evolutionary chain

You have obviously already gotten a number of replies to this. I haven't read them yet. (I feel so behind in this whole thing). Anyway thank you for this chain. What I'm most curious about is the similarities and differences between Dalanistes and Rodhocetus. From the picture I can see that Dalanistes has legs and Rodhocetus does not. Also Dalanistes has a smallish neck and Rodhocetus doesn't. And maybe you could give me the evidence for why it is believed that Rodhocetus is decended from Dalanistes. There seem to be a few "missing links" here, right at the crucial point of transition from land to water.

Ok, this one's a bit more clear and I can see that Rodhocetus DOES have something like legs. They still seem much different than Dalaniste's legs, especially the back legs.

Thanks RAZD, this should be helpful. It's hard to sift through all this and figure out where I left off. Interesting reading though.

Are you sure the numbers down the left hand side indicate the depth at which each group of fossils were found? Because those numbers get smaller as you go down and if they indicate depth, I would think they would get larger. Am I missing something? Of course I'm not making any exciting point here, just trying to understand the chart.

Still this seems like a transition from lemur to lemur. I would like to see pictures of these guys. Do they cross any distinctive lines?

ok so this is not what I was looking for. I would like to see something distinctive being developed. Looks like they got bigger,and then some got bigger while others got smaller. That's interesting, but not what I was looking for.I took a look at the chipmunk thread, also interesting, but more talking about the idea that macroevolution CAN occur, by the same processes with which microevolution occurs. Still, I don't see a macroevolutionary chain.

I'm not looking for change in a short time. I don't care how long the chain is, I only want to see that one could've evolved from the previous up until we have something distinctively different. It doesn't even have to be from the fossil record. If evolution were correct, I would think there would be countless possible chains like this, living and fossilized. The big horse with one toe and the little horse with three toes are both horses. There are many different kinds of dogs and many different kinds of cats. I think it is possible that all cats evolved from a common cat ancestor. What I would like to know is what did the first cats evolve from that were not cats and how did the transition likely take place? Are we on a "downward trend" then? Because it is my understanding that there used to be giant dragonflies and beetles and lizzards, larger than any we know of today. This may be off topic though. Same question as above, then. Why are there not larger creatures than what once existed, long ago? They may be classified as different genuses, but what is so different about them? All I could tell from the chart is that they changed in size. Then maybe you can show me the chain of them becoming more distinct? I think macroevolution is where there is a change from one "kind" of animal to another. I don't know, though, how to define "kind" except that it includes animals which are distinct meaning they do not interbreed, or have some feature which is distinct from other animals. I do not think it occurs. The man-made classifications don't seem adequate for drawing lines, but wherever there is something distinct, it is unknown what the most recent ancestors were, as far as I can tell. I realize there are animals which do not interbreed, but likely have common ancestry. All I'm saying is that it is obvious to me that aminals which DO interbreed are an exception.
Some examples of what I would like to see the chain of development for: The amniotic egg of reptiles, the jumping aparatus of the click beetle, the pentadactyl limb of tetrapods, the spinneret and male copulating organ of spiders, the wing of a bat the water vascular and ambulacaral systems of echinoderms, the neck of the giraffe, the male reproductive organs of the dragonfly. Those examples were taken from Michael Denton's book "Evolution: a Theory in Crisis" But I could add the metamorphis of the butterfly or the shell of a turtle. Any of those would be very interesting to me.Hope that's helpful. Actually, to be honest, I hope I've stumped you, since I don't want evolution to be true.

this is from the link you gave me about horse evolution: Why is it that he thought they were found in the Miocene rocks? Didn't the people who found the fossils tell him which layer of rocks they were found in? I suspect that this isn't as clear cut as it seems. That dating layers isn't as easy as you guys make it seem.

Actually, I think that #1 under distictive is a pretty good definition: 1. Serving to identify; distinguishing: distinctive tribal tattoos. See Usage Note at distinct. What I mean is a defining characteristic. Something like the trunk of the elephant, or the quills on a porcupine. Perhaps, but I would think you could find something better. I gave you lots of possible options, can you not find chains for any of those?

OH yeah, I was slipping off topic again. Sorry.

Ok, if you can show me a gradual progression from a padded foot to a hoved foot, that will be good, since the horse is a pretty good runner on the feet he has, it's unlikely that this would just be a loss of something. Apparently that's what you've given me so I will have to research horse evolution and see how much validity there is. I'll let you know what I come up with.

Actually that horse chart you gave me doesn't give a description of the foot at each stage. I would really like to see that. Do you think you could find something like that for me?

that's a good idea. I'll look them up in the vertebrate palentology book you recommended I read.

That's what I was thinking. (posted before I read this) I still have the book. I didn't have to check it out of the library since my husband already had a copy. It has some stuff about horse evolution. I need to look at it again. Been kind of out of it lately with being sick and then getting ready for Christmas.I'm looking at it now, it has that same picture that you posted, or something very similar, with the horses hooves.I'm just reading it a bit as I'm working on this post. Here's an interesting quote:
Early work suggested that horses constituted a single assemblage that progressed relatively steadily from the small sized Hyracotherium (Eohippus), with low-crowned teeth and four toes on the front feet and three on the rear, to the modern genus Equus, which has high-crowned teeth and whose manus and pes are reduced to a single toe. Subsequent research has demonstrated a much more complex radiation, with many divergent lineages of browsers and grazers overlapping one another in time.Don't know whether that contradicts your idea of things or not, RAZD, but thought it was interesting. Anyway, I'll read this section thouroughly (doesn't look very long, so might not have any more explicit information that what I already have, but a good place to start). Then I'll let you guys know what I think.Have a nice day and Merry Christmas.

Yeah, it seems pretty general. I looked on amazon for some books specifically on horse evolution and didn't come up with much. What they had was pretty expensive. Maybe I'll check the library.