Question

Short/Long answer type questions
How does palaeontological evidence support the theory of organic evolution? Explain with an example.

Answer 1

Palaeontology, the science of fossils, provides the strongest and direct evidence in support of the theory of organic evolution. Fossils are dead remains of plants and animals preserved in the rocks of the remote past. It supports the theory of organic evolution as following:-

(i) Number and Nature of Fossils in Early Rocks: The rocks of early era (e.g., Proterozoic) contain less number of fossils than the rocks of later era and only fossils of simple marine inver­tebrates are in these rocks

(ii) Distribution of Fossils in the Succes­sive Strata: The distribution of fossils indicates that early fossils present in the bottom rocks are simple, however, the recent fossils found in the upper layers of the rocks are more complex.

(iii) Missing Links (Transitional Forms): The fossil organisms which show char­acters of two different groups are called missing links. An example of the missing link is Archaeopteryx. It was found in the rocks of the Jurassic period. Archaeop­teryx was discovered in 1861 by Andreas Wagner from the lithographic quarry at Solenhofen, Bavaria, in Germany. This fossil is placed in the British Museum, London. It dis­plays the characters of both the reptiles and birds.