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Author Topic:   The Origin of Novelty
mindspawn
Member (Idle past 2660 days)
Posts: 1015
Joined: 10-22-2012


Message 811 of 871 (697096)
04-21-2013 9:55 AM
Reply to: Message 809 by Granny Magda
04-21-2013 8:29 AM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
And if they had been classified by so simple-minded a process, you would have a point. But they're not, so you don't.
Yes, they are all apes; upright walking apes, with far more in common with humans than you seem to realise.
More claims by evolutionists. Please just give me a link, or article to back up your claims that those particular ape fossils are human? Don't assume these scientists know everything, I would like you to actually QUOTE them to back up your claims.
Except that these fossils were not "placed" in a row. Their ordering is not arbitrary, they are placed in chronological order. This is completely objective. And - quelle surprise - these observations agree with the ToE. No-one forced them to do this, they just happen to be that way. This is, as per our previous agreements about the nature of supporting evidence, yet another line of evidence that supports evolution.
They are placed in chronological order. I give you that. BUT they were not the ONLY hominid fossils of that time. Do you get my point? If EVERY age has a large range of hominid fossils, then this gives evolutionists the freedom to pick and choose among the hominid fossils available for that age, to find one that best suits their homology sequence. This makes the process arbitrary. YOU may not see this point, but there are clever spectators of this thread that will be quietly giggling at your lack of comprehension combined with your intellectual patronising. To explain it SLOWLY for you, there were monkey fossils during each age too. So they just picked the convenient ape fossils that had at least one feature that matched humans, without acknowledging that EVERY age has had apes with at least one feature matching humans, right from the very first ape.
For example one of the very first monkeys, the apidium, had a human-like flat face. If found later, this would be "proof" of evolution, because of the developing flat features. But because the apidium is found first, the emphasis is on other human-like features of the other later apes (brow ridge). The core logic in support of evolution is frankly, missing!
This is utterly false.
Disagree? Then show me a Pliocene Homo sapiens, or a modern Australopithecene
I didn't say every age had every species, but every age had a large range to choose from.
I agree. But the fact remains that no-one arranged these skulls in anything other than the chronological order they came in. Your criticisms are unfounded.
not unfounded at all
Edited by mindspawn, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 809 by Granny Magda, posted 04-21-2013 8:29 AM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 812 by Coyote, posted 04-21-2013 10:13 AM mindspawn has replied
 Message 813 by Granny Magda, posted 04-21-2013 1:00 PM mindspawn has replied

  
Coyote
Member (Idle past 2106 days)
Posts: 6117
Joined: 01-12-2008


(1)
Message 812 of 871 (697097)
04-21-2013 10:13 AM
Reply to: Message 811 by mindspawn
04-21-2013 9:55 AM


"What ifs" lose again
Please just give me a link, or article to back up your claims that those particular ape fossils are human? Don't assume these scientists know everything, I would like you to actually QUOTE them to back up your claims.
You need a link? A quote??? Just look at the name! If you see Homo they are classified in the human genus. Pretty simple when you get the hang of it, eh?
And nobody assumes scientists know everything, quite the contrary. But there are scientists all over the world looking to make a name for themselves by proving other scientists wrong! This would be the quickest way for a graduate student to get ahead, and believe me they are looking for any opportunity.
Although I now practice archaeology, half of my training in graduate school, to the Ph.D. level, was in the fields of human osteology and fossil man. I have been on the inside of this profession, an area about which you can only speculate wildly (and wrongly).
Sorry, but all of your "what ifs" do not rise to the level of one piece of actual evidence.

Religious belief does not constitute scientific evidence, nor does it convey scientific knowledge.
Belief gets in the way of learning--Robert A. Heinlein
How can I possibly put a new idea into your heads, if I do not first remove your delusions?--Robert A. Heinlein
It's not what we don't know that hurts, it's what we know that ain't so--Will Rogers

This message is a reply to:
 Message 811 by mindspawn, posted 04-21-2013 9:55 AM mindspawn has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 816 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 11:22 AM Coyote has not replied

  
Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 4.0


(5)
Message 813 of 871 (697110)
04-21-2013 1:00 PM
Reply to: Message 811 by mindspawn
04-21-2013 9:55 AM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
Please just give me a link, or article to back up your claims that those particular ape fossils are human?
You misunderstand me. Australopithecines were not human. What I said is that they were human-like and they are.
These are bipedal apes. They displayed adaptations for upright walking, yet their skulls were very similar to those of modern apes. That alone marks them out as having a mixture of basal ape-like characteristics and derived human-like characteristics. The comparison is shown here;
As you can see, the pelvis and feet of A. afarensis are much more like ours than they are like the chimp pelvis used for comparison. Their legs were more human-like as well. The fossil displays a mixture of basal and derived characteristics, just as one would expect under the ToE.
There are further points of comparison. A. afarensis had canine teeth that jutted out from the rest (although not as much as in modern chimps). By comparison, later Austalopithecines show further derived features, such as A. africanus, whose teeth were more similar to those of modern humans. The front teeth in this species were larger and did not jut out, just as we see in humans. Again, this shows a mixture of basal and derived characteristics, just as we would expect under the ToE.
Read more here.
So when you rather dismissively referred to "Just because a gorilla has a large cranial capacity, or a gibbon has an upright stance, or an orangutang has smaller eyebrow ridges" as representative of the kind of anatomical details that scientists use, you were not being fair. They go into far more detail than that. If you want to see more detail on the similarities between Lucy and a mo0dern human, there is an excellent article here; Not Found
And if you still want more detail, just google up a few academic papers and take a look. They go into just a bit more detail than you seem to think.
They are placed in chronological order. I give you that. BUT they were not the ONLY hominid fossils of that time. Do you get my point?
Yes, I get your point. You suspect cherry picking has taken place. This would be a reasonable objection, were it true. But it's not true. For example, you say;
If EVERY age has a large range of hominid fossils, then this gives evolutionists the freedom to pick and choose among the hominid fossils available for that age, to find one that best suits their homology sequence.
This would be a fair objection... if it were true that "EVERY age has a large range of hominid fossils", but that just isn't true. There are no fossils of the genus Homo in the early Pliocene or anything nearly that human-like. There just aren't. They are not absent from the comparison because someone decided to leave them out. They are absent because they have never been found. They're absent because they don't exist. Similarly, there are no Australopithecines beyond about 2.5 mya. The later comparisons omit them not because of evolutionist's bias, but because they were simply not around by that time.
The "large range of hominid fossils" that you imagine for each era does not exist. The sequences you're being shown have not been rigged. they are actually rather good. Worse for your particular YEC position, no human or ape fossils of any kind appear before the Miocene. That's some hundreds of millions of years without human fossils, when you would have us believe that humans have been around since about day six of creation. I gotta say, my supporting evidence is looking a bit better than yours.
To explain it SLOWLY for you, there were monkey fossils during each age too.
Monkey fossils? Really?
We're not talking about monkey fossils. None of the fossils in that sequence was of a monkey. Monkeys have tails. Do you think that any of those fossils had tails? Try to keep up.
But yes, some lineages persist, whilst others die out... just as we would expect under the ToE. I fail to see how this is any kind of objection.
EVERY age has had apes with at least one feature matching humans, right from the very first ape.
Do you realise what you're saying? Humans are apes. If there wasn't "at least one feature" that humans and apes had in common, they would not be classified together (or the record, they were classified together by Linnaeus; a creationist).
The point is that you cannot find an ape fossil from the early Pliocene that is as similar to humans as Homo. The scenario you describe is not credible.
For example one of the very first monkeys, the apidium, had a human-like flat face. If found later, this would be "proof" of evolution, because of the developing flat features. But because the apidium is found first, the emphasis is on other human-like features of the other later apes (brow ridge).
Except that it's a monkey fossil, not an ape fossils. In fact, it's not even a monkey, it's from further back up the tree than that. Professional palaeontologists are not like you. They know the difference between apes and monkeys. Please trust me when I tell you that they are not so moronically incompetent as to place a friggin monkey into an evolutionary sequence of apes.
I didn't say every age had every species, but every age had a large range to choose from.
I'm sorry, but you are just flat-out wrong about that. Better think again.
Mutate and Survive
Edited by Granny Magda, : No reason given.
Edited by Granny Magda, : Improve image, fix spelling error.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 811 by mindspawn, posted 04-21-2013 9:55 AM mindspawn has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 815 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 8:35 AM Granny Magda has replied
 Message 817 by New Cat's Eye, posted 04-22-2013 11:43 AM Granny Magda has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22392
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 5.3


(2)
Message 814 of 871 (697120)
04-21-2013 5:20 PM
Reply to: Message 810 by mindspawn
04-21-2013 9:19 AM


mindspawn writes:
The AUSTRALOPITHECUS is an ape.
They're all apes, including us. You need to pick a different level of classification.
Even if you exclude humans and chimps, you still have a group of closely related ape skulls that, when ordered by time, appear to represent a transitional sequence. To deny this is to stare at the sky and declare it not blue.
The fossil record includes examples of all magnitudes of differences. Some fossils are barely different at all because they're the same species. Some fossils are a little more different, but still so similar that it isn't possible to know whether they're the same species or closely related species. Other fossils have a greater degree of differences and we can be pretty sure they're different species. (Of course, most fossils are so different that we can be sure they're not only different species, but different genus and class and so forth.)
In such a fossil record as we have it would be impossible that there be no orderings that resemble transitional sequences, yet this is what you're asking people to believe. Denying that there are transitional sequences is like denying that water is wet.
And unfortunately you have had propaganda enriched education! In your early days of education you get shown a sequence of pictures from ape to crouched hairy man, and the mental imprint is so strong that evolutionists have built a massive "evidence based" mountain of information with no foundation except a few fossils arranged in artificial sequences. It is funny, even though its really sad for science.
Gee, I wonder if we can turn this around. Let me give it a try:
"And unfortunately you have had a propaganda enriched education. In your early days of education you were told stories of a six day creation and talking snakes and a global flood and an ark, and the mental imprint combined with the threat of eternal damnation for not believing is so strong that creationists have built a massive "mythology based" mountain of misinformation with no foundation at all except a mountain of lies about what science really says and that they want to teach to kids everywhere. It isn't at all funny. It is really sad for us all."
Did I forget anything?
I've dealt with his hominid range of skulls now that I had the time.
No, you really didn't. You don't consider any of the details of the fossil sequence, you just declare them not transitional.
No I would expect something more logical, like a body covering that had some aspects of scales and some aspects of fur. This is what the gradual change of evolutionary theory would predict.
Well, yes, I think most would agree that fits the concept of a transitional. The small changes in skull shape of the hominid sequence also fits the concept of a transitional. The criteria you seem to be applying for whether something is a transitional or not is whether we have actual examples of it. If we have examples of a transitional sequence, such as the hominid sequence, then it isn't really transitional to you. But if we don't have examples of some hypothetical sequence, such as a transition from scales to fur or vice versa, then it is a transitional to you. Do you have any criteria that aren't so obviously biased and artificial?
Where are these so-called gradual changes?
You were already given a sequence of gradual changes in the hominid sequence. You still haven't given any reasons that make any sense for rejecting the transitional nature of that sequence. You seem to believe you've given a reason, but "Because I said so," which is in effect what you're saying, isn't a reason.
Now we shouldn't expect to convince anyone about evolution who believes it means eternal damnation, but we should expect an investment in time and effort to give us answers that make sense.
By the way, before you start complaining about the introduction of the religious basis for your position, realize it was you who introduced the effect of mental icons into the discussion. They shouldn't be part of any scientific discussion. What's important is the evidence supporting one's position, and your position seems to require ignoring the evidence before one's very eyes.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 810 by mindspawn, posted 04-21-2013 9:19 AM mindspawn has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 820 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 12:03 PM Percy has replied

  
mindspawn
Member (Idle past 2660 days)
Posts: 1015
Joined: 10-22-2012


Message 815 of 871 (697156)
04-22-2013 8:35 AM
Reply to: Message 813 by Granny Magda
04-21-2013 1:00 PM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
You misunderstand me. Australopithecines were not human. What I said is that they were human-like and they are.
These are bipedal apes. They displayed adaptions for upright walking, yet their skulls were very similar to those of modern apes. That alone marks them out as having a mixture of basal ape-like characteristics and derived human-like characteristics. The comparison is shown here;
Oh they were bipedal like gibbons? Gibbons are on the way to becoming more human like, as proven by their bipedal pelvis? This proves that they are a future missing link of some future intelligent race? hmmm I'm not sure about your logic that a bipedal posture and pelvis proves anything. Maybe an increased brain size proportional to body size would have more significance towards the rise of an intelligent species.
As you can see, the pelvis and feet of A. afarensis are much more like ours than they are like the chimp pelvis used for comparison. Their legs were more human-like as well. The fossil displays a mixture of basal and derived characteristics, just as one would expect under the ToE.
Oh really? I would think the first signs of a rise towards an intelligent race would be brain capacity, not upright posture. Gibbons have an upright posture, they are not the brightest of anthropoid apes and I doubt are heading off to becoming more intelligent than the chimp, just because they stand straight. What links etc can you show me to prove your statement that the A afarensis has the correct mixture of characteristics as expected under ToE?
Look at the proconsul, arguably the first ape. It had LESS prominent brow ridges than future apes. ie it showed human features prematurely, followed by other apes with less human features (prominent brow ridges). Logically these are just numerous unique species, only the assumption of evolution would put them in an artificial sequence, when at every age there were numerous types of apes, some which had human-like features.
So when you rather dismissively referred to "Just because a gorilla has a large cranial capacity, or a gibbon has an upright stance, or an orangutang has smaller eyebrow ridges" as representative of the kind of anatomical details that scientists use, you were not being fair. They go into far more detail than that. If you want to see more detail on the similarities between Lucy and a mo0dern human, there is an excellent article here; Not Found
Thanks for the link, even the article itself admitted that there is not enough literature that does define Lucy as an intermediate. But I feel their attempt to do so also fails. Let me quote a logical fallacy of that article , the entire article is based on a silly argument "The hypothesis that Lucy is just an ape predicts that the comparison will reveal no humanlike features in Lucy that are unnecessary for upright bipedal locomotion"
He's basically saying that any ape with more than one human feature is an intermediate, and not fully an ape. But yet he then defines ape features, based on the chimpanzee. Why pick on the chimp? Why not the gorilla, or the orangutang? I personally see a human as having a high brain to body size ratio as adjusted by the encephalization quotient (EQ). If say an ape could be shown to have the EQ of a dolphin, then sure. that would be a good candidate for an intermediate, but the other features are all shared even among non-human relatively lacking intelligence apes, and no-one feature is only seen in humans, why then call these features "human" if modern apes already have them? And it is wrong to class an ape as "human-like" just because it has two features that are already common among modern great apes, humans, and gibbons.
I'm sorry, but you are just flat-out wrong about that. Better think again.
Regarding whether I am wrong about the diversity of ape species during past ages, let's look at the Miocene: Wikipedia had the following to say:
Miocene - Wikipedia
Approximately 100 species of apes lived during this time. They ranged over much of the Old World and varied widely in size, diet, and anatomy. Due to scanty fossil evidence it is unclear which ape or apes contributed to the modern hominid clade, but molecular evidence indicates this ape lived from between 15 to 12 million years ago.
One hundred species? That is a lot.
Then during the Pleistocene we have evidence of current great apes, as well as a number of other ape-like species: the Paranthropus and Australopithecus , Gigantopithecus, the mystery ape : The mystery ape of Pleistocene Asia | Nature
http://digitallibrary.amnh.org/dspace/handle/2246/259 " In a previous study of material from the cave of Tham Khuyen (Schwartz et al., 1994) we identified, but did not name, a new species of Pongo as well as a new genus and species of thick-enameled, nonhominid hominoid. These new taxa are named and characterized in this contribution, as are four new subspecies of Pongo pygmaeus."
So generally you evolutionists have a nice range of apes to choose from. Yes cherry picking is the right phrase, you can pick which ones best suit your imagined evolutionary tree from every age.
The "large range of hominid fossils" that you imagine for each era does not exist. The sequences you're being shown have not been rigged. they are actually rather good. Worse for your particular YEC position, no human or ape fossils of any kind appear before the Miocene. That's some hundreds of millions of years without human fossils, when you would have us believe that humans have been around since about day six of creation. I gotta say, my supporting evidence is looking a bit better than yours.
The problem with evolution is that there is so much intellectual pride at stake (and careers at stake) that when any evidence is found that contradicts the view, it is ridiculed and never analysed properly. I'm sure you will take the same approach to the following links as other scientists do, rather than looking for actual truth:
NONE of the following websites is reputable, but reading between the lines you can see the wealth of unfaced truth that scientists of today should be answerable for. The reason these websites are popping up all the time, and have gained so much popularity is because people can see that the scientific community is NOT taking alternative views seriously enough, and with scientific respect:
Just a moment...
http://www.epubbud.com/read.php?g=8XLKTFDM&tocp=97
Evolution by Catastrophe: Does it indicate Intelligent Design? - Graham Hancock Official Website
Page not found – Hall of the Gods
I am 100% sure these links will have no effect on you, its the neutral spectators that they will affect profoundly, and this effect will be exacerbated by the attitudes of evolutionists on this thread which merely reflect or copy the blindness of the scientific community. I'm willing to explore every idea with openness to truth, I wonder why scientists are not willing, this seems extremely unscientific to me.
Edited by mindspawn, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 813 by Granny Magda, posted 04-21-2013 1:00 PM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 818 by Granny Magda, posted 04-22-2013 11:59 AM mindspawn has replied

  
mindspawn
Member (Idle past 2660 days)
Posts: 1015
Joined: 10-22-2012


Message 816 of 871 (697185)
04-22-2013 11:22 AM
Reply to: Message 812 by Coyote
04-21-2013 10:13 AM


Re: "What ifs" lose again
You need a link? A quote??? Just look at the name! If you see Homo they are classified in the human genus. Pretty simple when you get the hang of it, eh?
And nobody assumes scientists know everything, quite the contrary. But there are scientists all over the world looking to make a name for themselves by proving other scientists wrong! This would be the quickest way for a graduate student to get ahead, and believe me they are looking for any opportunity.
Although I now practice archaeology, half of my training in graduate school, to the Ph.D. level, was in the fields of human osteology and fossil man. I have been on the inside of this profession, an area about which you can only speculate wildly (and wrongly).
Sorry, but all of your "what ifs" do not rise to the level of one piece of actual evidence.
I'm not too interested in credentials or labels, I'm interested in facts. If you can back up your comments with facts, I'm cool with that.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 812 by Coyote, posted 04-21-2013 10:13 AM Coyote has not replied

  
New Cat's Eye
Inactive Member


(1)
Message 817 of 871 (697189)
04-22-2013 11:43 AM
Reply to: Message 813 by Granny Magda
04-21-2013 1:00 PM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
Great post, Granny. Hey, when you get those images with the "clear" backgrounds, its a lot easier to see them if you use the blockcolor dBCode to make the background white instead of blue. Like this:
I used
[blockcolor=white][thumb]http://anthro.palomar.edu/hominid/images/pelvis_and_feet.gif[/thumb][/blockcolor]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 813 by Granny Magda, posted 04-21-2013 1:00 PM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 819 by Granny Magda, posted 04-22-2013 12:01 PM New Cat's Eye has seen this message but not replied

  
Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 4.0


(3)
Message 818 of 871 (697195)
04-22-2013 11:59 AM
Reply to: Message 815 by mindspawn
04-22-2013 8:35 AM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
Oh they were bipedal like gibbons? Gibbons are on the way to becoming more human like, as proven by their bipedal pelvis? This proves that they are a future missing link of some future intelligent race?
1) Gibbons are not fully bipedal. They're more bipedal than other modern apes, but they are far from fully bipedal.
2) Gibbons do not have a "bipedal pelvis", their pelvises resemble those of a chimp far more than a human and they resemble a chimp's pelvis far more than an Australapithecine's pelvis.
3) Please stop trying to put words in my mouth. If you are unable to manage this, please try to find some slightly less stupid words.
The fact remains that gibbons are not very similar to humans. Even in this specific point of comparison, they are not anywhere near as similar to us as Lucy.
Maybe an increased brain size proportional to body size would have more significance towards the rise of an intelligent species.
Well yes. That is exactly what we see in the transitional human-lineage fossils, increasing brain size.
Oh really? I would think the first signs of a rise towards an intelligent race would be brain capacity, not upright posture.
You might think that, but it is not a prediction of the ToE.
There has long been debate about which would arise first, brain capacity or bipedalism. The evidence is currently in favour of bipedalism arising first, but this is not a requirement of the ToE.
What links etc can you show me to prove your statement that the A afarensis has the correct mixture of characteristics as expected under ToE?
I already provided you with links to that effect. Here is one of them again; Not Found It goes into some detail on the morphological comparisons between Australopithecines and modern humans.
Look at the proconsul, arguably the first ape. It had LESS prominent brow ridges than future apes. ie it showed human features prematurely, followed by other apes with less human features (prominent brow ridges). Logically these are just numerous unique species, only the assumption of evolution would put them in an artificial sequence, when at every age there were numerous types of apes, some which had human-like features.
You cite only a single human-like feature, and even that is not supported by my reading;
quote:
Proconsul's monkey-like features include pronograde postures, indicated by a long flexible back, curved metacarpals, and an above-branch arboreal quadrupedal positional repertoire. The primary feature linking Proconsul with extant apes is its lack of a tail; other "ape-like" features include its enhanced grasping capabilities, stabilized elbow joint and facial structure.
Source
According to that its facial structure was ape-like. Looking at the photo's on that page, the skull is clearly ape-like. Certainly, it is more ape-like than any member of the Homo genus. So you are wrong about this one.
Thanks for the link, even the article itself admitted that there is not enough literature that does define Lucy as an intermediate. But I feel their attempt to do so also fails. Let me quote a logical fallacy of that article , the entire article is based on a silly argument "The hypothesis that Lucy is just an ape predicts that the comparison will reveal no humanlike features in Lucy that are unnecessary for upright bipedal locomotion"
No. That is the prediction of your argument; that Lucy is merely an upright ape, not an intermediate. The article tests both hypotheses, evolutionist and creationist. If the evolutionary hypothesis were true, we would expect "a point-by-point comparison will reveal in Lucy a mixture of apelike features and humanlike features in which some of the humanlike features are not necessary for upright bipedal locomotion." And that is exactly what we see. If the creationist hypothesis were true, there's no reason we should expect to see human-like features in Lucy that are not linked to bipedalism, or, as the article puts it "the comparison will reveal no humanlike features in Lucy that are unnecessary for upright bipedal locomotion". That isn't what we see though. The predictions of the ToE are vindicated and your "just an ape" predictions are not. Score one for the ToE.
He's basically saying that any ape with more than one human feature is an intermediate, and not fully an ape.
No he isn't. You've misread it.
But yet he then defines ape features, based on the chimpanzee. Why pick on the chimp? Why not the gorilla, or the orangutang?
Because chimps are the most human-like of the modern apes. In choosing the most human-like, rather than a gorilla or orang, they are using the example which is least favourable to the ToE. After all, a comparison between humans, Australopithecines and gorillas, would be too easy a test; of course Lucy was more like a human than a gorilla, that much is obvious. It's much more telling to compare between similar species.
I personally see a human as having a high brain to body size ratio as adjusted by the encephalization quotient (EQ). If say an ape could be shown to have the EQ of a dolphin, then sure. that would be a good candidate for an intermediate,
That would be absurd. The ToE does not predict close similarity between humans and dolphins. The point is to test the ACTUAL Theory of evolution, not the one you just made up.
but the other features are all shared even among non-human relatively lacking intelligence apes, and no-one feature is only seen in humans, why then call these features "human" if modern apes already have them?
The point is to compare the specimens to modern human anatomy. There are similarities between a modern ape and a human, but no modern ape will ever be as similar to a human as Lucy is. Further, no Australopithecine will ever be as similar to a human as Homo habilis is. Further again, no H. habilis will ever be as similar to a human as H. erectus is... and so on.
The point is not merely that similarities exist, it's the degree of similarity that counts. These fossils are more similar to humans than any of those that you have mentioned. As they get more recent, they get more human-like. That is their significance.
And it is wrong to class an ape as "human-like" just because it has two features that are already common among modern great apes, humans, and gibbons.
God dammit mindspawn...
quote:
Of 36 anatomical characters examined on AL 288-1, 14 (39%) exhibit the apelike state and 22 (61%) exhibit the humanlike state.
Twenty-two. Out of the thirty-six features looked at in that paper, twenty-two were human-like. Not two.
Regarding whether I am wrong about the diversity of ape species during past ages, let's look at the Miocene: Wikipedia had the following to say:
Miocene - Wikipedia
Approximately 100 species of apes lived during this time. {snip}
One hundred species? That is a lot.
It is indeed. Now ask yourself; how many of those display the human-like features that Lucy does, to the same degree that Lucy does? Because your objection could only be valid if there were a wealth of (at least somewhat) human-like apes from every period. Showing us ape-like apes proves nothing - we already know that basal apes survived, they exist today. Your argument can only work if there are early strongly human-like apes that precede Lucy and screw up the narrative - and there aren't.
Then during the Pleistocene we have evidence of current great apes, as well as a number of other ape-like species: the Paranthropus and Australopithecus , Gigantopithecus, the mystery ape : Nature - Not Found
http://digitallibrary.amnh.org/dspace/handle/2246/259 " In a previous study of material from the cave of Tham Khuyen (Schwartz et al., 1994) we identified, but did not name, a new species of Pongo as well as a new genus and species of thick-enameled, nonhominid hominoid. These new taxa are named and characterized in this contribution, as are four new subspecies of Pongo pygmaeus."
All of which are more ape-like than Lucy, not less. If this is your example of what has been missed out of the sequence, it fails miserably. If you can present a fossil which does not agree with the evolutionary narrative, then present it. So far, you have not done so.
The problem with evolution is that there is so much intellectual pride at stake (and careers at stake) that when any evidence is found that contradicts the view, it is ridiculed and never analysed properly. I'm sure you will take the same approach to the following links as other scientists do, rather than looking for actual truth:
Your own assessment of the links in question;
NONE of the following websites is reputable
No. None of those links is reputable. One of them is from Graeme-fucking-Hancock for god's sake! Fuck Graeme Hancock! The man's a cretin and a fraud. Another is to a message board post written by someone calling himself "Anonymous Coward", a display of self-awareness with which I fully concur. He writes some tosh about "human" bones being found at Kanapoi, but fails to note that they are actually from an Australopithecine. All of these links are by crackpots and the claims they make all seem to be based upon misunderstandings, out of date info and plain old fraud. So no, I'm not impressed. Still, if you think that any of these links contains evidence that has been unfairly overlooked, feel free to bring it up. Just don't post a list of nutty links and expect me to waste my time refuting them all.
Mutate and Survive
Edited by Granny Magda, : No reason given.
Edited by Granny Magda, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 815 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 8:35 AM mindspawn has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 821 by JonF, posted 04-22-2013 12:06 PM Granny Magda has replied
 Message 828 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 3:25 PM Granny Magda has replied
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Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 4.0


(1)
Message 819 of 871 (697196)
04-22-2013 12:01 PM
Reply to: Message 817 by New Cat's Eye
04-22-2013 11:43 AM


Re: Which of those skulls are dated?
Cheers for that one CS! I'll go back and edit it.
Edit: it works even better with [center] The blockcolor seems to change the default for centered thumbnails.
Mutate and Survive
Edited by Granny Magda, : No reason given.

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mindspawn
Member (Idle past 2660 days)
Posts: 1015
Joined: 10-22-2012


Message 820 of 871 (697197)
04-22-2013 12:03 PM
Reply to: Message 814 by Percy
04-21-2013 5:20 PM


They're all apes, including us. You need to pick a different level of classification.
Even if you exclude humans and chimps, you still have a group of closely related ape skulls that, when ordered by time, appear to represent a transitional sequence. To deny this is to stare at the sky and declare it not blue.
On the contrary , to deny that evolutionists have cherry picked a convenient sequence from the many species of ape found through the ages, is to "stare at the sky and declare it not blue". Seriously, I would like a logical answer as to why its not cherry picking??
In such a fossil record as we have it would be impossible that there be no orderings that resemble transitional sequences, yet this is what you're asking people to believe. Denying that there are transitional sequences is like denying that water is wet.
Denying cherry picking is like denying "that water is wet". Because there is such a large variety of apes to choose from, its pretty easy for homologists to create an ordering that resembles transitional sequences. So you are right , in such a fossil record that we have (revealing large numbers of extinct species) , it would be impossible not to be able to create an artificial ordering that resembles transitional sequences.
But why create these artificial sequences if your only evidence for evolution is the very artificial sequence you are creating?? That is called simply, circular reasoning.
Gee, I wonder if we can turn this around. Let me give it a try:
"And unfortunately you have had a propaganda enriched education. In your early days of education you were told stories of a six day creation and talking snakes and a global flood and an ark, and the mental imprint combined with the threat of eternal damnation for not believing is so strong that creationists have built a massive "mythology based" mountain of misinformation with no foundation at all except a mountain of lies about what science really says and that they want to teach to kids everywhere. It isn't at all funny. It is really sad for us all."
Did I forget anything?
The difference is that I've tried to be unbiased by putting both theories on equal empirical footing, acknowledging that both theories can result in the details that we see in current genome sequencing. It is evolutionists that need to see that their theory has no empirical advantage over the baramin concept, but the blindness comes through indoctrination.
Well, yes, I think most would agree that fits the concept of a transitional. The small changes in skull shape of the hominid sequence also fits the concept of a transitional. The criteria you seem to be applying for whether something is a transitional or not is whether we have actual examples of it. If we have examples of a transitional sequence, such as the hominid sequence, then it isn't really transitional to you. But if we don't have examples of some hypothetical sequence, such as a transition from scales to fur or vice versa, then it is a transitional to you. Do you have any criteria that aren't so obviously biased and artificial?
Do you have any sequences that aren't so obviously biased and artificial? The cherry picking is obvious.
You were already given a sequence of gradual changes in the hominid sequence. You still haven't given any reasons that make any sense for rejecting the transitional nature of that sequence. You seem to believe you've given a reason, but "Because I said so," which is in effect what you're saying, isn't a reason.
My reason is cherry picking. When you have a wide variety of ape species to choose from, even if evolution did not exist, its easy to pick the earliest fossil that suits your homology sequence as your starting point. This is cherry picking. The evidence itself is just showing that there were many species and now there are few. The evidence says nothing more. If you don't see that, you are blinded. Why would you deny the logic that is staring you in the face. There were many species, now there are few. We KNOW there were extinctions to explain why there were many species, and now there are few. But evolution is just an interesting concept, and placing fossils in a hierarchy is an intellectual exercise to demonstrate the possibilities of evolution, but does not add strength to the concept, where there are many fossils to choose from. The more fossils of a taxonomic family that existed in the past, the more able to cherry pick from them, and the less convincing the hierarchy. this is obvious logic.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 814 by Percy, posted 04-21-2013 5:20 PM Percy has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 823 by Dr Adequate, posted 04-22-2013 1:12 PM mindspawn has replied
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JonF
Member (Idle past 168 days)
Posts: 6174
Joined: 06-23-2003


Message 821 of 871 (697199)
04-22-2013 12:06 PM
Reply to: Message 818 by Granny Magda
04-22-2013 11:59 AM


Whoops?
quote:
Of 36 anatomical characters examined on AL 288-1, 14 (39%) exhibit the apelike state and 22 (61%) exhibit the humanlike state.
Fourteen. Out of the thirty-six features looked at in that paper, fourteen were human-like. Not two.
I haven't read the paper, but don't you mean twenty-two were humanlike? Or else your quote is wrong.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 818 by Granny Magda, posted 04-22-2013 11:59 AM Granny Magda has replied

Replies to this message:
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Granny Magda
Member
Posts: 2462
From: UK
Joined: 11-12-2007
Member Rating: 4.0


Message 822 of 871 (697204)
04-22-2013 12:21 PM
Reply to: Message 821 by JonF
04-22-2013 12:06 PM


Re: Whoops?
Yeah that's what I meant. I'll go edit... again. Thanks!
Mutate and Survive

This message is a reply to:
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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 823 of 871 (697214)
04-22-2013 1:12 PM
Reply to: Message 820 by mindspawn
04-22-2013 12:03 PM


But the expectation that there should be this wide variety, and that this wide variety should include intermediate forms between basal apes and humans, is a prediction of the evolutionary theory.
If it was just up to a creator God doing fiat creation, then he could have made no apes at all besides humans, or he could have made no australopithecines, or he could have introduced "variety" by giving some of them antlers and some of them feathered wings, and so on and so forth.
Instead, biologists find just those things that the theory of evolution would lead them to expect that they should find.
I think as is so often the case with creationists you are confusing the interpretative and the predictive functions of evolution. You accuse the biologists of "cherry-picking". But why are there any cherries there for them to pick?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 820 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 12:03 PM mindspawn has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 831 by mindspawn, posted 04-22-2013 3:59 PM Dr Adequate has replied

  
Taq
Member
Posts: 9973
Joined: 03-06-2009
Member Rating: 5.7


(1)
Message 824 of 871 (697215)
04-22-2013 1:26 PM
Reply to: Message 820 by mindspawn
04-22-2013 12:03 PM


On the contrary , to deny that evolutionists have cherry picked a convenient sequence from the many species of ape found through the ages, is to "stare at the sky and declare it not blue". Seriously, I would like a logical answer as to why its not cherry picking??
Which fossils are they excluding?
It's not cherry picking because they use ALL of the fossils.
And as Dr. Adequate states, why are there cherries to pick to begin with? Why can't we find a feathered or antlered ape?
But why create these artificial sequences if your only evidence for evolution is the very artificial sequence you are creating??
What makes them artificial? Also, we have mountains of genetic evidence that you constantly ignore.
The difference is that I've tried to be unbiased by putting both theories on equal empirical footing, acknowledging that both theories can result in the details that we see in current genome sequencing.
The problem is that magical poofing can create anything. It is unfalsifiable. What you end up claiming is that if creationism is true it will look exactly like evolution occurred. You might as well argue that we should throw out all forensic evidence at a crime scene because it is also consistent with Leprechauns magically poofing fingerprints into being.
Edited by Taq, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
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Taq
Member
Posts: 9973
Joined: 03-06-2009
Member Rating: 5.7


(1)
Message 825 of 871 (697216)
04-22-2013 1:29 PM
Reply to: Message 810 by mindspawn
04-21-2013 9:19 AM


The AUSTRALOPITHECUS is an ape.
Yes, an ape with human-like features not found in other living apes. This makes australopithecines transitional because they have a mixture of features from two divergent taxa.
You have the evidence right in front of you, but you choose to close your eyes.

This message is a reply to:
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