Transitional fossils not proof of evolution?

The first relates to the number of gaps. It seems that everytime we do find a fossil that fits nicely into one of the existing gaps, all we seem to have accomplished is to create two new gaps. Second, as predicted by the TOE, we are finding more and more evidence that the Cambrian Explosion was not where all of the different critters first appeared. In this thread I provided links to some of the recent findings of pre-cambrian Bilaterian fossils just as one such example.The issues revolving around what once was called the Cambrian Explosion is just another example of the Biblical Creationists not keeping up with what is actually known.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Typo. The problem is, it was argued for years this is how evolution works. Even after creationtionists and panspermists repeatedly shown the errors, it was still in the minds of evolutionists as an unassailable fact. Now that its so anemic, evolutionists blithely make the transition over to PE and sort of casually make remarks such as you made. A flippant attitude about it won't erase the bulk of the predominent evolutionary thought.Aside from which, I still recieve conflicting views on ToE to this day, where many still believe in gradualism. So, if I'm not talking to you specifically about that, let it roll off your back.

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I have REPEATEDLY pointed out that no modern evolutionary biologist works from the assumption of phyletic gradualism anymore, and therefore the repeated arguments by NJ and Mr.Matrix against phyletic gradualism are strawmen, and moot.

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And if the altruism thread is any indication, you will coninue to repeatedly point out these basic facts, but NJ will either choose to ignore it or refuse to read it correctly.

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"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the same sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart."
-- H. L. Mencken (quoted on Panda's Thumb)

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Here's the actual core of the problem. You want to see finely gradated changes not for transitions between species, which you concede happens, but between higher taxa, such as genus, family and order. Unless we get incredibly lucky, we're simply not going to find this. The vagaries and rarity of fossilization make it extremely unlikely.

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What is remarkable is that this is what we see in the fossil record: we do see gradated changes between higher taxa, and some of the gradations are quite fine. What tends to be very rare in the fossil record is gradations between closely related species in the same genus (or even in the same family). There are many lineages that link higher taxa, and the "gap" between inidividual species can easily be bridged by the very species-to-species gradations that creationists are forced to admit are seen in the present day.Creationists are forced to admit the existence of "micro"-evolution. The question is whether these "micro" changes can add up to "macro" evolution -- it is evidence that "macro"-evolution occurred that the fossil record provides.

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"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the same sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart."
-- H. L. Mencken (quoted on Panda's Thumb)

You say this as if phyletic gradualism were somehow foundational to all of evolution. It isn't. Phyletic gradualism isn't "how evolution works". It used to be a tiny part of evolutionary theory dealing with the pace at which evolution took place.Imagine someone arguing that trains can't really travel from city to city, and he cites as evidence that it used to be believed that trains traveled at a constant speed between cities, but that it is now conceded that trains travel at a variety of speeds. He then uses this to conclude that trains can't really travel between cities.You're doing the same silly thing. Before we knew much about mode and pace in evolution (Gaylord Simpson) or punctuated equilibria (Gould and Eldredge, same ideas as Simpson's, but applied to a paleontological context), we assumed that the pace of evolution was relatively constant. This meant we used to believe that as a species changed from one to another that it did so at a relatively constant rate.But we no longer believe the rate is constant. We believe that species can remain unchanged for eons, and then suddenly undergo rapid change. The largest governing factor affecting the pace of evolution is selection pressure.You're arguing that the change in our understanding of the pace of evolution is so revolutionary that it invalidates evolution itself, when it is actually a kind of ho-hum realization: "Oh, evolution can be fast or slow, not just one speed - yeah, makes sense." By its tentative nature and because of ongoing research, an inherent quality of science is constant change and improvement in our understanding. Creationist objections span the entire field of evolution. Saying "It's all wrong" and then taking credit when something inevitably does turn out to be wrong makes no sense. It's like betting on every number on the roulette wheel and then touting your gambling skill when one of your numbers comes up - it's a "so what!" Phyletic gradualism was never considered an unassailable fact. Progess in science is inevitable. You're saying this as if you believe it's a bad thing.You can go to the history of any topic in science and say the same type of things. For example, why aren't you saying, "Now that Newtonianism is so anemic, physicists blithely make the transition over to relativity." And relativity represents a much bigger revolution over Newtonianism than irregularly paced evolution does over constant-rate evolution.And the fact is, phyletic gradualism was never the over-arching consideration that you're making it out to be. If you had asked a biologist back in the 1920's if he believed that populations under selection pressures would change more rapidly than those that weren't, he would have answered yes, the exact same answer a modern evolutionist would give.Every field of science can point to old views that are no longer held, but it is the Creationist speciality to point to such evolutionary progress and conclude that something fishy or invalid is going on. What they should be looking for is discordances between contemporary theory and currently available evidence. What they're actually doing in such cases is criticizing science for doing what it's supposed to do: improve our understanding of the world in which we live.--Percy

Right, and I believe this level of fine gradations that are occasionally found at the inter-species level is what Nemesis_juggernaut is asking for, only at higher taxa levels.We *do* have gradated changes between higher taxa, but Nemesis_juggernaut wants the same fine gradation level as is necessary for showing inter-species evolution.Put another way, he wants to measure the distance between New York and San Francisco using a micrometer. But we don't measure such distances to high degrees of accuracy by starting at the very small - we measure them using macro-methods like bouncing lasers off objects. Finding the gradations between the higher taxa does not require the species-level precision that Nemesis_juggernaut is asking for, but it's evidence that doesn't exist, and that's why he's trying to build it up as something important.In fact, this approach of talking up minor aspects of evidence as if they were theory-breakers is common with Creationists. The most extreme example I've ever seen was Randman's multi-month harangue about Haeckle.--Percy

I have a thing about straw man arguments. I hate 'em. They can be due to honest ignorance, and I can understand that. But when the error has been pointed out, and the person continues to make the straw man argument, it is then dishonest.I have repeatedly asked you to provide quotes which demonstrate that anyone here has argued against PE. You have repeatedly ignored this request {edit: and continued to assert that there are "gradualists" here}. Therefore I suspect that your misrepresentation is intentional.Edited by Belfry, : marked addition

It sounds like a clearer emphasis needs to be made of what Percy mentioned above to distinguish a view which incorporates both long periods of morphological stasis and periods of morphological change (continuous or discontinuous) and one of what Dawkin's called 'Constant Speedism'.There are undoubtedly many who believe that populations undergo gradual changes in both their genetics and morphologies which may lead to speciation amongst other things, it is highly unlikely that there are any 'Constant Speedism' adherents on the board.TTFN,WK

Right, that's why I tried to be careful to talk about an "assumption of phyletic gradualism." Certainly evolution can be a gradual process (and PE doesn't argue against that), but we don't assume that it is always a steady rate... "constant speedism," I like that.Compounding the confusion, NJ seems to mistakenly believe that PE is a fundamentally different phenomenon in evolution, one that bypasses or falsifies the need for stepwise changes (see Message 22):

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And if you believe in the typical, stepwise fashion of evolution, then where does that place punctuated equilibrium? Doesn't one bring the other into disrepute?

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Unfortunately, PE claims, (because no such transitions exist), asserts that most species experience long periods of stasis, and then inexplicably make a taxonomical jump.

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PE gives reasons for why we shouldn't expect to find very many transitions in the fossil record, again, presumably to cover up the fact that they simply don't exist. Instead, they claim that long periods of stasis will occur in organisms and peripheral populations that have optimal suitability to their enviornment, and so, there is no reason for nature to weed out that which is already very strong. A typical creature they posit has gone through such a stasis, would be a shark. (Where a Hammerhead fits into the equation is anyone's guess). They also say that when it does make its transition, its usually punctuated by short (geologically/biologically, relative to a vast stretch of time) bursts of change. That rapidity creates less of a chance for us to find solid evidence of such gradations.This is a brief synopsis, but I think it conveys that I understand what lies at the root of the theory. I was asserting that steps are being skipped. That's not me claiming that fox's turn into bears in one felled swoop. Perhaps I could have worded it more clearly. What I was arriving at was that PE provides a basis for understanding why evidence might not exist. In fact, Gould coins the phrase, "stasis is data" as if a lack of evidence is providing an evidence of lack.The paper below elucidates my point and makes some objections, claiming their theory to be both banal and unclear as to the purpose of the paper."The original Eldridge & Gould paper (1972) presents three principal ideas. The first - that even ostensibly 'objective' observations are influenced by the observers' preconceptions, not least in deciding what to observe - is so obvious, and delivered with such an offensive sanctimony, that it deserves no further attention and will certainly receive none from me.

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The remaining theses are (1) that lengthy periods of evolutionary stasis within lineages are genuine and important phenomena, and (2) that speciation events usually appear in the fossil record as more or less instantaneous events. The combination of these two observations leads to a step-wise evolutionary pattern, rather than steady, insensible 'gradualism.'Punctuated Equilibrium Agreed. I think that's why the paper, above, describes it as 'banal', almost like its a redundency or a rebirth of a preexisting theory. I appreciate your train model and understand what you're arriving at, but odds are odds - and the odds that in the million + fossils on file that none of them clearly show any change from one species creating a new genus through morphology, acts as a detriment. I understand that the binomial nomenclature is just a form of classification, and that it is ultimately a human construct. Its obvious that no two organisms are truly identical and that they change on some level. We know that organisms change. If they didn't, you and I would be identical. What I find objectionable is to jump to the conclusion that because changes occur within species, that we must somehow all be related. This is an inferrence and it is an interesting one. However, I feel that there is no legitimate evidence supporting macroevolution. There are scores of secularists in the fields of science who feel the same way, not based on personal predjudices, but on the merits of unbiased science. Somebody did. I dare not hit the back button to see if my post that you responding to was initially me responding to you or somebody else. I don't know how many times I've hit the back button to referrence something when I'm nearing the completion of a post. Its..... ummmm..... oh, what's the word? Infuriating!!! Here's the crux of the situation:In northeastern Oregon, the three-toed (Neohipparion) and the one-toed horse (Pliohippus) are found in the same strata
2. which means that they lived at the same time in the same place. No transitional forms have been found. One does not seem to be the ancestor of the other as Figure 18.4 proposes.
3. In South America the one and the recessed three-toed horses (Equus and Merychippus) were found together in the Miocene strata (13-25 million years) and the full three-toed horse (Mesohippus) above
the other two in the Pliocene strata (2-13 million years ).
3. This completely contradicts Figure18.4.
5. Size cannot be used as an indicator of evolution because today’s horses range in size from 16 to 80 inches tall.
5. As late as 1892 three toed horses were reported to be living with the one toed horse in the U.S.
6. A volcano eruption in Nebraska buried a one-toedand a three-toed horse together proving that they lived together at the same time.
7. David Raup, Curator of the Museum of Natural History, where approximately 20% of the world’s fossils are housed, comments ,
“......some of the classic cases of Darwinian change in the fossil
record, such as the horse in North America, have had to be discarded or modified as a result of more detailed information.” Note that this comment was made back in 1979."http://www.textaddons.com/...logy_Mader_McGraw_Hill_2001.pdf Mayr was commenting on OC Marsh's depictions of the evoultion of horses series that were misleading. He stated that Simpson corrected the changes, however, the refutable information still made it in the textbooks. My reason for mentioning is that many horse evolution series depictions still exist in some of the textbooks and even in museum displays. In other words, they present it as factual, when it isn't. I couldn't referrences on the changing of horse ribs. Where can I find a source on this? Evolutionists come from all nations. Religions come from all nations. Evolutionists come in all races. The religious come in all races. Many opponents of evolution are typically creationists, however, this is far from exclusivity. As far as theistic evolutionists are concerned, I feel that many of them are simply misinformed and are the types that hold fast to religious sentiments for emotional reasons, yet have never challenged (or cared enough about) the evolutionary model to satisfy any inquiries on the intellectual level. After all, where does a Creator fit into the equation in evolution?Revolution Against Evolution – A Revolution of the Love of GodI believe the evolutionary model provides its adherents a form of escapism - not all of them, but many. This is just how I feel about it. And as dogmatically as some adhere to it despite some good arguments against its most basic theory, it seems that abandoning it would betray philosphical suppositions. Edited by nemesis_juggernaut, : No reason given.

And I should correct myself - Phylum Bryophyta, not Bryozoa. Quick fingers doth oft make stupid mistakes.

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PE gives reasons for why we shouldn't expect to find very many transitions in the fossil record, again, presumably to cover up the fact that they simply don't exist.

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Actually, as crashfrog pointed out to you already, Gould and Eldridge were well aware that transitions do exist, and lots of them. What punctuated equilibrium is meant to explain was two common phenomena:(1) Many species exist in the fossil record for long periods of time with very little or no change during this time.(2) There are many examples of species being "suddenly" replaced by new, closely related species, that is, species being replace by similar species that could easily be related through the "micro"-evolution that creationists do accept.Punctuated equilibrium does not, and was not meant to, explain large gaps that exist in the fossil record -- these are already adequately explained by the imperfections of the fossilization process.Punctuated equilibrium was mean to explain the existence of "micro"-gaps that exist.At any rate, creationists still have never provided an adequate explanation of the many, many transitional fossils that exist in the fossil record that give good records of the evolution of important lineages.

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"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the same sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart."
-- H. L. Mencken (quoted on Panda's Thumb)

people who say this sort of thing, in my experience, are really in the dark about the fossil record in general. i'm also annoyed by people (as above) that say it's "spotty." it's not. there are a few missing ancestors here and there, but there are far, far more links than holes. the problem isn't that one species looks like another. it's the pattern of similarties. speculation?tell me about your family. do you have a mother and a father? brothers, sisters? does your mother have a mother and father? brothers, sisters? your father? if we wanted to draw a diagram of who is related to whom and how, what would we call it?life *IS* a tree, because of variation in sexual reproduction. i can't actually think of a single case of a "missing link" that's actually missing. i'm trying -- but if what you say is true, we shouldn't see slightly varied ancestor species, or at least they should be much less common.even the so called "cambrian explosion" doesn't indicate this. we have quite a few prominent pre-cambrian fossils, which looks nearly exactly like cambrian organism with one marked difference: no hard parts. i wonder why we have far, far more cambrian fossils? could it be the development of hard parts, allowing for better fossilization? the "explosion" doesn't mean they came from nowhere, it means we have more fossils, all of a sudden. every so often, someone here will post an image that looks like this: the only deceptive part is how much it looks like it does go in a straight line. isolated like this, it sure looks like it clearly indicates a gradual evolution. it's based on reasonable inference. we know things have sex. we know that they produce offspring that are not exact duplicates of themselves. and we have a bunch of fossils that when arranged chronologically, seem to show a succession of slight modifications.how many points would you like before you can draw the line? we could have a record of every single individual ever born, and the creationists would still be saying that we can't prove the mother and the daughter are actually related. they just look a lot a like, but were created entirely separately.i think it's the creationists who are biased, and not willing to look at the solid scientific evidence because they'd find it hard to draw the conclusions they want.Edited by Admin, : Reduce width of image.Edited by Admin, : Additional width reduction.

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See how evolutionist interprate the fossil record in the way they want. IN previous posts some evolutionist explained the absense of evident fossils by saying that the fossl record is incomplete. NOw you say that it is not spotty and it completely shows gradual evolution. Evolutionists are contradicting each other because of their different interpretations and speculations about fossils. Do you fill the fossil record whenever you want and make it look empty whenever you want just to support your interpretations? Variations but not evolution. I can draw a tree of my family and this tree is full of Humans only. But the tree of life mixes up different creatures wherever evolutionists see fit. Probably the reason why you make such unfounded claim is that YOU have a lack of knowledge about fossils. OR maybe because you only search in evolutionist web sites that are full of false claims and misinterprated fossils. You are saying "could it be", well it could be not. If you quit your evolutionary speculations about the fossil record you should also take into account other possibilities.
But you still admit the huge amount of fossils in the Cambrian explosion. How do you explain the suddent emergence of fossils as you said "all of a sudden"?You already said that fossils show patterns of life. This is why evolutionists make phylogenic trees. Evolutionists use fossils to indicate patterns of life. Well how come non of them pays attention to the obvious emrgence of more that 60 phyla in the fossil record in a short period of time (geologically speaking)? You admitted that there is a huge number of fossils in the Cambrian explosion. How come this does not indicate any pattern of life for evolutionists and they even try to refute it, while at the same time, they make tons of interpretations and speculations and imaginary scenarios based on few fossils that are "thaught" to support evolution. How come evolutionists ignore any patterns regarding the Cambrian explosion and at the same time claim that they base their evidence on the fossil record.About the picture you posted, there are thousands of diagrams (either imaginary or based on speculation) regarding human evolution. It is obvious that most of the skulls do not belong to humans, they belong to either apes or chimps. I am certain that many of these skulls have been already refuted by scientific evidence that clearly showed that they belong to apes. You could draw hundreds of diagrams based on skulls but remember that they are all imaginary. Biased? You are talking as if evolutionists are not biased. Where is that solid scientific evidence? Evolutionists always say that there is evidence but when you ask them about it they start making imaginary scenarios and interprete the fossil record the way they like just to fit in thier family trees. The reproduction you mentioned does create variations, but you cannot find species turning to different species as a result of variations, so you should not use variations to prove evolution. Ans where is that logical inference you're refering to? Is it the speculations about fossils or the believe that all life forms emerged on Earth by random chances?

no, i'm correcting their error. while there are holes in the fossil record, the sorts of holes the creationist imagines out ignorance and the sort of holes the paleontologist looks to fill are vastly different in scale. there are no large gaping holes like the creationists contend. there simply aren't. variation IS evolution. what mechanism do you propose keeps genetic variation from compounding? or maybe because i have a passing interest in paleontology, and have seen a good deal more than you think. the point is that we have good transitions from invertebrate to vertebrate, from early vertebrates to fish, from fish to amphibian. from amphibian to early pre-reptiles. from those to mammals and dinosaurs. and from dinosaurs to birds. the problem is not that i don't know where the holes are -- it's that there is no example you can think of that i can't fill with at least a few "transitional" species. (i dare you) you missed the condescencion in the basic logic of that statement. it's a basic fact that the harder an object, the longer it remains in sediment without decomposing, and the better chance it has to fossilize. VASTLY better chances, actually. that's why we see a lot of fossils of dinosaur bones, but not so many of feathers and skin.so when we see a few fossils of soft creatures, and then tons and tons of harder creatures -- it's not really a suprise. there's no mystery here. that god created the soft pre cambrian creatures, and then suddenly created scores of similar harder cambrian creatures? um, the development of hard parts explains it rather well. hard parts fossilize better, thus more fossils. ta da. if you're still talking about the cambrian explosion, it's because those organisms didn't just appear out of nowhere. they existed prior to the cambrian explosion in softer forms. this is NOT speculation, we have some nice examples of them. because there's no mystery to paleontologists. only the creationists make a big deal out of this -- no one's refuting that there's a lot more cambrian fossils than precambrian fossils. there are. and we know WHY, too. what's imaginary here is the notion that humans are NOT apes. all of those skulls belong to apes, including the cromagnon one. but at what point do YOU say that it's an ape and not a human? each skull is remarkably like the one before it. if i ever kill a man, i want a creationist as my attorney. they could have me on video, for all i care. you would hold up each frame of the security camera footage, and say "look, they're all still pictures. here is my client holding the gun. and here is the muzzle blast. and here is the bullet in the air. and here is the bullet partially through the victim's skull. now, you can't scientifically prove that any of these are actually related. where's the evidence that this bullet came from this gun? how do you know these weren't all separately posed pictures, and completely isolated?"nevermind that the bullet matches the gun. nevermind that i'm at the scene of the crime, with a gun in my hand. nevermind that i have gun powder on my clothes and the victims blood in my hair. there's no signed confession, so i can't have actually done it. it's just one big conspiracy, and there's no real evidence.in my experience, this is the creationist argument. nothing is ever good enough, because you so heartily wave away common sense, logic, and basic testable inference.with evolution, we can place species at the scene of the crime. we can match bones and prove homology, and even relation. we can easily map out a tree of relation -- and we have millions of snapshots frozen in time. like i said, even if we had a record of every individual plant and animal that ever existed, and which individual was created by the union of which other individuals, it still wouldn't be enough -- maybe they were just created to LOOK that way, right?at a certain point, it really requires more mental gymnastics to think this way than anything else. it's an excuse to discount evidence, and ignore logic. yes, actually, you can. it has been observed in laboratory conditions. many, many forms of live reproduce and create successive generations much faster than humans. it's not a proof of evolution. it's the premise. the logical inference that, given enough points on a graph, one can draw a good approximation of the function. or, simply, given enough points, you can draw a line. where in "natural selection" did you get "random?" evolution is anything but random. variation has a random aspect to that. but you accept that part. evolution is the combination of that, and the idea that there are factors (environmental, sexual, inter-species) that help "decide" who gets to pass their genes on, and who does not.it's a relatively simple idea. and sexual selection is one we should all be familiar with, if we've ever been interested in the opposite sex.Edited by arachnophilia, : No reason given.

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