Darwin and the fossils.
Posted: Wed Mar 27, 2013 10:42 am
Heres where Dawkins gets one of his 'arguments' (he gets a number of them close to word for word from Darwin)
OOS 162
It makes the works of God a mere mockery and deception; I would almost as soon believe with the old and ignorant cosmogonists, that fossil shells had never lived, but had been created in stone so as to mock the shells now living on the sea-shore
Pg167
Hence we ought not to expect at the present time to meet with numerous transitional varieties in each region, though they must have existed there, and may be embedded there in a fossil condition. But in the intermediate region, having intermediate conditions of life, why do we not now find closely-linking intermediate varieties? This difficulty for a long time quite confounded me. But I think it can be in large part explained. (Goes on to explain, in the sense of explain away the problem)
Pg171
Consequently evidence of their former existence could be found only among fossil remains, which are preserved, as we shall attempt to show in a future chapter, in an extremely imperfect and intermittent record.
Pg321
In other cases we have the plainest evidence in great fossilised trees, still standing upright as they grew,................ (Polystrate fossil trees, this is a headache for deep time)
Pg323
This could be effected by the future geologist only by his discovering in a fossil state numerous intermediate gradations; and such success is improbable in the highest degree (A backup null hypothesis, predicts failure of his predictions)
Pg 330
There is another and allied difficulty, which is much more serious. I allude to the manner in which species belonging to several of the main divisions of the animal kingdom suddenly appear in the lowest known fossiliferous rocks.
Pg333
The sudden manner in which several groups of species first appear in our European formations, the almost entire absence, as at present known, of formations rich in fossils beneath the Cambrian strata, are all undoubtedly of the most serious nature
Pg360
I have attempted to show that the geological record is extremely imperfect;.....
Pg462
Why does not every collection of fossil remains afford plain evidence of the gradation and mutation of the forms of life?
OOS 162
It makes the works of God a mere mockery and deception; I would almost as soon believe with the old and ignorant cosmogonists, that fossil shells had never lived, but had been created in stone so as to mock the shells now living on the sea-shore
Pg167
Hence we ought not to expect at the present time to meet with numerous transitional varieties in each region, though they must have existed there, and may be embedded there in a fossil condition. But in the intermediate region, having intermediate conditions of life, why do we not now find closely-linking intermediate varieties? This difficulty for a long time quite confounded me. But I think it can be in large part explained. (Goes on to explain, in the sense of explain away the problem)
Pg171
Consequently evidence of their former existence could be found only among fossil remains, which are preserved, as we shall attempt to show in a future chapter, in an extremely imperfect and intermittent record.
Pg321
In other cases we have the plainest evidence in great fossilised trees, still standing upright as they grew,................ (Polystrate fossil trees, this is a headache for deep time)
Pg323
This could be effected by the future geologist only by his discovering in a fossil state numerous intermediate gradations; and such success is improbable in the highest degree (A backup null hypothesis, predicts failure of his predictions)
Pg 330
There is another and allied difficulty, which is much more serious. I allude to the manner in which species belonging to several of the main divisions of the animal kingdom suddenly appear in the lowest known fossiliferous rocks.
Pg333
The sudden manner in which several groups of species first appear in our European formations, the almost entire absence, as at present known, of formations rich in fossils beneath the Cambrian strata, are all undoubtedly of the most serious nature
Pg360
I have attempted to show that the geological record is extremely imperfect;.....
Pg462
Why does not every collection of fossil remains afford plain evidence of the gradation and mutation of the forms of life?