Yet another blow to the myth of vestigial organs

Darwinism considers all life on Earth as a productof chance mutations
andnatural selection and, as ana prioricommitment, excludes
intelligent design. In order to argueagainst design, the Darwinist
mind seeks forflaws in the biological systems. From Darwin to Dawkins,
over and over, this dogmatic stance has led the evolutionist to insist
on the existence ofimaginary flaws and"useless" vestigial organsin
living systems. However, over and over, these bold claims by
evolutionists turned out to be manifestations of ignorance.The
allegedly vestigial organs were discovered to be performing very
important functions and the whole "vestigial organ" argument turnedout
to be a fallacy.
The history of science documents a steady reduction in the numberof
the so-called vestigial organs. The allegedly non-functional organs,
one by one, turned out to be organs whose functions had not yet been
discovered. A list ofvestigial organs that wasmade by the German
Anatomist R. Wiedersheim in 1895 included approximately 100
structures, includingthe appendix and the coccyx.As science
progressed, it was discovered that all of theorgans in
Wiedersheim'slist in fact had very important functions. Forinstance,
it was discovered that theappendix, which was supposed to be
a"vestigial organ," was in fact a part of the lymphatic system. A
medical publication notes in 1997 that "otherbodily organs and tissues
- the thymus, liver, spleen, appendix, bone marrow, and small
collections of lymphatic tissue such as the tonsils in the throat and
Peyer'spatch in the small intestine - are also part of the lymphatic
system. They too help the body fight infection." ( 1)
It was also discovered that the tonsils, which were also included in
Wiedersheim's list of vestigial organs, had a significant role in
protecting the throat against infections, particularly until
adolescence. It was found that the coccyx at the lower end of the
vertebral column supports the bones around the pelvis and is the
convergence point of some small muscles and for this reason, it would
not be possible tosit comfortably without a coccyx.
In the years that followed,it was realized that the thymus triggered
the immune system in the human body by activating the T cells, that
the pineal gland was in charge of the secretion of some important
hormones, that the thyroid gland was effective in providing steady
growthin babies and children, and that the pituitary gland controlled
the correct functioning of many hormone glands. All of these were once
considered to be"vestigial organs." Finally, the semi-lunar fold in
the eye, which was referred to as a vestigial organ by Darwin, has
been found in fact to be in charge ofcleansing and lubricating the
eye.
The steady reduction in the list of vestigial organs results from the
fact that this is an argument from ignorance. Some wiser evolutionists
also came to realize this fact. S.R. Scadding, an evolutionist
himself, once wrote in his article"Can vestigial organs constitute
evidence for evolution?" published in the journalEvolutionary Theory:
Since it is not possible tounambiguously identify useless structures,
and since the structure of the argument used is not scientifically
valid,I conclude that "vestigial organs" provide no special evidence
for the theory of evolution. ( 2)
The Leg of the Horse
The latest blow to the myth of vestigial organs comes from a recent
study of the leg of the horse. An article in the 20-27 December 2001
issue of the Nature magazine, entitled"Biomechanics: Damper For Bad
Vibrations", it is noted that "Some musclefibers in the legs of horses
seem to be evolutionary leftovers with no function. But in fact they
may act to absorb damaging vibrations generated in the leg as the
horse runs." The article reads:
Horses and camels have muscles in their legs with tendons more than
600 millimeters long connected to muscle fibers less than 6
millimeters long. Such short muscles can change length only by a few
millimeters as the animal moves, and seemunlikely to be of much use to
large mammals. The tendons function as passive springs, and it has
been assumed that the short muscle fibers are redundant, the remnants
of longer fibers that have lost their function over the course of
evolution. But Wilson and colleagues argue… that these fibers might
protect bones andtendons from potentiallydamaging vibrations….
Their experiments show that short muscle fibers can damp the damaging
vibrations following the impact of a foot on the ground. When the foot
of a running animal hits the ground, the impact sets the leg
vibrating; the frequency of the vibrations is relatively high - for
example, 30-40 Hz in horses - so many cycles of vibration would occur
while the foot was on the ground if there were no damping.
The vibrations might cause damage, because bone and tendon are
susceptible to fatigue failure. Fatigue in bones and tendons is the
accumulation of damageresulting from repeated application of stresses.
Bone fatigue is responsible for the stressfractures suffered by both
human athletes and racehorses, and tendon fatigue may explain at least
some cases of tendonitis. Wilsonet al. suggest thatthe very short
muscle fibers protect both bones and tendons from fatigue damage by
damping out vibrations… ( 3)
In short, a closer look at the anatomy of the horse revealed that, the
structures that had been considered as nonfunctional by evolutionists
have very important functions. In other words, scientific progress
demonstrated that what was considered to be evidence for evolution
isin fact evidence for design.
Evolutionists should takea hint from this fact, if they are willing to
do so.These comments made inNatureseem reasonable:
Wilson et al. have found an important role for a muscle that seemed to
be the relic of a structure that had lost its function in the courseof
evolution. Their work makes us wonder whether other vestiges (such as
the human appendix) are as useless as they seem. ( 4)
This is not surprising.The more we learn about nature, the more we see
the evidence for God's creation. As Michael Behe notes, "theconclusion
of design comes not from that we do not know, but from what we have
learned over the past 50 years." ( 5) And Darwinism turns out to be an
argument from ignorance, or, in other words, an"atheism of the gaps."