"The blood vessels of embryonic humans start out resembling those of embryonic fish, with a top and bottom vessel connectedly by parallel vessels, one on each side ('aortic arches'). In fish, these side vessels carry blood to and from the gills. Embryonic and adult fish have six pairs of arches; this is the basic ground plan that appears at the beginning of development of all vertebrates. In the human embryo, the first, second, and fifth arches form briefly at the beginning of development, but disappear by four weeks of age, when the third, fourth, and sixth arches have rearranged themselves, looking much like the embryonic vessels of a reptile. In the final adult configuration, the vessels are rearranged still more, with some having vanished or transformed themselves into different vessels. The aortic arches of fish undergo no such transformation."
"All vertebrates begin development looking like embryonic fish because we all descended from a fishlike ancestor with a fishlike embryo. We see strange contortions and disappearances of organs, blood vessels, and gill slits because descendants still carry the genes and developmental programs of ancestors. And the sequence of development changes also make sense: at one stage of development mammals have an embryonic circulatory system like that of reptiles; but we don't see the converse situation. Why? Because mammals descended from early reptiles and not vice versa."
"Darwin was the first to use data from nature to convince people that evolution is true, and his idea of natural selection was truly novel. It testifies to his genius that the concept of natural theology, accepted by most educated Westerners before 1859, was vanquished within only a few years by a single five-hundred-page book. On the Origin of Species turned the mysteries of life's diversity from mythology into genuine science." -- Jerry Coyne
Tuesday, June 18, 2019
Some very interesting evidence for evolution from "Why Evolution Is True" by Jerry Coyne.
Labels:
2019/06 JUNE,
BOOKS,
embryology,
evidence for evolution,
Human Apes,
Jerry Coyne
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