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Talk:Transitional form (view source)
Revision as of 00:22, February 4, 2008
, 00:22, February 4, 2008→Recent quote: For the record, I'm actually rather happy right now.
::::::::: And how is it unbalanced to only say that there are no transitional fossils ''if that is so''? You are claiming that it is unbalanced because it doesn't acknowledge your views. But if your views are wrong, then it's not unbalanced to not acknowledge them. The article already has a reference to the link you provide, but the link fails to make its case. To take the first example I looked at, [http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional/part2b.html#eleph elephants], it starts off with "''Minchenella'' or a similar condylarth (late Paleocene) -- Known only from lower jaws. Has a distinctive broadened shelf on the third molar. The most plausible ancestor of the embrithopods & anthracobunids." This is nothing more than evolutionary story-telling. There's not enough of the fossil to really tell, and the best she can say is that it's "the most plausible ancestor". So apart from it not being hard evidence contradicting Gould and Patterson, it's circular reasoning because it's starting with the assumption that there must be something that evolved into an elephant and that this is the most likely candidate. Not all her arguments are exactly like that of course, but from what I've seen there is nothing of real substance there. The existence of an article full of bluff and fluff trying to make the case does not mean that the case is actually made and that the paleontologists quoted in the article had no clue what they were talking about.
::::::::: And how is it unbalanced to only say that there are no transitional fossils ''if that is so''? You are claiming that it is unbalanced because it doesn't acknowledge your views. But if your views are wrong, then it's not unbalanced to not acknowledge them. The article already has a reference to the link you provide, but the link fails to make its case. To take the first example I looked at, [http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional/part2b.html#eleph elephants], it starts off with "''Minchenella'' or a similar condylarth (late Paleocene) -- Known only from lower jaws. Has a distinctive broadened shelf on the third molar. The most plausible ancestor of the embrithopods & anthracobunids." This is nothing more than evolutionary story-telling. There's not enough of the fossil to really tell, and the best she can say is that it's "the most plausible ancestor". So apart from it not being hard evidence contradicting Gould and Patterson, it's circular reasoning because it's starting with the assumption that there must be something that evolved into an elephant and that this is the most likely candidate. Not all her arguments are exactly like that of course, but from what I've seen there is nothing of real substance there. The existence of an article full of bluff and fluff trying to make the case does not mean that the case is actually made and that the paleontologists quoted in the article had no clue what they were talking about.
:::::::: [[User:Philip J. Rayment|Philip J. Rayment]] 18:49, 1 February 2008 (EST)
:::::::: [[User:Philip J. Rayment|Philip J. Rayment]] 18:49, 1 February 2008 (EST)
::::::::: ""''Remember, these take a while to form.''": Yeah? a given layer takes, what?, a few million years to form whilst slowly burying a specimen and it's evolved descendant?" That's what my "uh, what?" was directed to. I have no freaking clue what you were attempting to say there.
::::::::: "first, it's evolutionist Gould that you are calling "nutty"," Oh no, I will now withdraw my opinion upon finding out that I dared to call an "evolutionist" nutty.
::::::::: It does; You simply choose to ignore every transitional form, prefering instead to cry and weep that we haven't found every fossil yet.
::::::::: It wouldn't be, if that was true. That's not circular, it's a correctly terminating idea. "If it evolved, and this fossil looks like it's reasonably simliar, this creature probably evolved from that."
::::::::: As a sidenote, I love how you write off every attempt to connect things as "storytelling" and seem to be scared by the idea that the evolutionary paths of each creature are not fully understood yet. [[User:Barikada|Barikada]] 19:22, 3 February 2008 (EST)
== Picture ==
== Picture ==