Archaeologica.org

All life on Earth evolved from a single-celled organism that lived roughly 3.5 billion years ago, a new study seems to confirm.

The study supports the widely held "universal common ancestor" theory first proposed by Charles Darwin more than 150 years ago.

(Pictures: "Seven Major 'Missing Links' Since Darwin.")

Using computer models and statistical methods, biochemist Douglas Theobald calculated the odds that all species from the three main groups, or "domains," of life evolved from a common ancestor—versus, say, descending from several different life-forms or arising in their present form, Adam and Eve style.

Minimalist wrote:

I sort of wish Arch was still here.

Invite him then.

Ishtar wrote:Don't worry, Min. That's just the effects of the aluminium and barium in the chemtrails over your neck of the desert!

In his 1859 book, On the Origin of Species, the British naturalist proposed that, "all the organic beings which have ever lived on this earth have descended from some one primordial form." Over the last century and a half, qualitative evidence for this theory has steadily grown, in the numerous, surprising transitional forms found in the fossil record, for example, and in the identification of sweeping fundamental biological similarities at the molecular level.

Digit wrote:At least I appear to be on the side of the angels this time.

Digit wrote:Habits can be hard to break.