Fake Evolution and the Tibetan Snow Lotus

Way, way up on the Tibetan Plateau is the Tibetan Snow Lotus. Of course, after China invaded Tibet in 1950, they have even influenced language; it is better known as Snow Lotus or even Chinese Snow Lotus. Or use the scientific name (Saussurea laniceps). There are different varieties of this flower.

People who can brave the rarefied air go up there and pick this endangered flower for various reasons. The most popular is that it is useful in Chinese folk medicine. While there is scientific evidence that it can treat rheumatoid arthritis, human tests seem nonexistent.

Icy Tibetan Snow Lotus (Saussurea gossypiphora), Wikimedia Commons / Prateek (CC BY-SA 2.5 IN)

Because people are picking these flowers, Darwin's disciples are claiming that since the lotus is now growing shorter, we see evolution in action. Not hardly! What we have is something that may be called natural selection (if you can call people picking flowers and driving them to extinction "natural"). There is loss of genetic material for the taller plants that was created to be in them in the first place.

The Tibetan Snow Lotus, Saussurea laniceps, is highly prized for its use in traditional Chinese and Tibetan medicine for the treatment of headaches, high blood pressure, and various other ailments. Every year at flowering time, Himalayan locals climb above altitudes of 4,000 metres (13,000 ft) to scour the rocky mountain slopes for it, harvesting the whole plant.

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Now because it’s the tallest plants that are harvested, being both easier to find and considered more potent, only the smaller plants are being left behind to produce seed. Therefore, only the smaller plants’ genes are making it through to the next generation. The result? Researchers have reported that the height of the snow lotus has nearly halved over the past century.

You can read all of this short article by climbing up to "Tibetan snow lotus — A prized flower suffers ‘tall poppy’ syndrome."