I guess flying squirrels, flying snakes, flying fish and even the colugo (flying lemur) have not heard that gliding is a non-starter.
For the lurkers out there, the gliding equipment of the colugo looks very much like a bat's. The 'flap/wing' connects from the tip of the tail to the rear legs to the front legs to the neck; sort of a transition between flying squirrels and bats. If it had longer fingers and more massive shoulders it would look much like a fruit bat (which some claim is a primate).
So far, the molecular evidence is looking good for the monophyly of bats.
A flying squirrel is still a squirrel. A flying lemur is still a lemur. And there is no clear evidence that these so-called "flying" forms evolved from "non-flying" squirrels and "non-flying" lemurs.
My main point here is, of course, that a bat has pretty sophisticated flapping wings--not mere gliding structures. For that matter, the terms "flying squirrel" and "flying lemur" are misnomers (at least for the purposes of your argument). They cannot fly in the sense we associate with birds or bats or dragonflies. Furthermore, squirrels and lemurs that can glide are not in the process of evolving into species that can truly fly anymore than Olympic ski jumpers are evolving into human eagles.
In this sense, gliding is a "non-starter."
Anyway, you ought to go back and look at my argument more carefully. It is correct. (It is also very simple, which makes it devastatingly elegant [ha!])
Several rather thoughtless evolutionists have carelessly theorized that bats evolved from rats, but it doesn't work. The really serious problem is seen in the early going, when the poor rat's deformity will not even facilitate gliding, much less bat-like flight. And, of course, the deformed rat cannot run, either.
Please notice that this is correct, hb.
So, even if I were to agree that gliding is surely a "starter," I would have to point out that the rat will never reach the stage of being able to glide through the air. Invoking aeons of time and zillions of generation doesn't help at all. The evolutionist's zeal to offer anti-creationist explanations makes him sloppy to the point of scientific dishonesty. It is very self-deceiving. the poor fellow cannot believe that the creationist's objections to evolutionary theory are scientifically sound. But they are scientifically sound. (They just aren't fashionable in our enlightened age [ha, again!].)
In short, there really are peculiar thermodynamic barriers between species. Your theory invokes itself past these by strangely ignoring them.
I would urge you to think again about the problem at the level I presented in my earlier post--not just go waving your hands (flapping your non-wings?) to invoke illustrations that do not, indeed, cannot support your case.
(Ah, but that is precisely what evolutionists do. They wave their hands a lot [and yell]. Evolution is just plain bad science. It is more religion than science.)
Regards,
the_doc