Where are all the missing links?

Can you provide specific examples where creationists and other anti-evolutionists do what you claim in the following?If you cannot, will you retract the statement? I have yet to see a major transitional sequence where evolutionists have found anywhere close to the numbers of transitionals you claim, such as having 1, 2, 4, 5, 8, and 9.In fact, that is a gross distortion of the fossil record, not accurate in the slightest, and the frequent quoted argument makes a false accusation towards critics and makes false claims about the fossil record.The real situation is the transitionals are more like 1000s, and evos have found some species they pencil in as the theoritical 1 and 103 and 800 and the 1500 and claim that verifies ToE, and sometimes it's worse than that.They are ignoring the fact that these could well not be intermediates at all, just their willful assumptions trying to make things fit, and that there should be a much higher percentage of transitionals found in the fossil record.So contrary to your little analogy, it's not the critics being unreasonable, and it isn't a matter of just some "gaps" missing. There is not enough evidence in the fossil record to say that "gaps" exist.The evos are the ones distorting the fossil record when they claim their critics are being unreasonable ["it never ends"], refusing to come clean and admit what it does and does not say, not the other way around. Just looking at this board and you can see this.Some evos challenged this very concept by claiming "speciation event" is not real or too difficult a subject to make an analysis, and yet speciation is a commonly used term and concept, used by evos when it suits them.Interestingly, I was banned for a day for supposedly making false criticism of evos, and yet unsubstantiated criticisms of creationists go uncensured.So not to pick on you, but can you show a sequence where the 1, 2, 4, 5, 8 and 9 of species evolving are found in the fossil record to back up your claim?

I am not interested in discussing issues with people that have trouble understanding the concept of species and speciation. Both concepts are well-known in the field of biology, and I don't want to get banned for causing unnecessary disruption in trying to discuss this.Perhaps you could ask someone else for definitions of species and speciation.In terms of sequencing 1-10, you created that. You seem to now be asking me to back that up for you. I know of no examples, as you posted of, of such sequences being shown in the fossil record. But you claimed we did know examples of a high degree of species to species or perhaps you meant transitional forms to transitional forms of evolution, say most of a transition, between 1-10 and critics were nitpicking.Can you show some examples?It seems like your argument consists of since we know ToE is true, the ToE must be true, that "knowing that a particular group had a common ancestor... is enough to support evolution."

Also, OK, so how what percentage of any major evolutionary sequence is represented?50%?
10%?
1%?
.1%?
.0001%?I suspect it is the latter.

Then, why do evolutionists deride criticism as if all that is missing are mere gaps when it appears the vast majority of "steps" or "links", something on the order of 99% plus are missing.Isn't it incumbent for evos to substantiate their claim that mere gaps are missing in an otherwise fairly complete picture, and at least try to assess whether the fossil record overall supports ToE?

I don't think you can really substantiate that. While it is true that there are commonalities to all of life, we do not see organisms just slightly altered. We see great differences in many organisms with major, not slight, differences and no traces of the creatures they supposedly evolved from that they would just be slightly altered from.Now, we do see instances of micro-evolution and thus the slightly altered thing works there, but once you get into differences past the family level, and definitely at the Order level, you see massive differences with no close, just slightly altered groups in-between.Of course, the argument of commonalities does not exclusively point to universal common descent since commonalities can also be explained via common physical and chemical laws exerting a common force, convergent and parallel evolution, common designs, and a common Creator or common Designer.In terms of every single trait or feature as a stand-alone issue, there are some very strange creatures with strange habits, and I think you would be hard-pressed to demonstrate every single one appears with a clear ancestral trait from before it, and I am not even sure you can do that with major traits in common creatures.Take the mammal ears supposedly developing from the jaw bone. There is a considerable break in the suppossed chain where we don't see some feature "slightly altered" to produce the ear, and there are other features which I suspect you cannot demonstrate some form prior to it, that produced it but just slightly altered.I'd like to see you explain how and why you came up with the idea so we can compare with real data.For example, can you show the form existing before the wing that was just slightly altered to produce the wing, in flies, birds, and bats?

The argument misrepresents the data, and suggests critics of evolution are nitpicking over mere gaps in an otherwise fairly complete fossil record.But the truth is different than what you are claiming.The bottom line is no evos here are putting forth, based on science, and estimate of the numbers of fossilized transitionals we should expect to find.You find a bird with lizard-like qualities you position as "half-way" in between, and then complain that creationists "just cannot be satisfied" as if that is some sort of conclusive evidence.What the fossil record shows is often an abundance of vertibrate fossils, and almost no transitionals.Why is that? Even if we spotted you every wild claim for a transitional you could come up with and show real fossils for, they would still be insignificant because you have no viable theory as to why the forms they supposedly evolved from and evolved to are extremely well-represented in the fossil record, but of the 1000s of forms needed to create the transition, you can at best produce per sequence some highly debatable handfuls, often that even evos conclude could not be direct ancestors of living species.Take the blinders off and look at this with a critical eye.I used to believe in ToE, but I decided to look at it more critically, and the fossil record has been the strongest evidence to date, imo, that universal common descent as theorized by evos did not seem to occur.Now, maybe the evidence will one day tilt the other way, but the fact we don't see the transitionals strongly suggests to me they never existed in the first place.

I have raised this issue elsewhere and have never been answered.What's the definition of "rare" here? Throwing out that expecting every step to be seen or something like that obscures the fact that no one is demanding that.What is demanded and not given, it seems, is some sort of working definition of "rare" in this context of geologic time. You say we are lucky to find them at all, as if they are extremely rare.My question is if fossilization is so rare, why do some species have thousands of fossils from all over the world, dating back based on evo assumptions 40 million years or more?If it's that rare that most species and families of species are not seen in the fossil record, would we expect some species and families of species to be represented by more than one or 2 examples?Let's use the lottery for an analogy. It is rare to win the lottery, right? Is it as rare for a species to be fossilized as for an individual to win the lottery?How about an individual winning the lottery several thousand times?The fact there are thousands of fossils for some species, such as Basilosaurus, indicates that fossilization is not as rare as evolutionists claim.
But w

Thanks for admitting that. I think an objective observer could safely conclude that belief colors your ability to look at the fossil record objectively. LOL. I am glad you admit to this. That's something I have claimed evos belive all along. Basically, there is no data, imo, nothing that can be found that could falsify evolution because evolution predicts everything!Aren't we having a wonderful day!

no, it was my impression that the majority of Basilosaurus were found in Louisiana where fossilized parts are often found and used in various ways, for household decorations, lamp pieces, etc,..It's quite humorous to hear how ignorant you are and assumed that they have been found only in one place in massive numbers when they are found in the southeastern US, Australia, Egypt and other places.As far as prior arguments, the same story holds true. We have thousands of fossils of some species. So fossilization is not that rare, and yet we don't see the transitional forms.Why is that?

This comment about sums up the evo argument. If there is no data, evolution is true. If there is some data, evolution is true, and if there is conflicting data, ToE is still true.ToE looks like faith-based scientism to me.

This isn't that hard of concept. It baffles me why you guys don't follow the reasoning.Fossilization is rare for individual members of species, but if "rare" is somewhat meaningless. Something can be "rare" and "common." Diamonds are a rare gem, but it is common to see this gem on the hands of married women.Obviously, in context, whatever labels you want to use, rare, common, etc...we see thousands of fossils of some forms of aquatic mammals, of whales and Basilaurus.I'd like to see the evos here dismiss with the terminology, totally undefined of "rare", and actually explain how "rare" something is if the process can produce thousands of such species.Moreover, you are claiming continuous evolution, right?So if a species is massive enough to fossilize even if fossilization is very, very rare, and so massive in number as to yield thousands of species, would not the next slow, gradual changes within that massive numbers of species be seen as well, considering continuous, gradual evolution? If evolution is continuous, then we know the numbers. They are the same roughly as the species that evolved into it, right? Which are exactly the habitats envisioned for land mammal to whale evolution.As far as your other points, sure with each transition or segment, there is the likelihood of gaps due to the issues you are talking about, but it is unlikely for the entire process to contain all of these problems, and with such a large, truly massive, morphological and behavioural transition, we should still see plenty of places with the transitions preserved, not just a paltry handful, and even reduced to calling a creature with not one single, definitive, fully whale trait a whale.

well said....classic!

LOL, gotta love the stamina and sheer brazenness of some evos declaring the fossil record is now inconsequential.

Sure there would. Commonality of design explains it just as well, but that's a different thread.

Any evolutionist not willing to admit that is obfuscating. Usually what evos will do is use spin and say it's unreasonable to ask for "every" step or some such to be seen, and thus try to suggest the critic is demanding something unusual, every single piece of evolutionary history to be seen.Then, the evo shifts and says, we have such and such examples of transitionals. They may not even be aware of the propaganda and deception they are engaged in. At times, it's almost cult-like the way evos don't even see it.They've gone from criticizing their critics falsely as if they want every stage seen to putting up just a bare few possible potentials.See the bait and switch?They argue that their critics want to see all the evidence, a calculated lie, and usually then say, the critics are just moving the goal-posts, a God of the gaps type of thing.Then, they switch and present just some possible transitional forms.What is the effect? To seek to completely dodge the issue of what the fossil record actually shows, which is that the massive numbers of transitionals are not seen in the fossil record.The weird part is the evos call their critics liars.It's weird, and cult-like, and imo, I am not even sure many evolutionists have retained enough logic to be able to see my point in this post. They don't see how they are arguing on the one hand falsely that critics want to see "every step" as if the majority or plenty of steps are seen, and then presenting some proposed transitionals which are something like less than 1% if they are even transitionals at all.It's sad, and the principle reason I no longer accept ToE.