Pre-Cambrian fossils

Some of us have lives. You should hold your tongue on the issue to avoid embarrassment.

I did answer. Now please address the issue in the OP of a "mollusc-like" organism before the Cambrian!

More data for you to ignore:

M. W. Martin, D. V. Grazhdankin, S. A. Bowring, D. A. D. Evans, M. A. Fedonkin, J. L. Kirschvink "Age of Neoproterozoic Bilatarian Body and Trace Fossils, White Sea Russia: Implications for Metazoan Evolution," Science 288 841-45 (2000).
Eoporpita, Age: 555.3 +/- 0.3 (White Sea Russia (Zimnie Gory) General Description: Thick tentacles surrounding a central body nearly 6cm across. Classification: Previously was thought to be a chondrophorine, but now is considered to be a benthic polyp similar to a sea anemone. Locations: White Sea Russia (Zimnie Gory) and Ediacara Hills South Australia

So, here is a representative of the phylum sea anemones are in before the Cambrian.

You realize that, according to your claims, that fossil can't be there. The fact of its existence shows your claim to be wrong. There are pre-Cambrian fossils.

Now, there aren't a lot of them. Why? There are several reasons:

1. Not much pre-Cambrian rock is exposed. In the 520 million years since the beginning of the Cambrian most of the sedimentary rock laid down in that period has been exposed and eroded, thus destroying it and the fossils it contained.

2. Soft tissue organisms don't fossilize well. The Cambrian Explosion correlates with an increase in the oxygen content of the atmosphere and thus the ability to form hard shells, which fossilize better. Thus, the Cambrian represents selective data.

3. Adaptive radiation following a mass extinction. The evidence is that the Eidacaran animals of 10 million years before the Cambrian represent a different evolutionary lineage. Earth went thru a "snowball" period between the Eidacarans and the Cambrian. That caused the major extinction of the Eidacarans and left all those ecological niches open. What we are seeing in the Cambrian is the adaptive radiation into those niches.

Now, this has happened in recent times. The most famous are the Galapagos finches. Over a dozen species all descended from a single species of finch that migrated from the mainland. Here the adaptive radiation is recent, so that there has only been time for a few species still classed in one genus.

But think, people. What happens as time goes on and each of those species continues to diverge? Each one becomes the ancestor to several species of a new genus. Then those species continue to diverge and become genera of their own, so now we have a family. The family diverges and now we have an order, the order splits and diverges thru new species, genera, and family and now we have a class. Continue the process one more level and now we have a phylum. All from a simple speciation.

This is what happened in the Cambrian. It happened 520 million years ago so now there has been the length of time to have all the speciations and divergences so that the species we see in the Cambrian were the ancestors to new phyla. It's not top down when you actually look at the species involved and consider the process.

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"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437

"Christians should look on evolution simply as the method by which God works." Rev. James McCosh, theologian and President of Princeton, 1890

And then there's this from the Precambrian:

http://www.emc.maricopa.edu/faculty/...bspriggina.gif
Spriggina. What Cambrian creature does it resemble?

The idea that all phyla suddenly popped into existence in the Cambrian is hooey.

1. You haven't demonstrated Troodon use ad hoc. You just used a phrase without any indication you know what it means. You asked for an explanation. You got it. Now you simply can't dismiss it as ad hoc. You must show it is ad hoc. Can you do that? Or can you just throw around terms you don't understand?

2. Ignoring the data absolutely is not scientific. And yet, you have ignored the data of the OP from the beginning! When are you going to address the FACT of a mollusc-like animal before the Cambrian?

__________________
"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437

"Christians should look on evolution simply as the method by which God works." Rev. James McCosh, theologian and President of Princeton, 1890

It's real simple troodon...either show me the morphological changes of several ancestral linanages found in the cambrian rock....or retract.

LOL!! My posts too tough for you, Arkguy?

Remember your claim! NO precedents to the Cambrian phyla before the Cambrian!

Now you move the goalposts because you are getting falsified. "Morphological changes of several ancestral lineages [corrected spelling] found in cambrian rock" LOL!

When falsified, change the goalposts! Quick. Demand retraction from other people but don't retract yourself!

Sorry, ArkGuy, debating tricks are fun, but they ain't gonna work here.

Barbarian gave you another one. Care to comment?

Here's another site for you: http://members.rediff.com/mistakenpoint/paper2.html

One of the groups of fossils:
"The fossils seem to represent a colony rather than a single individual. In arrangement of individuals in a colony, the needle-like bodies diverge from a point where they were joined to one another (Pls. 6A and 8B). If the lateral branches found in some of these organisms (Pl. 3B) are those of the spindle-shaped organisms, the dendrite like organisms may be spindles in a different preservation and would represent colonial Hydrozoans, or Pennatulids. However, if the dendrite-like organisms are different from spindle-shaped organisms, the dendrite-like animals might have been attached to the substrate from where they diverged upward in the living form. The organisms in this case could be sessile forms of Coelenterates here-to fore unreported. "

Here we have a linneage for Hydrozoans and Pennatulids. Already gave you a lineage for molluscs. Barbarian has yet a third. How many do you need?

__________________
"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437

"Christians should look on evolution simply as the method by which God works." Rev. James McCosh, theologian and President of Princeton, 1890

lucaspa seem to be ah, er...fibbing.

Remember your claim! NO precedents to the Cambrian phyla before the Cambrian!



This is my claim..Why do the major phyla and classes of animals suddenly appear fully developed in the cambrian fossils with no ancestral linage leading up to the phyla and classes that are found fossilized there?


I never claimed there wasn't any fossils found prior to the pre-cambrian. That appears to be some sort of strawman on your part.

My claim is that higher taxomonic rankings occur with out the fossil support of some sort of ancestral linage. They suddenly appear.

Do you understand now?

ArkGuy, Lucaspa made the opposite claim in his OP.

ArkGuy, when are you going to do this?

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Lucaspa...please present a linage..or retract.

I think Ark Guy has his story, and he's sticking to it.

Yep, that's what I said your claim was. "fully developed" is the same as "no precedents".

My claim is that higher taxomonic rankings occur with out the fossil support of some sort of ancestral linage. They suddenly appear.

"without the fossil support of some sort of ancestral lineage" is the same as "no precedent". So yes, I do understand.

And what I've been doing is posting fossils that are "some sort of ancestral lineage". That's what the mollusc-like bivalve is in the OP. It is very similar to molluscs (a phyla) but without the hard shell. An ancestor. Another post gave ancestors to Hydrazoans (another phyla) found before the Cambrian. Spiriginnia is an ancestor to arthropods (a phyla). Compare it to trilobites and the family resemblance is striking

Here's another one:
5. RA Kerr, Pushing back the origin of animals, Science 279: 803-804, 6 Feb. 1998. The peer reviewed article is C-W Li, J-Y Chen, T-E Hua, Precambrian sponges with cellular structures. Science 279: 879-882. Got embryonic animal fossils that lived 40-50 million years before the Cambrian.

So, ancestors to sponges (another phyla).

So, we have fossils representing "some sort of ancestral lineage". Exactly what you asked for.

Now, I suspect that, having gotten what you asked for, you will not retract your claim. Instead, you have changed the claim to avoid retraction. It looks now like what you want are detailed lineages with intermediate species. IOW, you are staking your claim to the idea that knowledge will never be found; or the absence of evidence. That is not a bright thing to do.

You might try this book: Lipps, J. H., and Signor, P., eds. Origin and Early Evolution of the Metazoa. Plenum, New York.

And this sitehttp://www.dc.peachnet.edu/~pgore/ge...02/precamb.htm
"Oldest diversified and relatively abundant marine fauna known. No skeletons.
All soft-bodied, jellyfish-like animals. 26 species, 18 genera, 4 or more phyla.
67% Cnidaria
25% Annelids (worms)
5% Arthropods"

It has nice pictures so you can see the ancestral relationships.

The data is there, Ark Guy. You just don't seem to be aware of it.

__________________
"If sound science appears to contradict the Bible, we may be sure that it is our interpretation of the Bible that is at fault." Christian Observer, 1832, pg. 437

"Christians should look on evolution simply as the method by which God works." Rev. James McCosh, theologian and President of Princeton, 1890