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Part I Part II Part III Part IV Part V Part VI Part VII |
Part I: Fossil Remains of Early Man and the Record of Genesis THERE IS no
question that the theory of evolution is useful as a teaching
aid to assist in the orderly arrangement of the data that is
available. And there is no doubt also that when the theory is
presented for popular consumption, i.e., omitting any mention
of problems which yet remain to be solved before it can unequivocally
be considered factually established, it has a certain compulsiveness
about it, for it appears to explain everything. This, as a matter
of fact, is one reason why there are a few authorities of stature
within the camp who nevertheless feel somewhat uneasy about it
all in its current theoretical formulation. For a theory which
can be made to explain everything by manipulating the threads
of the argument to suit the occasion is really unsound, for the
basic reason that it could never be disproved. As Medawar observed,
(27) if a theory
is so flexible that the same explanation can be used to account
for two entirely contrary tendencies, then the theory is meaningless.
Once it was held that man's enlarging brain caused his emergence
as Homo sapiens, the great tool-user, so that smaller
brained creatures were lower in the scale. Now that small-brained
creatures have turned up as tool users, it is being argued that
the very use of tools is what enlarged the brain to man size.
Evolutionary theory is highly "adjustable." "When
we speak," Medawar said, "as Spencer was the first
to do, of the survival of the fittest, we are being wise after
the event: what is fit or not fit is so described on the basis
of retrospective judgment. It is silly to profess to be thunderstruck
by the evolution of organism A if we should have been just as
thunderstruck by a turn of events which would have led to the
evolution of B or C instead." 27. Medawar, Sir Peter B., The Art of the
Soluble, Methuen, London, 1967, p. 55.  pg
1 of 6  believe is of fundamental
importance, that in order to be useful a theory must be so structured
that some critical experiment is conceivable which, if it is
actually false, could prove it to be so. As Medawar has pointed
out, (29) since
absolute proof is beyond our power (for there may always turn
up one more piece of evidence which is irreconcilable), the best
we can do in any area of research is to constantly seek for error
in the hypothesis. The result of each experiment which does not
demonstrate a flaw serves either to confirm the present hypothesis
or to purify it by forcing its modification. But the theory of
evolution is so flexible that it is simply not possible to conceive
of a critical experiment which could disprove it. All research
seems to be ultimately devoted to proving the theory, not to
challenging it. How could one challenge it? 29. Medawar, Sir P. B., The Uniqueness
of the Individual, Basic Books, New York., 1957, p.76. Similarly,
Rudolf Flesch remarked, "The most important thing about
science is this: that it isn't a search for truth but a search
for error. . ." (see his book, The Art of Clear Thinking,
reviewed by H. Kreighbaum in Scientific Monthly, vol.74,
(4), April, 1952, p.240). See also the editorial comment under
"The Discipline of the Scientific Method," (Nature,
Aug. 1, 1959, p.295): "Since, according to the code of science,
no positive assertions are final and all propositions approximations,
and indeed provisional, science is seen to advance more by denying
what is wrong than by asserting what is right -- by reducing,
and eventually eradicating, errors rather than by heading straight
towards some preconceived final truth." pg.2
of 6 Circular reasoning plays
a large part in current evolutionary anthropology, perhaps as
large a part as it does in modern geology although it is not
as readily admitted. The circularity of the reasoning goes something
like this: we know that human evolution is true and therefore
there must be a succession of forms from some protohuman being
up to man spread over an appropriate time scale of millions of
years. Since by disregarding geographical location and taking
some liberties with an expansive time scale, one can line up
a set of candidates in fossil form which make what is euphemistically
termed a "nice sequence," this proves that human evolution
is a fact. The possibility that there might be another explanation
for similarity of form is not even considered. The point is that
the mere arbitrary lining up of man-like fossils, even when the
temporal ordering is correct, does not prove descent. The assumption
is made that descent is the explanation, and the line-up is then
used to prove the assumption. (32) This is as characteristically circular as much geological
reasoning is. 32. R. H. Rastall of Cambridge wrote "It cannot be denied that from a strictly philosophical standpoint geologists are here arguing in a circle. The succession of organisms has been determined by a study of their remains buried in the rocks, and the relative ages of the rocks are determined by the remains of organisms that they contain." (Encyclopedia Britannica, 1956, Article on Geology, vol.10, p.168). W. R. Thompson says of Simpson, "Simpson states that homology is determined by ancestry and concludes that homology is evidence of ancestry"! ("Evolution and Taxonomy," Studia Entomologica, vol.5, 1962, p. 567). pg.3
of 6 as to its significance by the man who is lucky enough to find one even more primitive (or human-like!). A great deal tends to be made, by each discoverer, of those features of his own particular find which distinguish it markedly � so it is claimed � from other like finds and on that account justify its claim as a new link in the chain rather than part of an existing link. We have already referred to the fact that within any species there may be considerable variability, variability which is quite sufficient to justify the counter-argument that many supposed links are not links at all but variant specimens of a single species. It is instructive to note a paper by Stanley M. Garn who, in discussing "the problem of fossil differences," makes the following series of observations which are extracted in the correct order from his paper but with much supplementary information omitted in the interests of brevity. He wrote: (33)
33. Garn, Stanley M., "Culture and the Direction of Human Evolution," Human Evolution: Readings in Physical Anthropology, edited by N. Korn and F. Thompson, Holt, Rhinehart & Winston, New York, 1967, pp.102-107. pg.4
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Since a great
deal is made of the face of fossil man, the majority of reconstructions
putting the major emphasis here pro bono publico, it is
a useful corrective to have this admittedly rather long extract
in front of one. Because it shows that if one is determined to
provide man with ancestors from which he evolved, it is also
necessary to show them as being significantly different in form
in various ways, otherwise one cannot point to any evidence of
"evolution." Evolution means change; and if there is
no demonstrable change one cannot argue for evolution. So because
of a consuming faith in an otherwise undemonstrable theory of
human origins, it is necessary to find substance for it by over-emphasizing
the evidence to the extent of distorting it out of all proportion
to its true significance. The facts do not justify this distortion
as Garn's paper shows unequivocally. It is generally accepted
as true that a view held without adequate evidence is held as
an act of faith, no matter how reasonable it may otherwise seem
to be. pg.5
of 6 Middle East as the Cradle of Man, in spite of the fact that the Australopithecine line leads to modern apes and not to man at all, according to the many experts. . . But there are ways in which the Middle East can still be shown to be the most reasonable Cradle of Man and that the group of fossils widely scattered over the world (in Asia, Africa, and Europe) which by general consensus of opinion do represent early man, such as the Homo erectus series, can be accounted for without making them man's ancestors. After all there is no need to assume automatically that everything that looks like an ancestor is an ancestor � it could be a descendant. If one believes in evolution, the former is a reasonable enough assumption because these fossil skulls are so very primitive in appearance. If one believes that man was created, the logic of the argument is not nearly so compelling; for degeneration is as likely as improvement, for as we hope to show, there is a way in which all those fossil remains which are generally agreed to belong within the family of man, Homo sapiens, can be accounted for without appealing to evolutionary processes of any kind. And this way is not only reasonable in itself, but has substantial support from what we know of man's early history on the basis of archaeology, the records of antiquity, and modern research into the effects of food, climate, and habit of life on human physique. pg.6
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