A Whale of a Tale

Then obviously you don't understand how science works. All scientific theories are devised to explain evidence, if they work we keep them untill something better comes along. You don't just toss it out.If you have nothing to replace it then what's the point of railing against it? Your opinion, but certainly not the opinion of the scientific community which has used the ToE to great effect. Without it, everything in Biology, genetics, etc. Fails to make sense. Wrong. We don't have evidence of an ID, if we did, we would consider it. Since there isn't evidence as of yet we have no reason to consider it.Remember the Sphagetti Monster? Yes, it's sad isn't it. s8int.com and AiG hasn't mannaged to sway our poor unbeliveing souls Well, so far it fits the evidence the best. Unfortunetly no one... *ahem* you... have offered a viable alternative. So we have to stick with what has been working untill now right? No, been there, done that.I find your position compleatly laughable. Mainly because you offer nothing as an alternative. You just want to say "Paki ain't a whale.". When asked "What is he?" you don't answer. When asked "Where did he come from?" You don't explain.When asked "How does *poofing* work?". I get names of some people, no explanation.We can explain to you how the ToE works, how it accounts for everything so far etc. So far, it's the best theory for the job. Works quite well. Yet, you want to trash it to replace it with a *poofing* hypothesis?I don't see how you can proceed on this thread, discussing pakicetus yet again, when you yourself can't account for where the creature fits into biology! You can't account for it's origins, it's demise, etc. ToE can.

Yawn, Typical absurd evo rant without a shred of substance. Heck, you do not even understand your own theory, much less criticism of it.Gould's quote on Ambulocetus illustrates the absurdity of your position quite well. The fact you guys must resort to presenting a potential, and mind you just a potential, few candidates for "transitionals" proves my point. The very fact Gould and others think that Ambulocetus disproves their critics is proof in fact that Gould's critics are correct in stating the evolutionary process is not seen in the fossil record; that we do not actually see evolution, but see the opposite.If evolution's critics were wrong, there would be thousands of transitionals like Ambulocetus even among the land mammal to whale proposed evolutionary paths, but they aren't there, and evos have offerred no real studies to back up thier claims of fossil rarity. The fossil rarity claim is assumed, just like they did with the phylotypic stage.I strongly suspect once evos are forced to demonstrate and back up their claims with strong comparitive data, they will be forced to admit that the claim of fossil rarity all these years was unfounded. Of course, it could take 50 years of creationists, IDers and other critics doing work and showing the evos they are wrong before they will own up to it.

Except that evolution *does* fit the facts. Just typing the sentence, "Evolution doesn't fit the facts," doesn't make it so. You have to support this with evidence and argument, something you have singularly failed to do. You appear to be basing your conclusions upon hopes, not facts. But we *are* being scientific when we interpret natural history in light of the well-established process of evolution. Evolution and ID's leading light Behe are in agreement on this. It is you who are being unscientific when you deny evolution any role whatsover and insist on a process that you refuse to describe. Will there ever be thread where you fail to dodge off-topic to issue charges of evolutionary fraud?--Percy

That is where you are wrong, Yaro. That's not how science works. Theories can be thrown out based on not fitting the data alone, even before there is something else better. Uh, because it is wrong. Some of us don't have a need for an explanation and can accept that it is more proper to answer I don't know than to provide a false answer. But like many evos, you don't understand something as basic as that. Sure you do. The fossil record and similarities are evidence of ID, as are physical laws and principles, genetics, etc,... No, it does not fit the evidence. So you are cutting and running. Glad we got that cleared up.

Percy, evolution does not fit the facts. Evolutionists have not quantified and qualified their claims of fossil rarity as an excuse for why we don't see whales evolving from land mammals. We see, even with the evo spin, at best a handful of examples.I am sorry, but if you look at those examples, we just do not see compelling story of evolution. We don't see each whale trait gradually appear and emerge. The archeotes are an extinct set of creatures with virtually no links between them and whales. That's just the facts.We know that thousands of transitional forms would emerge if land mammals evolved into whales.Where are the thousands of forms?You say that they do not exist due to fossil rarity. Well, show me some studies proving that. They existed, if they did exist, in habitats extremely conducive to fossilization rates, as evidenced by the large numbers of whale fossils and Basilosaurus fossils.Perhaps a better explanation for why these transitionals do not exist in the fossil record is that they never existed in the first place?

Did the American passenger pigeon ever exist?This message has been edited by crashfrog, 01-03-2006 03:11 PM

First, we don't yet see macroevolution in genetics or mutations. The theory is little changes can add up, but in a lot of ways this is flawed as we see typically species change over time within a range. often a species appears to evolve at first discovery, but then later findings show the species changing back again. This is a dominant characteristic in the fossil record called "stasis."Secondly, we see another dominant characteristic that does not mesh with evolutionary models. Species appear suddenly and fully formed without any hint of their immediate ancestors. This is so prevalent that, imo, an unbiased person would have to admit evo models cannot explain this.In fact, this is so pronounced that, imo, if common descent is the answer, ToE would be very strong evidence for ID as no known natural process can fully explain the appearances of species in such a predictable pattern of not showing the transitions. If the transitions occurred in smaller populations as PE posits, it would need to keep on occuring without the populations getting larger. The idea this is likely to occur causing major morphological change, but none of the new species growing large enough to fossilize, as a general pattern, fits more what we know about directed breeding and genetic manipulation than random mutations being selected for.Third, and I hit on this above already, evos provide no explanations for the disparity in the fossil record for whales and their ancestors. We see whales well-represented, but not their immediate ancestors. There is no explanation for this backed with scientific studies. Evos just assert fossil rarity in a similar manner they used to assert the phylotypic stage. It's just accepted without any real documentation and qualification of the concept in terms of it's varied application.

LOL...crash, the fact you cannot see how the pidgeon differs from whales and their habitat is amusing.

Nope. If it fits the data, that's what stands. Science is a process of getting "righter".Say you were stranded on an island and you only had a flat-head screwdriver and all the screws to fix your boat were philips-head screws. Do you fling away the screwdriver and say "Damn. This doesn't fit the screws 100% it's worthless." Apperantly that's what you would do. See, here is the thing randman, ToE makes predictions and those predictions bare out. It's used and applied in genetics, computer science, and medicine. Thing is, it works! So unless you got something better, we ain't gonna throw it out. No, they are not. They are evidence of teh giant green elf that lives in my butt. Duh. Wonderfull. Thanks for that assertion I guess we will all go home now. No. You still havn't answerd my question. What is the mechanism by which things *poof* into existance?What is it. I can explain the ToE and it's mechanism to you in a paragraph. Can you do the same for your *poofer*?This message has been edited by Yaro, 01-03-2006 03:26 PM

LOL... randman, the fact that you cannot see that that the passenger pidgeon had flocks of over a billion birds around 300 miles long which flew all around the country is amusing.

A question to all, not just Randman:Are whale fossils actually relatively "well-represented"? If so, are these fossils all of the same stratigraphic position (ie same age)? If they are not all of the same stratagraphic position (ie same age), are not the stratigraphicly lower (older) fossils prime candidates to being the "immediate ancestors"?Moose

Nice rant. Have you ever seen Billy Madison? Here is a quote from that movie that your responnse reminded me of: (one of my favorite all time movies!)You have again failed to debunk any of the evidence in the article and have not addressed any of the conclusions made by scientists in the literature provided.- Please stop demanding to see transitional forms. I KNOW for a fact that you have been informed that almost all species are transitional (unless their population group dies out) MANY times. This is a completely bogus argument.As for fossil rarity. It's slightly off-topic, but I found the article/essay here to be very enlightening.http://www.freeinquiry.com/challenge.html

randman, Take a look at any cladistic analysis that includes prehistoric & extant cetacea, & examine the character matrix that the cladogram/phylogeny was derived from. There you will see the apomorphies that place Pakicetus et al in that clade. There you will see what it takes for an organism to be considered a cetacean.Big clue: it doesn't have to be a marine mammal.MarkThis message has been edited by mark24, 01-03-2006 04:18 PM

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

Ah, so it's not fossil rarity in general that you dispute?

Except the predictions don't bear out. We don't see evolution occuring in the fossil record. You fail to grasp that fundamental fact.