Hidden Agendas: The Media & Science

Over a conversation about the decline of paleontology versus the rise of fossils in the media, my mate and colleague Tony Gill pointed out several interesting points. The hype and media attention surrounding Jurassic Park, Tiktaalik roseae the 'fish-to-tetrapod' transition and most recently, Ida the lemur-like fossil, all misrepresent paleontology. Furthermore, the medias handling of fossil ‘news’ is indicative of the decline of paleontology overall. This ‘hidden agenda’ namely, promoting a cheap technology or highly applied field at the expense of a scientific scholarship and endeavor, is endemic to current science reporting.

At first glance, Jurassic Park is an adventure movie about dinosaurs. A dinosaur expert gets to do what most paleontologists only dream of – walking with living fossils. Add a little romance and adventure into the script and "Hey Presto!" you have the kids hooked. Dinosaur figurine sales go up and you need to queue to get into your local museum. All a perfect recipe for promoting paleontology and getting the message that what paleontologist do is 'cool'. Think again: "What is Jurassic Park actually about?"

The answer, quite rightly is genetics, more accurately genetic engineering. Jurassic Park may show off some stunning (albeit incorrect) CGI reconstructions of dinosaurs, but mostly it is about how modern technology can progress science to unbelievable heights. What most people remember from the script is how dinosaur DNA can be extracted from fossil blood-sucking insects trapped in amber. Jurassic Park did more for genetics than it did for paleontology. For example, the "National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health, and by the Ben F. Love Endowment, the ARC Federation Fellowship and the NHMRC C.J. Martin and R. Douglas Wright Research Fellowships" (Choi, 2008) supported a project to resurrect the extinct Tasmanian Tiger from DNA retrieved from a preserved fetus. Paleontology got peanuts.

Before I continue with more examples, I want to quickly explain what I mean by paleontological research. The majority of paleontologists are taxonomists and systematists. Many expand their research to include stratigraphy, paleoecology, taphonomy and functional morphology. Taxonomy however is essential in paleontology. Without it we are describing bits of shell and pieces of bones. Taxonomy gives us a name a diagnosis and most importantly a classification. Systematics helps us to establish evolutionary relationships. Equally important are the circumstances in which the fossil was preserved (taphonomy), it age (stratigraphy), the depositional environment (paleoecology) and what sort of life the organism led (functional morphology). Together they form a well rounded paleontologist and a paleontological project. For the media, paleontology as a scholarly endeavor, sells few magazines and doesn't cover the cost for airtime. Many people share a passion for paleontology, but what sells tons of plastic stegosaurus in museums could never satisfy the public's hunger for sensationalism.

In the same way that Jurassic Park appeals to our belief in modern technology, the hype around Tiktaalik roseaeand Ida ( Darwinius masillae) is our human desire to find out who we are and where we come from. The desire to know our own family genealogies is transposed onto evolutionary biology as the search for ancestors and origins – different concepts all together.

Ancestors and centers of origins are only place-holders to make statements about ancestor-descendants and dispersal. In order to propose evolutionary scenarios about individual taxa, say hominids or just humans, we need the evolutionary equivalent of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden. As systematists, however, we don’t need either. Taxa are related in some way based on their 'derived' characters so too are biotic areas. Stating a new discovery, such as Harpetidae are more closely related to Harpididae than they are to Entomaspidae, require no ancestors, only homologies. Therefore, homologies are necessary evidence in discovering evolution, where ancestors may be used in explaining evolutionary scenarios – they are not essential. The aim of any field, be it paleontology or entomology, is to find homologies and natural classifications first before we can even entertain the idea of ancestors and their centers of origin. Hence systematics lies outside evolutionary biology or, in other words, evolutionary biology depends on systematics.

The media however are unaware of this process of discovery and explanation. We have no way of knowing whether Tiktaalik roseaeand Ida are our ancestors or not. All we can discover are their systematic relationships. Anything beyond that is simply speculation and lies outside the realm of empiricism. The media’s hidden agenda feeds off the latter.

If paleontology were to be promoted responsibly by the popular media, more is to be done about reporting about systematic relationships. The media’s hidden agenda however is to personify these discoveries in the context of human genealogy. For example:

"Scientists have discovered fossils of a 375-million-year-old fish, a large scaly creature not seen before, that they say is a long-sought missing link in the evolution of some fishes from water to a life walking on four limbs on land" (Wilford, 2006: Online).

"Meet your ancestor – the fish that crawled" (Holmes, 2006: Online).

"In the PLoS paper itself, the scientists do not actually claim the specimen represents a direct ancestor to us. But Dr Hurum believes that is exactly what Ida is" (BBC Online 19 May, 2009).

"Fossil Ida: extraordinary find is 'missing link' in human evolution" (Randerson 2009: Online).

The media are excited about a "missing link" (read "ancestor") rather than a new systematic discovery. For instance neither article tells us what has been discovered. Ida is a "47m-year-old primate" that is "not on the lemur line because she lacks two key characteristics shared by lemurs" (Randerson, 2009) or "She belongs to the group from which higher primates and human beings developed but my impression is she is not on the direct line" (BBC Online 19th May, 2009). Neither report states what Ida is or who she is related to. Rather we are told what she isn’t. The same is true for Tiktaalik roseae, a "375-million-year-old fish" that "… is significantly closer to the midpoint of the transition than Panderichthys," says Per Ahlberg, a palaeontologist at Uppsala University in Sweden. "Panderichthys is clearly a fish. With Tiktaalik, you're not entirely certain what to call the thing" (Holmes, 2006: Online).

What then, reading these media reports, do we know about either of these fossils from a systematic or classificatory stand-point? Not much, other than what they represent within an evolutionary scenario – a ‘missing link’, a transition from sea to land or a potential ancestor. In effect, the media has used the discoveries of fossils, and not classifications, to push evolutionary scenarios. The discoveries that were made are not reported or at best briefly covered. Tiktaalik roseae and is closely related to Acanthostega and Ichthyostega and belongs in the family Elpistostegidae. Ida, or Darwinius masillae belongs to the subfamily Cercamoniinae; however, their systematic relationship within that group is currently unknown. These two taxonomic and systematic discoveries represent scholarship within paleontology, a field that is slowly declining in importance and prominence. The evolutionary scenarios are merely speculations, guess-work based on little empirical evidence. The media, as well as the science community, need to decide which deserves greater recognition. The future of paleontology is at stake.

Biology & Teleology

“Met the ghost of Stephen Foster at the Hotel Paradise
This is what I told him as I gazed into his eyes:
Rooms were made for carpets,
Towers made for spires,
Ships were made for cannonades to fire off from inside them ..." (Squirrel Nut Zippers, 2002)

Findings of a recent study published in Cognition state that:

"... college-educated adults display scientifically unwarranted teleological explanations with ease. Such findings highlight the challenges faced by educators in both the life and physical sciences. The source of popular resistance to scientific ideas appears to run deep" (Kelemen & Rosset, 2009: 143).

They certainly 'run deep' in biological systematics and in the philosophy of biology as a newly published article in the Journal of Biogeography by Heads (2009) clearly demonstrates.

According to Heads, Darwin's move away from teleological argumentation was rejected by neodarwinists who preferred purpose over structure:

"... as his knowledge of biology and laws of growth deepened, Darwin learned to avoid teleology. Through this process he left his background behind and evolved into a modern (Renaissance) scientist. Nevertheless, Darwin's later work has been ignored whereas his earlier arguments have been co-opted as support for teleology, panselectionism and centre of originism." (Heads, 2009: Online)

Teleology and biology have been inseparable since Aristotle despite the attempts by Roger Bacon, Rene Descarte, Baruch Spinoza and Wolfgang von Goethe to undermine it completely. German idealists didn't help, neither did 19th century English naturalists, who like Kant sought to replace a theological or 'higher purpose' with Natural 'intention'.

Heads provides several excellent examples of natural teleology in systematic biology:

"... many features of organisms are teleological, a bird's wings are for flying; eyes are for seeing ..." (Ayala, 2004:65).

"A rock may not have a purpose but an eye does. Eyes and hands do not just happen for no reason" (Ruse, 2003:33).

Teleology, according to Heads, seems to be embraced by some philosophers of biology:

"... a vitally important tool for looking into the organic world" (Ruse, 2002: 47).

The problem of teleology is rampant in systematics and biogeography, with few opposing it and others, like Ernst Mayr, using weak arguments:

"[Mayr] recognized that the teleology in biology was a serious problem. His solution was to suggest that the modern synthesis is not really teleological, and that it uses teleological language but not teleological thinking" (Heads, 2009: Online).

I believe that Heads, like Kelemen & Rosset (2009), has pin-pointed the problem behind teleology, namely we start out as teleologists. Once we accept this fact, we have a lot of unlearning to do. I whole-heartily recommend Heads (2009) for students of systematics and biogeography.

Malte C. Ebach

References
Ayala, F.J. (2004) Design without designer: Darwin's greatest discovery. Debating design: from Darwin to DNA (ed. by W.A. Dembski and M. Ruse), pp. 55–80. Cambridge University Press, New York.
Heads, M. (2009). Darwin’s changing views on evolution: from centres of origin and teleology to vicariance and incomplete lineage sorting Journal of Biogeography DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2699.2009.02127.x
Kelemen, D., & Rosset, E. (2009). The Human Function Compunction: Teleological explanation in adults Cognition, 111 (1), 138-143 DOI: 10.1016/j.cognition.2009.01.001
Ruse, M. (2002) Evolutionary biology and teleological thinking. Functions: new essays in the philosophy of psychology and biology (ed. by A. Ariew, R. Cummins and M. Perlman), pp. 33–62. Oxford University Press, New York.

An Interview with Mr. Darwin

On Friday afternoon Dave and Malte step into the Hoop and Toy for their regular ‘end-of-the-week’ pint (or three).

At the bar they are approached by a dark and mysterious man with a cockney accent and an unlit cigarette hanging precariously from his lips. “’Ere, interest’d in a time machine?” David chokes on his beer. “‘Ow much den?” (David is also a cockney, so it’s going to be a bit complicated). Anyway, they buy it for a fiver (5 British Pounds Sterling).

It takes six pints and a Japanese translator (an unwitting tourist) to work out how the thing turns on. Within two hours and a spectacular light display, too complex to describe here, Malte and Dave make it to 19th century England. Due to the Earth’s orbit, and other dreary time-space continuum explanations privy only to Doctor Who fans, they end up in the village of Downe in Kent, 1862.

“Sh*t, where are we?”
“Dunno. Fancy a pint?”

After several hours in the George and Dragon Inn – David and Malte discover that they are only 20 minutes away by horse-and-cart from Down House, home of Charles Darwin.

“Hang on. What if we interviewed Chuck for our blog, eh?” The pints were taking their toll.
“That’ll show them who's wrong!”

An Interview with Mr. Darwin

[Loud banging on door - followed by intermittent singing and shushing. A distinguished, but slight nervous looking, gentleman opens the door a crack. A brass chain can be seen securing it to the rest of Down House]

“Chucky!”
“I do not wish to purchase excessive merriment from two louts! Please be off with you!
“Hey, Chuck … sorry Mr. Darwin. We are schistema … cystmena … nat … naturists …?”
“I am ill. Please go away!”
“… Naturalists!”
“I am very sick. Please let leave me in peace!”
“… from the futu… er … Australia …”
“I’m not talking to you. I am too ill. Please remove your foot from my door!”
“Look, in the future people are all fighting over your ideas and your work. Evolution has become an explanation for almost everything and you seem to be considered the originator of all modern ideas in biological classification, as well as, plant and animal geography!”

[Darwin paused for a moment and seemed to relax].

“But why? Ideas are developed through time. Evolution is an idea to which I had been introduced. Most of it made no sense. Some of it was simply nonsensical. I make no excuse for my ideas, but surely a good rational explanation makes for a better understanding of the processes at work?”
“… er… What?”
“Where do you think I got my ideas from? I didn’t just invent them there and then! They evolved from other ideas.”

[Dave and Malte think this is a pun and giggle]

But people in the future think 1859 and your Origin was a turning point for biology!”
“Please make no such assumption! I, Monsieur Lamarck and probably others, have provided ways with which to explain the biological world. It is not the answer but simply an explanation that I am convinced is good and rational …”
“But ..”
“I am ill. Goodbye to you sir!”

[David and Malte look at each other].

“He called me sir!”
“Want to interview Agassiz?”

The Absence of Evolution (Homology)

We almost labeled the paper entitled Bringing Homologies Into Focus by Anastasia Thanukos as 'Paraphyly Watch'. Here is why.

The paper is part of a new journal called Evolution: Education and Outreach - aimed at science school teachers rather than academia in general. The paper is a rather typical guide to homology - for instance:

"Homologies are traits present in two or more organisms that were inherited from the common ancestor of those organisms. The human five-fingered hand and the five-toed foot of a lizard, for example, were both inherited from our common ancestor that lived more than 300 Mya" (p. 498).

Almost right. Homologies, as a concept, existed in the literature before 'ancestors' were accepted in an evolutionary context - so it would be technically incorrect to associate them with ancestors per se - in the same way Alexander von Humboldt wasn't a biogeographer (the concept may have existed but not as we understand it today; and the term was coined much later to refer to something else). Is this a case of whiggish history? Possibly. Homologies are the only evidence we have of a common history, that is evolution. We may be splitting hairs but explanations as to how things originate does rather detract from the meaning (as we will show later). A clearer definition is "Homologies are relationships and occur when the same structure exists in two organisms but as different manifestations (in this case forearm and wing)". What this implies (and how it got there) is another matter that detracts from the homologies themselves. And this is exactly what happens with the rest of the paper.

Why would a paper titled 'Bringing Homologies Into Focus' give more space to explaining analogies and homoplasies? Is the absence of homology really more interesting? If so, we would assume non-evolution is of greater interest. This is a typical trend in evolutionary biology - attempting to explain why evolution is not present by invoking other assumed 'evolutionary' mechanisms. This is contradictory and send out the wrong message. What is important is when evolution is present - namely homologies. When it is not present it should really be of little or no interest. Then why probe into the absence of evolution?

There is a misconception in science that everything needs to be explained. This is the underlying premise of paraphyly 'enthusiasts'. When a group turns out to be non-monophyletic, that is non-evolutionary, people insist that evolution has gone on anyway. Apart from flying in the face of empiricism, explaining the absence of evolution by using other explanatory 'evolution' mechanisms is meaningless. Convergent evolution is not evolutionary. It does not result in homologies, only in analogies, that is non-homologies. Why this is even taught as 'evolution' mystifies us. We wonder if this happens in other fields? When volcanic rocks are absent from an area, do geologists explain it through volcanism? They could, but it would be very silly indeed.

References
Anastasia Thanukos (2008). Bringing Homologies Into Focus. Evolution: Education and Outreach, 1 (4), 498-504 DOI: 10.1007/s12052-008-0080-5

The Evolution Slogan

The term "evolution" can be used recklessly in a variety of ways: "If evolution was outlawed, only outlaws will evolve", "Paraphyly is evolution all the way" (Brummitt, 2002:40) and most recently, "Because we understand how evolution happens, we can also guess where it will go next" (Jones, 2008; see also John Wilkins's post). The two main points of contention, highlighted in the latter statement by Steve Jones, are our "understanding" of evolution and our ability to "guess".

The late Colin Patterson, ichthyologist at the then British Museum, Natural History in London, gave a presentation that questioned the term. The talk, titled "Systematics and Creationism", was given at American Museum of Natural History (Patterson, 2002) in November 1981. There Patterson noted:

"...the theory is evolutionary theory, descent with modification" (Patterson, 2002:23; see also Martin Brazeau's post)

Combined with the above slogans we may suggest that 'evolution' is: a process of descent with modification that results in paraphyly problem arises. How do we see this process?

In order to know we need to be able to observe or measure. Paraphyly, for instance, cannot be observed. It exists only when an artificially delineated taxonomic group is discovered to be monophyletic (homologous) - like 'invertebrates' or 'aliens'. Descent with modification is also difficult to see in action. Although we can see genealogy and ontogeny, they do not constitute 'descent with modification', at least not in the way Jones uses the term.

What systematists and biogeographers know is that evidence for evolution is based on retrodictions - that is past 'predictions' or patterns. These patterns are homologies or relationships - evidence for evolution. Our task as systematists is to discover whether our groups are a result of evolution, rather than poor taxonomy. Evolution should not be taken for granted - just because we know it exists doesn't mean we should stop looking. Reptiles, for example, are not an evolutionary group. They are a poorly defined taxonomic group like 'insectivores' and 'creepy, crawling things'. Discovering that taxa within the reptilia share closer relationships with taxa in mammalian than with any other taxon does not validate reptiles as an evolutionary group. The task of herpetologists is find those evolutionary groups and, not to defend existing names that have no evolutionary significance. Patterns, homologies, relationship and monophyletic groups are all the same thing: evidence for evolution.

Now we return to Jones. He, like many other evolutionary biologists, has committed a classic error - assuming that life progresses from an incomplete to complete phase: also known as 'primitive to derived'. A typical example is the 'primitiveness' or 'plesiomomorphy' of Archaeopteryx lithographica. The half bird-half reptile is always considered to be transition - fossilized in the middle of evolving. Like all living things dead or alive, Archaeopteryx is perfect in its own right. It has no hidden agenda, no purpose other than to be Archaeopteryx. If we were to assume, unwittingly and in hindsight, that it was primitive, then we are advocating some purpose or teleology, namely that Archaeopteryx was aiming to become a bird. This sort of thinking gives evolution a bad reputation and opens it up to attack from protagonists of anti-science. The logic behind it does not work. Let us assume for the moment that we could go back in time, back when Archaeopteryx was alive. We would assume, that this is a highly evolved 'reptile', a derived form. See the problem? Archaeopteryx is both derived and primitive at the same time in form and space but not in geological time. The whole 'primitive – derived' argument is based stratigraphic sequence and not evolution (homology).

To counter Jones's argument - we are complete, so is Archaeopteryx and all other life that has ever existed and will ever exist on this planet. What does this completeness say about evolution? Absolutely nothing at all. Instead it tells us of a desire for explanation.

We may think 'nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution' (Dobzhansky, 1973), but without a doubt, evolution only makes sense in the light of homology. Biological classification provides us with the tools to discover relationships and a way to understand the evolution of life. Without it we are just telling never-ending stories. I am sure that in 200 millions years time, an octopod biologist, will wonder how something as incomplete and primitive as Homo sapiens lived for as long as it did.

References

Brummitt, R. K. 2002. How to chop up a tree. Taxon 51: 1-41.
Dobzhansky, T. 1973. Nothing in Biology Makes Sense. Except in the Light of Evolution. The American Biology. Teacher, 35:125-129.
Jones, S. 2008. Evolution is complete: so where do we go from here? Daily Telegraph Online, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/10/07/scievolution107.xml
Patterson, C. 2002. Evolutionism and creationism. The Linnean 18: 15-33.

The Giraffe's Long Neck

Craig Holdrege at the Nature Institute has published a great book titled The Giraffe's Long Neck: from evolutionary fable to whole organism. Here an excerpt from my review in The Systematist

"The book consists of four chapters that cover existing theories of giraffe form, notably its long neck, physiology, development, ecology and evolution. The text is interspersed with elegant black and white line drawings and the text is written in an easy conversational style. The first chapter “Evolutionary stories falling short” is a critique of present evolutionary theories in relation to the giraffe's neck. Like most, I recall being taught sometime in school that the giraffe's long neck is an example of an adaptation, an explanation that championed neo-Darwinian theory over “inferior” Lamarckianism. In our texts there was a picture of an upright giraffe apparently feeding, with the story that by having a long neck the giraffe could reach the rare green foliage and therefore survive. Since no one in class experiences the giraffe directly, we accept the story and go no further. This is the starting point for Holdrege's argument. In considering the giraffe feeding it appears to have a long neck. With legs splayed cumbersomely to reach down while drinking, giraffes appear to have awkwardly short necks. What do we as taxonomists gain from this insight? Holdrege has exposed advantageous adaptation as an evolutionary fable, showing that in focusing on a single part of the giraffe we have lost sight of the whole organism" (The Systematist 2007 28:13-14)

The Giraffe's Long Neck: from evolutionary fable to whole organism is available from the Nature Institute website.

References

Holdrege, C. 2005. The Giraffe's Long Neck: from evolutionary fable to whole organism. Nature Institute Perspectives 4. The Nature Institute, Ghent, New York, pp.104. USD14.00.