Haeckel's Embryo Similarity Refuted
by Owen Borville
Mainstream textbooks on evolution commonly feature skewed illustrations of human embryos along with embryos of other animals to give evidence of macroevolution. Drawings of these various animal embryos were popularised by Ernst Haeckel in the 1860’s. These illustrations were later revealed to be fraudulent and grossly misrepresented. Not only the anatomy of the embryos but also their size were misrepresented in the illustrations. The sizes of the embryos were modified in the illustrations to show similarity along with the anatomy. Also, the stages of development were misrepresented in each embryo to show similarity.
Photographs of these animal embryos by embryologists around the world later revealed a substantial differentiation in appearance in later stages of development. The embryos revealed slight similarity in early stages but differentiated greatly in later stages of development. Embryos of different animals than Haeckel used were later photographed and shown to be substantially different among different animal kinds.
Creationists explain that an intelligent designer would feature similarities in different species or kinds that would later differentiate as the embryo developed. Creationists assert that each embryo from each animal kind is unique and while appearing somewhat similar in some ways, each embryo is different with a unique genetic code that was discovered later in history after the initial fraudulent illustrations. Real photographs of various animal kinds later showed how different their anatomies were.
by Owen Borville
Mainstream textbooks on evolution commonly feature skewed illustrations of human embryos along with embryos of other animals to give evidence of macroevolution. Drawings of these various animal embryos were popularised by Ernst Haeckel in the 1860’s. These illustrations were later revealed to be fraudulent and grossly misrepresented. Not only the anatomy of the embryos but also their size were misrepresented in the illustrations. The sizes of the embryos were modified in the illustrations to show similarity along with the anatomy. Also, the stages of development were misrepresented in each embryo to show similarity.
Photographs of these animal embryos by embryologists around the world later revealed a substantial differentiation in appearance in later stages of development. The embryos revealed slight similarity in early stages but differentiated greatly in later stages of development. Embryos of different animals than Haeckel used were later photographed and shown to be substantially different among different animal kinds.
Creationists explain that an intelligent designer would feature similarities in different species or kinds that would later differentiate as the embryo developed. Creationists assert that each embryo from each animal kind is unique and while appearing somewhat similar in some ways, each embryo is different with a unique genetic code that was discovered later in history after the initial fraudulent illustrations. Real photographs of various animal kinds later showed how different their anatomies were.
