The BBC has a report on
these fossils found in China and recently analyzed by microCT (a form of tomography for visualizing interior structures in rock).
Using digital reconsruction, the organelles of specific embryonic cells could be visualized and conpared to those of modern embryonic eukariotes.
Quotes from one of the scientists:
S. Xiao writes:
It is amazing that such delicate biological structures can be preserved in such an ancient deposit. We digitally extracted each cell from the embryos and then looked inside the cells.
The consensus was that the embryos were those of very primitive sponge-like animals.
This apparently rich bed of fossil embryos dates to the pre-Cambrian (around the time of the Burgess shale) and the primitive intracelluar structure supports the view that multi-cellular life forms were not yet highly evolved before the 'Cambrian explosion'.
So this is another monumental accomplishment for modern paleontology that is beautifully consistent with the predictions of other independent lines of reasoning w/r/t the time frame when higher life began to diversify into the forms we would find recognizable today.
Furthermore, given the disparity in intracellular structure between these fossil cells and modern embryonic cells we can say that nothing comparable exists today.
So, in an effort to be fair, let's see how this is consistent with the YEC view.
1. The dating is wrong, so the rocks are really only about 5,500 YO, not 550,000,000 years.
2. The fact that such embryological cells are no longer found is consistent with loss of biological diversiy after the fall.
3. The fact that the 'dated' materials yield biological inferences consistent with other independently 'dated' materials is only a coincidence, despite the vanishingly small probability.
Am I missing anything?
Seriously though, I think you have to accept this kind of work as great science with great public impact potential, whether you believe in evolution or not. But if you doubt evolution, consider this.
Of this international team that independently and collectively...
-discovered the micro-fossils
-dated the materials
-inferred taxonomy
-adapted the technology to image the fossils
-digitally reconstructed the images
-interpreted the images in terms of biological function
-etc. etc.
These scientists conceived of techniques, obtained funding, and collected and processed data under the operating assumption that their collective efforts would be interpreted within
a framework of evolutionary paleontology. And that is precisely how they chose to interpret their results. No creationist assumptions anywhere to be found, nor anything to be gained in understanding by adding them.
But perhaps some might disagree...
Proposed for Biological Evolution -EZ