Fossil Friday: An Ediacaran Animal with a Question Mark

A. Yu Ivantsov, animals, dickinsoniids, Ediacaran biota, Epibaion, Evolution, Evolution & Development, flatworms, Fossil Friday (series), IFLScience, jello, microbial mats, multicellular animal, muscles, nervous system, Nilpena Ediacara National Park, outback, paleontology, placozoan, Precambrian, protists, Quaestio simpsonorum, Roomba, sandstone, South Australia, trace fossils, Tribrachidium
To claim that such undefinable blobs in sandstone represent fossils of the oldest motile animals is massively overselling the evidence to say the least. Source
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Control Systems in Vertebrate Limbs Further Demonstrate that They Were Designed

accuracy, bioengineers, biological limbs, biology, control systems, Evolution, evolutionary narratives, flexibility, intelligent agent, Intelligent Design, limbs, motor control systems, nervous system, robots, sensors, stability, Stuart Burgess, vertebrate limbs
Even if one limb suddenly transformed into another, the new limb would prove useless until its control system was entirely reengineered. Source
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The Incredible Design of Muscles

Andrew McDiarmid, antagonists, biochemistry, circulatory system, Complexity, connective tissue, Engineering, Evolution, evolutionary mechanisms, Intelligent Design, Jonathan McLatchie, Michael Behe, muscle contraction, muscle fibers, muscles, nervous system, respiratory system, skeletal system, synergists, tendons
To understand the limitations of evolutionary mechanisms, we have to “bite the bullet of complexity,” as biochemist Michael Behe writes. Source
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Can Animal Minds Explain Human Minds?

Cambridge Declaration on Consciousness, Christof Koch, consciousness, crabs, dualists, Francis Crick, hard problem of consciousness, John Horgan, Kristin Andrews, Life Sciences, materialism, mind, nervous system, neurological capacity, neuroscience, Neuroscience & Mind, panpsychism, philosophers, philosophy, physiology, The Animal Mind, theists, York University
Kristin Andrews thinks consciousness researchers should discard the assumptions of “white, male and WEIRD” philosophy profs and study more crabs. Source
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MicroRNAs: A New Clue About Octopus Intelligence?

apes, biology, brain, central brain, cognitive abilities, Cris Niell, crows, cuttlefish, Dogs, dolphins, elephants, Grygoriy Zolotarov, intelligence, MicroRNAs, miRNAs, nervous system, neuroscience, Neuroscience & Mind, neurotransmitters, Nikolaus Rajewsky, octopus, Oregon, RNA, science, squid, vertebrates, whales, William Rainey Harper
While octopus brains are very different from vertebrate brains, they share with vertebrates, a huge number of microRNAs. Source
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This Cambrian Explosion “Explanation” Qualifies as Propaganda

arthropods, brain, Cambrian Explosion, Cambrian News, China, crap theory, Current Biology, Debating Darwin's Doubt, Derek E. G. Briggs, Ediacaran Period, evo-devo, Evolution, fecal material, fossil record, Intelligent Design, Izvestia, Kimberella, morphology, nervous system, newspapers, oxygen level, Palaeophragmodictya, phyla, Pravda, stem taxa, Stephen Meyer, USSR
It’s interesting to see what Derek E. G. Briggs is willing to admit about the Cambrian explosion. Source
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How Plants Talk When We’re Not Around

anesthesia, associative learning, biology, Claude Bernard, communications, consciousness, fungi, gene expression, glutamate, Hailing Jin, heliotropism, Life Sciences, Mimosa pudica, miRNAs, nervous system, Neuroscience & Mind, plants, psychology, Rainer Hedrich, RNA, sensory hair, shameplant, TMAO, Venus flytrap, vernalization, worms
One genuine surprise in recent decades has been the discovery that plants have nervous systems like animals. Source
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Evans et al. (2021): All Four Examples Debunked

animals, axial polarity, Cambrian Explosion, Cambrian News, circular reasoning, Darwin’s House of Cards, Dickinsonia, Ediacaran fossils, Ediacaran organisms, Ediacaran specialists, Eukaryonta, Evans et al. (2021), Evolution, evolutionary biology, Facebook, Gregory Retallack, Ikaria, La La Land, lichen, marine protozoans, Mary Droser, muscles, nervous system, paleontology, Precambrian House of Cards Series, Tom Bethell, Tree of Life, Tribrachidium, trilobozoans, University of Oregon
Evans et al. (2021) seem to have been well aware of the circular reasoning in their argument. Source
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