Is there any new evidence for Evolution?

Answer 1

Here are some recent discoveries that provide further, compelling evidence for evolution:

• Tiktaalik roseae is the name of a newly discovered lobe-finned fossil fish from the late Devonian period, that is a transitional form to amphibians. It had basic wrist bones and simple fingers, as well as the robust ribcage necessitated by existence out of water.

  There would be no conceivable explanation for Tiktaalik other than evolution.

• Another example of a clearly transitional species is the 380 million-year-old fossil of a primitive fish, Gogonasus. It had fins strong enough to support its weight in shallow water and propel itself along. A scan of the fossil, using a three-dimensional X-ray microscope, revealed its skeleton had several features that were more like those of a four-legged land animal, or tetrapod, than a fish. They included the structure of its middle ear and the existence of precursors of the forearm bones in its fins: the radius and ulna.

  Here was a fish that had already evolved to a point where it had much in common with later land animals.

• A recently discovered 220-million year old fossil, Odontochelys semitestacea, is further evidence of evolution. This new species of turtle had a fully formed shell on its underside, but only a small partial shell on its back, extending from its backbone. Scientists had long debated how the turtle shell evolved. As well as a partial shell, Odontochelys semitestaceaalso had ribs that had begun to widen, thus demonstrating that the fully developed shell of later turtles evolved from the ribs of earlier species.

  Odontochelys semitestacea is one more piece in the jigsaw that shows conclusively how life on Earth evolved from earlier species.