The Journal of Biology and Life Science, published by the Macrothink Institute, has retracted a paper that claimed “fossil does not provides [sic] the convincing and direct evidences for evolution,” for reasons that they left to us to figure out.

The entire notice for “Fossils Evidences (Paleontology) Opposite to Darwin’s Theory,” allegedly written by Md. Abdul Ahad, of Hajee Mohamed Danesh Science and Technology University in Bangladesh, and Charles D. Michener, of the University of Kansas, reads:

That notice seems to have disappeared from the web, but is available as a Google cache. The same goes for the paper, which seems to have been published sometime this year. Here’s the abstract:

Darwin‟s Theory is a central theme of biology and all theories of evolution. Paleontology, the study of fossils provide convincing and the direct evidences for evolution. Save for, if the organisms of same class arise from the same ancestor as Darwin opine; fossil record should provides a series of fossil from the progressive to older deposits, that show stage of intermediate between specialized modern (existing) living organism, but no so found at all. Nevertheless, silicafied wood is a familiar example of plant fossils. Invertebrates have no hard parts, so, they are rarely form fossils but few insects found in amber as fossils. The entire vertebrate fossils are fragmentary bones. For example fossil of dinosaurs are thigh bone, arm bone, teeth, footprints, track, bite etc., and fossils of ancestors of human are skull fragments, teeth, jaws etc. Even these fossils are negligible amount and are not found in the original form but are moulds, casts, compression, impression, etc. The only unchanged fossil is the Woolly mammoth. Furthermore, transitional fossil is absent; claimed transitional fossils of Archaeopteryx and Seymouria are not transitional, they are true bird and true reptile, respectively. Obtain fossil are of fossil of present day organisms or are fossil of extinct organisms, which may form during a universal flood. Fossil evidences prove that humans have not evolve/descent from monkey lower animal. Even Darwin himself agreed in the “Descent of man‟ that origin of human cannot explain by science. Co-discoverer of natural selection Alfred Russel Wallace never believes that human is evolved from lower animal. Moreover, estimation of age of fossil, age of earth by radiometric method and preparation of geological time table (scale) is imaginary as it overlooks 3.5 billion year. Extinction of living organism never produce any new species, if produce, no need of biodiversity conservation convention to prevent extinction. Living fossils prove that there is no evolutionary relationship between fossils and existing organisms. The fathers of modern paleontology and geology opposed evolution. Consequently, paleontology does not provide convincing, strongest, verified, and direct evidences for evolution as well as fossils evidences are opposite to Darwin‟s Theory. Moreover, the scientists of the most countries except a few have no facility to work with fossils; due to lack of technologies even they have no chance to see the fossils too. That is why the evolutionists as well as paleontologists cunningly have shown the fossils as the direct evidences of organic evolution. Darwin stated that if the geological record be perfect then the main objection of his theory natural selection will be greatly dismissed or disappears and he, who rejects these views on the nature of geological record, would rightly reject his whole theory.

The conclusion:

It is seen from different literatures that fossil does not provides the convincing and direct evidences for evolution; instead fossil evidence is extremely poor and biased. As fossils are negligible amount and are fragmentary bone, so, like living organisms, it has no taxonomic classification such as order, family and so on, except Dinosaurs, whose classification is hypothetical. However, evolutionists have done extreme publicity about fossils to convince non-evolutionists. Moreover, the scientists of the most countries except a few have no feasibility to work with fossils, due to lack of technologies and other facilities. Even they have no chance to see the fossils too. That is why the evolutionists as well as the paleontologists cunningly have shown the fossils as direct and sound evidences for organic evolution. As a result, Ho (1988) pointed out that the symbol of natural selection is derived from the dominant socioeconomic ideology of the Victorian era, now rejected by nearly all humanity. Indeed, much of reason for the instant success of Darwin‟s theory is that it was cut off from the very fabric of Victorian era or the English society. There is no cause still to cling this metaphor. As it can serve no other purposes than to support those injustices, which gave it birth. So, a research articles are needed whether other evidences of evolution and Darwinian Theory of natural selection (in Origin of Species) as well as sexual selection (in The Descent of Man) theories are true or false.

It struck us as a bit odd that someone like Charles Michener — an award-winning entomologist who wrote the introduction to a 1993 edition of Darwin’s The Origin of Species — would co-author a paper like this, so we asked him what had happened. Turns out it struck him as a bit odd, too. He explained:

The paper was submitted with my name as coauthor, even though I had no knowledge of the paper and had never contributed in any way to its writing or ideas. I was completely surprised to find my name as coauthor of a paper about which I knew nothing. My desire is to remove my name as coauthor of a paper to which I had made no contribution. I also requested that my name not be cited as a contributor within the paper. It is probably editor of the journal who wrote of rejection of the paper, not merely the removal of my name as coauthor.

We’ve contacted author Ahad and the journal for more details, and will update with anything we learn.

Update, 7:45 a.m. Eastern, 3/25/14: The journal’s publisher sent us this unhelpful response:

Journal of Biology and Life Science will publish the paper online first before the publication date. For example, for the February 2014 issue, the papers accepted during August 2013-January 2014 will be assigned to be published in that issue. However, we will upload the papers online once it was accepted rather than waiting for the date of February 2014. Then the readers can review the paper and give us feedbacks, and we could finally evaluate the value of the paper. The one you related was pointed out there is some problem with the co-author’s agreement before the final publication date ( ). Therefore, we have published a notice and withdrew the paper from the website.

Hat tip: Rolf Degen

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