Haeckels' Drawings Part II

Nope. I admitted as much before - I presented an alternative hypothesis to show that your interpretation of the presented evidence can lead to an entirely different conclusion. Thus: more evidence is needed to differentiate the two interpretations. It is telling that you automatically assume one interpretation. Either you have more information than you are telling us, or you decided that you didn't want to believe in evolution and used this as a reason.The two interpretations:randman: Either deliberately or through some Evolutionary Indoctrination, evolutionists saw something that supported evolution and blindly accepted it, then they taught it to lots of kids so that they would blindly believe it. Evolutionists ignored the criticisms of the creationists as they always do, but as usual the creationists were right and the evolutionists were wrong.Mod: Haeckel's comparitive embryology made it into the textbooks. After some time, the pictures were modified, and the known fakes were discarded. Comparitive embryology was a discipline that fell out of favour (probably due to genetic science coming to the fore), the last pieces of work into the field were all that textbook makers had to go on, so they printed the diagrams. Creationists, bless 'em said the diagrams were wrong. It seems they never showed why they were wrong, just pointed at the dirty history behind the pictures and as usual, made some bare assertions...they were ignored because, as usual, most of what creationists say is utter claptrap (*cough thermodynamics cough*).It wasn't until comparitive embryology started to come back that a comparitive embryologist finally used modern technology to show why Haeckel's diagrams were erroneous, where he exagerated features, and more importantly omitted other features. This kind of work hadn't been done before, and in light of actual evidence textbook makers modified the diagrams.If creationists were serious about their work, they would have done some comparitive embryology and shown the errors, it would have upped their credibility 1000-fold. The work was done, the conclusions drawn. Why reinvent the wheel? Actually some of the fake drawings were common knowledge, and thus were not used (at least you have not shown where the known fakes were used). The rest were generally regarded as being OK, though with some questions...the people who were unaware of the problem were the textbook makers, not the entire biological community of evolution scientists. The claims were thought to have been substantiated. Critics disputed it, critics dispute a hell of a lot of things. It's one thing to dispute something, its a whole world of difference to present evidence that falsifies a claim. It seems that nobody took the time to verify the evidence. Indeed, but both are right. IT is slow, it is gradual...however it is possible that a lot of changes happened in relatively short periods of time. But, that's off topic, so let's not get too bogged down here with the deadly sin of scientists who modify theories to fit the evidence. This is probably a whole thread in its own right (indeed it has been many times over).

Evidently the work was not done, however it was perceived that the work was either done, or nothing of interest lay in its further study. I believe in this area of evolutionary study, heterochrony was the thing to be investigating. If you think that most of the evidence for evolution lies with embryology, you must have been taught it very oddly. I was always taught comparative embryology as an afterthought. Neither did creationists - that's why the came up with the idea that life has changed on earth over time...no other explanation has explained the fossil record better. Fossil evidence is highly off topic, but the gaps in the fossil record have never been thought to not be a problem, it was just hoped that further excavations would close some of those gaps up a little. Wow - wait a minute, you actually did comparative embryology with photographic evidence in the 80s? You should have written about it, you'd have beaten all the eminent embryologists in their own field. You could have at least given the photographs to a real scientist, say a creation scientist, and let him write a paper on it. Nevertheless, this is just an assertion. I've heard your assertions before. We're here to try and see what evidence for these assertions we can dig up. If all people checked the work of their forefathers in their field, they would have little time to do the work they are actually being paid for. If just one creationist checked, made sure the data was correct and presented a case for why the data was so wrong, millions of students would have not been exposed to these drawings. Well, if they were anything like me somebody said to them "Embryos seem to have common structures during their development such as pharyngeal arches, here are some simple diagrams that show what we mean", and then they go an check and find out that these common features are well documented and they say "Excellent, now, on with my own life". It doesn't strike a whole lot of people to check the accuracy of diagrams in high school text books. Indeed, it isn't the job of your average evolutionary scientist to check these diagrams, it is the job of the textbook maker and his/her editor.If creationists knew these diagrams were so bad, and did nothing but whinge about it to themselves, I would consider that negligence. What is this large group? What is the error? Are we talking all evolutionists? Most evolutionists aren't embryologists, indeed comparative embryology was (and I believe still is) a small section of the evolutionary community. So basically a small group of phDs didn't dispute one diagram that was in their high school text book. Reduces the problem somewhat to think of it like that.Nevertheless, all you have done here is present your case that a problem occurred. I agree, but I think the problem was that of the textbook makers not the people that do the science. This is the point we reached the last time, and you have been unable to present any evidence that would differentiate between the two interpretations.

No, but you would have to independently compare embryos. Embryos aren't something we did a lot of comparing of in high school. Yes ANYONE. Not just 'evolutionists' but evolutionist's opponents, the creation scientists. Why did they engage in rhetoric and not science? Indeed, but its not always practical. One cannot force humans to do something, so somethings don't get rechecked...its a systematic error but an unassailable one. In science the checking is done by the curious or the sceptical. Should we go to the moon again just to ensure that it isn't made out of cheese? Which is your opinion. Creation science is almost never good science, what's your point.Once again, you have reasserted than an error was made, a rather fundamental error, one that is as a result of the system. That is all. I agree that an error (or a sequence of errors) was/were made. The onus is on you to actually provide some evidence that this error was anything more sinister than that. At this time we have just been discussing textbook makers. Let me clarify it one more time, The system of compiling textbooks is flawed in that the people that compile and edit the textbooks rely on other textbooks and what science is saying, and when science is silent about something, it just reports the last fundamental things.Is evolution flawed because the scientists no longer wanted to engage in comparitive embryology? No. The textbook makers were in error for simply accepting an old piece of evidence because it was easy and clear, as opposed to such things as heterochrony which is not so straightforward.Can you demonstrate that it is fair/logical to tar the scientists with same brush as the people that report the science in textbooks which get bought by schools?

I'd be interested to see some references to this. I wouldn't be surprised given high school text book standards, but I would certainly agree that it would be a gross error. Amusingly, the Origin of Species had a chapter called 'Recapitulation and Conclusion'...simply using the word doesn't really hold any significance. Once again you've jumped from textbook makers to evolutionists. Either show how you made the leap (perhaps by showing how the evolution scientists were continuing the work on /to claim ontology recapitulates phylogeny) or stop using this potentially dishonest tactic If you still dispute the existence of pharyngeal pouches despite one of your only primary sources discussing their existence and significance then we are truly stuck. What's the false claim? About pharyngeal pouches? Show me some science which shows how they don't exist, aren't something that a lot of embryos from varying organisms share, and don't go on to develop into gills in fish. That is to say, pharyngeal pouches in human embryos are homologous with the structures in fish that go on to develop gills. You were even shown how the same arch/pouch goes on to perform some similar functions in humans as it does in fish (ie salt regulation). May I remind you, you have not provided any evidence that would differentiate our two models yet. Just more opinion, interpretation and assertions. If that is all we are going to do, is there any point?You have also frequently conflated textbook makers with all people associated and involved evolutionary theory and its affiliated hypothesis.This message has been edited by Modulous, Wed, 03-August-2005 06:54 AM

What we are discussing here is the reasons why Haeckel's diagrams were used in textbooks discussing evolution, specifically those used by school pupils (the reason might be indoctrination, or it might be a fundamental problem with the text book making procedure). The responsibility for the content of these books does not lie with every human being that accepts the theory of evolution (evolutionists) but with the writers, editors, publishers and illustrators (where necessary).Conflating the two, is not necessarily dishonest, but it isn't fair unless you can show that it is. Thus, unless you are going to refer to all evolutionists in general, it would be appropriate to begin to refer to the guilty party: text book makers. Excellent. I agree that the term 'gill slits' isn't very good, but fortunately it is on its way out. It is one of those poor pieces of nomenclature that echos and remains, it has some relevance since they (the pouches) are indeed homologous with structures that become gills, but it isn't a very specific peice of terminology. Nowadays it seems to be just one of those simple term being used rather than the technical and correct term. I do not see any evidence that its usage was used to 'push/indoctrinate' evolution. I agree, and its one of those problems text book makers have, geting the terms right. Gill pouches seems to be an almost acceptable term if used in the proper context (ie when discussing homology of structures), but basically text books language should be clear and unambiguous and unfortunately this is not always the case.

I wrote Message 27 where I said:

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The responsibility for the content of these books does not lie with every human being that accepts the theory of evolution (evolutionists) but with the writers, editors, publishers and illustrators (where necessary).

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The lack of reply I take to mean either a concession, a memory lapse, ignoring or a lack of interest.I think I'll scratch the last two, ignoring since I give credit to randman, and the latter because the thread is still ongoing.If it is a memory lapse, consider this a reminder.Otherwise I will continue with the assumption that this is a concession. Rather than using the umbrella term evolutionist we'll directly refer to the party's accused.So, according to your Message 26 the guilty parties can be broken down as this:1. textbooks (or rather, as I have been saying, the writers thereof)
2. introductory teachers
3. authors that write books explaining ToEI think we can, for the most part conflate (1) and (3), and since (2) are generally bound by various laws to teach what is written in (1) and (3) we can, for the moment, discount them.so we now have one prime culprit, textbook authors. Exactly as I have been trying to state for some time now.The follow-up argument randman has used is that evolutionist scientists should have done the research that Richardson did regarding comparitive embryology. I don't believe that scientists should be compelled to do research they do not want to do: the science community is not under a fascist regime that dictates research projects.Thus, we see that textbook authors are principally in error, and in some cases all that error was was trusting in the accuracy of other textbooks.

No, I'm not sure how I can word this any more simply. Let me try it this way:Textbook authors are not ALL evolutionists. They are a specific subset thereof. There is no justification for saying 'evolutionists are guilty of x' when it has only been shown that a subset of evolutionists are actually the guilty party.This is like saying "Muslims are dangerous fanatics who kill innocents to further their agenda", when it is Islamic Fundamentalists who are the dangerous fanatics. Let's see what your response would look like if we were discussing Islam:

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Are you suggesting that Islamic Fundamentalists are not Muslims?

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Incredible.

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Obviously this is not what was being suggested. Great! Indeed, and it includes many more, like geneticists, paleontologists etc. When discussing the Haeckel's Diagram issue, we are generally referring to a subset of 'evolutionists' known as textbook authors. It is not the responsibility of paleontologists to check school textbooks' sections on comparitive embryology, that is the responsibility of editors and committees. Creationists were welcome to demonstrate why the diagrams were in error, rather than just asserting it. I've asked you to show this, and all you did was show me examples of creationists criticizing the diagrams because some of them were shown to be fraudulent (though the ones that were ousted as fraudulent (for example the dog embryos) weren't generally the ones used in textbooks).So far along our road of discovery we have agreed that textbook authors and those who are directly in charge of the textbook process were in error for printing erroneous diagrams.Next, you have to demonstrate why we should now add comparitive embryologists to the list. Are all comparitive embryologists morally/legally obligated to check educational resources to ensure accuracy?Indeed are the scientists of any given field likewise obligated to check said resources?I wonder if we should then hold anti-evolutionist engineers responsible for letting the thermodynamics argument get used in the public domain? Who can we hold responsible for Hovind?

Since you didn't address the central theme of my post I take that as a concession regarding how to identify the parties we are discussing? And a concession that the scientists in the appropriate field are not responsible for the contents of textbooks.I said:

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Creationists were welcome to demonstrate why the diagrams were in error, rather than just asserting it. I've asked you to show this, and all you did was show me examples of creationists criticizing the diagrams because some of them were shown to be fraudulent (though the ones that were ousted as fraudulent (for example the dog embryos) weren't generally the ones used in textbooks).

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you responded: And you provide an example. The first part is about Ontogeny recapitulates Phylogeny, which is not currently under discussion. The quote then goes on to assert that Haeckel's diagrams were inaccurate and uses Richardson's paper to back that up. It does not show anti-evolutionists/creationists demonstrating the inaccuracies before Richardson, which is what I was asking for. You say the book was published in 1996/84, but clearly the edition you are quoting from wasn't, since it references papers written in 1997.AbE: I just realized, the quoted section is actually commentary about his book which he made in 1999. That is almost what I am asking you to show. Here it is again: Show that creationists/anti-evolutionists demonstrated the inaccuracies of these diagrams rather than just asserting that to be the case.This message has been edited by Modulous, Tue, 23-August-2005 11:35 AM

To quote Shakespeare: 'this learned constable is too cunning to be understood'I fail to see a rebutal image to Haeckel's.

Which is what I said. Agreed, it would be impossible for it to do that...as I pointed out. Came out with what? That there was some fraud surrounding Haeckel's diagrams? That wasn't what was requested, do I have to say it a third time? Perhaps it would an idea to re-read what I said. What am I not admitting? I have not denied that there was a book published in 1984 that criticized Haeckel and his biogenetic law. I believe Gould published a book containing the same criticisms (indeed rather scathing ones) in the 70s. True, but that depends on how you define evos doesn't it? That fraud was committed was widely known to those in the relevant fields as far as I'm aware. The inaccuracies in the remaining diagrams did come as somewhat as a surprise to many. The evolutionists that were surprised that the diagrams were so inaccurate evidently believed a lie. Well that's the point isn't it. Did they know the diagrams were so inaccurate? I'm asking you to show some work, done by anybody, that goes towards explaining exactly why the diagrams were not a good representation of the embryos they purported to be.

Because I've never studied embryos live, so don't know what they actually look like, relying only on pictures, photographs and diagrams. Or were you you using the impersonal? It might be clearer if you worded 'How could one not know...' so that I don't get confused between personal and inpersonal. Indeed several aspects of their fraud was known (such that Haeckel's dog embryo was rarely seen ), however that some elements were frauds does not mean that the the other elements were grossly inaccurate. That would be a good start. It would also be great if some halfway modern comparative embryology could be referenced. No. I know that Haeckel's opponents criticized Haeckel, and some elements of the fraud was uncovered at that time (duplicate engravings). That isn't in question. It would certainly be useful to see what was said then. However, more important is to see what was said once they had become concreted into textbooks. I believe we have established that nobody, creationist nor evolutionist, did any significant work comparable to Haeckel's to demonstrate, in modern times the problems associated with the work. Not until Richardson. Indeed, obvious perhaps to masters of comparitive embryologists, obvious to people who were directly opposing Haeckel's work due to rivalries...was it so obvious in the modern period when the works of Baer and co were gathering dust and comparitive embryology was not the focus of science? No. I'm trying to discover the truth. What errors in Haeckel's work were known in the 19th Century? Were these errors known in the mid to late 20th Century? Who knew? Did they tell anybody? Who? How? To get to the bottom of this we need to answer these kinds of questions.I was hunting around the old web, and I found an article by Gould in Nature magazine that actually reflects precisely what I have hypothesized since this issue raised its head:

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Haeckel's drawings, despite their noted inaccuracies, entered into the most impenetrable and permanent of all quasi-scientific literatures: standard student textbooks of biology. I do not know how the transfer occurred in this particular case, but the general (and highly troubling) principles can be easily identified. Authors of textbooks cannot be experts in all subdisciplines of their subject. They should be more careful, and they should rely more on primary literature and the testimony of expert colleagues, but shortcuts tempt us all, particularly in the midst of elaborate projects under tight deadlines.

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emphasis mineThat's exactly what I've been saying, straight from the mouth of one of the most eminent evolutionary historians.

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Therefore, textbook authors often follow two suboptimal routes that usually yield adequate results but can also engender serious trouble: they copy from previous textbooks, and they borrow from the most widely available popular sources. No one ever surpassed Haeckel in fame and availability as a Darwinian spokesman and a noted professor at the University of Jena. So textbook authors borrowed his famous drawings of embryonic development, probably quite unaware of their noted inaccuracies and outright falsifications--or (to be honest about dirty laundry too often kept hidden) perhaps well enough aware, they then rationalized with the ever tempting and ever dangerous argument "Oh well, it's close enough to reality for student consumption, and it does illustrate a general truth with permissible idealization." (I am a generous realist on most matters of human foibles. But I confess to raging fundamentalism on this issue. The smallest compromise in dumbing down by inaccuracy destroys integrity and places an author upon a slippery slope of no return.)

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Once ensconced in textbooks, misinformation becomes cocooned and effectively permanent, because, as stated above, textbooks copy from previous texts.

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Read the full article

No, I'm saying that some of the drawings were known to be fraudulent (I don't think it has been established that all of the drawings were ousted, but I could be wrong). I claim that it was not common knowledge how inaccurate the drawings were. No. I think I've made myself clear on that. Wooops, there you go again. Let me reword that for you

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It seems the approach of high school textbook authors is to copy what looks good without always checking its substance

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That's a bit better. Remeber that discussion we had about evolutionists and how they were the superset, and the discussion was actually about a subset of evolutionists known as textbook authors? It was only a few posts ago, and I don't want to have to over it all again, thanks for your consideration. You're logic has led you astray. Let me help,

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Well, this illustrates the threshold of "evidence" for high school textbook authors, imo, and is a major reason I do not trust any data put forth by high school textbook authors

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Which would a laudable sentiment which you would have my agreement on (largely, most of the material is reliable, but sometimes it isn't). No, they shouldn't have been submitted after they had been shown to be fraudulent. But yes, as Gould said and I agreed with, high school textbook authors should be more careful and consult the primary literature or the relevant field experts. Exactly, this is part of the systematic error in high school text book publishing I have previously been referring to. I think you might finally be getting my point of view here. Scary. I think you might have exaggerated things here. From what I remember the duplicates were dog/human/turtle (IIRC they were duplicates of the fanciful human embryo) and something else. There were lots of others that weren't duplicated, just fudged. Well that's great. Why on earth did you never present this when I asked why nobody had done what Richardson did? I'm assuming you aren't merely referring to Haeckel's contempories but some work done in the mid to late twentieth century?I feel we are close to coming to an agreement.

All that you showed me was that Dewar wrote a book which discusses embryology. I don't remember actually seeing what was said unfortunately. I know that creationists made claims that these were fraudulent, so far all we have is them doing in popular press books. So they weren't written to anyone, just general books that the important audience (high school textbook authors) would probably never get hold of. Creationists write a lot of books, they make a lot of claims and assertions. Pretty much everything they say is a load of crap. Its called boy cried wolf syndrome. Creationists shot themselves in the foot with that unfortunately. All I'm looking for is creationists were responsible with this revelation. They had a valuable piece of information, it would be a shame if they just wrote it all down in general books. What I'm looking for is evidence that a creationist made a formal presentation to a major textbook publisher demonstrating why the diagrams should not be used. Actually had a paper, like Richardsons. Shown photographs of embryos and compared them with the diagrams in the textbooks. Actually showed them exactly, clearly and without hotheaded rhetoric, what the problem was.That's all. I know that if a school near me was peddling something I thought was fraudulent or indoctrinating or whatever the creos claim these diagrams might be indicitave of, you can get bet my response wouldn't be to write a really angry sounding book....it would be to actually get in touch with the people responsible, their superiors, anyone I could.If you can show me that happened, and the publisher ignore them, you will certainly have a partner in anger against that particular publisher.

I've already agreed that creationists have asserted, in popular press, that Haeckel's drawings were fraudulent. I'd debate some of the things you listed could count for this, as I have done before, but its irrelevant for the moment.I haven't seen any actual specific data yet.You are still conflating evolutionists and text book writers. Wasn't it 1997? I don't think it matters, but this isn't under a massive amount of debate. No, I think it is indicative of a massive flaw in the science education text book compilation procedure. Gould agreed with me. I agree. That's a nice opinion. Unfortunately it has no support. Indeed, given that the paper was 1997, when the internet was still a small place, it seems to contradict that scenario. Do you mean 'why did text book compilers not correct this earlier?' if not then the answer to the question is another question "Why did creos not correct this earlier?" Yes, the flaw and those to blame are, as Gould put it, with the text book compilers, which are notorious for immortalizing incorrect information through the process of copying from earlier works. You have yet to succesfully show that all people that accept evolution are at fault for this scenario.If you want to close the discussion, I think I should repeat Gould's statement, which is quite a good conclusion:

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Haeckel's drawings, despite their noted inaccuracies, entered into the most impenetrable and permanent of all quasi-scientific literatures: standard student textbooks of biology. I do not know how the transfer occurred in this particular case, but the general (and highly troubling) principles can be easily identified. Authors of textbooks cannot be experts in all subdisciplines of their subject. They should be more careful, and they should rely more on primary literature and the testimony of expert colleagues, but shortcuts tempt us all, particularly in the midst of elaborate projects under tight deadlines.

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SourceAnd likewise for creos, only they often cling to ideas that never had merit in the first place, even after being shown why their ideas are wrong. But that's just opinion and is irrelevant. By text book compilers at the high school level. It didn't keep being used by evolutionary scientists. Once again, this seems to be a text book issue, not evolutionary science. I am in agreement with you that high school text books are a quagmire of problems. Why? It was only the text books that used this 'slogan'. Evolutionary scientists didn't, unless you can show they did. If you do, I will agree that said scientist was wrong. Why the sinister cloak and dagger conspiracy theories? Why not the mundane, normal reason, that there is a fundamental problem with the high school text book compilation culture? There did appear to be a single phylotypic stage. There is strong reason to accept that. It might be wrong, it might be right. This is a matter of debate within science, and your asserting that the question has been answered is a little premature. Yes, I even linked you to a paper that showed this stage, demonstrating the controversy. 'evos' don't teach. Teachers teach. Some teachers are 'evos', most teachers just teach what the curriculum tells them to and what is in their text books. I refer you to the publisher you have cited as apologizing and changing their pictures. I point you to Gould. I point you to me. The field didn't ignore the facts. How you continue to conflate education of a field with the actual field amazes me. As Gould said, this is a big problem, verification of text book material is appauling, and there should be some way to encourage the publishers to have more responsibility for this. It illustrates the way that text books are compiled. Anything else is a leap of your making that you have failed to provide the steps you took.