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Updated: June 28, 2025
Sparsely peopled, isolated from civilization as is the 'great jurassic island' in our own day lost as it seems to have been in the pages of French history it was inhabited by our prehistoric forerunners, contemporaries of the great cave-bear. The entire department of the Lozere is a rich palaeontological field, and the Causse Mejean especially has afforded abundant treasure-trove.
The palaeontological talk continued as far as the entrance of the assembly hall. The zest with which Mr. Warricombe spoke of his discovery never led him to raise his voice above the suave, mellow note, touched with humour, which expressed a modest assurance.
We know that the alluvium of the same district, having a similar relation to the present geographical outline of the valleys, is of Pleistocene date, for it contains around Le Puy the bones of Elephas primigenius and Rhinoceros tichorhinus; and this affords us a palaeontological test of the age of the human skeleton of Denise, if the latter be assumed to be coeval with the lava stream above referred to.
Here, apparently, was the Palaeontological Section, and a very splendid array of fossils it must have been, though the inevitable process of decay that had been staved off for a time, and had, through the extinction of bacteria and fungi, lost ninety-nine hundredths of its force, was nevertheless, with extreme sureness if with extreme slowness at work again upon all its treasures.
I have recently been adjured with much solemnity; to state publicly why I have "changed my opinion" as to the value of the palaeontological evidence of the occurrence of evolution. To this my reply is, Why should I, when that statement was made seven years ago?
But we continually overrate the perfection of the geological record, and falsely infer, because certain genera or families have not been found beneath a certain stage, that they did not exist before that stage. In all cases positive palaeontological evidence may be implicitly trusted; negative evidence is worthless, as experience has so often shown.
On the absence of intermediate varieties at the present day On the nature of extinct intermediate varieties; on their number On the lapse of time, as inferred from the rate of denudation and of deposition number On the lapse of time as estimated by years On the poorness of our palaeontological collections On the intermittence of geological formations On the denudation of granitic areas On the absence of intermediate varieties in any one formation On the sudden appearance of groups of species On their sudden appearance in the lowest known fossiliferous strata Antiquity of the habitable earth.
It may be true, as a general rule, that groups of the same species of animals and plants may extend over wider areas than deposits of homogeneous composition; and if so, palaeontological characters will be of more importance in geological classification than the test of mineral composition; but it is idle to discuss the relative value of these tests, as the aid of both is indispensable, and it fortunately happens, that where the one criterion fails, we can often avail ourselves of the other.
On the other hand, while the palaeontological record can never prove that a species arose by mutations, it does sometimes show that species arise by very gradual modification. The Chalk period, which we have just traversed, affords a very clear instance. One of our chief investigators of the English Chalk, Dr.
W. B. Scott, an expert evolutionist, says, "It must not be supposed that there is any exact mathematical ratio between the degrees of relationship indicated by the blood tests, and those which are shown by anatomical and palaeontological evidence.... It could hardly be maintained that an ostrich and a parrot are more nearly allied than a wolf and a hyena, and yet that would be the inference from the blood tests."
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