More Turbulence at the Base of the Tree of Life

Here is a new open-access paper, published in Frontiers in Microbiology, that is instructive: "Eukaryogenesis: The Rise of an Emergent Superorganism." Author Philip J. L. Bell begins:

Although it is widely taught that all modern life descended via modification from a last universal common ancestor (LUCA), this dominant paradigm is yet to provide a generally accepted explanation for the chasm in design between prokaryotic and eukaryotic cells. Counter to this dominant paradigm, the viral eukaryogenesis (VE) hypothesis proposes that the eukaryotes originated as an emergent superorganism and thus did not evolve from LUCA via descent with incremental modification. [Emphasis added.]

The "chasm in design"? For a theory (i.e., the universal Tree of Life, rooted in LUCA — universal common descent, or UCD) whose empirical strength is so great that it cannot be doubted, UCD certainly is doubted a lot.

Doubted by biologists, in fact, with no known interest in intelligent design.

Comment:

Study: "Most of Our Evolutionary Trees Could Be Wrong"

From Phys.org:

Study suggests that most of our evolutionary trees could be wrong
New research led by scientists at the Milner Centre for Evolution at the University of Bath suggests that determining evolutionary trees of organisms by comparing anatomy rather than gene sequences is misleading. The study, published in Communications Biology, shows that we often need to overturn centuries of scholarly work that classified living things according to how they look.
In other words: often anatomical similarities are not based on common descent and different lines of evidence (anatomy versus genetics) conflict and thus do not converge on one true tree of life! This refutes one of the favorite talking points of popularizers of Darwinism like Richard Dawkins.

GÜNTER BECHLY
SENIOR FELLOW, CENTER FOR SCIENCE AND CULTURE
Günter Bechly is a German paleo-entomologist who specializes in the fossil history and systematics of insects (esp. dragonflies), the most diverse group of animals. He served as curator for amber and fossil insects in the department of paleontology at the State Museum of Natural History (SMNS) in Stuttgart, Germany. He is also a Senior Fellow with Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture. Dr. Bechly earned his Ph.D. in geosciences from Eberhard-Karls-University in Tübingen, Germany.
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Reader Comments

codis · 2022-06-08T08:29:08Z

Study suggests that most of our evolutionary trees could be wrong.

Theories are nice, but a real scientist should avoid to develop an emotional attachment to them.

Dwoods44 · 2022-06-08T14:43:43Z

codis Yes. Dogmatism has become scientism.

Artex · 2022-06-08T16:21:45Z

Dwoods44 That's been a back & forth problem throughout history. Religion was a science, then became dogmatic and separate from science. Then science split, but now we science becoming dogmatic again. And it happens to greater or lesser degrees every generation after something that fits our observations is discovered and it held as fact until some young scientists come along and find a better explanation for our observations - which are then promptly suppressed and ridiculed for challenging the establishment. When the PTB find ways to use science to advance power, it become religion (except completely lacking in spirituality).

Sim · 2022-06-08T09:13:35Z

In biology's collected and identified genes in all the genomes of all the species so far sequenced, ORFan genes (open reading frame, ie codes for proteins) with no apparent antecedent genes or any evidence of descent by incremental modification, now vastly outnumber those that do — by orders of magnitude.

[Link]

JTF Truth · 2022-06-10T02:30:07Z

In other words: often anatomical similarities are not based on common descent and different lines of evidence (anatomy versus genetics) conflict and thus do not converge on one true tree of life!

I wonder if the freak shows got their ideas from this statement?

Gnostic · 2022-06-10T02:58:03Z

JTF Truth I don’t know but common sense sure ain’t with them thar scientists that is fer showe. I have known since high school that something was not right with evolutionary theory going off looks alone when I saw some things that just made no sense in the books.

One of the best creatures that shits in the eyes of the blind is the platypus. There are others but that is just one great creature that walks to its own drum beat in the kingdom of mammals.

Then there is the octopus which some recently theorized may not be from earth at all but somewhere else.

The wizzard behind the curtain is a trickster. Maybe a cousin to Hermes Trismigistus.

Have fun!

Winternights3 · 2022-06-13T17:22:11Z

Now't liken to a tad of unnecessary Darwin bashing to make a new hypothesis credible.

Come the day that the scientific fraternity can muster a credible argument, then I might be interested.