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To: Quark2005
Do you likewise think it's possible that we know something about the ancestry of life on earth without knowing everything about how it originated?

No, but you have to have sufficient evidence that doesn't admit of more than one interpretation. The fossil record should be be composed almost entirely of transitional forms. It isn't.

Every single bit of evidence you have requires a presupposition of trans-species evolution.

You have to know something for sure, and you don't.

754 posted on 04/06/2006 9:04:23 AM PDT by William Terrell (Individuals can exist without government but government can't exist without individuals.)
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To: William Terrell
The fossil record should be be composed almost entirely of transitional forms. It isn't.

How do you define transitional form? In other words, can you describe what you believe a transitional form would look like?

761 posted on 04/06/2006 9:14:13 AM PDT by atlaw
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To: William Terrell
No, but you have to have sufficient evidence that doesn't admit of more than one interpretation.

We do. Fossil evidence combined with biogeographical evidence, morphological evidence, and vast amounts of genetic evidence (the strongest of all) points to only one interpretation with consistent results: evolution.

The fossil record should be be composed almost entirely of transitional forms. It isn't.

It is. There are thousands of examples of transitional fossils. Every fossil that doesn't represent a lineage that immediately became extinct is a transitional form. And even representations of lineages that became extinct provide insight into closely related lineages that existed at around the same time.

Every single bit of evidence you have requires a presupposition of trans-species evolution.

Nope. Not when fossil evidence is cross-referenced with evidence from the other completely independent lines of inquiry I mentioned, all of which point to the same result: evolution. The result of several lines of inquiry painting a consistent picture of a theory is known as consilience, and is the primary means by which almost all scientific theories are given credence.

You have to know something for sure, and you don't.

We know a lot more about evolution than you think. Learn it or get left behind.

766 posted on 04/06/2006 9:23:15 AM PDT by Quark2005 (Confidence follows from consilience.)
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