Land Mammal to Whale transition: fossils

*lurk mode off*Why don't you explain the frequency of fossilization, if the people responding are so incapable, do some research, find out the odds, form a hypothesis of how often we should find transitional fossils between certain species. Then form a hypothesis about how many transitionals you think there should be, and present it based on what you have learned. Because right now all you are doing is saying "tell me how many there should be." You are told, then you say "nope, that's not enough, there should be thousands." Then you ask again "How many do you think there should be?" Obviously you are just fishing for the answer from every evo here "omg, evolution is a lie, a blad faced lie, even. I need to accept jesus because there are only a handful of fossils that show a transition between whale forms. Nevermind that is well within what could be expected."My observation of what has been said so far.*lurk mode back on, at least until I can sum things up again.*AbE:
What you are asking for is like me asking you for fossils of Adam and Eve, and telling you that because you don't have them that Genesis is a lie.This message has been edited by Brad, 08-05-2005 01:11 PM

Did you see that randman, it went zooming by you, it was THE POINT. The point of the post was that the ToE is based on observable fact. What you are doing is taking your faith, deciding that ToE is not possible, then setting unreasonable goals. Then you decide because no one can answer you to your satisfaction that you must be right. Again, the adam and eve. It's like me saying that I would become a YEC if you could find me the fossils of Adam and Eve.

Okay, since you ignore my points and attack the first sentance of each of my posts, let's move on. How many fossils do you think there should be. Make a hypothesis based on observable FACT about the frequency of fossilization. Then we can refine that hypothesis together, then ALL look at the available data. That seems like a better idea to me.*lurk more back on...really*

First point, fossils are rare. We know this not just because of how infrequently it occurs, but also because of the process.From encyclopedia.laborlawtalk.com:Fossilization is a rare occurrence, because natural materials tend to be recycled. In order for an organism to be fossilized, the remains normally need to be covered by sediment as soon as possible, however there are exceptions to this, such as if an organism becomes petrifaction or comes to rest in an anoxic environment such as at the bottom of a lake. There are different types of fossils, and fossilization processes.So lets build a model from what we can now conclude. Let’s take another animal that has fossilized remains. There have been about 30 t-rex fossils discovered since 1905. Many of them are not considered to be the same species. We can group them into about five different species; T. rex, T. bataar, T. efremovi, T. lancesis, and T. movojilovi. None of the fossils are complete, and no one knows how many bones the t-rex had. Now, T. rex was considered to be a common dinosaur based on the unusually high number of fossils we have for it. Now, whale population has always been much smaller then many other species. To me, it doesn’t seem so absurd to have about 1 ancient whale transition for every 5 t-rex fossils.I know this isn’t perfect, but we can begin to see where low numbers are very reasonable. Note also that the different species of T-rex that I named are considered to be transitions. Anyway, not all of the information here may be perfect, but I hope we are beginning to put some perspective into the issue that is more then a yeah huh/nuh uh debate. I would appreciate someone with more knowledge then myself also helping to take this in a more productive direction.Brad

Fossilization is a rare occurrence, because natural materials tend to be recycled. In order for an organism to be fossilized, the remains normally need to be covered by sediment as soon as possible, however there are exceptions to this, such as if an organism becomes petrifaction or comes to rest in an anoxic environment such as at the bottom of a lake. There are different types of fossils, and fossilization processes.