Taxacom: initial terrestrial transitions

[John Grehan]

Happened to see a pop note on the web titled "New Fossil Trackways Reveal
Fish Left The Ocean 10 Million Years Earlier Than Thought" I guess some
people still think the oldest fossil is the oldest origin - until falsified
by an earlier fossil that is earlier 'than thought' (perhaps someone
should stop thinking).

The referenced article is Szrek et al 2025 "Traces of dipnoan fish document
the earliest adaptations of vertebrates to move on land" (open access).

Authors make a couple of interesting points: "The process of vertebrate
terrestrialisation was therefore multi-staged, suggesting that the ability
to walk and/or near-walking in very shallow water may have existed even
before the appearance of tetrapods." They actually used the term
pre-adaptation. To me this is fine.

But then they say "By moving towards land, the fishes avoided competition
and predation, gaining access
to new feeding areas." This is where teleology starts to creep in. They do
not elaborate, but the purposeful nature of the event is evident. The
authors, along with just about everyone else in paleontology (as far as I
know) fail to consider tectonic uplift as the key process that imposes an
increasingly terrestrial situation for coastal organisms that become
sufficiently stranded. Those with the critical 'preadaptations' survive,
and under those newer conditions will continue to evolve. those that do
not, do not. Simple as that.

Cheers,

John Grehan

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