Prof. Chen is one of the world's top experts on Cambrian animal fossils.
His main point was that the major animal phyla arose suddenly and fully
formed in the early Cambrian. Since the early Cambrian fauna from
Chengjiang, China, includes soft-bodied animals, the absence of precursors
presents a serious challenge to Darwinian evolution (the usual excuse being
that the precursors were soft-bodied and thus did not fossilize well).
Prof. Chen made his point forcefully and repeatedly, and compared the
seriousness of his challenge to Darwinism with the irreducible complexity
argument of Mike Behe.
The lecture was well-attended. Over 50 people were there, including
Berkeley paleontologists James Valentine, David Lindberg and Jere Lipps,
and evolutionary biologist Harry Greene.
Questions after the lecture were fairly technical, focusing on details of
the fossils described by Prof. Chen. Clearly, no one was eager to tackle
the "challenge to Darwinism" issue.
Following the lecture and discussion, dozens of participants crowded around
the impressive collection of fossils which Prof. Chen had brought with him
from China. Later that evening he spoke at Prof. Lipps's class, which I
missed due to a prior commitment.
The correspondent pointed out to Prof. Chen that criticizing Darwinism in
the U.S. can be quite
controversial -- even risky. Prof. Chen laughed, and said he wasn't
afraid. He
remarked that in the U.S. it's OK to criticize the government, but not
Darwinism, while in China it's OK to criticize Darwinism, but not the
government.
Prof. Chen is speaking at universities around the United States in advance
of a conference to be held next June near the Chengjiang fossil site in
China. The conference, sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, will
focus on the origin of animal body plans. Research for the Chengjiang
project was partially financed by the National Geographic Society.