Günter Bechly: Still More Evidence Against Darwinian Gradualism
On this episode of ID the Future, paleontologist Günter Bechly speaks again with host Andrew McDiarmid about the growing case against Darwinian gradualism. Bechly points out two more cases where fossil discoveries refuted Darwin’s prediction of gradualism in species transitions. In one of the classic showcases for such alleged transitions, between two species of deep-sea protists called foraminifera, more recent research showed their speciation to be abrupt and not an ancestor-descendent sequence. And fossil freshwater snails from Germany, once viewed as another textbook example of gradual speciation, were discovered not to be separate species at all. Is there a paradigm change coming in evolutionary studies? Nothing fits the data better than intelligent design.
Günter Bechly Says Goodbye to Darwinian Gradualism
On this episode of ID the Future, paleontologist Günter Bechly and host Andrew McDiarmid discuss Bechly’s article “Ape-Man Waves Goodbye to Darwinian Gradualism.” Bechly touches on the oldest australopithecine fossil skull ever found, from 3.8 million years ago. The researchers behind the find are confident of its age but puzzled because the discovery undercuts one of the best examples of alleged gradual transition between two hominid species, and it also doesn’t fit well with common theories of phylogenetic relationship. The evidence poses a significant problem for the Darwinian mechanistic paradigm, but can be readily explained with an intelligent design approach.
Günter Bechly on the Latest Fossil Find Confusing the Human “Evolutionary Tree”
On this episode of ID the Future, Andrew McDiarmid interviews paleontologist Günter Bechly about the latest hominin fossil that’s once again “rewriting human evolutionary history.” News of the find reached the media early this month. Dubbed homo luzonensis due to discovery on the Philippine island of Luzon, it poses yet another challenge to neo-Darwinian theory. A fossil like this one should have been found in Africa, not the Philippines. It should have been a lot older than it is, and it confuses the human evolutionary tree even more than before. “Darwinian theory predicts there should be one true tree of life that should converge,” says Bechly, “but the fossil record respectfully disagrees, again and again.”
Günter Bechly: Human Evolution’s Once ‘Indisputable Facts’ Now “Dead Theory”
On this episode of ID the Future, Andrew McDiarmid interviews paleoentomologist Günter Bechly about human evolution, and how the story keeps getting rewritten. The “out of Africa” story was once “indisputable,” but recent evidence has overturned it; it’s now “dead.” The human phylogenetic tree is riddled with question marks. An original human pair is no longer out of the question. So much weakly founded evidence has been oversold in the past, says Bechly, it’s still wise to apply a healthy dose of skepticism toward today’s “indisputable facts” of human evolution. Please consider donating to support the IDTF Podcast.
Günter Bechly: Rich Fossil Record Says No to Insect Evolution
On this episode of ID the Future, Dr. Günter Bechly, paleoentomologist and former curator for amber and fossil insects for the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart, Germany, talks with host Andrew McDiarmid about evidence for macroevolution among insects. The fossil record is “saturated,” Bechly says. By that he doesn’t mean there aren’t new fossil forms to discover. Bechly himself has discovered several. He means we have an extensive enough sampling to confidently discern the major patterns of change and stasis in the history of life. And it shows no sign of insect evolution. It shows no transition from marine arthropods to terrestrial insects, none from wingless insects to winged insects, and no gradual evolution to insects (such as Read More ›
Living Fossils Really Do Live — and Pose Problems for Evolution
On this episode of ID the Future, German paleo-entomologist Dr. Günter Bechly explains the real, living problem of living fossils — a term resisted by evolutionists though coined by Darwin himself and undeniably a living reality. These plants and animals have remained unchanged over eons: in the case of the horseshoe crab, nearly half a billion years through enormous upheaval.
Read More ›Scientist Names Dragonfly Species after Michael Behe. Gets Roasted. Shrugs.
On this episode of ID the Future, paleoentomologist Günter Bechly discusses the new dragonfly fossil that he discovered, described, and named after intelligent design theorist Michael Behe — Chrismooreia michaelbehei. Bechly describes what’s remarkable about this stunning fossil, explains some problems dragonflies poses for Darwinism, and shares some of the strangely uninformed criticisms he’s received for naming the species after Behe.
Read More ›A Paleontologist on Why the “Cambrian Explosion” Label Persists
On this episode of ID the Future, Sarah Chaffee interviews German paleo-entomologist Günter Bechly on the Cambrian explosion, the relatively sudden appearance of new body plans in the fossil record an estimated 550 million years ago. Dr. Bechly explains how the Cambrian explosion has been challenged by non-experts with an anti-ID bias, yet remains very much a real event in the opinion of specialists in the field — and with the continuing failure of Darwinian explanations, a strong source of evidential support for intelligent design.
Read More ›Günter Bechly on Fossils and Common Descent, Pt 2
German paleontologist Günter Bechly was co-author (with Stephen C. Meyer) of the chapter titled The Fossil Record and Universal Common Ancestry, in the major new book Theistic Evolution: A Scientific, Philosophical, and Theological Critique. In this second conversation with Sarah Chaffee on this topic, Bechly speaks of “life’s second ‘big bang,'” one of many discontinuities in the fossil record. “There’s no reasonable way,” he concludes, “to get from bacteria to mammals via evolutionary processes.”
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