Summations Only

Very interesting topic. I have a few thoughts though.First of all, I do not agree with the evolutionary diagrams depicting the changes happening over several millions of years. The oldest known DNA found according to http://news.nationalgeographic.com/...070705-oldest-dna.html is 400 000 years old. Thus, even getting the ‘youngest’ organism, Odontocetes’s DNA would not be possible. How can a diagram like this be assumed to be true when there are no DNA records that can prove that the transitions are even remotely related? There are so many different species of animals, you could make infinitely many different transitional diagrams to ‘prove’ that one species evolved into another when in fact evolution would totally disagree that the particular animal evolved in such a way. Mesonychids and Pakicetus for example could be two different and unrelated animals, putting them next to each other in such a diagram does not prove that the one evolved into the other. Off coarse I cannot disprove this either, I just believe that it should not be used in ‘proving evolution’ as there is NO evidence! For unproven facts no information is better than fiction.On one of your responses

Well, there are many organisms that eat algae and do not have 4-chambered stomachs. For example, some snails eat algae, and some shrimp. Also, some fish eat algae. You don't need a 4-chambered stomach to eat algae.

Still, you have not provided Dr Adequate with a satisfactory answer in my opinion. It does not mean that if fish or other organisms eat algae and have only one stomach that whales do not need four. I would be very interested in some reference to evidence that whales do not use their four stomachs.In closing, if whales have these vestigial stomachs why didn’t they just stay on land where they would have gotten the most nutrition from a fully adapted system for eating grass. Where did this need come from? What was so attractive about the sea?Edited by TheArtist, : No reason given.

Just for interest sake, what other ways are there? I won’t disagree with you there, I will leverage off your comment here to try and make my point a bit more clear. This is something that I’ve been pondering about quite a bit and is quite a lengthy post but it does resolve back into context! Let’s suppose we have a Panda on an evolutionary transition diagram (such as the ones presented in this post) what would you put as the ancestor where it evolved from or the descendant where the evolution is continuing to, looking at modern animals? Is there any other animal on earth that is somewhere in the middle between a Panda and something else? Not nearly as much as to cause confusion as to whether it is a Panda or not. Why did evolution not try new avenues and evolve some intermediate steps or other variations?Here is the closest known relative to the Panda, the Spectacled Bear. Different behaviour, different look etc. Look at the markings, more evil looking face, baldish, flatter snout, different ears, longer beak etc. No flowing intermediate steps alive to show gradual transition from the one species to the other, it is either Panda or Spectacled Bear. Look at it from a slightly different angle, the ease of naming the different transitions (Mesonychids, Pakicetus, Ambulecetus, Dalanistes etc.). If there were any fluent transition between these different versions, it would be difficult to put a name to each of them — if there was a smooth transition between the different species you would have to create bounds to clamp the specie names down. Where do you assume the Mesonychids end and the Pakicetus starts? If such a diagram (evolution in general) were true then animals on earth would just be a hodgepodge of intermediate steps of evolution and you would not be able to distinguish animals from each other. There would not be this is a Panda, that is a Lion or be able to tell where to draw the line between apes and human beings, just more human like or more ape like beings.One could argue that these transitional steps were just intermediate species that was later discarded by evolution (natural selection). Why did species evolve into these intermediate steps in the first place? They could not have been half bad as they survived good and well enough to apparently carry our species all the way from the apes to what we are today. Why would they mysteriously be absent from life today? And what better laboratory to test these ideas than the here and now? Going back millions of years gets rid of a lot of evidence making these ideas more plausible just because you can always make guess work.

To apply this directly into this discussion’s context the question remains the same. Where is the semi-cow-hippo-whale combo? We are talking about a HUGE transition here all the way from a cow to a whale and there would be ample opportunity for some ‘inbetweeners’. I mean seriously, where are they??? In fact, we should be able to draw at least some kind of evolutionary diagrams showing the transition from live specimens today! Even if some of the species in the diagram above died out there should be new or other ones to use.

As per my point mentioned above. Why can’t this diagram be drawn today where there would have been more than enough proof?Edited by TheArtist, : No reason given.

Point taken, however, we are looking at fossils here. A mere outline of these animals. That is a small portion of an animal’s anatomy and these animals can be vastly different otherwise for all we know (organs, skin, hair, eyes etc.). Let me rephrase; it does not mean that if fish or other organisms eat algae and have only one stomach that whales do not need four for whatever reason. I’m not saying that they would need four for digesting algae specifically. I mean that all four could be necessary for their lifestyle and environment i.e. not just there because it used to be part of a cow.

Apparently the pelvis is crucial to a whale's reproductive system.Edited by TheArtist, : No reason given.

There is a book by Dr. Bergman and Howe called Vestigial organs are fully functional where they apparently explain in detail how these bones are used and that they are important to the reproductive system on pg 71. They also point out that these bones are different in male and female specimens. Unfortunately I do not have this book to give you a direct quote but it sure sounds worth reading. There are numerous references to this book and what it says about the pelvis but I couldn’t find any direct quotations as yet.

Here is another:

"Evolutionists often point to vestigial hind legs near the pelvis. But these are found only in the Right Whale. and upon closer inspection turn out to be strengthening bones to the genital wall." John C. Whitcomb, Early Earth (1988), p. 84.

There might be later studies where these bones were found in other whales as well.

"These results reveal a large discordance between morphological and molecular measures of similarity. Rats and mice are classified in the same family, while cows and whales are classified in different orders. Perhaps molecular sequences are not necessarily giving us an accurate picture of ancestry."

"The Marsupial Mitochondrial Genome and the Evolution of Placental Mammals," Genetics, 137:243-256 (1994).

Seems like such a diagram is a pretty doubtful display of ‘evidence’ of the evolutionary process, especially considering that it is only the skeleton and does not include the vast array of other missing features as already mentioned. So the only way to prove these or have evidence of these transitions is morphology (DNA is not available) and this is has a large discordance to molecular similarity. Not very convincing.

Dr David Berlinski, made an important point in my opinion. He made the now semi famous statement that a cow would have had to undergo over and above 50 000 mutations to reach a whale which sounds very reasonable don’t you think? I would think that it would be way more than that, however let’s say it is only 50 000.

Consider the fact that each of these 50 000 mutations can loosely be considered as new species as they are each slightly different from the previous. Your assumption is that none of these 50 000 species survived (only the hippo)? For any mutation to live on it would require the animal carrying the mutation to be fit enough to successfully mate with a female. Then the mutation needs to live on a couple of generations to ensure that it does not get lost at some point. I wouldn’t doubt for a second that if a mutation was good enough to enable a male interest in a female or the other way around, that this mutation (or species) would not die out anytime soon.

Male/female courtship depends on both genres to be fit and fertile. We often see how males need to present great displays of manliness to females to win over courtship with them. A female will not easily mate with a weak male. So we can say that all of these mutations need to be very successful for them to live on.

But only a hippo stands between a cow and a whale. Let’s take it easy here and count in the apparently 80 different species of whale in existence today (give or take). This will still yield 49 920 intermediate species or mutations that died out! Why such a great number of very successful mutations that died out? Why are none of them walking the earth today? Well, apparently all of them died out leaving us with no contemporary proof of this transition.

It does not matter how you look at this, 49 920 transition steps being absent today seems a bit suspect. However if all of them did die out, I would SERIOUSLY question the existence of hippos and whales, as it seems that species which was extremely closely related to them, died off.

Remember that these intermediate steps would have had to be very similar in appearance and function. Only miniscule changes would have happened if it took millions of years. In line with this analogy, you would have thousands of very slightly different versions of the Atari ST. We could say that these different versions came about due to imperfections in the production process. Some might be a very slightly different colour whereas other could have slightly more lead residue on their circuit boards. Then, saying that they were good for their time would include many of the slightly different versions, as the difference between them would be so small it would almost be unnoticeable and for all practical reasons the same thing. Then, when they get discarded due to some new technology, all of the versions will be discarded! You could pick any version and it would still be, very much an Atari ST.

The ‘survival’ of the Atari ST would very strongly guarantee the survival of any of the slightly different version and the ‘death’ of the Atari ST will take with it all of these versions too.

Apply this to the evolutionary process. You’ll get the same result.

One would never have to reason that God just made them worse than related species. I can easily say that all creatures were made perfectly in the first place. We know that many a specie became extinct in the past because of natural disasters such as climatic changes, changes in sea levels or currents, volcanic eruptions, rapidly spreading disease etc. These natural forces can be attributed to number of different species’ becoming extinct. Some of them happen suddenly and wipe out entire species in their native area and other happen over time. Another example is the amount of species that became extinct due to human activity such as over hunting and pollution. So all of these were made worse than other animals living away from the harm? Is a certain specie of bird made worse than another if the former specie lives exclusively on a certain island and is wiped out due to a volcanic eruption’s toxic ash clouds?

I bet if you asked the professor what it is for he would passionately ramble on about how important it is to the rest of his machine. I’m just saying that just because you looked at this picture and cannot see an apparent reason for the coal scuttle to assume that it was just what the professor had at hand.

This argument goes both ways. I’m simply responding to the initial statement It is doubtful if this pelvis has any function at all, although it might have some minor function. Ask the professor about the coal scuttle before making the assumption.

Apologies, you’re absolutely right. I could not find the quote either, it does not seem to be anywhere in the paper. I found the quote and reference elsewhere and never thought to double check it.

It’s quite curious as to where this originated from as the same thing seems to be repeated on the net.

I strongly agree with you that spreading lies or misinformation is distasteful. It wastes one’s time or is just plain embarrassing as in my case. A perfect example that one should never just except something you read.

I’m not saying that this is definitely a lie though as it could well be that someone just screwed up and put the wrong reference to this quote. I am looking into this to try and find out for myself what the story around this is.

Edited by TheArtist, : No reason given.

I think your comments are uncalled for. You are badmouthing creationists as a whole and this is all you could contribute to the forum so far.

It’s like saying that people are liars. You cannot make such a generalization just because some mishaps do happen. Sure somewhere someone will screw up, and this screw up can be spread quickly if someone forgets to check the validity of the claim as I did. No one is perfect.

Hi Dan, According to wikipedia "Himalayacetus is an extinct genus of carnivorous aquatic mammal (from the same link you provided).This aquatic mammal was one of the earliest mammals on your list, alongside Pakicetus and even the Pakicetus seemed to roam dry land.What is your thoughts around this?

I don't see how this brings my previous arguments into question in any way?If you looked back at my previous arguments, my main point was that one still sees a big enough gap between these species to easily assume that they were different animals not one that evolved out of the other. You don’t see a smooth enough transition in the fossils and neither do you see it today as part of continuing evolution. What about the fact that this species survived for a while questions my reasoning? Please explain.

Please explain how this is relevant to my point. Human KIND is alive today, or not extinct, sure people die, that doesn’t mean that the human species is extinct.

Please explain how this argument answers: It does not matter how you look at this, 49 920 transition steps being absent today seems a bit suspect.

Edited by TheArtist, : No reason given.

Since this was the cause to some heated discussion I had taken the time to investigate this particular case. Unfortunately I could not find the true origin of this quote/reference but as I stated before this was most likely that the reference provided did not match the quote.

In any case, here is some reading material that seems to make the same statement:

Investigating species boundaries in the Giliopsis group of Ipomopsis (Polemoniaceae): Strong discordance among molecular and morphological markers: http://www.amjbot.org/content/96/4/853.full

Discordances between morphological systematics and molecular taxonomy in the stem line of equids: A review of the case of taxonomy of genus Equus: http://www.journals.elsevierhealth.com/...311003362/abstract