Coelacanth: Fish defying the ages, a challenge to evolution

[Ark~Magic]

Pocket Articles

Coelacanth: the world’s oldest fish?

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Evolutionary scientists used to think that amphibians evolved from a group of fishes that included the coelacanth, which was known only from fossils. But they dropped this idea when living coelacanths were found from 1938 showing no evidence of evolution from the oldest fossil coelacanths to the living examples. The evidence from the coelacanth is good evidence for creation, for it shows that DNA, the genetic code, has remained stable throughout time.

When a living coelacanth fish was found in 1938 it was hailed as the scientific sensation of the century. Until then, the coelacanth (pronounced SEE'-luh-canth) was known to science only from fossils. Scientists generally believed coelacanths had become extinct 60 or 70 million years ago. Since 1938 many more living coelacanths have been caught.

All coelacanths, living and fossil, are members of a group of fishes called Crossopterygians. It is this group that most evolutionists believe evolved into amphibians and all land vertebrates — including man.

Before the discovery of living coelacanths, evolutionists assumed that the fish's internal organs would be “part way” evolving from those of ordinary fish to those of amphibians. But the living coelacanths showed no evidence that their soft parts were starting to adapt for use on land. So it was conceded that the coelacanth was obviously not the ancestor of amphibians after all.
Did anything evolve?

So evolutionists looked for another type of fish that would fit their belief that fish evolved into the creatures that dwell both on land and in water — the amphibians. There was no strong evidence, but they decided that another member of the Crossopterygian group of fishes — the rhipidistian — might have evolved into an amphibian.

How did they decide that rhipidistian fishes could have evolved into amphibians? The idea grew out of their study of similarities in skeletons of rhipidistians and what they believe were “early” amphibians. But in reality there is a vast difference between rhipidistians and amphibians.

Using even the evolutionists' time scale, which some scientists dispute, the coelacanth is the same fish it supposedly was hundreds of millions of years ago. It is surely strange that the coelacanth could remain so stable all this time, both genetically and morphologically, while its cousin the rhipidistian was supposedly evolving the mind-boggling number of changes required to transform it eventually into a human.

The evidence from the coelacanth is good evidence for creation, for it shows that DNA, the genetic code, has remained stable throughout time. In other words, the coelacanth has reproduced after its kind just like the Bible's book of Genesis said fishes would!

[sandy_mcd]

Coelacanth: the world's oldest fish?

Coelacanth, large, primitive fish that first appeared more than 350 million years ago and remains relatively unchanged today, earning it the moniker “living fossil.”

4 November 1999
Two new fossils unearthed in South China have been identified as the earliest known fossil fish.
The discoveries, by two separate teams of Chinese palaeontologists, have prompted scientists to reconsider the rates of evolution in the oceans during the Cambrian age, between 500 and 540 million years ago.

[Jbuza]

Coelacanth: the world's oldest fish?

What are you crazy? Evolution cannot be disproven, it is a living breathing document. How dare you show evidence to pull the covers off the furry little evolutionists?

WE all know that evolution happened so don't let any contrary evidence stand in the way. Just assimilate and move on.

[SUGAAAAA]

Its my great-great-great-great-great-great grandpa.

[Believer]

Yes, we were like that once, too bad I couldn't tell my grandma and grandpa things because they couldn't hear what I was saying .

[mick]

What is the source of that article/citation?

I've seen this addressed and deflated many times by scientists.

[numeral2_5]

The way in which the theory of evolution works, if it were an effective manner of living any mutation changes would not be beneficial and that is why it would have stayed in a similar physical and genetic state.

[Ark~Magic]

The way in which the theory of evolution works, if it were an effective manner of living any mutation changes would not be beneficial and that is why it would have stayed in a similar physical and genetic state.

This is not logical because if so, there should be more fish like the coelacanth.

[numeral2_5]

Other ways work too but gradual transition would be needed; also this is a deep sea fish so there may be more than we know.

[Jbuza]

there may be more than we know.

There is more than we know.

[BGoodForGoodSake]

The article is setting up a strawman and then disputing it. I didn't think that this required mentioning.

[Jbuza]

It's no suprise evolution has been rolling with the punches since Darwin. IT hasn't got any value, except to those who want to build stick houses to hide in.

[BGoodForGoodSake]

It's no suprise evolution has been rolling with the punches since Darwin. IT hasn't got any value, except to those who want to build stick houses to hide in.

Are you saying that scientific theories should be rigid and unflexible? A dogma so to speak?

[Believer]

It's no suprise evolution has been rolling with the punches since Darwin. IT hasn't got any value, except to those who want to build stick houses to hide in.

Are you saying that scientific theories should be rigid and unflexible? A dogma so to speak?

I know this isn't for me to respond to, but.... The ToE is anything but rigid and unflexible. 150+ years in "development", nothing new. Scientific theories aren't rigid and unflexible, I agree, but a line draws when it comes to this theory of evolution. There are atheists that see it as fact, but then turn away from it after looking real hard into it. Charles Darwin made good observations, but that didn't provide THE answer, just observations, like anything else, and like anything else, it can be wrong. I just don't believe in it.

[Jbuza]

Are you saying that scientific theories should be rigid and unflexible? A dogma so to speak?

Nope. I'm saying at some point perhaps it would be the better part of science to say perhaps the theory is wrong, instead of just coming up with an explanation for every problem that arises with the theory.

For instance one of the responses (not yours, I think) was that the Coelacanth hasn't changed because it didn't have to, and a response was that well all the other fish have supposedly changed. IF evolution explains everything and every "punch" thrown at it is shrugged off by some "explanation" than it really explains nothing.

Seems to me that evolution is not a disprovable theory if it can explain everything. IT explains how processes have stayed the same, yet when a processes is shown that brings doubt to the truth of evolution it explains how that process has changed. Men work hard at explaining everything from evolution because they want to believe it so badly