The theory of evolution is studied in schools and universities, but there are still many myths and misconceptions about it. Let's analyze the main ones.
Lots of fakes
Critics of the theory of evolution like to argue that evolutionists base many fake finds as evidence. In fact, there really is a fake, one - the famous Piltdown skull, but this falsification was debunked more than half a century ago, back in 1953. Since that time, no anthropologist or paleontologist has used the Piltdown Skull to substantiate anything. Evolutionists have plenty of other, undeniable factual material.
Evolutionists take single finds as evidence
The oldest and most famous Austrolopithecus is Lucy, whose skeleton was found in 1974 in the Awash valley in Ethiopia. Lucy is still a bone of contention with evolutionists. Critics like to "shine" in conversation with the fact that Lucy is the only Austrolopithecus found, and therefore it is not serious to talk about these representatives of hominids seriously.
In fact, Lucy is simply one of the first and most famous find. In addition to it, scientists operate on the data of hundreds of excavations of various types of Austrolopithecus.
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Eugene Dubois confesses to having found a giant gibbon
One of the most common myths about the theory of evolution is the story that Eugene Dubois (famous for excavating Pithecanthropus), before his death, admitted that he had actually found a giant gibbon. As evidence of this misconception on the Internet, they cite an article in the journal Nature for 1935. In fact, there is no recognition of Dubois in this magazine, and after the discovery of Dubois in southern Europe, Java, Asia and Africa, the remains of more than 250 individuals of Pithecanthropus were found, which have nothing to do with mythical "giant gibbons".
Darwin said: "Man descended from ape"
Aristotle drew attention to the similarity between man and great apes. In the IV century BC. e. he wrote: "Some animals have the properties of humans and tetrapods, such as pythikos, kebos and kinokephalos …".
Let us explain: Pifikos, or Pithekos, is a tailless monkey, a kebos is a monkey, and a kinokefalos is a dogglave, possibly a baboon.
The idea that the ancestor of man is an ancient ape, half a century before Darwin, was expressed by Jean Baptiste Lamarck, the author of the first complete theory of evolution, in his book The Philosophy of Zoology, published in 1809.
Darwin was extremely correct. Therefore, he spoke about evolution using the example of pigeons, finches, turtles, bears, bees and flowering plants.
Evolution is always improvement
Evolution is not always an improvement, as is often believed. There are many organisms that have not changed at all in the course of history. Such, for example, as sharks, mosses, crayfish. Evolution is rather the adaptation of organisms to environmental conditions, their adaptation. It doesn't always mean improvement. Many species have been simplified following changes in the environment. For example, parasites.
Ancient people lived at the same time and did not descend from one another
As an argument for this statement, critics like to cite, for example, the fact that various finds of the remains of Homo habilis date from 2.3 million to 1.5 million years ago, and the species Homo ergaster, which is believed to have descended from Homo habilis, appeared 1.8 million years ago. Thus, the lifetime of these species partially overlaps.
This, however, is not surprising. A new species never replaces an ancestor's species instantly. Examples include a dog and a wolf. No one denies that the dog descended from the wolf, but they still live nearby.
Darwin renounced his theory
This pseudo-scientific myth, which critics of Darwinism love to cite, first surfaced many years after the death of the scientist, in 1915. The story of Darwin's denial of theory was published in the American Baptist edition by preacher Elizabeth Hope. She claimed that Darwin informed her of this on his deathbed.
There is no other confirmation of the scientist's remorse in his views, and the children of Charles Darwin (son of Francis Darwin and daughter of Henrietta Lichfield) stated that Lady Hope had never even met their father.