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Bird added a unique category of origins to the list in 1987 when he collected information on the theory of abrupt appearance. This presentation was assembled for lower court and Supreme Court cases dealing with the Arkansas and Louisiana laws on teaching origins in public schools. Although many reviewers consider abrupt appearance to be a cover-up for old-fashioned creationism, Bird makes a substantial case for a non-religious theory of origins that relies on scientific evidence with no appeal to revelation. In turn he shows the religious nature of most evolutionary theories. Bird defines the theory of abrupt appearance to be "the scientific theory that the universe, the first life, and plants and animals appear abruptly in complex form and in a discontinuous manner, in contrast with the progressive and ultimately continuous nature of the theory of evolution." As stated, this theory encompasses typological views, theories of discontinuity, and natural group systematics, and of panspermia and directed panspermia, and scientific theories of creation to the extent they rely solely one empirical type of evidence. Evidence used to support this theory are: discontinuities between systematic groups; abrupt appearance of forms and biochemicals as well as cosmic phenomena; panspermia and directed panspermia; non theistic forces such as creative intelligence, great origins thesis, and vitalism; and theories of creation (miraculous). Affirmative scientific evidence utilizes fossils, information content, probability, genetics, and comparative biology. Bird, Wendell R. The Origin of Species Revisited (New York, Philosophical Library, 1989), pp. 6, 21, 39.
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