Biology: How Life Works
Biology: How Life Works
3rd Edition
ISBN: 9781319017637
Author: James Morris, Daniel Hartl, Andrew Knoll, Melissa Michael, Robert Lue, Andrew Berry, Andrew Biewener, Brian Farrell, N. Michele Holbrook
Publisher: Macmillan Higher Education
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Chapter 22.4, Problem 12SAQ
Summary Introduction

A kind of evidence that is used to date the timing of the first eukaryotic cell is fossil record. the direct evidence of the evolutionary history can be obtained by the fossil record. The fossil are remains of organisms that preserved in the sedimentary rocks. Since eukaryotes possess well defined morphological features (nuclear membranes and organelles), they can be fossilized easily compared to bacteria and archaea.

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Phylogenies based on structural or molecular comparisons of living organisms create hypotheses about the period or timing of evolutionary transformations through the history of life on earth, for example, humans. Based on comparisons between the DNA sequences of humans and chimpanzees, it was revealed that chimpanzees are the native relatives of humans. Therefore, this hypothesis is strongly supported by observations that humans and chimpanzees share several characteristic features noticeable at a glance.

Fossils show the history of life and also the past and present processes of evolution on earth. For instance, the capability to walk upright evolved earlier humans evolved a larger-than-average brain. Lucy, the famous specimen of Australopithecus afarensis, dating on about 3.2 million years ago. It was observed that it was fully bipedal, however, it had a brain relatively similar to chimpanzee’s brain. Hence, Lucy (a mix of ancestral characters) provides strong support for a phylogenetic tree that reveals that both chimpanzees and humans are sister taxa.

Therefore, from the above-given example, the criticism of evolution (theory of evolution is impossible to falsify) theory is made false.

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Fossil: The Language & History of Paleontology; Author: Alliterative;https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x9yNwRBlKtU;License: Standard youtube license