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Book by: Thomas F. Heinze · ©2005 · 96 pgs.
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Ernest Haeckel, a follower of Darwin, believed that at the beginning of a new life, as the embryo grows, it passes through the various stages of its evolutionary history. He called this idea the biogenetic law, and popularized it in 1866 with a series of pen and ink drawings which is still used to convince students of evolution.
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Faked Drawings Haeckel drew the embryos as he felt they should have looked if each embryo passed through the same stages in its development that its evolutionary ancestors had followed in the course of their evolution. These drawings were then presented as evidence that an embryo actually goes through the same stages its species had gone through while evolving to its present state. Its best known claim is that at one stage of development a human embryo looks like a fish with gills. This stage is supposed to show that humans evolved from fish, and that as the human embryo grows, each human passes again through that stage. Above-left, top row: Haeckel's drawings of several different embryos, showing incredible similarity at their early "tailbud" stage. Bottom row: Richardson's photographs of how the embryos of these same animals really look at the same stage (see reference 13 for species names). Many modern evolutionists no longer claim that the human embryo repeats the adult stages of its alleged evolutionary ancestors, but point to Haeckel's drawings (top row) to claim that it repeats the embryonic stages. However, even this alleged support for evolution is now revealed as being based on fake drawings. |
The drawings were exposed as fraudulent by a number of scientists as early as 1874, while Haeckel was still alive. Despite being exposed, Haeckel's theory is often presented as a law of science. Some of his drawings are still in school books today.
Jonathan Wells, in his book, “Icons of Evolution”, critiques seven biology textbooks, mostly from 1998 and 1999, which use Haeckel's drawings. (1) In spite of Haeckel's drawings being exposed as fakes, many, even among today's leading evolutionists, still think they are true. Wells writes,
"In February 2000 textbook-writer Douglas Futuyma posted a message to a Kansas City internet forum in response to a creationist who had accused him of lying by using Haeckel's embryos in his 1998 textbook [advanced college level], Evolutionary Biology. In his defense Futuyma explained that before reading the critic's accusation he had been unaware of the discrepancies between Haeckel's drawings and the actual vertebrate embryos."Futuyma, though a well-known, well-informed, and highly respected evolutionist, probably never would have learned about the hoax had that creationist not told him in the email.
A few honest evolutionists continue to discover the hoax, and expose it. For example, M. K. Richardson discovered the hoax and in 1998 exposed it in the journal Science, saying:
"Haeckel's drawings of 1874 are substantially fabricated. In support of this view, I note that his oldest 'fish' image is made up of bits and pieces from different animals - some of them mythical. It is not unreasonable to characterize this as 'faking.' Later editions of Haeckel's drawings were somewhat more accurate... Sadly, it is the discredited 1874 drawings that are used in so many British and American biology textbooks today." (2)Richardson's article in Science stirred up letters to the editor insisting that since the embryo evidence is in so many textbooks, it must be true. I followed the discussion as Richardson answered the objections with more letters published in Science. The few people who read that journal seemed to eventually be convinced because the letters objecting to Richardson's article stopped. Now things will probably continue as they were until another scientist discovers the fraud, becomes embarrassed at having been deceived, and writes an article in another journal. At this writing the fraud has been making converts to evolution for almost 150 years. It makes one wonder, would the textbooks still use this fake evidence to convince people of evolution if there was real evidence they could use instead?
To avoid criticism, some school books show short, hard to identify portions of Haeckel's drawings, and others attribute them to someone else. In these cases, old fraud is hidden by new fraud, and Haeckel continues to make converts to evolution.
What makes the idea believable is that there really are some similarities between a human embryo and some lower forms of life. Most animals are somewhat similar in basic structure, being made of cells, and also in basic function, needing nutriment, oxygen, and a way to dispose of waste materials. The drawings were faked, however, by adding similarities that don't really exist in order to claim that the embryo passes through one after another of the stages of its evolutionary history.
The resemblances to lower animals that really do exist are usually quite superficial. In the case of the famous "gill slits," the embryo, when a month old, has certain folds on what is becoming its neck, but these folds never have either the function or the material of gills. The tissue of the folds is actually developing into jaw, neck, etc., not into gills, yet some young people are still told that their embryos went through a gilled stage, and are fed the conclusion: "...fish and humans shared an ancient gilled ancestor." (3) Or just that men evolved from fish.
While I was writing this book its chapters were posted on creationism.org. I expected to receive indignant emails from evolutionists when they found out they had been deceived; that their school books had hoodwinked them. I was not prepared, however, for who they would be indignant with. It was not with Haeckel who had perpetrated the scam. It was not even with the school books that promoted a known fraud for 150 years. On the contrary, they defended both Haeckel and the school books, and were outraged with me! I was trying to rob them of an argument that for years has been effective in making converts for what seems to have become their religion. That, as far as I can tell, was more important than truth. If you feel this way too, don't think by writing me an indignant letter you can change my mind. Remember, the converts the faked embryos are bringing into your religion are taken from mine!
After our schools squeezed out the Creator, it was only natural for them to cleanse the schools of the Creator's 10 commandments as well. People, however, must believe something. Perhaps it is significant that one of the kids who ushered in the era of the school house shootings wore a tee shirt emblazoned with the words "survival of the fittest." Acting out that message by murdering his schoolmates is still not acceptable, but wearing the message seems not to have received any official criticism. The right to free speech extends to every one — except the Creator! A public school my own children attended would not even permit the use of the word Christmas because it is made up of two words, one of which is Christ.
Abortion
Back to Haeckel: Even though his theory was known to be false, teaching it as if it were true has influenced society in another way as well. I believe that some of your friends are having abortions today because Haeckel falsified his drawings in 1866. If you think this is far fetched, I still receive emails like the following:
"I furthermore don't believe that people are having abortions due to his drawings which I acknowledge were not correct, however they weren't that far off, at conception you are not a human you are a group of cells, you do not become a human until you develop the traits of a human. By your reasoning, any cluster of developing cells is a human which obviously is not true." As you see by this email, even after people acknowledge that Haeckel's arguments were not correct, some still find it hard to let go of the error.In Oregon, where I live, not only abortion, but even murder of unborn babies has been legal. Read this quote from an article entitled "Fetus Stabbed In The Womb Dies," in the Portland newspaper, The Oregonian:
"The fetus of a woman who was stabbed in the abdomen two weeks ago by a man who came into her family's store died last week, police said. ...The woman continues to recover from her injuries at OHSU Hospital."In the eyes of the law, the attacker did not kill an unborn baby, but just a fetus, and that was okay. Haeckel's drawings trumped a woman's right to choose. The legislators who wrote that law believed their biology textbooks which showed that at one stage an unborn baby looks much more like a fish or a pollywog than a human. Such power to convince is the reason the false drawings have been used so long.Clackamas County prosecutor Michael Regan said the death of the fetus is not expected to have legal implications for Alfredo Cortes-Villa, 20, of Salem, who has been charged with the attack. A fetus cannot be a homicide victim, according to state law. A homicide victim is defined as a human being who has been born and was alive at the time of the criminal act that led to his death." (4)
Today, however, a powerful new influence is pulling society back toward truth. Ultrasound is showing an evergrowing number of people what their unborn babies really look like, and it is not like the drawings. It has taken 150 years, but the textbook position is becoming such an embarrassment that evolutionists may, with a sigh of reluctance, drop it.
Before I finished this book, a new national law burst onto the scene, making it illegal to stab unborn babies. The Oregonian includes this comment:
"Opponents of the proposal, while saying they sympathized with the desire to severely punish anyone who would attack a pregnant woman, said they were troubled by the definition of the 'child in utero' covered under the bill as 'a member of the species Homo sapiens at any stage of development, who is carried in the womb."The next paragraph adds these important words:
"...they thought that once the definition was written into federal law, it would ultimately be used as an argument to overturn existing laws protecting abortion rights." (5)I can understand why people who were convinced in school that the fetus goes through fish, pollywog and whatnot stages would be concerned about the new definition.
Let me clarify my position. I do not claim that a new embryo starts out as a perfect miniature adult. It starts out as two cells which unite and become one, and then grow from there. But a human baby is human from the moment of conception. The development of the embryo is directed by human DNA. There is no stage when the development of the embryo is determined by monkey DNA or fish DNA. The DNA for each form of life contains the instructions for constructing and maintaining its body. The instructions are written in a chemical code which is passed on to its offspring. RNA copies sections of the code as needed and takes them to the parts of the cell that translate and use the information. A baby fish is fish at every stage, just as a human baby is fully human even when it is not fully developed. It does not begin as a lower animal, and gradually become a human. You will never hear of a paternity test like this: "We tested the DNA of Megan's fetus and found that the father was a fish!"
Endnotes
1 pp.102-107; como exemplo, veja o livro da Prentice Hall “Biology,
The Living Science”, 1998, p.223.
2 Michael K. Richardson, Science, vol. 281, 28 August 1998.
3 John H. Postlethwait, Janet L. Hopson, McGraw-Hill, “The
Nature of Life”, 1995, p.373.
4 Noelle Crombie, The Portland Oregonian, 30 December 2003.
5 The Oregonian, 26 March 2004, p. A7.
<http://www.creationism.org/books/HeinzeVanishing/HeinzeVanishChap02_en.htm>
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