Burchell, P. J.
News
All human transitional forms discovered
Introduction
Creationists, naturalists and historians alike will be interested to know that to date, every single transitional form has now been found and fully documented, between modern humans (Homo sapiens) and their last common ancestor with chimpanzees (Pan Troglodytes)1.
The Project
Since the discovery of a number of high profile transitional forms (Lucy, Java Man, Turkana Boy, Cheddar Man, etc) work has been ongoing, funded by SJIS, to uncover the remaining forms in between and including P. troglodytes and H. sapiens. Although primarily conducted for the advancement of human evolutionary biology, this work was also undertaken following criticism by creation science groups for failing to provide sufficient evidence of the existence of what they term 'missing links'.
The Specimens
Where possible, fresh specimens were collected to catalogue the most very recent of transitions towards the modern human (this has been unfortunately referred to in the mainstream media as 'The Great Scientific Genocide of 2015'). For slightly earlier forms, skeletons with varying levels of tissue were collected, primarily from historical sites/museums where dead humans have been on display, as well as graves and cemeteries from all over the world (this has been unfortunately referred to in the mainstream media as 'The Worldwide Grave Robbery Scandal of 2015', or simply '#gravegate'). One interesting specimen of this type was collected from underneath a car park in Leicester2. For earlier forms than this, all the way back to the common ancestor itself (Pan prior), fossils
Scientific Method
4
Forming hypotheses is the second part of the highly anticipated 'Scientific Method' Series.
So you've made your observations (see last issue's instalment) and have questions that you want answered. Good. Questions are what make a hypothesis hypothetical. They're what the uneducated refer to when they say 'only a theory', whereas a theory in the scientific sense is a logical construct and the best explanation fitted to a series of verifiable facts.
If you're particularly pretentious, you may want to consider forming a null hypothesis, the nihilistic sibling of the regular hypothesis. If you decide the null hypothesis is for you, then reform the regular hypothesis into an entirely pessimistic viewpoint. For example, "an increase in temperature has no effect on a bucket of water".
"But what do I do with all these hypotheses I've got cluttering up the place?" I hear you ask. Well, join us next issue where we'll look at the next (and everyone's favourite) stage of the scientific method: the test.
hypotheses