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Does Botany Support Creation or Evolution?: Mit Kent Hovind, Massimo Pigliucci. Menü . Filme. Veröffentlichungskalender Die 250 besten Filme Meistgesehene Filme Filme nach Genre durchsuchen Top Box Office Spielzeiten und Tickets Filmnachrichten Spotligh ...
- Overview
- Evolution and paleobotany
- Evolution of land plants from the Ordovician Period through the middle Devonian
The evolutionary history of plants is recorded in fossils preserved in lowland or marine sediments. Some fossils preserve the external form of plant parts; others show cellular features; and still others consist of microfossils such as pollen and spores. In rare instances, fossils may even display the ultrastructural or chemical features of the plants they represent. The fossil record reveals a pattern of accelerating rates of evolution coupled with increasing diversity and complexity of biological communities that began with the invasion of land and continued with the progressive colonization of the continents. At present, fossil evidence of land plants dates to the Ordovician Period (about 485.4 million to 443.8 million years ago) of the Paleozoic Era. However, research using “molecular clock” methodology, which uses genetics to estimate how long species have been separated from a common ancestor, suggests that plants started to colonize terrestrial environments around 500 million years ago, about the middle of the Cambrian Period.
By far the most diverse and conspicuous living members of the plant kingdom are vascular plants (tracheophytes), in which the sporophyte phase of the life history is dominant. (See above Life histories.) Fossil remains of vascular plants provide evidence for evolutionary changes in the structure of the plant body (sporophyte and gametophyte), in the variety of plant forms, in the complexity of the life history, in the tolerance for ecological conditions, and in systematic diversity. Nonvascular plants, or bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, and hornworts), are much smaller and less diverse than vascular plants. The first evidence for liverworts occurs in rocks laid down between 473 million and 471 million years ago, during the Ordovician Period, whereas the earliest moss fossils are from the Permian Period (298.9 million to 251.9 million years ago). In contrast to tracheophytes, most fossil bryophytes are relatively similar to living forms. Understanding of the evolution of nonvascular plants is, therefore, less complete than for tracheophytes.
The evolutionary history of plants is recorded in fossils preserved in lowland or marine sediments. Some fossils preserve the external form of plant parts; others show cellular features; and still others consist of microfossils such as pollen and spores. In rare instances, fossils may even display the ultrastructural or chemical features of the plants they represent. The fossil record reveals a pattern of accelerating rates of evolution coupled with increasing diversity and complexity of biological communities that began with the invasion of land and continued with the progressive colonization of the continents. At present, fossil evidence of land plants dates to the Ordovician Period (about 485.4 million to 443.8 million years ago) of the Paleozoic Era. However, research using “molecular clock” methodology, which uses genetics to estimate how long species have been separated from a common ancestor, suggests that plants started to colonize terrestrial environments around 500 million years ago, about the middle of the Cambrian Period.
By far the most diverse and conspicuous living members of the plant kingdom are vascular plants (tracheophytes), in which the sporophyte phase of the life history is dominant. (See above Life histories.) Fossil remains of vascular plants provide evidence for evolutionary changes in the structure of the plant body (sporophyte and gametophyte), in the variety of plant forms, in the complexity of the life history, in the tolerance for ecological conditions, and in systematic diversity. Nonvascular plants, or bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, and hornworts), are much smaller and less diverse than vascular plants. The first evidence for liverworts occurs in rocks laid down between 473 million and 471 million years ago, during the Ordovician Period, whereas the earliest moss fossils are from the Permian Period (298.9 million to 251.9 million years ago). In contrast to tracheophytes, most fossil bryophytes are relatively similar to living forms. Understanding of the evolution of nonvascular plants is, therefore, less complete than for tracheophytes.
Botanists now believe that plants evolved from the algae; the development of the plant kingdom may have resulted from evolutionary changes that occurred when photosynthetic multicellular organisms invaded the continents. The earliest fossil evidence for land plants consists of isolated spores, tracheid-like tubes, and sheets of cells found in Ordovician rocks. The abundance and diversity of these fossils increase into the Silurian Period (about 443.8 million to 419.2 million years ago), where the first macroscopic (megafossil) evidence for land plants has been found. These megafossils consist of slender forking axes that are only a few centimetres long. Some of the axes terminate in sporangia that bear trilete spores (i.e., spores that divide meiotically to form a tetrad). Because a trilete mark indicates that the spores are the product of meiosis, the fertile axes may be interpreted as the sporophyte phase of the life cycle.
Fossils of this type could represent either vascular plants or bryophytes. Another possibility is that they are neither but include ancestors of vascular plants, bryophytes, or both. The earliest fossils also include at least one or more additional plant groups that became extinct early in the colonization of the land and therefore have no living descendants. By the early Devonian Period (about 419.2 million to 393.3 million years ago), some of the fossils that consist of forking axes with terminal sporangia also produced a central strand of tracheids, the specialized water-conducting cells of the xylem. Tracheids are a diagnostic feature of vascular plants and are the basis for the division name, Tracheophyta.
The simplest and presumably most primitive vascular plants from the late Silurian and early Devonian periods (about 419.2 million to 393.3 million years ago) were the Rhyniopsida. They included plants such as Cooksonia and Rhynia, which were herbaceous colonizers of moist habitats. Most were less than 30 cm (12 inches) tall. The plant body was not differentiated into stems, leaves, and roots; rather, the forking aboveground axes bore terminal sporangia and produced stomata, which demonstrate that the plants were green and photosynthetic. Surface or underground axes served to root the plant and were anchored by rhizoids. Because such plants produced only one type of spore, they were nonseed plants with a homosporous life cycle and free-living gametophytes. A small number of such gametophytes have been described from Devonian deposits.
Some plants of the early Devonian had multicellular emergences of tissue along their aboveground axes, which are thought to have increased the light-capturing surface of the photosynthetic tissue. Such emergences (enations) gave rise to the leaves (microphylls) of the Lycopsida, thus producing an aboveground shoot system that consisted of branching stems with leaves. Underground axes that lacked leaves would have become the roots. Lycophytes were the first plants with well-differentiated shoot systems, and they are the most ancient groups of vascular plants with living representatives.
The leaves of several other plant groups were derived from modifications of the forking axes. There was a variety in structure among Devonian plants. The axes of some plants forked equally, whereas other plants—e.g., Drepanophycus—were more specialized, comprising a large centrally located axis as well as smaller axes borne laterally. In plants where the lateral systems branched in only one plane, the side branches were flat like leaves. Filling in (webbing) of the spaces between forks of the laterals with photosynthetic tissue produced leaves called megaphylls. There is evidence for the evolution of megaphylls in several plant groups of the late Devonian Period (about 382.7 million to 358.9 million years ago) and early Carboniferous Period (about 358.9 million to 323.2 million years ago). Although most of these groups have no living representatives, by the Carboniferous Period they had given rise to homosporous ferns, sphenopsids (horsetails), and seed plants (gymnosperms).
As Devonian plants with microphylls and those with specialized branching systems diversified, many grew to the size of shrubs. By the middle Devonian Period (about 393.3 million to 382.7 million years ago), there were shrub-size representatives of several lineages, but a further increase in the size of herbaceous plants was restricted by the limited diameter that aboveground stems and rooting systems could achieve. The development of lateral (secondary) growth overcame this size restriction. The ability to produce secondary growth evolved independently in several groups. In the lycophytes, much of this secondary growth occurred in cortical tissues; in the ancestors of seed plants and several other lineages, however, the production of wood accounted for most of the growth in stem diameter. About the same time, downward-growing central rooting systems evolved independently in lycophytes and other plant groups. As a result, there were forests with a canopy of giant lycophyte and gymnosperm trees near the beginning of the Carboniferous Period.
The debate topic is "Does Botany Support Creation or Evolution? Dr. Hovind takes on Dr. Massimo Pigliucci, assistant professor of botany at The University of Tennessee. Creation vs Evolution Debate 12 is part of Dr. Kent Hovind's Debate Series. Dr. Hovind has debated over 100 evolutionists and atheists.
Amazon.com: Does Botany Support Creation or Evolution? - (Creation Vs Evolution Debate 12: Kent Hovind & Masimo Pigliucci) : Movies & TV
Evolution explains both the diversity and unity of life. Through time, some species evolved adaptations that increased their ability to survive and reproduce in their environment. This gave them an evolutionary advantage to other species.
Dr. Hovind vs. Assistant Professor of Botany Dr. Massimo Pigliucci
29. Sept. 2023 · September 29, 2023 5 min read. Discover the fascinating history of botany, from Aristotle and Theophrastus to modern advancements in photosynthesis and genetic engineering. Explore the milestones that have shaped our understanding of plants and their biology.
