where was the transition within fossil record?? [Stalled: randman]

randman, Er, I offered plenty of comments on the points you raised, but then you failed to actually refute why cladistics match stratigraphy at all, let alone to the striking degree that they do, so why you think your comments had any value whatsoever is beyond reason. You said, "every fossil uncovered, when considered in toto, is totally inconsistent with the ToE". Please explain what "comprehensive analysis" has been undertaken in order for you to come to this conclusion.Who cares what YOU think what types & numbers of fossils are required? The salient point is that what ever the fossil record has, you want more, rather than actually looking at what the fossil record actually has. Regardless, looking at the fossil record as a whole we see stratigraphic flora & fauna being different over time. The whole fossil record isn't comprehensive enough for you? The 300 cladograms cited previously showing an "odds against" correlation of 5.68*10^323:1 isn't comprehensive enough for you? Clearly not, yet you will happily swallow medical drugs with far less evidence of their safety.You will have to forgive us, Randman, for thinking your argument is nothing more than wanting more than is ever available at any given time before you accept it. A single fossil that is consistent with evolution is evidence of it, because it is a fact predicted by a logically valid scientific theory. There is no arbitrary evidence value line-in-the-sand that must be surpassed before we can accept that evidence. The only standard that logically valid evidence must meet is that it is a logically derived prediction made by a logically valid hypothesis. YOU don't get to sweep anything away for no other reason than you don't like it & you want "more" (like the fossil record in its entirety & 300 cladograms isn't enough, anyway :rolleyes. Pah!Mark

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There are 10 kinds of people in this world; those that understand binary, & those that don't

I seem to remember speaking of this with you in the old whale evolution thread. I gave you some ideas that you seemed to think were reasonable but it looks like you've forgotten it. I'll try to re-visit my general idea.So, there are a lot of fossils of Basilosaurus. This does not by any means serve as an indication of how many fossils will exist of anything else. Lets look at things as they are today. There don't appear to be a lot of places where fossils are likely to form. You need things like mud, tar and such things. Volcanoes too, are a likely fossil forming phenomenon. However, animals live in all sorts of places. Some live in areas where there is greater potential for fossilization than others. Is this a reasonable statement? I think it is.Back to our old friend Basilosaurus. Fossils of these guys may be common, but all this suggests is that the habitats they tended to live in were in locations where fossilization was more likely. To take the example of basilosaurus and use it to claim that fossils of all or most of other transitionals should be as common is a very very big jump. Furthermore, basilo may have been very common and wide ranging in its day. Look at something like the common rat. They are everywhere, all over the world. Then there is the Giant Panda, very rare and inhabits a small part of the world. In a few million years time, which do you think is more likely to have fossils of them dug up? It's quite possible that there would not be any panda fossils at all, but say there was a mudslide that landed squarely on top of a colony of rats, well, then you'd have a lot, maybe hundreds or thousands of fossils of them.I'm not a scientist, so I can't and won't give detailed specific evidence of any of this. At any rate, I'm not making assertions, rather I'm speculating what is likely to have happened in the past based on what we can observe today. So I'll leave you with this. Think of an area of real wilderness that is existing today, maybe the Amazon, or central Africa, something like that. Think of how many different animals and plants inhabit this place. Now stop and consider, in several million years time (assuming no human interference) what would the fossil record from this area reveal to whoever might be around to dig them up?

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The probability that someone is watching you is directly proportional to the stupidity of your action.

Source for the thousands of remains? Can you quantify this rarity? No, it is rare for an organism to fossilize, if a given species lives in an area not susceptable to fossilization or said area has since eroded away or if there were only a small quantity of said species we may well find less or no fossils. Assuming we have thousands, then you might be right. Some species may be more likely to fossilize due to their habitat, or their fossils are more likely to have survived due to how their habitat has changed or there were many of said species. The larger the population, the more chances for a fossil to form exists. I'm not claiming that, I was pulling numbers out of my ass because you have not provided them.

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But since I have no idea how many ever lived in total, and neither do you, we can't really put figures on the rarity can we? Of course, your problems with taphonomy are pretty irrelevant.

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You don't think a 1 in 40,000 shot makes something rare and that's your opinion since rare is a relative term. Compared to the number of organisms that didn't fossilize that is rare. If only 40,000 members of a species ever existed, that makes that one fossil unique in the world...which is rare.When somebody says "fossilization is a rare procedure", they mean 'it doesn't happen very often, and when it does, it is even more rare for that fossil to survive for millions of years and be discovered'. If you dispute this, I expect you to back up your assertion that fossilization is a common event with figures.For the third time:

• Himalayecetus subathuensis
• Pakicetus inachus
• Protocetus
• Dorudon atrox
• Zygorhiza
• Basilosaurus cetoides
• Prosqualodon
• Squalodon
• Eurhinodelphis

Define for me how many of the above creatures existed. How often did they fossilize? How many of those survive to this day? How many have been discovered?

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In summary: Fossilization is rare. It does not happen after the great majority of deaths. Certain species live in areas which may increase the fossilization frequency. Certain species have many more members than others and thus it is likely that more will be fossilized.We see transtional fossils. We don't see all transitions. The transitions we do see are consistent with the Theory. If there were less, the ones that we find would be consistent. The prediction: If more are found they would be consistent.Evolutionists do not assume the chances for fossilization are the same for all species at all times in all places. If you are trying to demonstrate the holes in natural history by arguing from taphonomy you're going to have to understand the actual position, then you are probably going to have to produce some figures to back up your assertions about distribution of fossils through the record.

Hi Randman,You seem to be caught in the same repetitive and unproductive cycle as your first visit. You need to find a way out of this rut. Perhaps you can find a buddy who agrees with you to help you make your points. Or maybe you can find some different avenues to approach the issues. Whatever you do, I hope you can figure some way to help this thread out of its present dilemma and allow discussion to move forward. To my eye, it seems as if you're not engaging the points being made to you, but merely doggedly repeating your initial premise that more transitional fossils should be found than actually are.Please note that I'm not saying you are right or wrong, only that by not engaging people's points and by primarily just repeating your initial point that you are preventing discussion from moving forward, something that is specifically frowned upon in the Forum Guidelines.Banning unproductive contributors, or consigning them to special forums, hasn't really worked as a means for improving the quality of discussion, so I'm considering another approach. Threads in which productive discussion is being stymied will be designated as nonsense threads, and those thought primarily responsible would be listed. In the case of this thread I would do this by changing the title to where was the transition within fossil record?? [Nonsense: randman]. This would put members on warning that participation in the thread is not recommended, which would absolve moderators from having to moderate these unproductive discussions.Just a thought, at this point, I'm still considering alternatives.This message has been edited by Admin, 10-19-2005 09:39 AM

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

I like this idea At another forum I visited, users could earn/lose special badges that would apear in the poster info. box. It would basicaly label an individual as "troll, poster of the month, etc.".Another suggestion.

Percy,Don't you think that, by designating it a 'nonsense' thread, you might create the impression that you are taking sides? Wouldn't it be more appropriate to use some other indication that the thread isn't moving much?

Maybe instead of nonsense [randman: stalling]ABE: or maybe [thread: holding pattern]This message has been edited by Yaro, 10-19-2005 09:16 AM

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Modulous, first off, I am not a scientist, and secondly, I have little confidence that evo journals would publish such a study if it contained criticism of the basic evo paradigm.

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You mean like Gould and Elderedge did?...and became famous and hugely respected for doing?

To Yaro and Parasomnium, This is coming in the longer term, after I've switched over to using a MySQL database. Another good point. I wasn't happy with "nonsense", either. Yes, these are good ideas.Thanks for the feedback!

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Then I suppose a little smilie with a dunce cap would be out of the question?

As you see from his reply, robin, randman likes whales.Early in the whale thread I set about extrapolating backward from the number of presently known species in order to compare the number of known fossil species with a reasonable estimate of the number of species through time.Even the initial guesstimates made fossilization look like a damned rare event.Randman didn't like that for "apples and oranges" reasons, though, of course, one purpose of averaging is to see what can be said about unlike things...Nope, it's gotta be whales. I believe it is because randman believes the "land mammal to whale" lineage provokes particularly strong incredulity, so he wants it mentioned in print/on screen as much as possible.That agitprop motivation is his sole reason for being here. He may be a kludgy AI program.

Gould and Etheridge did not challenge the basic evo paradigm. What they did was very interesting. They used facts that creationists had used for decades but which evos steadfastly denied were true because creationists used these facts as evidence against ToE.Gould and Etheridge were able to use these same facts to support the evo paradigm, and only then were they admitted by the evo community at large, which is very, very telling imo.

Percy, I repeat myself because not once has the issue I raised been addressed. For example, one poster here brought up cladistics, which is a fine point and does address one aspect of the fossil record in toto. I refused to engage the point though because it is irrevalent to the specific point and issue I raised, which has to do with viewing the fossil record in toto relative to specific numbers and frequency of fossils discovered relative to what we should expect based on transitional forms that must have occurred.It's the same point, over and over again, yep, but only because there is abject refusal by evos to tackle it in any meaningful manner.For example, let's say that cladistics, for sake of argument, indicate that species did "evolve" or came to be in the nested order claimed, but at the same time, there appears to be less actual fossils than should be present assuming observed natural processes produced changes according to evo models.Assuming that was the case, the fossil evidence in toto, even with the cladistics, would be evidence of ID not ToE because the evidence would suggest a much more rapid form of evolution, and continually so, that massive numbers of transitional forms did not occur, and thus left no fossils.The issue is thus the same irregardless of much of the material others post. I spent lots of time addressing many of those issues, but honestly, why should the evos not have to address the issues I have raised here?Is it not reasonable to expect evolution proponents to back up their claims on "fossil rarity", which is given as an explanation for why the vast majority of species that supposedly lived leave absolutely no trace whatsoever. If fossilization is so rare, then why do many species leave so many fossils in so many different parts of the world?If it's a matter of ecology, then why don't see their immediate and subsequent ancestors, or even most of the species that lived in the same ecology?Where are the studies justifying evo claims in this area?

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Gould and Etheridge did not challenge the basic evo paradigm. What they did was very interesting. They used facts that creationists had used for decades but which evos steadfastly denied were true because creationists used these facts as evidence against ToE.

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Gould and Etheridge were able to use these same facts to support the evo paradigm, and only then were they admitted by the evocommunity at large, which is very, very telling imo.

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Perhaps you can provide some evidence to support these claims.However it IS a fact that creationists have often misrepresented the claims made by Gould and Eldredge to TRY to support their views. That, is certainly "very, very telling"

go to your local university library, and find this book. i'll even give you the call number, it's probably qe841.c254 (1988)it's just a suggestion, a good place to start. if the library follows the library of congress system, it'll be in the qe section with a ton of other books of vertebrate paleontology.suggest anyone making the argument that the fossil record does not plainly show evolution, or that transitional species are missing, do the same. until you do, you're just being willfully ignorant. they don't exist because you haven't seen them on tv, and the internet doesn't present a very good case with them all in the same place and lined up in a row.i should mentioned that this book is 700 pages, and barely scratches the surface. but it's an adequate length to give you an impression of the amount of data there is, and how it relates to the whole. it's not a popularist book, like goulds, and it's not trying to sell the idea -- it's a collection of fossils. but if you want to look at some of the actual data, scoot over a few shelves to the journals (qh?).go do some research. read several books like these. take some classes in geology and biology and paleontology. and then come back and pretend like you know a little something about the field.This message has been edited by arachnophilia, 10-20-2005 03:09 AM

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