Fossil Hunters Find Evidence of 555 Million-Year-Old Human Relative (theguardian.com) 75
It might not show much of a family resemblance but fossil hunters say a newly discovered creature, that looks like a teardrop-shaped jellybean and is about half the size of a grain of rice, is an early relative of humans and a vast array of other animals. From a report: The team discovered the fossils in rocks in the outback of South Australia that are thought to be at least 555 million years old. The researchers say the diminutive creatures are one of the earliest examples of a bilateral organism -- animals with features including a front and a back, a plane of symmetry that results in a left and a right side, and often a gut that opens at each end. Humans, pigs, spiders and butterflies are all bilaterians, but creatures such as jellyfish are not. Dr Scott Evans, of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History and a co-author of the research, said: "The major finding of the paper is that this is possibly the oldest bilaterian yet recognised in the fossil record. "Because humans are bilaterians, we can say that this was a very early relative and possibly one of the first on the diverse bilaterian tree of life."
Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Scott and colleagues in the US and Australia report how they made their discovery in sandstone at sites including fossil-rich Nilpena. They say careful analysis ruled out the possibility that the fossils were actually formed by the action of currents or from microbial mats. The animal has been named Ikaria wariootia in reference to an Indigenous term for Wilpena Pound, a nearby landmark, and the Warioota Creek that is close to the sites of the find.
Writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Scott and colleagues in the US and Australia report how they made their discovery in sandstone at sites including fossil-rich Nilpena. They say careful analysis ruled out the possibility that the fossils were actually formed by the action of currents or from microbial mats. The animal has been named Ikaria wariootia in reference to an Indigenous term for Wilpena Pound, a nearby landmark, and the Warioota Creek that is close to the sites of the find.
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And sometimes you are just talking out of your ass.
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So, you have no argument to the direct facts of the matter. Understood.
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"My worldview collapses immediately if that's true" is, technically, not an actual argument.
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And every day genetic engineering gets more advanced, that screw tightens a bit more.
Is it really getting more advanced if they were doing a better job of it 555 million years ago?
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Common refrain among physicists when violating causation is mentioned.
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So, you've got nothing either. Natural little liar you are, very temporarily, no?
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Some worse than others. There is a huge difference between verifiable evolution such as in bacteria, and handwaving the entire history of biology with nothing but confirmation bias.
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That's just the other open end of the gut.
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So, nothing, too.
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Except, of course, that Common Descent makes predictions that we should find such organisms in the fossil record.
Re:Well, except (Score:4, Insightful)
Since "design" (whatever that means) would be compatible with any possible observation, whether or true not, it lacks explanatory power. Common descent makes some rather clear predictions. Design does not. A Designer could presumably design an organism in any way it pleased, and depending upon the Designer imagined, could even fashion the laws of physics to make any design possible.
Re:Well, except (Score:4, Insightful)
Point to one single structure in any extant or extinct organism that you can demonstrate is designed. And then, for bonus points, point to the Designer.
This ID stuff was debunked years ago. It's a load of horseshit.
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Don't confuse an explanation with a cause. We have models, but the models themselves are representations. We design models of natural systems, but that in no way indicates that any natural system is designed.
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The fact that you cannot explain biology without design is a simple, direct fact. Even apart from that, you can provide no evidence that evolution itself was not designed. Those are standard debate points, but I find it a bit disturbing that you question that "any natural system is designed", when it overtly, obviously is the case natural systems are designed, because -we did it- and you can be aware of this with the most vague familiarity with the news in the domain of genetics.
What you mean to say, I th
Re:Well, except (Score:4, Informative)
"Design" as used by biologists is a shorthand for the natural physical processes that drive change in populations. Biologists use it without making the claim that there is a Designer. Quite the opposite, they outright reject that notion. Even if they believe in God, they do not use any form of ID to explain evolutionary processes. Well, except Michael Behe, whose, er, unique views on, for instance, the vertebrate immune system, got slaughtered in the Dover Trial when it turned out that biologists many years before had explained the evolution of the vertebrate immune system without saying "God did this bit..."
At best you're a very sloppy thinker. At worst you're an idiot. I'm leaning towards the latter. You're word salads come down to an etymological fallacy.
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As I said, you're committing the etymological fallacy.
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And here comes the transparently lying fail-mods.
Of course. Your inevitable elimination by evolution isn't exactly like having your face scraped off every honest person's boots, but close enough... as a start.
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It's inescapable direct fact, idiot. Or are you proposing you will not physically die, per evolution? Even if that is not the attribute you wish to focus on.
There's lying, and then there's directly absurd lying. You clearly have no issue with doing either.
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You're exhibiting your standard spastic tedium.
So, I'll just wait, and let the evolution you don't believe in take you out, without question.
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That a 555 million year old fossil has no DNA signature is a profound point only to a complete idiot, who knows nothing about the topic, and is desperate to pretend to be smart.
It looks exactly like what we would expect an early relative from that era would look like. Duh.
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And from that point, every step occurred without genetic design? Again, that's sheer conjecture.
So, has common unmodified descent been fully refuted in this last week, by virtue of the fact -we- did the design? You have no clue, with the coronavirus or innumerable (and growing) other cases.
You certainly don't know over the last 555 million years. This is simple fact.
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Just the standard word salad that ID advocates piece together. Mumbo jumbo.
Common descent predicts we will find, whether in the fossil record, or (by the Modern Synthesis, in the molecular record) relics of common ancestors in a lineage. Design predicts nothing, since a Designer with the capability of creating and altering genes, or indeed, the entire system of heredity, could use Common Descent, some mix of Common Descent and design, or no Common descent at all. All possible observations are compatible wit
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You got spanked, again. Time to cry to mommy!
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That a 555 million year old fossil has no DNA signature is a profound point only to a complete idiot, who knows nothing about the topic, and is desperate to pretend to be smart.
It looks exactly like what we would expect an early relative from that era would look like. Duh.
This Easter advertising is getting bad (Score:4, Funny)
But at least they didn't specify what brand of Jelly Bean.
Biota of the world! Unite!! (Score:5, Funny)
The biologists are the most divisive people in the world, constantly seeking what divides us rather that what unites us. "Got three floating ribs? Yeah, you are a true finch. No? You are not a finch!". They turn a blind eye to the 99.999% agreement between individuals and pick on one thing that is different and divide them into different clades.
These high priests of division, worshiping at the altar of their Lord and Master Linnaeus, wont rest till each one of use, every individual is given his own or her own place in the cladogram.
It is time we show them the stuff we are made of. From the lowly bit of RNA that never acknowledges the designation these biologists conferred on it, covid-19 all the way to advanced form of life that could conceive a nation of laws, we all should stand united!
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No, seriously. And particularly in respect of the Plantae, an awful lot of his classifications were being revised, long before Crick and Watson, let alone the development of genetic sequencing. Classical morphology and developmental morphology applied with microscope and a small amount of some stains.
Sorry, but when you're looking to see if this is different to that, cladistics is the way to go, concentrating, as it does and as you say, on differences between organisms.
555 Million year old lower form of life? (Score:1)
Congratulations. You've discovered Senators.
"a front and a back" (Score:2)
Well, if this has a mouth at one end, and an asshole at the other, I can see how this could be an ancestor to humans.
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Again, "no, seriously". Are you a protostome or a deuterostome? Then, are you a bilaterian? Then are you an ecdysozoan or a lophotrochozoan, or even a chaetognath (yeah, good keyboard skills there!)
the earliest evidence of an... (Score:2)
>> often a gut that opens at each end.
So it has an a-hole, eh?
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Not the first such animal. Protozoans with a hard "skin" have cytostomes and cytopyges. A kid should remember at least that from high school -- Beavis, the cell's ass is "cytopyge", uh huh huh.
s/early human relative/very distant ancestor/ (Score:1)
Distant ancestor of almost all animal life, in fact.
Yes I know ancestors are relatives too, but this one is SO distant that even the first fishes are its remote descendants, never mind land animals.
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Yes, distant ancestor. But looking at the title of the topic the relationship shows up more clearly on some people.
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So more seriously, I have a basic science education through college.
From the Dunning Kruger institute for remedial science?
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If that is what you learned in college, then you are probably lying about your education, or went to a university which did not have any Science faculty. Possibly one where everything was a subset of the Theocracy department. Most of your phrasing is a cut'n'pa
And cue the religitards.... (Score:2)
Of all the places I never expected to see retards attempting to claim Intelligent Design or divine creation were a valid scientific hypothesis, I expected it on this site the least.
Your imaginary friends do not and have never existed. Your faith is stupid. All religions, especially Abrahamic religions, are nothing but a disgusting cancer. Fuck your beliefs, fuck your imaginary friends and most of all, FUCK YOU!
When you can back your stupid hypothesis with peer review, consensus and actual evidence people
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And yes, the problem does seem to be strongly associated with monotheistic religions, and particularly the Abrahamic ones - which are all of the major monotheisms, all worshipping the same non-existent god. There's probably some relationship with the religion structure encou
Just Read The Friendly Paper (Score:2)
Title "Discovery of the oldest bilaterian from the Ediacaran of South Australia" - well, " Here, we describe Ikaria wariootia gen. et sp. nov. from the Ediacara Member, South Australia" so pretty definiti
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