Undermining long-held paradigms

OK, from Science News 3/18/06:

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IN THE SWIM The latest entry in the early mammalian diversity parade is Castorocauda lutrasimilis-which, translated from Latin, means "beaver-tailed creature that looks like an otter." The 50-centimeter-long creature, about the size of a modern-day platypus, lived about 164 million years ago in what is now northeastern China.

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And for weight:

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Castorocauda probably tipped the scale at around 800 grams, at least 10 times the weight of its known mammalian contemporaries.

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Hope this helps.

I appreciate that. However, in order to show that these examples are more or less bogus, we'd take this particular thread so far off topic that Admin would shoot the lot of us. That's why I suggested a new thread to discuss these specific claims.

Many thanks, anglagard. It occurred to me we were overlooking another interesting creature.To the extent that mammals lived in forests--the habitat would provide cover in a dinosaur-dominated age--they wouldn't fossilize often. No doubt many more discoveries await us.Some friends of mine who love animals saw the picture of Castorocauda. Their first reaction:'I want one!'Edited by Archer Opterix, : Typo.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

You seemed to only answer my post halfway. You even included my last question to you without quotes and you didn't respond to it. Neither of the pieces of evience you posted brings the Theory of Evolution into disrepute. You are very obviously confusing an instantiation of the theory with the theory itself. While the mammalian find may cause us to toss out some of what we thought the history of mammals was like, the overarching theory itself is not hampered. The parts of mammalian history that were theorized before were based on the evidence we had at the time. It was a complete theory given the evidence. Now there is new evidence that adds more information. This does not mean that our previous explanation of mammalian history was faulty. It simply means that it was incomplete.Newton's theories were not invalid because he didn't include relativity. In fact they are correct for a single frame of reference. Now we know more so we have a better understanding of how the laws of motion and forces work. We don't chide Newton for not being complete because that knowledge was the foundation that eventually became the new best explanation that we have. Even now we think there might be something missing that relativity cannot explain. Maybe you can produce for us where anyone has said that the previous understanding of the evolution of mammals was "evo gospel". Scientists fight about paradigms all the time but the evidence always wins.A century ago it was considered rediculous that the continents might be moving. The evidence won and changed our knowledge.Recently it was considered rediculous that the Earth might have ever been frozen from the poles to the equator. The evidence won and we changed our knowledge.Some things even went back and forth like the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs. It was volcanoes, then it was an impact, now we have evidence that the impact caused the volcanoes, then we have even more evidence of other impacts and their effect, then we have computer modeling of what an impact would do, then we have other palentological evidence of a decline in Mezozoic mega-fauna even BEFORE the impact and the volcanoes.Science is self correcting. No one who can claim to be a scientist SHOULD ever say that what we know now is 100% correct. Everything is open to be falsified and corrected when new evidence comes to light.Now we know there were bigger mammals in the age of the dinosaur. This REALLY isn't that big of a paradigm shift. All this evidence does is help complete our picture of mammal evolution.I would like for you to answer the question at the begginging of this post, the one you forgot about. As a hint, answering it properly requires that you are capable of distinguishing between the ToE and a particular instantiation of the theory, in this case early mammalian evolution.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

oh no -- don't let randman see that picture ... we'll have another whale tale highjacking.Size might be in the articleThe abstract says
Just a moment... Note "convergent to the modern platypus and many Cenozoic placentals" does NOT mean they were marsupials. Just in case eh?

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Just for giggles and grins, has anyone brought up the Synapsids on this thread as part of the reply to this false assumption that mammals were not really around during the age of the dinosaurs?

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"Chance favors the prepared mind." L. Pasteur
and my family motto
Transfixus sed non mortis
Taz

Dr Tazimus maximus writes: I mentioned the therapsids early on--not that anyone paid it much heed.And that's indeed quite a grin you have there. Please continue. I could use a refresher on the relationship between pelycosaurs, therapids, synapsids, and cynodonts, if you don't mind.

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ArcherAll species are transitional.

I am just really getting into the Permean myself and have to admit to being on the sharp end of the learning curve with respect to the current state of the research.While I normally do not use Wikpedia they do have an outstanding series of linkages for the class Synapsida and the order TherapsidaAn interesting book that I am reading now is When Life Nearly Died by M.J. Benton.All of this going back, obviously, to the fact that none of this data (despite statements to the contrary) does anything to cause problems with the theory of evolution and in fact strengthens the theory as it better defines the origins of MODERN mammals by better defining their ancestors.Edited by Dr_Tazimus_maximus, : Lack of coffee leading to typing mistakes

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"Chance favors the prepared mind." L. Pasteur
and my family motto
Transfixus sed non mortis
Taz

Whoo, hoo! Welcome back, Taz. Long time no, erm, read. Hope you'll have some time to post. After you're finished with that one, I urge you to read Douglas Erwin's Extinction: How Life on Earth Nearly Ended 250 Million Years Ago (Princeton Uni Press, 2006). Very up to date on the End Permian mass extinction.

Alright, that is enormous. Obviosly much bigger than Meteor Crater, which by the way, is extremely impressive once you're inside it. Here is the purpose of the inquiry: Theory and fact often converge prematurely when theory unduly becomes fact. The general concensus of the K-T event is that a meteor that hit the Mexican peninsula was the factor for such a catastrophic event. Afterall, there has to be some good reason for why these creatures simply disappeared, right. But not everyone is convinced that it was the Chicxulub site that did them in. A few separate teams, including some researchers from NASA, believe that it was another site that caused such a massive extinction. As for my own beliefs on the subject, they are tentative, as I'm not swayed in either direction. My reason for mentioning has to do with the difference between fact and theory and how that line often gets hazy. It would be one thing if the community stated their beliefs based on certain pieces of evidence. That way, as new evidence appears, they can tailor their beliefs accordingly. But some people just can't do that. Instead, they have to tell me all about their "proof," and how its a "fact" that this or that happened. Suddenly, fact becomes factoid. As a defense, they tout the much coveted line, "We accomodate our beliefs as new evidence sufaces." Then what you stated prior was not a fact, right? Don't call it a fact unless its a fact. This is really the purpose of my post. To show how theory and fact become convergent prematurely.

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“"All science, even the divine science, is a sublime detective story. Only it is not set to detect why a man is dead; but the darker secret of why he is alive." ”G. K. Chesterton

Hi Nemesis,
you said

The general concensus of the K-T event is that a meteor that hit the Mexican peninsula was the factor for such a catastrophic event. Afterall, there has to be some good reason for why these creatures simply disappeared, right. But not everyone is convinced that it was the Chicxulub site that did them in. A few separate teams, including some researchers from NASA, believe that it was another site that caused such a massive extinction.

I am afraid that your facts are wrong. The Chicxulub impact site is for the KT boundry extinction event, the one in Australia is for an earlier, larger event at the end of the Permean almost 200 million years prior to the KT extinction event.Also you have repeated a certian philospophical error seve3ral times on this thread

when theory unduly becomes fact

Theory never becomes fact, it only becomes more or less supported. Facts, laws and observations all all part of a framework that becomes theory.

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"Chance favors the prepared mind." L. Pasteur
and my family motto
Transfixus sed non mortis
Taz

Fair enough. Perhaps the wording was a bit antagonistic. I don't think anyone can say with any semblance of veracity that these ages took place or what events took place during the timeframes. These are assumptions based on the manmade concept of classification and how what organism followed in a sequence of evolutionary events. This is partly why I object to most evo's saying that evolution does not have a direction of less complex to more complex. Of course that's what it implies, however tacitly they'd like to package it. I would say that it undermined a belief. I understood you, no worries.

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“"All science, even the divine science, is a sublime detective story. Only it is not set to detect why a man is dead; but the darker secret of why he is alive." ”G. K. Chesterton

true--the names given to the periods are based off of the life found at that time.however, one quick point--life doesn't automatically evolve towards greater complexity.I point you in the direction of the largest biotic kingdom on earth, the one with the most profound impact on the ecology of this planet--bacteria.They are the simplest life forms in existence (unless you think that virus's are alive, at which point, those are the most simple). And if everything supposedly moved from simple to complex, why haven't these guys? And if they have, how come they have gotten as complex, as say, you or I? after all, they've had the same amount of time to get here, no?abe: dang it man, you're turning into randman. this article is about an impact that occured 250 million years ago. this does nothing to refute the fact that chixulub impact was involved in the extinction event at the end of the cretaceous. referring to the k-t. referring to a much earlier extinction event.In fact, this supports chixulub. Why? Becuase no we have two meteor(asteroid?) impacts and massive volcanism at the same time. One volc/impact 250 mya, one volc/impact 65mya.
It was thought to be a coincidence that the volcanism came at the same time as the impact. we now have this "coincidence" twice. More probable that the volcanism and impact are linked, which just aids the case of "yes, an asteroid impact took out the dinos".Edited by kuresu, : No reason given.

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All a man's knowledge comes from his experiences

Put on blindfolds. Wear earplugs. Stop eating.All of the evidence of our senses depends on classification. If you deny classification, you deny everything, including your own existence.

Facts are evidence, theory is based on fact -- it has to explain the existing body of {facts\evidence} first before it can advance to the next stage, predictions. This alone makes scientific theory of a higher standard than mere belief:

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be”lief” -noun
1. something believed; an opinion or conviction: a belief that the earth is flat.
2. confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof: a statement unworthy of belief.
3. confidence; faith; trust: a child's belief in his parents.
4. a religious tenet or tenets; religious creed or faith: the Christian belief.

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Nor do "beliefs" need to be falsifiable.

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scientific theory n :
a theory that explains scientific observations; "scientific theories must be falsifiable"

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Theory is not "belief" that {something} is true, it is the proposition that {something} MAY be true, and that lists ways to TEST whether it is or not.This does not make theory into fact as you seem to be claiming. Not for evolution, not for any science. No matter what you believe.New {facts\evidence} are uncovered all the time -- that is an {ahem} fact of science.Sometimes those facts confirm existing theory, sometimes they don't. Mostly they do, but the ones that make "the news" are the ones that don't confirm existing theory -- when that happens the new {fact\evidence} is not ignored, it is included in the pile of {fact\evidence} that must be explained by a theory before it can advance to the next stage, predictions.This is done by either a new theory or by modification of the old one so that the new {fact\evidence} is included in the explanation of all the existing {fact\evidence}The adjustment is not to the facts but to the theory that explains themYour continued use of the term "belief" when talking about scientific theory is just part of your denial of the validity of the evidence that supports the theory, the part that forms the foundation of the theory.Your strawman is conflating theory with the evidence that supports the theory: What was stated before was theory, not fact. The theory that explained all the previous evidence.All the old facts are still there, still used, we have just added {new information} to the pile.What has changed is the theory, not the facts that are explained by the theory. It is not a new "belief" because theory exceeds the definition of belief, and it is not fact because theory is based on fact - the new plus the old.We still end up with a proposition that {something} MAY be true, and that lists ways to TEST whether it is or not.This is not belief, it is science.Enjoy.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
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RebelAAmericanOZen[Deist
... to learn ... to think ... to live ... to laugh ...
to share.