In his book The God Delusion, prominent atheist Richard Dawkins wrote, "As J. B. S. Haldane said when asked what evidence might contradict evolution, 'Fossil rabbits in the Precambrian.'" But how does Haldane's rather sarcastic and flippant remark translate into English? Well, consider that the Precambrian describes the geologic period of time between the origin of life and the Cambrian explosion. According to our experts in paleontology, this particular period of time during the Earth's development was dominated by single-celled organisms that descended via asexual reproduction from LUCA, an acronym referring to our Last Universal Common Ancestor, formed by a secular miracle of chemical reaction. So a fossil showing the presence of a more complex and modern product of sexual reproduction, such as a rabbit or a human, shouldn't be found in rocks formed long before that particular creature could have come into existence, according to these "rules" of evolution. When Darwin famously suggested that "monkeys make men", he could have claimed that protozoa make men, but his idea presented in The Origin of Species would have been harder to defend using comparative anatomy as the only weapon in Darwin's arsenal of evidence to argue in favor of common descent rather than common design. The idea that every living organism is related through common descent is the very heart and soul of Darwin's theory -- the belief that simple organisms can gradually evolve to become more complex, given the vagaries of time, through variety created by descent with modification via … [Read more...]
The reward for fostering a dog
The very first short story I wrote about animal rescue and fostering dogs was about Trooper, a little yellow dog once struck by a car and left for dead. He became one of the many animals my wife and I fostered during our tenure with the Humane Society of Forsyth County, when he had recovered well enough to leave the veterinary hospital. Whenever someone says that they couldn't foster a dog or cat because they are afraid of becoming too attached, I often think of Trooper. My wife and I would have loved to have kept him, but he was a very desirable dog that proved easy to place in the perfect "forever" home where he wouldn't have to compete with the pack for attention. Trooper is the reason why my book was named Always a Next One: true stories of dog fostering. If we had adopted him, we couldn't have fostered Bessie the Basset Hound or any of the other dogs that followed Trooper. Only by helping good dogs like Trooper and Bessie go to the right homes, perfect homes for them, were we able to help save even more animals. It was easy to become attached to the fosters, and not as easy to let them go. I'd be lying if I said otherwise. We fostered Pancho for over a year before the perfect home for him came along. I grew very attached to him. Unlike Trooper, Pancho had people issues and wouldn't easily fit into just any home. When the perfect home for him finally came along, it would have been wrong for me to keep Pancho. If we hadn't let go of Pancho, we might not have had space for Trooper during his recovery. There was a great reward for having that … [Read more...]
Amazing Gracie’s terrible ordeal
In my book Always a Next One, I shared the story of how my wife and I came to rescue Gracie, a skittish little Norwegian Elk Hound pursued by a dedicated group of animal rescue volunteers for more than a month before someone finally caught up to her. Today, I'm going to tell you the story of an even more harrowing rescue attempt that happened only yesterday. This is Amazing Gracie. As this picture suggests, she's not a very big dog, perhaps slightly overweight for her size at around forty pounds. Of course, every member of our pack is special in their own right. But Gracie has endeared herself to the point she is the only dog in the pack with more than one nickname. She's also the baby of the pack. Depending on the circumstances, she has been called my sunshine because she brightens my day, our little butter bean because of her somewhat rotund body, the Chupacabra because of her feigned aggression at mealtime, and she's even been called snicker doodle, for some strange reason -- by me. I can't begin to explain how or why those words occasionally come out of my mouth when I'm talking to Gracie, so I won't even try. However, her whole body wiggles with joy when I say her name. How could anyone not love a dog that looks like a little grey German Shepherd and acts like she loves them with every fiber of her being? How could I help feeling a little more protective of her than I would, say, of a ninety pound German Shepherd who would eat you if you posed a threat to me, or my family? Compared to the mighty Ox or big, ferocious-sounding Shiloh, Gracie … [Read more...]
