Even evolutionary paleontologists are largely convinced that the media’s recent promotion of a new “missing link” is a monumental overstatement. There is little doubt that the hype surrounding the fossilized lemur “Ida” is primarily bluff and bluster.¹ But her media campaign may actually be a more significant story than the fossil itself.

Flu is in the news, with some people fearing a possible pandemic from the latest strain. The most recent threat, initially labeled “swine flu,” comes from an H1N1 influenza virus, the same “subtype” responsible for the horrendous 1918 Spanish influenza outbreak. What makes this virus new is that it traded parts with other flu viruses and mutated.

A recent study discovered that certain molecules mimic the exact shapes of other molecules, allowing them to interact in a way that protects the genetic integrity of their host organism.

Scientists observe many changes to animal physiology that occur too quickly to fit the “slow and gradual” concepts favored by classical Darwinian evolution. An illustration of this type of rapid variation is the ever-growing list of dog breeds, which proliferated to over 150 from only a few dozen strains in just a couple of centuries.

Darwin’s original conception of simple-to-complex evolution maintained that nature selected certain individuals with superior features, and in this way gradually, one tiny feature at a time, an entirely different creature could eventually form.