destruction* and exclusion from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.” (*“Eternal ruin,” NAB, NE; “lost eternally,” JB; “condemn them to eternal punishment,” Kx; “eternal punishment in destruction,” Dy.)

Jude 7, KJ: “Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.” (The fire that destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah ceased burning thousands of years ago. But the effect of that fire has been lasting; the cities have not been rebuilt. God’s judgment, however, was against not merely those cities but also their wicked inhabitants. What happened to them is a warning example. At Luke 17:29, Jesus says that they were “destroyed”; Jude 7 shows that the destruction was eternal.)

What is the meaning of the ‘eternal torment’ referred to in Revelation?

Rev. 14:9-11; 20:10, KJ: “If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke of their torment [Greek, basa·ni·smou′] ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.” “And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.”

What is the ‘torment’ to which these texts refer? It is noteworthy that at Revelation 11:10 (KJ) reference is made to ‘prophets that torment those dwelling on the earth.’ Such torment results from humiliating exposure by the messages that these prophets proclaim. At Revelation 14:9-11 (KJ) worshipers of the symbolic “beast and his image” are said to be “tormented with fire and brimstone.” This cannot refer to conscious torment after death because “the dead know not any thing.” (Eccl. 9:5, KJ) Then, what causes them to experience such torment while they are still alive? It is the proclamation by God’s servants that worshipers of the “beast and his image” will experience second death, which is represented by “the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone.” The smoke, associated with their fiery destruction, ascends forever because the destruction will be eternal and will never be forgotten. When Revelation 20:10 says that the Devil is to experience ‘torment forever and ever’ in “the lake of fire and brimstone,” what does that mean? Revelation 21:8 (KJ) says clearly that “the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone” means “the second death.” So the Devil’s being “tormented” there forever means that there will be no relief for him; he will be held under restraint forever, actually in eternal death. This use of the word “torment” (from the Greek ba′sa·nos) reminds one of its use at Matthew 18:34, where the same basic Greek word is applied to a ‘jailer.’—RS, AT, ED, NW.

What is the ‘fiery Gehenna’ to which Jesus referred?

Reference to Gehenna appears 12 times in the Christian Greek Scriptures. Five times it is directly associated with fire. Translators have rendered the Greek expression ge′en·nan tou py·ros′ as “hell fire” (KJ, Dy), “fires of hell” (NE), “fiery pit” (AT), and “fires of Gehenna” (NAB).

Historical background: The Valley of Hinnom (Gehenna) was outside the walls of Jerusalem. For a time it was the site of idolatrous worship, including child sacrifice. In the first century Gehenna was being used as the incinerator for the filth of Jerusalem. Bodies of dead animals were thrown into the valley to be consumed in the fires, to which sulfur, or brimstone, was added to assist the burning. Also bodies of executed criminals, who were considered undeserving of burial in a memorial tomb, were thrown into Gehenna. Thus, at Matthew 5:29, 30, Jesus spoke of the casting of one’s “whole body” into Gehenna. If the body fell into the constantly burning fire it was consumed, but if it landed on a ledge of the deep ravine its putrefying flesh became infested with the ever-present worms, or maggots. (Mark 9:47, 48) Living humans were not pitched into Gehenna; so it was not a place of conscious torment.

At Matthew 10:28, Jesus warned his hearers to “be in fear of him that can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.” What does it mean? Notice that there is no mention here of torment in the fires of Gehenna; rather, he says to ‘fear him that can destroy in Gehenna.’ By referring to the “soul” separately, Jesus here emphasizes that God can destroy all of a person’s life prospects; thus there is no hope of resurrection for him. So, the references to the ‘fiery Gehenna’ have the same meaning as ‘the lake of fire’ of Revelation 21:8, namely, destruction, “second death.”

What does the Bible say the penalty for sin is?

Rom. 6:23: “The wages sin pays is death.”

After one’s death, is he still subject to further punishment for his sins?

Rom. 6:7: “He who has died has been acquitted from his sin.”

Is eternal torment of the wicked compatible with God’s personality?

Jer. 7:31: “They [apostate Judeans] have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, in order to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire, a thing that I had not commanded and that had not come up into my heart.” (If it never came into God’s heart, surely he does not have and use such a thing on a larger scale.)

Illustration: What would you think of a parent who held his child’s hand over a fire to punish the child for wrongdoing? “God is love.” (1 John 4:8) Would he do what no right-minded human parent would do? Certainly not!

By what Jesus said about the rich man and Lazarus, did Jesus teach torment of the wicked after death?

Is the account, at Luke 16:19-31, literal or merely an illustration of something else? The Jerusalem Bible, in a footnote, acknowledges that it is a “parable in story form without reference to any historical personage.” If taken literally, it would mean that those enjoying divine favor could all fit at the bosom of one man, Abraham; that the water on one’s fingertip would not be evaporated by the fire of Hades; that a mere drop of water would bring relief to one suffering there. Does that sound reasonable to you? If it were literal, it would conflict with other parts of the Bible. If the Bible were thus contradictory, would a lover of truth use it as a basis for his faith? But the Bible does not contradict itself.

What does the parable mean? The “rich man” represented the Pharisees. (See Lu 16 verse 14.) The beggar Lazarus represented the common Jewish people who were despised by the Pharisees but who repented and became followers of Jesus. (See Luke 18:11; John 7:49; Matthew 21:31, 32.) Their deaths were also symbolic, representing a change in circumstances. Thus, the formerly despised ones came into a position of divine favor, and the formerly seemingly favored ones were rejected by God, while being tormented by the judgment messages delivered by the ones whom they had despised.—Acts 5:33; 7:54.

What is the origin of the teaching of hellfire?

In ancient Babylonian and Assyrian beliefs the “nether world . . . is pictured as a place full of horrors, and is presided over by gods and demons of great strength and fierceness.” (The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, Boston, 1898, Morris Jastrow, Jr., p. 581) Early evidence of the fiery aspect of Christendom’s hell is found in the religion of ancient Egypt. (The Book of the Dead, New Hyde Park, N.Y., 1960, with introduction by E. A. Wallis Budge, pp. 144, 149, 151, 153, 161) Buddhism, which dates back to the 6th century B.C.E., in time came to feature both hot and cold hells. (The Encyclopedia Americana, 1977, Vol. 14, p. 68) Depictions of hell portrayed in Catholic churches in Italy have been traced to Etruscan roots.—La civiltà etrusca (Milan, 1979), Werner Keller, p. 389.

But the real roots of this God-dishonoring doctrine go much deeper. The fiendish concepts associated with a hell of torment slander God and originate with the chief slanderer of God (the Devil, which name means “Slanderer”), the one whom Jesus Christ called “the father of the lie.”—John 8:44.

Was Moses a true god?

So how is theon to be understood at Exodus 7:1?
Exodus 7:1 Commentaries

The Adam Clarke Commentary:

Verse 1. I have made thee a god 
……………



The New John Gill Exposition of the Entire Bible:

I have made thee a god to Pharaoh;
not a god by nature, but made so; he was so by commission and office, clothed with power and authority from God to act under him in all things he should direct; not for ever, as angels are gods, but for a time; not in an ordinary way, as magistrates are gods, but in an extraordinary manner; and not to any other but to Pharaoh, being an ambassador of God to him,
…………………….


Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible  
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset and David Brown

I have made thee a god--"made," that is, set, appointed; "a god"; that is, he was to act in this business as God's representative, to act and speak in His name and to perform things beyond the ordinary course of nature. The Orientals familiarly say of a man who is eminently great or wise, "he is a god" among men. 

…………………….


Matthew Henry Complete Commentary on the Whole Bible

Here, I. God encourages Moses to go to Pharaoh, and at last silences all his discouragements. 1. He clothes him with great power and authority (Exodus 7:1): I have made thee a god to Pharaoh; that is, my representative in this affair, as magistrates are called gods, because they are God's vicegerents.
……………………


Joseph Benson’s Commentary
A god to Pharaoh — That is, my representative in this affair, as magistrates are called gods, because they are God’s vicegerents. He was authorized to speak and act in God’s name, and endued with a divine power, to do that which is above the ordinary course of nature.


………………………



Arno Gaebelein's Annotated Bible
Twice Jehovah said that Moses should be a god. A god to Aaron (Ex. 4:16) and a god to Pharaoh (Exodus 7:1). He received divine authority and power over Pharaoh….


………………………….

Geneva Study Bible

Ex. 7:1
And the LORD said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a[*]god to Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet.
(*) I have given you power and authority to speak in my name and to execute my judgments on him.


…………………………..

The Popular Commentary by Paul E. Kretzmann [Lutheran]

And the Lord said unto Moses, See, I have made thee a god to Pharaoh, He had given him authority as His ambassador, with power to carry out His judgments


……………………………

Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
At the same time Moses was also made a god to Pharaoh; i.e., he was promised divine authority and power over Pharaoh,


…………………………….


Some trinitarian-translated Bibles which translate Exodus 7:1 as ‘a god’:

KJV

American KJV

21st Century KJV

KJ2000

ERV

MKJV and LITV (Green)

Webster

GodsWord

The Message

BBE

GNT

Young’s

Moffatt

Byington

Lamsa

Leeser

IHOT

CAB

EJ2000

Posted by tigger2 

New testament logic and the one God.

On the madness of M.A.D

Re: the issue of controversy within Darwinism :it's complicated?

What Evolution “Controversy”? Scott Turner Gets High Praise from Quarterly Review of Biology

David Klinghoffer | @d_klinghoffer

This confirms an observation that philosopher of science Stephen Meyer and others have often made. If you want to know what scientists themselves think about the current status of evolutionary theory, you have to look behind the curtain. You must read what they say in the relative privacy of their professional journals. Here, for example, is a review in the current volume of The Quarterly Review of Biology praising Scott Turner’s book, Purpose and Desire: What Makes Something “Alive” and Why Modern Darwinism Has Failed to Explain It.

While registering some mild reservations, chemist Addy Pross could hardly be friendlier. Pross is himself the author of What Is Life? How Chemistry Becomes Biology(2012, Oxford University Press). He is currently a professor at Ben Gurion University of the Negev, in Israel. An expert of termite mounds, Turner is a biologist with the State University of New York.

The first sentence of the review is striking.

For those who still believe that the fundamentals of modern biology were firmly established by Darwin’s monumental theory of evolution a century and a half ago, and fine-tuned by neo-Darwinism some seven decades later, J. Scott Turner’s provocatively titled book Purpose & Desire is a further reminder that [biology’s] very nature remains mired in controversy and uncertainty.

Wait, “For those who still believe that the fundamentals of modern biology were firmly established by Darwin’s monumental theory…” (emphasis added)? You mean not everyone does “still believe” that anymore? What “controversy”? What “uncertainty”?

Pross writes:

The author…proceeds to build on this theme to argue three main points, all controversial in varying degrees. First, that the central thesis of neo-Darwinism, namely, that evolution is the result of what Turner labels a “soulless lottery” (p. 292) of the gene pool, rests on the shakiest of grounds and is long due for revision.

Wait, wait, wait! To say that the “central thesis of neo-Darwinism… rests on the shakiest of grounds” is a “controversial” statement? As in, not flat-out mistaken but one that’s legitimately up for debate?

No! I thought, “There’s No Controversy: Let’s Stop Failing Our Children On Evolution” (National Public Radio). I thought, “Mainstream scientists see no controversy” (Live Science). I thought, “There is no debate about evolution among the vast majority of scientists” (Union of Concerned Scientists). I thought, “There is no scientific controversy about the basic facts of evolution” (National Academy of Sciences). I thought, “[T]here’s still no debate over evolution” (Steven Newton, National Center for Science Education). I thought, again, “There is no scientific debate about the fundamentals of evolution” (NCSE). Etc., etc.

Ah, but those are all statements intended for media or public consumption. Don’t you see?

It is, says Pross, “All provocative stuff destined (intentionally) to make traditional neo-Darwinists recoil aghast.” To say that “modern Darwinism has failed to explain what makes something ‘alive’” is “provocative,” you say, but not evidence of madness, self-delusion, or the boogeyman always hiding behind the curtains or under the bed in contexts like this, so-called creationism?

While attributing some “quixotic ideas” to Dr. Turner, Dr. Pross could not, on the whole, be much more warmly disposed to the book or its author.

What makes the book so worthwhile and thought-provoking is, however, that Turner is a deeply knowledgeable biologist, well versed in the intimate details of evolutionary theory and the convoluted path the evolutionary debate has taken over the past 150 years.

The final paragraph:

Despite these more quixotic ideas, this beautifully written book, brimming with anecdotes and biological insights that only decades of field and life experiences could provide, will leave readers moved by Turner’s deep appreciation of life’s exquisiteness, its richness, and diversity. Purpose & Desire is a provocative thesis for sure, but one that is a wonderfully rich read, thought-provoking, and highly recommended.

That is a wonderful review, for any author and not least for a biologist who very interestingly straddles evolutionary theory and intelligent design. Listen to Scott Turner’s two-part podcast interview with Rob Crowther for ID the Future (here and here) ,where he talks about meeting Stephen Meyer and other ID proponents.

From assertions in the popular media that neo-Darwinism has got everything all figured out, you would expect that, in the hands of a distinguished scientist in a peer-reviewed journal, such a book would be mocked as the work of a crank or otherwise eviscerated. Not at all!

The shock-wave from The Cambrian explosion continues to rock fortress Darwin.

Cambrian Explosion Shrapnel Still Hitting Evolutionary Scenarios
Evolution News | @DiscoveryCSC

How many evolutionary explanations for the Cambrian explosion have come and gone so far? We’ve seen the oxygen theory, the cancer theory, the slime theory, and others. Here’s another contender reported by Quanta Magazine: the tipping-point theory. Animals were trying really hard to hit on regulatory gene networks by chance. It took a really long time, but — finally! —  they hit the lottery, and it all took off.

This model is the brainchild of Nicholas Butterfield of the University of Cambridge. He published it in Geobiology. It’s open access, so you can take a look. Back at Quanta, staff writer Jordana Cepelewicz says that the new theory not only explains the suddenness of the Cambrian explosion, but why it took so long.

Approximately 540 million years ago, life rapidly diversified in an evolutionary burst — a biological “Big Bang” that witnessed the emergence of nearly every modern animal group. Scientists have long sought to determine what caused the Cambrian explosion, and to explain why animal life didn’t take this step at any point about a billion years earlier.

Butterfield doesn’t buy the oxygen theory. He points to other situations where animals make do without modern levels of oxygen. Surely microbes could have figured out how to get the needed energy. Besides, there should have been enough oxygen in the oceans to support life long before the so-called Great Oxidation Event 2.4 billion years ago — and that was long before the Cambrian explosion (540 million years ago).

Before animals could explode onto the scene, he thinks, they needed two things: the ability to re-engineer oxygen structure in the oceans (what he calls “aquatic bioturbation”) and the invention of gene regulatory networks to adapt to the new environment.

Eventually, this cascading interplay between animals’ inadvertent re-engineering of ocean structure and their adaptive responses to those changes reached a tipping point. “The system went critical,” in Butterfield’s words, resulting in the sudden eruption of animal diversity and complexity during the Cambrian.

The delayed appearance of animals in the ocean was therefore not caused by a lack of oxygen, according to Butterfield, but rather because blind Darwinian evolution needed time to arrive at that tipping point. “The gene regulatory network to build an animal is the most complex algorithm that evolution has ever produced,” he said. “And it’s only ever happened once, [just as] it’s only ever happened once in land plants,” which he points out are the only other lineage of organisms to have derived differentiated tissues, organs and organ systems. “And that took even longer. It followed the evolution of animals by another 100 million years.”

Notice first of all that Butterfield turns the oxygen theory on its head. A rise in oxygen was a result, not a cause, of the explosion. Secondly, observe that his argument is basically a blind watchmaker argument: “blind Darwinian evolution” was trying very hard to arrive at the magic combination to unlock the inherent potential of animals to evolve. It took a long time, but once it happened, the rest was easy. Selective pressures would guarantee the emergence of muscles, eyes, digestive systems, armor, and all the rest.

All biological exchange ultimately depends on chemical diffusion, but it is the associated fluid‐dynamic context that determines physiological and ecological properties (Agutter, Malone, & Wheatley, 2000). In the context of early animal evolution, it was the evolutionary assembly of increasingly sophisticated devices for manipulating fluids that revolutionized the biosphere. Collectivized flagellar beating was clearly the place to start, providing the stepping stone to higher‐order divisions of labour … In its wake came efficiencies of scale, the evolutionary discovery of muscular propulsion and stepwise application of emergent hydrodynamic properties.

It all began with the first microbes inventing ways to utilize the available oxygen. They did this by creating currents around their bodies, increasing diffusion of dissolved oxygen so they could use it for energy. The more those microbes perfected this novelty, the more they restructured the ocean depths with aquatic bioturbation, sending more oxygen downward for more microbes to use. Once the gene regulatory networks were discovered by chance, the fuse was lit. Evolution was set to discover muscles and all kinds of other neat inventions.

Instant Flagella

Butterfield starts with flagella already working. Isn’t that a bit like assuming a can opener? Actually, yes, and he isn’t the only one. In Current Biology, Khan and Scholey take a look at the three different cases of rotary outboard motors in the three kingdoms life: the flagellum in bacteria (prokaryotes), the archaellum in archaea, and the cilium in eukaryotes. Guess which one they think emerged first. That’s right: according to Figure 1, the bacterial flagellum — the icon of intelligent design and irreducible complexity — emerged first. (If you’re going to believe in miracles of chance, might as well start big.) The other two, being structurally different, could not have evolved from it, because they “assemble from distinct subunits that do not share a common ancestor and generate torque using energy derived from distinct fuel sources…” In comes one of Darwinism’s favorite magic phrases to explain this situation:

Cells from all three domains of life on Earth utilize motile macromolecular devices that protrude from the cell surface to generate forces that allow them to swim through fluid media. Research carried out on archaea during the past decade or so has led to the recognition that, despite their common function, the motility devices of the three domains display fundamental differences in their properties and ancestry, reflecting a striking example of convergent evolution.

Other Cambrian News

Remember the Cambrian fossil bed in northern Greenland we recently talked about? Researchers found exquisite preservation of “not just one, but 15 fossilized brains from a 520-million-year-old marine predator,” reports Live Science. The discovery “is helping scientists understand how ancient brains evolved into the complex command centers they are today.” National Geographic breathes life into these complex National Geographic:

The extinct species, Kerygmachela kierkegaardi, swam in ocean waters during an evolutionary arms race called the Cambrian explosion. Flanked by 11 wrinkly flaps on each side of its body, the ancient predator sported a long tail spine and a rounded head. Its fearsome forward-facing appendages grasped prey, says UK-based paleontologist Jakob Vinther, “making lives miserable for other animals.”

Scientific names can be fun to analyze. This one, named by Graham Budd in 1993, honors philosopher Søren Kierkegaard for some reason. The genus name is even more peculiar for an evolutionary context. Kerygma is Greek for “the preaching of the gospel of Christ, especially in the manner of the early church,” and chela is Greek for pincer or claw. We leave it to the reader’s imagination how this creature got its name. Whatever you call it, it was a complex animal with image-forming eyes, looking somewhat like an anomalocarid. The main point was that its brain was so well preserved, the discoverers could make out details of its structure.

Did animal burrowing begin before the Cambrian explosion? News from Nagoya University  reports U-shaped tunnels under some Ediacaran environments found in Mongolia show “early origins of animal behavior.” No animals were found. The rest is optimistic speculation:

“It is impossible to identify the kind of animal that produced the Arenicolites traces,” lead author Tatsuo Oji says. “However, they were certainly bilaterian animals based on the complexity of the traces, and were probably worm-like in nature. These fossils are the earliest evidence for animals making semi-permanent domiciles in sediment. The evolution of macrophagous predation was probably the selective pressure for these trace makers to build such semi-permanent infaunal structures, as they would have provided safety from many predators.”

One would like to see actual worms before accepting the premise of this series of cumulative speculations. The centimeter-diameter traces, reported in the Royal Society Open Science journal, could have other explanations, given that they are not found anywhere else. It sounds like a case of exaggerated special pleading to call this the beginning of an “agronomic revolution” that “did not proceed in a uniform pattern across all depositional environments during the Cambrian radiation, but rather in a patchwork of varying bioturbation levels across marine seafloors that lasted well into the early Paleozoic.”

Another discovery should put the brakes on speculations that Cloudina was evolving into a Cambrian animal (see these March and July entries at Evolution News from last year). The simple cup-shaped Ediacaran was not a reef builder, according to PNAS. The title by Mehla and Maloof says it all: “Multiscale approach reveals that Cloudina aggregates are detritus and not in situ reef constructions.”

It has been suggested that some Ediacaran microbial reefs were dominated (and possibly built) by an abundant and globally distributed tubular organism known as Cloudina. If true, this interpretation implies that metazoan framework reef building — a complex behavior that is responsible for some of the largest bioconstructions and most diverse environments in modern oceans — emerged much earlier than previously thought. Here, we present 3D reconstructions of Cloudina populations, produced using an automated serial grinding and imaging system coupled with a recently developed neural network image classifier. Our reconstructions show that Cloudina aggregates are composed of transported remains while detailed field observations demonstrate that the studied reef outcrops contain only detrital Cloudina buildups, suggesting that Cloudina played a minor role in Ediacaran reef systems.

As a simple isolated organism that would get swept into heaps of debris, it was not complex enough to qualify as a transitional form to the Cambrian animals.

That’s it for this episode of the  Cambrian Explosion Gong Show.