Joel Kontinen
Scorpions are one of the "oldest" living fossils or animals that have resisted Darwinian orthodoxy and refused to evolve for aeons. Research recently published in the journal Biology Letters suggests they already resembled modern scorpions “430 million years” ago.
A report in Nature Communications stated:
“Scorpions are known as ‘living fossils’ and represent a unique type of arthropod because they maintain the primary anatomical features of their ancient arthropod ancestors.”
In other words, they have not changed.
Writing in New Scientist, Sandrine Ceurstemont says:
“The world's oldest scorpions are thought to have led an aquatic life, but surprisingly, recently unearthed fossils are now hinting at a penchant for land. The remains of a new species, Eramoscorpius brucensis … thought to have lived 430 million years ago, are revealing legs adapted for walking out of the waves.”
The abstract in Biology Letters reveals that the researchers were surprised. They did not expect a land animal this old:
“One of the oldest known fossil scorpions, a new species from the mid-Silurian Eramosa Formation (430 myr) of Ontario, Canada, exhibits several surprising features. The depositional environment and associated biota indicate a marine habitat; however, the leg morphology of this scorpion, which has a short tarsus in common with all Recent scorpions, suggests that a key adaptation for terrestrial locomotion, the ability to support its weight on a subterminal ‘foot’, appeared remarkably early in the scorpion fossil record.”
The more we get to know about fossils, the more surprised evolution-believing researchers will become, as the fossils don’t support change of the Darwinian variety.
What they do show is that animals change according to their kinds, as Genesis tells us.
Sources:
Ceurstemont, Sandrine. 2015. Ancient sea scorpion shows off its land legs. New Scientist (14 January).
Genetics: ‘Living fossil’ provides insight into arthropod evolution. Nature Communications. October 16, 2013.
Waddington, Janet, David M. Rudkin and Jason A. Dunlop. 2015. A new mid-Silurian aquatic scorpion—one step closer to land? Biology Letters. (14 January).
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