"evolution changed into a religion" says prominent Chinese scientist

But the new fossils have become nothing less than a challenge to the theory of evolution in the hands Chen, a professor at the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology. Chen argued that the emergence of such a sophisticated creature at so early a date show that modern life forms burst on the scene suddenly, rather than through any gradual process.According to Chen, the conventional forces of evolution can't account for the speed, the breadth, and one-time nature of "the Cambrian Explosion," a geological moment more than 500 million years ago when virtually all the major animal groups first appear in the fossil record.Rather than Charles Darwin's familiar notion of survival of the fittest, Chen said he believes scientists should focus on the possibility that a unique harmony between forms of life allowed complex organisms to emerge. If all we have to depend upon is chance and competition, the conventional forces of evolution, Chen said, "then complex, highly evolved life, such as the human, has no reason to appear."The debate over Haikoulla casts Western scientists in the unlikely role of defending themselves against charges of ideological blindness from scientists in Communist China. Chinese officials argue that the theory of evolution is so politically charged in the West that researchers are reluctant to admit shortcomings for fear of giving comfort to those who believe in a biblical creation."Evolution is facing an extremely harsh challenge," declared the Communist Party's Guang Ming Daily last December in describing the fossils in southern China. "In the beginning, Darwinian evolution was a scientific theory.... In fact, evolution eventually changed into a religion."Taunts from the Communist Party wouldn't carry much sting, however, if some Western scientists weren't also concerned about weaknesses in so-called neo-Darwinism, the dominant view of evolution over the last 50 years."Neo-Darwinism is dead," said Eric Davidson, a geneticist and textbook writer at the California Institute of Technology. He joined a recent gathering of 60 scientists from around the world near Chengjiang, where Chen had found his first impressions of Haikouella five years ago.

Davidson & Erwin: Neo-Darwinism Doesn't Work for the Cambrian Explosion
Paul Nelson
Seven years ago, I was sitting outside a hotel in China waiting for lunch to start (yes, I worked at gaining weight back then), when Caltech developmental biologist Eric Davidson walked up and asked me why I was carrying a diagram from one of his papers. The diagram depicted the complex control region of the Endo16 gene in sea urchins. I told him that I wanted to ask conference participants what process they thought had constructed the highly specified genetic circuitry (over a dozen DNA-binding proteins, interacting at nearly three dozen binding sites, to construct the sea urchin gut) -- what Davidson described as "information processing units 'wired' into the regulatory network so that they receive multiple inputs" (2001, p. 7).Davidson smiled, somewhat ruefully, and said, "Well, I'm not sure, but I know that standard single-base-pair mutations won't do it" -- meaning, as he later explained to me, the textbook neo-Darwinism every college biology student learns. He was more blunt with the science writer Fred Heeren, who was covering the now-notorious conference we were attending. "Neo-Darwinism is dead," he said in an interview.Davidson brought his case for the insufficiency of standard evolutionary theory to the pages of Science this past week. Writing with the paleontologist Doug Erwin, he argued that the "establishment by the Early Cambrian of virtually all phylum-level body plans" is not explained by the usually-invoked evolutionary processes

Chen, a professor at the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology, discovered an important fossil which he feels seriously undermines some aspects of evolutionary theory, and basically agrees that the Cambrian explosion cannot be accounted for by current evo models.

He says that the reason the West has such a hard time dealing with these facts is because "evolution changed into a religion", .

What do EVCers think about crunching the Cambrian explosion down to 2-3 million years instead of 50? Is this prominent scientist correct that this is a serious problem for evolutionary theory?

I'd like to suggest promotion of the topic, possibly with a change in title. Rather than yet another "evolution is religion" bs topic, if Randman is willing to change the focus to a discussion of the Cambrian and the position of Haikouella as a basal deuterostome (or not) and its implications, I think that would be a very interesting topic.

Ditch any and all focus on the "evolution as religion" theme and I think we might have a good topic here.

Right! This is exactly the sort of topic that it is best to avoid with randman.

I (personal opinion) would tend to agree that evolutionary scientists do treat evolution as a "religion", which isn't to say it's a matter of theology. Rather, it is a "religion" in that they have a great interest in and enthusiasm towards the subject.

I think that "evolution as religion" is a topic theme we should avoid altogether.

To my mind, the comment that he feels Western scientists cannot properly assess the evidence because the issue is so "politicized" and that the West has changed evolution into a religion is at the heart of the proposed topic, not just the factual issues of the Cambrian explosion.

Why? You guys start threads accusing creationists and IDers of having no objectivity, and offer no evidence at all for that, and here we have a respected foreign scientist saying Western evos have lost their objectivity, and you won't promote it?

The fish-like creature was hardly more than an inch long, but its discovery in the rocks of southern China was a big deal. The 530-million-year-old fossil, dubbed Haikouella, had the barest beginning of a spinal cord, making it the oldest animal ever found whose body shape resembled modern vertebrates.In the Nature article announcing his latest findings, Jun-Yuan Chen and his colleagues reported dryly that the ancient fish "will add to the debate on the evolutionary transition from invertebrate to vertebrate."But the new fossils have become nothing less than a challenge to the theory of evolution in the hands Chen, a professor at the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology. Chen argued that the emergence of such a sophisticated creature at so early a date show that modern life forms burst on the scene suddenly, rather than through any gradual process.

In the Nature article announcing his latest findings, Jun-Yuan Chen and his colleagues reported dryly that the ancient fish "will add to the debate on the evolutionary transition from invertebrate to vertebrate."

But the new fossils have become nothing less than a challenge to the theory of evolution in the hands Chen, a professor at the Nanjing Institute of Paleontology and Geology.

I think that "evolution as religion" is a topic theme we should avoid altogether. I suggest the various admins reject all such topics with a comment such as what I said in my previous message: