The Myth of Homology

Anyone who studies the different living species in the world may observe that there are some similar organs and features among these species. The first person to draw materialistic conclusions from this fact, which has attracted scientists' attention since the eighteenth century, was Charles Darwin.

Darwin thought that creatures with similar (homologous) organs had an evolutionary relationship with each other, and that these organs must have been inherited from a common ancestor. According to his assumption, both pigeons and eagles had wings; therefore, pigeons, eagles and indeed all other birds with wings were supposed to have evolved from a common ancestor.

Homology is a tautological argument, advanced on the basis of no other evidence than an apparent physical resemblance. This argument has never once been verified by a single concrete discovery in all the years since Darwin's day. Nowhere in the world has anyone come up with a fossil remain of the imaginary common ancestor of creatures with homologous structures. Furthermore, the following issues make it clear that homology provides no evidence that evolution ever occurred.

1. One finds homologous organs in creatures belonging to completely different phyla, among which evolutionists have not been able to establish any sort of evolutionary relationship;

2. The genetic codes of some creatures that have homologous organs are completely different from one another.

3. The embryological development of homologous organs in different creatures is completely different.

Let us now examine each of these points one by one.

The Invalidity of Morphological Homology

The homology thesis of the evolutionists is based on the logic of building an evolutionary link between all living things with similar morphologies (structures), whereas there are a number of homologous organs shared by different groups that are completely unrelated to each other. Wings are one example. In addition to birds, we find wings on bats, which are mammals, and on insects and even on some dinosaurs, which are extinct reptiles. Not even evolutionists posit an evolutionary relationship or kinship among those four different groups of animals.

Another striking example is the amazing resemblance and the structural similarity observed in the eyes of different creatures. For example, the octopus and man are two extremely different species, between which no evolutionary relationship is likely even to be proposed, yet the eyes of both are very much alike in terms of their structure and function. Not even evolutionists try to account for the similarity of the eyes of the octopus and man by positing a common ancestor.

In response, evolutionists say that these organs are not "homologous" (in other words, from a common ancestor), but that they are "analogous" (very similar to each other, although there is no evolutionary connection between them). For example, in their view, the human eye and the octopus eye are analogous organs. However, the question of which category they will put an organ into, homologous or analogous, is answered totally in line with the theory of evolution's preconceptions. And this shows that the evolutionist claim based on resemblances is completely unscientific. The only thing evolutionists do is to try to interpret new discoveries in accordance with a dogmatic evolutionary preconception.

However, the interpretation they put forward is completely invalid. Because organs which they have to consider "analogous" sometimes bear such close resemblance to one another, despite being exceedingly complex structures, that it is totally illogical to propose that this similarity was brought about as a result of coincidental mutations. If an octopus eye emerged completely by coincidence, as evolutionists claim, then how is it that vertebrates' eyes can emerge by the very same coincidences? The famous evolutionist Frank Salisbury, who got dizzy from thinking about this question, writes:

Even something as complex as the eye has appeared several times; for example, in the squid, the vertebrates, and the arthropods. It's bad enough accounting for the origin of such things once, but the thought of producing them several times according to the modern synthetic theory makes my head swim.275

According to the theory of evolution, wings emerged independently of each other four times: in insects, flying reptiles, birds, and flying mammals (bats). The fact that wing with very similar structures developed four times—which cannot be explained by the mechanisms of natural selection/mutation—is yet another headache for evolutionary biologists.

One of the most concrete examples of such an obstacle in the path of evolutionary theory can be seen in mammals. According to the accepted view of modern biology, all mammals belong to one of three basic categories: placentals, marsupials and monotremes. Evolutionists consider this distinction to have come about when mammals first appeared, and that each group lived its own evolutionary history totally independent of the other. But it is interesting that there are "pairs" in placentals and marsupials which are nearly the same. Placental wolves, cats, squirrels, anteaters, moles and mice all have their marsupial counterparts with closely similar morphologies.276

In other words, according to the theory of evolution, mutations completely independent of each other must have produced these creatures "by chance" twice! This reality is a question that will give evolutionists problems even worse than dizzy spells.

One of the interesting similarities between placental and marsupial mammals is that between the North American wolf and the Tasmanian wolf. The former belongs to the placental class, the latter to the marsupials. Evolutionary biologists believe that these two different species have completely separate evolutionary histories.277 (Since the continent of Australia and the islands around it split off from Gondwanaland (the supercontinent that is supposed to be the originator of Africa, Antarctica, Australia, and South America) the link between placental and marsupial mammals is considered to have been broken, and at that time there were no wolves). But the interesting thing is that the skeletal structure of the Tasmanian wolf is nearly identical to that of the North American wolf. Their skulls in particular, as shown on the next page, bear an extraordinary degree of resemblance to each other.

Extraordinary resemblances and similar organs like these, which evolutionary biologists cannot accept as examples of "homology," show that homology does not constitute any evidence for the thesis of evolution from a common ancestor. What is even more interesting is that the exact opposite situation is to be observed in other living things. In other words, there are living things, some of whose organs have completely different structures, even though they are considered to be close relatives by evolutionists. For example, most crustaceans have eye structures of the "refracting lens" type. In only two species of crustacean—the lobster and the shrimp—is the completely different "reflecting" type of eye seen. (See the chapter on Irreducible Complexity.)

The Genetic and Embryological Impasse of Homology

The discovery which really overthrew homology is that organs accepted as "homologous" are almost all controlled by very different genetic codes. As we know, the theory of evolution proposes that living things developed through small, chance changes in their genes, in other words, mutations. For this reason, the genetic structures of living things which are seen as close evolutionary relatives should resemble each other. And, in particular, similar organs should be controlled by similar genetic structures. However, in point of fact, genetic researchers have made discoveries which conflict totally with this evolutionary thesis.

Similar organs are usually governed by very different genetic (DNA) codes. Furthermore, similar genetic codes in the DNA of different creatures are often associated with completely different organs. The chapter titled "The Failure of Homology" in Michael Denton's book, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, gives several examples of this, and sums the subject up in this way:

Homologous structures are often specified by non-homologous genetic systems and the concept of homology can seldom be extended back into embryology.278

This genetic question has also been raised by the well-known evolutionary biologist Gavin de Beer. In his book Homology: An Unsolved Problem, published in 1971, de Beer put forward a very wide-ranging analysis of this subject. He sums up why homology is a problem for the theory of evolution as follows:

What mechanism can it be that results in the production of homologous organs, the same 'patterns', in spite of their not being controlled by the same genes? I asked this question in 1938, and it has not been answered.279

Although some 30 years have passed since de Beer wrote those words, they have still received no answer.

A third proof which undermines the homology claim is the question of embryological development, which we mentioned at the start. In order for the evolutionary thesis regarding homology to be taken seriously, the periods of similar structures' embryological development—in other words, the stages of development in the egg or the mother's womb—would need to be parallel, whereas, in reality, these embryological periods for similar structures are quite different from each other in every living creature. Pere Alberch, an eminent developmental biologist, noted, it is "the rule rather than the exception" that "homologous structures form from distinctly dissimilar initial states." 280

The emergence of similar structures as the result of totally dissimilar processes is frequently seen in the latter stages of the development phase. As we know, many species of animal go through a stage known as "indirect development" (in other words the larva stage), on their way to adulthood. For instance, most frogs begin life as swimming tadpoles and turn into four-legged animals at the last stage of metamorphosis. But alongside this there are several species of frog which skip the larva stage and develop directly. But the adults of most of these species that develop directly are practically indistinguishable from those species which pass through the tadpole stage. The same phenomenon is to be seen in water chestnuts and some other similar species.281

To conclude, we can say that genetic and embryological research has proven that the concept of homology defined by Darwin as "evidence of the evolution of living things from a common ancestor" can by no means be regarded as any evidence at all. The inconsistency of homology, which looks quite convincing on the surface, is clearly revealed when examined more closely.

The Fall of the Homology in Tetrapod Limbs

We have already examined homology's morphological claim—in other words the invalidity of the evolutionist claim based on similarities of form in living things—but it will be useful to examine one well-known example of this subject a little more closely. This is the "fore- and hindlimbs of tetrapods," presented as a clear proof of homology in almost all books on evolution.

Tetrapods, i.e., land-living vertebrates, have five digits on their fore- and hindlimbs. Although these may not always look like fingers or toes, they are all counted as "pentadactyl" (five-digit) due to their bone structure. The hands and feet of a frog, a lizard, a squirrel, or a monkey all have this same structure. Even the bone structures of birds and bats conform to this basic design.

Evolutionists claim that all living things descended from a common ancestor, and they have long cited pentadactyl limb as evidence of this. But they know that this claim actually possesses no scientific validity.

Even today, evolutionists accept the feature of pentadactylism in living things among which they have been able to establish no evolutionary link. For example, in two separate scientific papers published in 1991 and 1996, evolutionary biologist M. Coates reveals that pentadactylism emerged two separate times, each independently of the other. According to Coates, the pentadactyl structure emerged independently in anthracosaurs and amphibians.282

This discovery is a sign that pentadactylism is no evidence for a "common ancestor."

Another matter which creates difficulties for the evolutionist thesis in this respect is that these creatures have five digits on both their fore- and hindlimbs. It is not proposed in evolutionist literature that fore- and hindlimb descended from a "common limb"; rather, it is assumed that they developed separately. For this reason, it should be expected that the structure of the fore- and hindlimbs should be different, the result of different, chance mutations. Michael Denton has this to say on the subject:

[T]he forelimbs of all terrestrial vertebrates are constructed according to the same pentadactyl design, and this is attributed by evolutionary biologists as showing that all have been derived from a common ancestral source. But the hindlimbs of all vertebrates also conform to the pentadactyl pattern and are strikingly similar to the forelimbs in bone structure and in their detailed embryological development. Yet no evolutionist claims that the hindlimb evolved from the forelimb, or that hindlimbs and forelimbs evolved from a common source… Invariably, as biological knowledge has grown, common genealogy as an explanation for similarity has tended to grow ever more tenuous… Like so much of the other circumstantial "evidence" for evolution, that drawn from homology is not convincing because it entails too many anomalies, too many counter-instances, far too many phenomena which simply do not fit easily into the orthodox picture.283

But the real blow dealt to the evolutionist claim of the homology of pentadactylism came from molecular biology. The assumption of "the homology of pentadactylism," which was long maintained in evolutionist publications, was overturned when it was realized that the limb structures were controlled by totally different genes in different creatures possessing this pentadactyl structure. Evolutionary biologist William Fix describes the collapse of the evolutionist thesis regarding pentadactylism in this way:

The older textbooks on evolution make much of the idea of homology, pointing out the obvious resemblances between the skeletons of the limbs of different animals. Thus the `pentadactyl' [five bone] limb pattern is found in the arm of a man, the wing of a bird, and flipper of a whale, and this is held to indicate their common origin. Now if these various structures were transmitted by the same gene couples, varied from time to time by mutations and acted upon by environmental selection, the theory would make good sense. Unfortunately this is not the case. Homologous organs are now known to be produced by totally different gene complexes in the different species. The concept of homology in terms of similar genes handed on from a common ancestor has broken down. 284

On closer examination, William Fix is saying that evolutionist claims regarding "pentadactylism homology" appeared in old textbooks, but that the claims were abandoned after molecular evidence emerged. But, some evolutionist sources still continue to put it forward as major evidence for evolution.

The Invalidity of Molecular Homology

Evolutionists' advancement of homology as evidence for evolution is invalid not only at the morphological level, but also at the molecular level. Evolutionists say that the DNA codes, or the corresponding protein structures, of different living species are similar, and that this similarity is evidence that these living species have evolved from common ancestors, or else from each other. For example, it is regularly stated in the evolutionist literature that "there is a great similarity between the DNA of a human and that of an ape," and this similarity is presented as a proof for the evolutionist claim that there is an evolutionary relationship between man and ape.

We must make it clear from the start that it is perfectly natural that living creatures on the earth should possess very similar DNA structures. Living things' basic life processes are the same, and since human beings possess a living body, they cannot be expected to have a different DNA structure to other creatures. Like other creatures, human beings develop by consuming carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins, oxygen circulates through the blood in their bodies, and energy is produced every second in each of their cells by the use of this oxygen.

For this reason, the fact that living things possess genetic similarities is no proof of the evolutionist claim that they evolved from a common ancestor. If evolutionists want to prove their theory of evolution from a common ancestor, then they have to show that creatures alleged to be each other's common ancestors have a direct line of descent in their molecular structures; in fact, however, as we shall shortly be examining, there have been no concrete discoveries showing any such thing.

Let us first of all take the matter of "the similarity between human and chimpanzee DNA." The latest studies on this issue have revealed that evolutionist propaganda about a "98 %" or "99 %" similarity between man and chimp is totally erroneous.

If a slightly wider study is made of this subject, it can be seen that the DNA of much more surprising creatures resembles that of man. One of these similarities is between man and worms of the nematode phylum. For example, genetic analyses published in New Scientist have revealed that "nearly 75% of human genes have some counterpart in nematodes—millimeter-long soil-dwelling worms."285 This definitely does not mean that there is only a 25% difference between man and these worms! According to the family tree made by evolutionists, the Chordata phylum, in which man is included, and the Nematoda phylum were different to each other even 530 million years ago.

This situation clearly reveals that the similarity between the DNA strands of these two different categories of life is no evidence for the claim that these creatures evolved from a common ancestor.

In fact, when the results of DNA analyses from different species and classes are compared, it is seen that the sequences clearly do not agree with any evolutionist family tree. According to the evolutionist thesis, living things must have undergone a progressive increase in complexity, and, parallel to this, it is to be expected that the number of genes, which make up their genetic data, should also gradually increase. But the data obtained show that this thesis is the work of fantasy.

The Russian scientist Theodosius Dobzhansky, one of the best-known theoreticians of evolution, once stated that this irregular relationship between living things and their DNA is a great problem that evolution cannot explain:

More complex organisms generally have more DNA per cell than do simpler ones, but this rule has conspicuous exceptions. Man is nowhere near the top of the list, being exceeded by Amphiuma (an amphibian), Protopterus (a lungfish), and even ordinary frogs and toads. Why this should be so has long been a puzzle.286

Other comparisons on the molecular level produce other examples of inconsistency which render evolutionist views meaningless. When the protein strands of various living things are analysed in a laboratory, results emerge which are totally unexpected from the evolutionists' point of view, and some of which are utterly astounding. For example, the cytochrome-C protein in man differs by 14 amino acids from that in a horse, but by only eight from that in a kangaroo. When the same strand is examined, turtles appear closer to man than to a reptile such as the rattlesnake. When this situation is viewed from the evolutionist point of view, a meaningless result will emerge, such as that turtles are more closely related to man than they are to snakes.

For instance, chickens and sea snakes differ by 17 amino acids in 100 codons and horses and sharks by 16, which is a greater difference than that between dogs and worm flies, which belong to different phyla even, and which differ by only 15 amino acids.

Similar facts have been discovered with respect to hemoglobin. The hemoglobin protein found in human beings differs from that found in lemurs by 20 amino acids, but from that in pigs by only 14. The situation is more or less the same for other proteins.287

This being the case, evolutionists should arrive at the conclusion that, in evolutionary terms, man is more closely related to the kangaroo than to the horse, or to the pig than to the lemur. But these results conflict with all the "evolutionary family tree" plans that have so far been accepted. Protein similarities continue to produce astounding surprises. For example:

Adrian Friday and Martin Bishop of Cambridge have analyzed the available protein sequence data for tetrapods… To their surprise, in nearly all cases, man (the mammal) and chicken (the bird) were paired off as closest relatives, with the crocodile as next nearest relative…288

Again, when these similarities are approached from the point of view of evolutionist logic, they lead us to the ridiculous conclusion that man's closest evolutionary relative is the chicken. Paul Erbrich stresses the fact that molecular analyses produce results that show very different groups of living thing to be closely related in this way:

Proteins with nearly the same structure and function (homologous proteins) are found in increasing numbers in phylogenetically different, even very distinct taxa (e.g.,hemoglobins in vertebrates, in some invertebrates, and even in certain plants).289

Dr. Christian Schwabe, a biochemical researcher from the University of South Carolina's Faculty of Medicine, is a scientist who spent years trying to find evidence for evolution in the molecular field. He first tried to establish evolutionary relationships between living things by carrying out studies on proteins such as insulin and relaxin. But Schwabe has several times been forced to admit that he has not been able to come by any evidence for evolution in his studies. He says the following in an article in Science:

Molecular evolution is about to be accepted as a method superior to paleontology for the discovery of evolutionary relationships. As a molecular evolutionist I should be elated. Instead it seems disconcerting that many exceptions exist to the orderly progression of species as determined by molecular homologies: so many in fact that I think the exception, the quirks, may carry the more important message.290

Schwabe's studies on relaxins produced rather interesting results:

Against this background of high variability between relaxins from purportedly closely related species, the relaxins of pig and whale are all but identical. The molecules derived from rats, guinea-pigs, man and pigs are as distant from each other (approximately 55%) as all are from the elasmobranch's relaxin. ...Insulin, however, brings man and pig phylogenetically closer together than chimpanzee and man.291

Schwabe was faced by the same realities when he compared the arrangements of other proteins besides insulin and relaxin. Schwabe has this to say about these other proteins that constitute exceptions to the orderly molecular development proposed by evolutionists:

The relaxin and insulin families do not stand alone as exceptions to the orderly interpretation of molecular evolution in conventional monophyletic terms. It is instructive to look at additional examples of purportedly anomalous protein evolution and note that the explanations permissible under the molecular clock theories cover a range of ad hoc explanations apparently limited only by imagination.292

Schwabe reveals that the comparison of the arrangement of lysosomes, cytochromes, and many hormones and amino acids show "unexpected results and anomalies" from the evolutionary point of view. Based on all this evidence, Schwabe maintains that all proteins had their present forms right from the start, undergoing no evolution, and that no intermediate form has been found between molecules, in the same way as with fossils.

Concerning these findings in the field of molecular biology, Dr. Michael Denton comments:

Each class at a molecular level is unique, isolated and unlinked by intermediates. Thus, molecules, like fossils, have failed to provide the elusive intermediates so long sought by evolutionary biology… At a molecular level, no organism is "ancestral" or "primitive" or "advanced" compared with its relatives… There is little doubt that if this molecular evidence had been available a century ago… the idea of organic evolution might never have been accepted.293

The "Tree of Life" is Collapsing

In the 1990s, research into the genetic codes of living things worsened the quandary faced by the theory of evolution in this regard. In these experiments, instead of the earlier comparisons that were limited to protein sequences, "ribosomal RNA" (rRNA) sequences were compared. From these findings, evolutionist scientists sought to establish an "evolutionary tree." However, they were disappointed by the results.

According to a 1999 article by French biologists Hervé Philippe and Patrick Forterre, "with more and more sequences available, it turned out that most protein phylogenies contradict each other as well as the rRNA tree."294

Besides rRNA comparisons, the DNA codes in the genes of living things were also compared, but the results have been the opposite of the "tree of life" presupposed by the theory of evolution. Molecular biologists James A. Lake, Ravi Jain and Maria C. Rivera elaborated on this in an article in 1999:

…[S]cientists started analyzing a variety of genes from different organisms and found that their relationship to each other contradicted the evolutionary tree of life derived from rRNA analysis alone.295

Neither the comparisons that have been made of proteins, nor those of rRNAs or of genes, confirm the premises of the theory of evolution. Carl Woese, a highly reputed biologist from the University of Illinois, admits that the concept of "phylogeny" has lost its meaning in the face of molecular findings in this way:

No consistent organismal phylogeny has emerged from the many individual protein phylogenies so far produced. Phylogenetic incongruities can be seen everywhere in the universal tree, from its root to the major branchings within and among the various [groups] to the makeup of the primary groupings themselves.296

The fact that results of molecular comparisons are not in favor of, but rather opposed to, the theory of evolution is also admitted in an article called "Is it Time to Uproot the Tree of Life?" published in Science in 1999. This article by Elizabeth Pennisi states that the genetic analyses and comparisons carried out by Darwinist biologists in order to shed light on the "tree of life" actually yielded directly opposite results, and goes on to say that "new data are muddying the evolutionary picture":

A year ago, biologists looking over newly sequenced genomes from more than a dozen microorganisms thought these data might support the accepted plot lines of life's early history. But what they saw confounded them. Comparisons of the genomes then available not only didn't clarify the picture of how life's major groupings evolved, they confused it. And now, with an additional eight microbial sequences in hand, the situation has gotten even more confusing.... Many evolutionary biologists had thought they could roughly see the beginnings of life's three kingdoms... When full DNA sequences opened the way to comparing other kinds of genes, researchers expected that they would simply add detail to this tree. But "nothing could be further from the truth," says Claire Fraser, head of The Institute for Genomic Research (TIGR) in Rockville, Maryland. Instead, the comparisons have yielded many versions of the tree of life that differ from the rRNA tree and conflict with each other as well...297

In short, as molecular biology advances, the homology concept loses more ground. Comparisons that have been made of proteins, rRNAs and genes reveal that creatures which are allegedly close relatives according to the theory of evolution are actually totally distinct from each other. A 1996 study using 88 protein sequences grouped rabbits with primates instead of rodents; a 1998 analysis of 13 genes in 19 animal species placed sea urchins among the chordates; and another 1998 study based on 12 proteins put cows closer to whales than to horses.

As life is investigated on a molecular basis, the homology hypotheses of the evolutionary theory collapse one by one. Molecular biologist Jonathan Wells sums up the situation in 2000 in this way:

Inconsistencies among trees based on different molecules, and the bizarre trees that result from some molecular analyses, have now plunged molecular phylogeny into a crisis.298

But in that case what kind of scientific explanation can be given for similar structures in living things? The answer to that question was given before Darwin's theory of evolution came to dominate the world of science. Men of science such as Carl Linnaeus and Richard Owen, who first raised the question of similar organs in living creatures, saw these organs as examples of "common creation." In other words, similar organs or similar genes resemble each other not because they have evolved by chance from a common ancestor, but because they have been created to perform a particular function.

Modern scientific discoveries show that the claim that similarities in living things are due to descent from a "common ancestor" is not valid, and that the only rational explanation for such similarities is "common creation."