randman,
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.
Nor do we have to.
Science works by providing a hypothesis that makes predictions. Those predictions are borne out or they aren't. Transitionals exist. Your claim that we should see more is nothing more than a subjective
ad hoc argument. If you wish to counter this then provide an argument with known premises rather than your personal opinion.
Your lack of transitionals argument is particularly baffling when the sampling study you asked for of the fossil record
exists. This makes your fallacy double-fold, you now hold your subjective view in the face of an objectively derived study.
I don't see it. So in fact, we don't really see this upward, from more primitive to more complex, transition in the earth's life.
I totally agree, & so what? THe ToE does not say complexity must increase, only that it has. Go back 3.5 Ga, there are only single celled prokaryotes, then single celled eukaryotes, then multicelled eukaryotes. That's an increase in complexity seen over time in the fossil record.
I think it's worth repeating a previous post contained points that have been ignored twice already by you...Third time lucky?
"
where are the transitional forms in the fossil record?
Pakicetus, Ambulocetus, Dahlanistes, Rhodocetus, Tekracetus, Gaviocetus, Remingtonocetids, Protocetids etc.
Duane Gish made exactly the same error you are making, he asks, "where are there transitionals?". They are pointed out to him, & he wants to see the transitionals of the transitionals or he won't accept that the originals are transitionals. If they are provided, he wants to see the transitionals between the transitionals of the transitionals. This has become known as the Gish Number. It is an intellectually bankrupt debating device because it can never be satified.
Evolutionary theory expects fossil forms that possesses character states that are part way between two separate taxa, &/or a mix of discrete characters between two taxa, namely transitionals.
They exist. Whether you like it or not, they exist.
But you guys cannot show these features evolving.
In the same way you can't show motion in a snapshot.
You make a mountain out of the slightest seeming evidence, an ear in a pseudo-canine, that has some whale-like properties.
Evolution predicts something that has whale-like properties, what's your beef (pun unintended - artiodactyl in-joke)? It wasn't going to be more than that. This is a sad attempt at playing down a borne out prediction.
Every single whale-like feature would have to evolve, very slowly, over millions and millions of years.
Would it? Why couldn't individual features evolve fairly rapidly? And as you well know, the actual number of cetacean genera known is relatively low with millions of years between finds, so you are going to see "jumps" in characters. Such a flick-book scenario would only exist if the sampling of the fossil record were amazingly good, which it isn't.
So we are left with the fossils we have rather than the ones you think we should have, which alone suggest an artiodactyl-cetacean transition. We have the phylogenies derived from morphology, amino acids, & DNA that also suggest the same thing.
Why are you not addressing the congruency of the data? As pointed out before, it's typical creationist head in the sand tactics. If you don't address the congruence you can pretend to live in a world of infinite coincidence where all correlating data that opposes your view (which you laughingly declare to have arrived at evidentially) is dismissed out of hand with a, "c'mon guys *insert irrelevant objection here*".
Fortunately the rest of science doesn't work that way. We have four
different datasets suggesting the same thing, it is therefore a perfectly reasonable conclusion that the data is a "signal", & that signal is derived from the evolution of cetaceans from artiodactyl ancestors.
Pretending that there should be more fossils is not a rebuttal.
Ignoring multiple correlation is not a rebuttal.
Asking, "when did he lose his hooves" is not a rebuttal.
Asking, "when did he develop a tail" is not a rebuttal.
Asking, "when did he start birthing underwater" is not a rebuttal.
Splitting hairs over what we can call a whale, or not, is not a rebuttal.
Repeatedly asserting that four congruent datasets pointing to the same conclusion is making a, "mountain out of the
slightest seeming evidence", is most certainly a triumph of wishful thinking over reason, but most definately
not a rebuttal.
Rebut the correlating evidence, or give it up."
Mark
There are 10 kinds of people in this world; those that understand binary, & those that don't
™ Version 4.2
