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Besides committing a number of errors, Bernard Kettlewell also ignored one very important factor. It is not only the species B. betularia in which melanic forms have spread in the wake of environmental pollution. An increase in dark-colored individuals had been observed in other insect species. Some 100 cases of melanism had been identified in various life forms.304 For example, dark- colored form had increased in the two-spotted ladybird, Adalia bipunctata, while light-colored individuals declined in numbers.
The colors in the two-spotted ladybird, approximately 3.5to 5.5 millimeters (0.1378 to 0.1969 of an inch) in size, exhibit variation.305 But birds do not hunt these insects because they find their taste unattractive.s In other words, there is no question of dark-colored individuals not being eaten by birds simply because they are better camouflaged. Since melanic ladybirds absorb solar energy and environmental heat better, they are better adapted to smoky environments. This phenomenon is known as thermal melanism.306 Every living thing has been created with systems and forms to allow it to survive in the environment where it lives. For example, the two-spotted ladybird is seen to lighten in color in low temperatures and to darken in high temperatures.307 In other words, ladybirds' colors can change and darken according to temperature, which rises in tttline with air pollution.
The clear significance of this has been known for long time. Melanism in moths may come about under the impact of very different factors beyond those claimed by Kettlewell. Indeed, three biologists—Theodore Sargent, Craig Millarand David Lambert—set out these likely factors in a paper published in 1998: These include probable difference in the moths' and/or in their larvae's tolerances towards toxic or harmful chemical substances, and their sensitivity to parasites. These three researchers evaluated the case of the Industrial-Revolution moths, mythologized by evolutionists, in these terms: "There is little persuasive evidence, in the form of rigorous and replicated observations and experiments, to support this explanation at the present time."308
Similar views have been expressed by many other scientists. According to the Italian biologists Giuseppe Sermonti and Paola Catastini, "Kettlewell's experiments do not prove in any acceptable way, according to the current scientific standard, the process he maintains to have experimentally demonstrated." They concluded that, "The evidence Darwin lacked, Kettlewell lacked as well." 309 In short, the evidence that Darwin couldn't supply is still lacked by contemporary evolutionists.
The views of the Japanese biologist Atuhiro Sibatani on this subject represent a definitive judgment for evolutionists: "... the story of industrial melanism must be shelved, at least for the time being, as a paradigm of neo-Darwinian evolution ..." 310 According to Sibatani, excessive devotion to neo-Darwinist theory led to other factors being left completely out of the equation. In addition, it led to regarding weak evidence—for melanism being dependent on natural selection—more favorably than it actually should have been. But this is not surprising in the least, because Darwinists have always resorted to all kinds of methods to advance the theory of evolution's acceptance.
The story of the Industrial- Revolution moths is just another one of the countless hollow evolutionary proofs produced for the sake of validating the theory.
Professor Jerry Coyne says that it should be removed from the scientific literature, and describes the lessons to be learned from it:
First, for the time being we must discard Biston as a well-understood example of natural selection in action, although it is clearly a case of evolution ... It is also worth pondering why there has been general and unquestioned acceptance of Kettlewell's work. Perhaps such powerful stories discourage close scrutiny. 311
References
- Bernard Kettlewell, The Evolution of Melanism, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973; Michael Majerus, Melanism: Evolution in Action, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998. ↩
- Prof. Dr. Ali Demirsoy, Yaşamın Temel Kuralları, Entomoloji, Vol. II / Nov. II, 5th edition, Ankara: Meteksan Publishing, 1997, p. 556. ↩
- E.R. Creed, "Geographic variation in the two-spot ladybird in England and Wales," Heredity, Vol. 21, 1966, pp. 57-72; E.B. Ford, Ecological Genetics, 4th ed., London: Chapman and Hall, 1975; P.M. Brakefield, "Polymorphic Muellerian mimicry and interactions with thermal melanism in ladybirds and a soldier beetle: a hypothesis," Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, Vol. 26, 1985, pp. 243-267. ↩
- Prof. Dr. Ali Demirsoy, Op. cit., p. 236. ↩
- T.D. Sargent, C.D. Millar, and D.M. Lambert, "The ‘classical' explanation of industrial melanism: assessing the evidence," Evolutionary Biology, Vol. 30, 1998, p. 318. ↩
- Giuseppe Sermonti, Paola Catastini, "On industrial melanism: Kettlewell's missing evidence," Rivista di Biologia 77 (1984): 35-52. ↩
- Atuhiro Sibatani, "Industrial Melanism Revisited," Rivista di Biologia 92, 1999, p. 546. ↩
- Jerry A. Coyne, "Not black and white," Loc cit., pp. 35-36. ↩