Monsters of Evolution?

So commonplace is the idea, and so confident are many in this belief, atheists will sometimes wear T-shirts bearing the phrase “We have the fossils—we win!” almost as if they believe fossils themselves are “proof” of their naturalistic story of origins.

The Missing Links Are Still Missing

Most are unaware that what Charles Darwin himself considered the weakest link in his entire naturalistic hypothesis—the lack of fossil evidence—has never been overcome. Darwin asked a question then made an admission and a statement all in one quote that sums the problem up perfectly.

Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely-graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory.1

Of course, many evolutionists will blow off that quite damning quote from the 1800s as no more than a “vestigial” comment from the past when evolution was in its infancy, assuming it’s all been worked out now.

Yet despite the bluff and bluster many evolutionists offer, one of the most prominent of their own picked up on the same problem and went public with it, causing quite a stir in the evolutionary community during the 1970s and 1980s—100+ years after Darwin.

Rebranding the Hopeful Monster

No less than the eminent American Harvard professor Steven J. Gould (paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science) spilled the beans in spectacular fashion when he began questioning the very same fossil record evolutionists and atheists like himself were parading as proof positive for evolution—and more specifically—a reason to reject the Creator God and his written revelation to humanity, the Bible.

As one of the most influential and widely read authors of popular science of his generation, a self-confessed atheistic Marxist, and one of the world’s foremost evolutionists, Gould could not be described by anyone in the evolutionary community as coming from a “biased creationist viewpoint” when he offered his honest and expert assessment of the fossil record with statements like the following.

The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology . . . [T]o preserve our favored account of evolution by natural selection we view our data as so bad that we never see the very process we profess to study.2

Gould’s atheistic ideology wouldn’t allow him to accept the concept of Genesis creation (and the corresponding biblical flood) as the far better explanation of the fossil record. So he gave up on a gradualist theory of evolution in favor of what he and colleague Niles Eldredge (also a well-known and respected biologist and paleontologist) referred to as “punctuated equilibrium.”

This new story of evolution conceded to the reality of the lack of any visible, graduated chain of fossils that support the idea of evolution happening slowly over millions of years. But rather than admitting this lack was problematic for the evolutionary narrative, it asserted that evolution happened quickly over millions of years—in sudden bursts that occurred periodically throughout the supposed long ages.

And this was the proposed reason why the fossil record looked the way it did, as if each kind of creature appeared fully formed. Gould’s idea was that evolution took place so quickly that you wouldn’t expect to see it in the fossil record! Which was very convenient indeed.

Monsters from the Past

This “hopeful monster hypothesis” had been proposed previously by other atheist types such as Bertrand Russell, claiming that perhaps large-scale, sudden changes could develop through the “power of x-rays to alter genes.”3

Otto Schindewolf developed these ideas in the 1930s, and they were also promoted in 1940 by Richard Goldschmidt, but to most it seemed absurd and immature, almost “comic bookish” in its presentation. Kind of like “gamma rays” somehow turning the fictional Dr. Bruce Banner into the Incredible Hulk in a sudden transformation. It looked good in comic book fiction, but like all evolutionary ideas, it made for poor science.

For example, Schindewolf proposed that the major evolutionary transformations must have occurred in single large steps—such as a reptile laying an egg from which a bird hatched!

The sheer absurdity in the suggestion that macromutations might cause major evolutionary transformations between kinds of creatures instead of more gradual processes was why it was widely mocked, hence the nickname the “hopeful monster hypothesis.”

Revealing the Need for “Rapid Evolution”

Regardless, Gould’s stature and the much more scientifically sounding “punctuated equilibrium” terminology certainly helped this new story of evolution to be promoted more vigorously.

And the admission as to “why” it was being proposed was promoted as well, much to the horror of many of their fellow atheists and evolution believers.

The general preference that so many of us hold for gradualism is a metaphysical stance embedded in the modern history of Western cultures: it is not a high-order empirical observation, induced from the objective study of nature.4

Phyletic gradualism was an a priori assertion from the start – it was never ‘seen’ in the rocks; it expressed the cultural and political biases of nineteenth-century liberalism.5

What Gould was willing to admit is that the story of evolution itself, based on an anti-God bias, drove conclusions that were not represented by a simple examination of the facts. He was willing to admit that gradualism was an a priori assertion based on a metaphysical stance.

In other words, “The story of gradualistic evolution is true, so we’ll interpret any evidence we find according to that view, regardless of whether it supports that concept or not.”

Reverting Back to Gradualism

With Gould’s passing, the championing of punctuated equilibrium among the evolutionary community has died down considerably. No doubt this breaking of the ranks by such a distinguished member of the evolutionary community and the frank admissions he made were quite embarrassing to the cause of naturalism.

So as the new guard of naturalists (represented by the likes of Professor Richard Dawkins) came along, the promoting of a more gradualistic method of evolution resumed. The only problem was that Gould’s assessment was still correct—facts observed from the fossil record simply did not support the story.

Once again, many evolutionists might posit that Gould—as legendary and gifted as he was—was speaking from a position of ignorance because even 100+ years after Darwin, science had simply not collected enough data.

And yet in 2004, National Geographic admitted,

Illuminating but spotty, the fossil record is like a film of evolution from which 999 out of 1,000 frames have been lost.6

Think about it, how would you like to watch a film where 999 out of 1,000 frames were gone? You wouldn’t see much of a show, would you? The fact is, they are confessing exactly what Gould said—that 99.9% of the fossil evidence for evolution is missing!

Fossils Fit Genesis

The fossil record does not exhibit a finely graduated “chain” of creatures evolving through time. What the fossil record shows is fully formed, distinct types of creatures buried together. “All animals and plants appear suddenly in the fossil record and are not preceded by continuous transitional stages.”7

Which is great evidence that these creatures were created fully formed and later buried rapidly in the great deluge—all described in the book of Genesis.