Posted on 08/23/2005 10:39:22 AM PDT by woodb01
The Golden Calf of Evolution is on Fire…
STORY SOURCE
NoDNC.com staff
The recent notice that Harvard was going to engage in “advocacy” research (it’s difficult to call the advocacy science) shows how concerned the evolution camp is about the theory of intelligent design. Contrary to popular myth, the theory of evolution has many holes. The only way evolution continues to survive is because people don’t actually stop to think about the absurd things that evolution requires one to accept on totally blind faith.
If in fact evolution were truly a science, then according to the scientific method, challenges to the theory of evolution, even a challenge calling itself “intelligent design” would be readily accepted. The whole notion of science is to put forth a theory, and then work to further develop the theory, or abandon it, based on challenges to discrete aspects of that theory. Real science not only accepts those challenges, but encourages them to ensure its accuracy. Evolutionists routinely censor and attack all dissent.
Now why would real scientists be so concerned about “intelligent design?” Why would prestigious Harvard University commit to invest a million dollars annually in a new program dedicated on the origins of life in relation to evolution? And as Harvard chemistry professor David Liu noted "My expectation, is that we will be able to reduce this to a very simple series of logical events that could have taken place with no divine intervention."
That is an interesting statement from a scientist. In professional circles, this is called “confirmatory bias” and it is not about science, but about making additional theories fit the predefined outcome that you want them to fit. It is advocacy “research” and not science. After all, with evolution, there is no way to test or verify history, so it is routine to just “create” anything you can imagine to fill the void, anything except intelligent design. Taking their cues from cults, when something doesn’t fit, just make up something that can’t be verified.
The secret of why Darwinists (evolutionists) see intelligent design as a threat is because in its simplest form, it is not only verifiable, but intelligent design is an ideal corollary [FN1] to the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Paraphrased that law says:
Any system, on its own, moves from order to disorder, and eventually becomes totally random.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics is considered an absolute, solid, verified truth in science. The reason it is considered a “law” in science is because it is said to apply to all matter in the entire universe and in all situations and circumstances. It has been tested, re-tested, verified, and re-verified and found to be a universal scientific truth.
Why is the Second Law of Thermodynamics Important?
Evolution defies the Second Law of Thermodynamics. In plain terms, it expects people to accept, on blind, unverifiable faith, that out of disorder, and through a bunch of accidents, order is created--, disorder becomes order.
Another way of looking at that would be to think of a deck of cards, carefully shuffled and thrown high in the air. With the expectation that eventually an “accident” would happen which would cause all 52 cards in the deck, to fall in perfect order, and perfectly aligned. [FN2]
Now we get to the interesting part, the part that absolutely horrifies Darwinists and all evolutionists in particular. INTELLIGENT DESIGN IS THE COROLLARY [See FN1] TO THE SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS!
With external inputs of energy, directed in a specialized way, disorder and randomness can be ordered.
Any system, whether open or closed, requires specialized work or specialized energy input to go from disorder to order. This same specialized work or specialized energy input is also required just to maintain order.
Let’s look at it this way. If you work at a desk, or construction, or homemaker, or whatever your job is, there are parallels. Evolutionists expect you to believe that if you leave a mess long enough, a set of accidents will eventually occur that will organize all your papers, build a new house, or clean each room in your house, etc. This is plain nonsense and not science.
Evolutionists realize that a COROLLARY to the Second Law of Thermodynamics is both science, is testable, is verifiable, and is true. This is why they are terrified. For evolution to “work” it requires that a settled scientific LAW be changed to accommodate it. Evolution’s FALSE COROLLARY to the Second Law of Thermodynamics expects one to accept the following paraphrased idea:
With external inputs of energy, random or disordered energy creates order.
In more “evolutionary” terms, enough accidents, stacked on top of each other, for a long enough period of time, creates order and perfection. Never mind that evolution also says that “natural selection” destroys all “accidents” that don’t have almost immediate usefulness. It is lunacy to believe that from random occurrence you gain greater and greater order. It then becomes zealous fanaticism when you deny that this is anything more than a secular fundamentalist belief system. In fact, this is in direct defiance of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Under evolution, instead of moving toward disorder, we are moving toward order.
On one hand we hear that life has developed and “evolved” through “accidents” that create the variations of the species. And in contradiction to everything coming about because of these “accidents,” Darwin’s evolutionists say that “natural selection” does away with the “accidents” and “chooses” the superior “accidents.” On one hand we have life being created, derived, developed and sustained through “accidents,” and on the other hand we have life being destroyed and killed off (natural selection) because the accidents aren’t the “right type” of accident.
STOP AND THINK about what evolution demands you to believe. Disorder creates order, accidents fix things. This is not only intellectually dishonest, it is absurd when you stop to think about it.
Is this Corollary Theory of the Second Law – Intelligent Design – Testable?
Routinely we hear from the evolution crowd that intelligent design is not testable. Not only is this blatantly false, the Corollary to the Second Law of Thermodynamics (intelligent design) has been proven over, and over, and over again. In fact, it continues to be proven many thousands of times a day.
Every time a pharmaceutical medication is taken to treat a disorder, whether it is physical or mental, it is a test of the theory of intelligent design. The Pharmaceutical companies that research new drug applications to treat disease not only defy “natural selection” but direct energy and efforts to cure a disorder which results in a medication to treat the disorder.
Every time a doctor performs a necessary surgery, that is successful, it is not only a test of intelligent design, but proof that it is valid. The Physician brings order to disorder and again defies “natural selection.”
Over and over again, architect, electrical engineer, physicist, chemist, veterinary, and any number of professions routinely cheat “natural selection” with intelligent design. Over and over again evolution’s “accidents” and “natural selections” are overcome by intelligent design.
Is it any wonder that the evolution crowd is terrified by intelligent design? Proving intelligent design disproves evolution. When considering intelligent design as a corollary to the Second Law of Thermodynamics, as well as easily tested and verified, it’s no wonder evolutionists are frightened.
Why so narrowly confined?
When major problems with evolution are raised, such as the INPUTS to the whole evolutionary process, evolutionists shriek, almost in horrified pain “that doesn’t apply,” or “that’s another area.” Take for example the origins of life itself. When raising the proposition that the origins of the chemical INPUTS to life, and the origins of life itself are critical building blocks to verify whether or not evolution is valid, routine shrieks of “abiogenesis” or some other silly segment of the process is invoked to defend the indefensible. These silly segmentations, which alone may disprove evolution, are routinely segmented out of the idea of evolution. These things are treated almost as if they must be warded off with some magical talisman or incantation against any evil spirits that might challenge the evolutionary cult. Evolutionists hide behind these silly, ridiculous, and utterly absurd notions that you can build valid science on a small piece of a process and leave out all of the pieces that the process depends on.
When parts of the process not only demonstrate that the sacred theory of evolution may be invalid or false, the shrieks of heresy and blasphemy are raised. This isn’t science, it is utter madness disguised as science. And certainly I can understand why the issue of the initial origins of life terrify evolutionists. The idea of “abiogenesis” expects one to accept on blind faith that life just “magically appeared” from some accidents with rocks, water, and a few base chemicals. Evolution suggests that right after that life was created, it began evolving. This is difficult to believe when you stop and think about it. Life “magically appears” from rocks, water, and a few chemicals? I’m still amazed that all those alchemists in the middle ages couldn’t find a way to do something as simple as turning lead into gold. If they had simply applied evolution’s teachings, water would have been gold, diamonds, and every other form of precious gem.
Evolutionary theory demands that only physical / material properties can be evaluated. This notion completely ignores the fact that human beings have the ability to reason, to think through things, to make value judgments, to make decisions, to choose right or wrong, to have order and structure or to have disorder and chaos.
This is another point of conflict, if you accept evolution’s true premises, only natural selection is valid and all of our morals, values, and social structures aren’t valid. But they exist and their very existence proves that evolution has more holes. So what do the evolutionists do? No problem, they say that social structures just don’t apply. It’s not “material” so we won’t even consider it.
Evolution by other names is the law of the jungle, survival of the fittest, kill or be killed, a form of “natural” eugenics, etc. So, if you remove the social structures, the laws, rules, morals, values, the social structures, all you have are wild animals.
The “law of the jungle” part of evolution is a glaring defect and a strong demonstration that evolution misses the mark. There is something more to human life than just “kill or be killed.” So what do the evolutionists do? They simply spout their dogma “that doesn’t apply, we’re only looking at the material world!” It’s easy to understand why they would do this, under the idea of eugenics, Hitler slaughtered millions.
If you stop and think about what “evolutionary processes” was required to create emotions, social structure, values, order, and the awareness of “self,” it is easy to understand why evolutionists are terrified of this. By their nature, by what these things ARE, they are not “natural” evolutionary occurrences. By themselves, they could not have come about by any type of evolutionary theory known today. So having these “artificial” structures imposed on “evolution” disproves evolution.
Evolution’s true believers treat any challenge to their sacred cow as blasphemy or heresy --, I guess that’s a normal reaction to a religious belief.
Evolutionists are terrified. And the debate must be contained. If the debate is not contained, the public school indoctrination and the cult of evolution will collapse. Once people actually stop and think about the blind leaps of faith that evolution requires, it will be seen as the cult it is. Evolution is nothing but wild religious beliefs clothed with the appearance of science.
The golden calf of evolution is on fire. As more and more people actually stop and THINK THROUGH the lunacy that evolution expects you to believe on totally blind faith, evolution will finally be seen for what it truly is, a religion pretending to be science. At that point the fire consuming the golden calf of evolution will turn it to ashes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[FN1] A corollary is something that is generally a “natural consequence” of the thing it is related to. So when a corollary is based on something that is already proven, the corollary generally does not require much proof because it is accepted and understood. For example, water freezes and turns to ice at about 32 degrees (F) depending on atmospheric conditions. A corollary would be that water melts as it rises above 32 degrees (F).
[FN2] Before all of the shrieks from the Darwinists, what I have just outlined is called an analogous syllogism, it is a writing tool to help understand complex issues.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Additional Resources:
Links:
http://www.nodnc.com/modules.php?name=Web_Links&l_op=viewlink&cid=12Resources:
DNA: The Tiny Code That's Toppling Evolution (DNA is PROVING that evolution is a hoax)
The controversy over evolution includes a growing number of scientists who challenge Darwinism. (The fraud of Darwinism...)
Einstein Versus Darwin: Intelligent Design Or Evolution? (Most LEGITIMATE Scientists do NOT agree with Evolution)
What’s the Big Secret? (Intelligent Design in Pennsylvania)
What are the Darwinists afraid of? (The fervent religious belief in evolution)
The Little Engine That Could...Undo Darwinism (Evolution may be proven false very soon)
I have twice now cited for you the recent gene therapy trials where retrovirally mediated insertion of a gene confering a serious immunogical condition called X-Scid was done. Of 11 children afflicted who received the therpay, nine had their symptoms alleviated by expression of the gene mutated in their disease.
But unfortunately, 2 of these nine came down with a side ffect where they came down with leukemia. 2 of 9 is a very high frequency. The trial was put on hold and the patients examined. In three cases (the two with leukemia and another without) the retrovirus had inserted such as to flank LMO2, a gene important in hematopoietic proliferation, and a leukemic oncogene.
Given that this insertion in to the same site happen not in two genomes, as you asked for, but in three out of only nine integrations, the targetted nature of integration, which is not understood, is apparent. Addressing this targetting is an active area of current research.
See my previous post which I posted just subsequent to this post of yours that I am responding to now for more discussion on the roles of retroviruses in evolution and for the functionality of their remnants in mammalian genomes.
I'd like to point out also that Eugene Sverdlov' group, who did the phylogram you posted from the Theobald article, discuss the non-random integration of the elements extensivley in their follow up articles, for eamples this one, Full-sized HERV-K (HML-2) human endogenous retroviral LTR sequences on human chromosome 21: map locations and evolutionary history, published in Gene 2001.
placemarker
Ding! Ding! Ding! I win!
I have a theory. Anything from NoDNC.com and authored by "Staff" is a thinly disguised vanity by the poster. A previous thread left that very distinct impression.
Ichneumons stunning post on transitionals is deeply flawed. His source posits that Archaeopteryx evolved from Caudipteryx. However, there are evolutionary avian experts who posit the exact opposite...that Caudipteryx evolved from Archaeopteryx. Now obviously we're talking about a disagreement in fossil dating that spans hundreds of thousands if not millions of years. This means that fossil dating, outside of guessing based on how the fossil looks, is a very inexact science. It's so inexact, that one persons guess is as good as another and there's no clear or definitive way to know who is right. With that in mind, my guess about how these fossils are related is just as good as the experts. Do you agree?
I'm not angry at all. And I welcome comments. But I do feel disgust at disingenuous attempts to cloud the issue rather than bring light to it.
It is a nice effort but filled with numerous errors or misunderstandings and simple mistakes (e.g. "human DNA project", when it was the human Genome project.)
That's not a mistake, you idiot, I'm writing for a general audience, many of whom won't know what a "genome" is, so I used more generally recognizable terms and phrases. But then you knew that. Stop playing dumb, and especially stop doing it in order to have a cheap and dishonest excuse to insult me.
I am focusing on the repeating elements section where your mistakes include refering to repeating elements as "fossils" or "doing no harm" as if they are inert.
Muddying an already complex topic with additional side issues would serve no point. Despite the activity of some ERVs, the point remains that they are for the most part non-infectious.
And of course they do not integrate randomly.
Of course they do, just not uniformly. Stop beating this dead dishonest horse of yours.
This non-randomness can be manifested at the DNA mechanistic level with repsect to the actual integration event or it can be conferered by selection after an integration event at the cellular level.
...none of which invalidates the points being made in the essay, so stop pretending that they do.
If you want to be ridiculous and complain that I talked only about the aspects of ERVs which are directly relevant to the subject of determining common ancestry (which was my topic), without writing a whole freaking book on everything else about ERVs which has ever been written in a medical journal, I suggest that you stop being so jaw-droppingly anal.
Further, you entirely misunderstand the nature of the evolution of repeating elements in the mammalian genome.
No, I didn't, nor do you actually identify anything whch I have gotten wrong due to this alleged "entire misunderstanding". Yet again you use dishonest innuendo. How do you sleep at night?
There is an initial retroviral infection (which does not have to result in a "broken" virus as you described it)
It has to be "broken" in the sense that it fails to reproduce itself and spawn new viruses to be released, as is the normal life cycle of retroviruses. This should have been obvious to anyone with even the most basic reading comprehension.
and the distribution of the repeat element is due to transposition events that occur subsequently over time.
Yes it is, but it's not the repeat elements that provide the most direct evidence of common ancestry, so that advanced topic was left out of the basic presentation. Whoop-de-do -- do you have any other trivial gripes?
But hey, if you want to write an essay yourself which details how the repeat elements provide *additional* evidence for common ancestry, as well as a kind of "clock" by which the age of the insertion event can be determined, and other phylogenetic "signal", go right ahead.
But don't be an a-hole and try to pretend that my providing the basics of the topic, instead of a full college course on it, is some kind of "mistake" or "misunderstanding" on my part, because it's not.
This initial insertion is called the "matser gene"
Try "master", Einstein. Gosh, by your nitpicking standards, I guess this means that you have a "total misunderstanding" of the topic after all.
or, to quote from Lebedev et al 2000 (cited by Theobald in 4.5): "These divergences can be used to calculate the age of the branch ancestor (master or source) gene, the retropositions of which gave birth to the branch members." Sequence homologies of the repeat element family (in the example you used, Herv-2) distributed throughout the genome are used to compute the evolutionary time relative to initial retroviral insertion event. The loss of homology is due to the recombinant transposition events which increase the frequency of the element in the genome with each event and also cause a degenracy in the sequence integrity.
Yes, thank you for *REINFORCING* my point. But what on Earth led you to falsely conclude that I didn't know this already or had "misunderstood" it?
The retroviruses do not become fossilized, they are incredibly active as "jumping genes" and are believed to have been a strong driving force in mammalian evolution.
Yup -- all of which is more advanced information than is necessary to impart in order to educate a lay audience in the basics of how ERVs are strong evidence of common ancestry, which is why I wrote an introductory essay instead of a PhD thesis.
As for your ludicrous nitpicking over the use of the term "fossil", the point is that they are something existing in modern times which is a leftover "mark" of an ancient event, just as a mineralized casting of a dinosaur footprint from 70 million years ago is.
They currently are believed to be involved in regulating gene expression (with the first experimental observation of a transpositional event (induced) affecting a gene expression in neural progenitor cells and, given the specific nature (as opposed to random) of their activity, they are being used as a tool to identify oncogenes.
Again, if you want to ramble on about ERVs other features, feel free, but none of this undermines the points made in my essay, and none of it was necessary background for the key explanations made in the essay about how ERVs get introduced into the genome, and about the most direct way in which they can be used as strong evidence of common ancestry.
You keep falsely accusing me of "misunderstandings" (without actually pointing out anything I have allegedly "misunderstood"), but your own bizarre list of nitpicks only reveals that you completely misunderstand the purpose and intended audience of the essay in the first place.
Or you actually do understand, and you're just getting your jollies by being a real jerk.
My comment is you are very enthusiastic (dare I say zealous), but don't really know or understand that much and it comes across.
Uh huh. Keep lying, jerk. I always appreciate it when folks who yap around my ankles keep torpedoing their own credibility, it saves me a lot of rebuttal time.
Drop the dogma and the attitude and rejoyce in the wonder of nature and what we do not know about it as well as what is known.
I always do.
The idea that retroviruses integrated randomly was common a long time ago. Still no one knows what the deterministic mechanisms are for the integration, so it was a fine working assumption to use that their integration was random. There was no way to assess if it was random or not, so it might as well be treated as if it were. But that idea has gone by the wayside in the same manner that the, at the time, perfectly reasonable idea that RNA was just scaffold for ribosomes or template for translation and all enzymatic activity resided in the proteins has been eradicated by Tom Cech and others.
Nice rambling innuendo. Feel free to actually *demonstrate* that independent same-locus events of natural retroviruses are actually as likely as you're trying to falsely imply. Oops, right, you can't, because they're NOT. Study after study which actually observes in vivo integrations demonstrates that they're not, they occur all over the damned place in the genome. So stop lying.
Also feel free to try to actually demonstrate that such independent "hits" on the same locus in independent integration *wouldn't* leave additional signs (such as differential sequence divergences) which would make it possible to distinguish them from actual ancestral events. Oh, right, you can't do that either.
You can *also* feel free to demonstrate your assertion that ERV integration is "deterministic" by predicting exactly where, and in what order, the first ten retroviral integration points will be when I bombard a cell culture with retroviruses of a given type. Oops, you can't do that, you say? The best you can do is describe a statistical distribution about the *probabilities* of those locations? That's because there's a RANDOM component to this process, no matter how much you try to hand-wave it away.
So you're just bluffing like a guy with his last few bucks in the poker pot, holding a busted flush.
Keep in mind Cech was not trying to provie anything about evolution or potential origins of life, he was simply trying to figure out why the tetrahymena RNA so painstakingly isoloated in his lab kept degrading in the fridge.
Keep in mind that your continued random "biology fact of the day" contributions still don't actually demonstrate any error in my essay, or invalidate its points about how ERVs are used to determine common ancestry.
No one's falling for your hand-waving.
Open your mind and stop clinging to your dogma and biases. Use them as tool, not weapons.
If ever there was a clearer case of what the psychologists call "projection"...
1) The distribution of ERVs matches a common ancestor, in that older species diversions have less in common than newer species.
2) I also understand that mutations within the ERVs themselves match the age of the infection, as predicted from the age species divergence.
3) If your hypothesis was true that all these ERVs are recent infections, that would predict that insertions would be random across species (or present in ALL species), yet they are not.
You're obviously well schooled in this issue tallhappy. Well enough that you actually understand Ichneumon's argument and can research it on your own. In my layman's opinion, you appear to operate like a defense attorney who knows his client is guilty, but they have to make the best case they can.
You've made a case that ERVs are not completely random (implying 1/3 odds) that counters Ichneumon's evidence that the highest probability of insertion in his study was 280x random. Yet the case for common ancestry for ERV insertions does not stand or fall on randomness alone.
If I were a layman on the jury of this trial, I'd conclude that you lost the case. You've done a bit of damage to one element of Ichneumon's case. But his case rests on much more than whether ERVs are totally random.
Don't bother criticizing this post. I'm not in your league and I'll play the victim if you try. I'm just expressing my opinion that you lost.
A mountain of BS is still BS.
I wouldn't answer your post if I were Ichneumon. If all you you can do is bring up one controversy out of all that he posted, then you've already lost the argument.
Throw out Archaeoperyx entirely if you want. The rest of the evidence still stands.
Not really. His post posits that Archaepteryx is representative of the more birdlike part of the transition. Caudipteryx, which lived later, is representative of what an ancestor of Archaeopteryx might have resembled. Basically, Archy occurs out of logical order in the fossil record.
Some people do think that the Chinese feathered dinos "devolved" (I hate that word) from more avian stock, but that's not widely credited. Why? That cladogram in Ichneumon's post. It makes more sense of the wealth of data we have to think Caudi is a revealing throwback to the common ancestor of Caudi and Archy.
Even if the minority are right, you have to wonder what a theropod dinosaur, almost standard issue except for the feathers, is doing "devolving" from a bird if the bird didn't come from saurian stock in the first place. You can't devolve if you didn't E-volve. You can't be a throwback if there's nothing to throw back too.
That's actually the only one I've looked at in any kind of depth at all. By "depth" I mean ten minutes of internet research...which is all it took to show the major problem with dating "transistional" fossils. BTW, did you know that Bill Clinton is married to a transistional fossil?
Throw out Archaeoperyx entirely if you want. The rest of the evidence still stands.
lol...that's pretty scientific. Throw out the evidence that doesn't agree with the conclusion you want to make. That's pretty handy.
What are you doing, covering your eyes and ears? We are and have been very vocal.
Ichneumons stunning post on transitionals is deeply flawed.
No it isn't.
His source posits that Archaeopteryx evolved from Caudipteryx.
No it doesn't. Learn how to read a cladistic tree, you dolt. It says that Caudipteryx's ancestors split off from the Archaeopteryx lineage prior to the splitting off of the families which appear between them in the tree.
However, there are evolutionary avian experts who posit the exact opposite...that Caudipteryx evolved from Archaeopteryx.
Feel free to name them, and cite their research to that effect.
Now obviously we're talking about a disagreement in fossil dating that spans hundreds of thousands if not millions of years.
No we're not. You really haven't a clue as to how cladistic trees are constructed, or read, have you?
This means that fossil dating, outside of guessing based on how the fossil looks, is a very inexact science.
No it doesn't -- it means you haven't the first clue what you're talking about.
It's so inexact, that one persons guess is as good as another and there's no clear or definitive way to know who is right.
This is your fantasy, anyway.
With that in mind, my guess about how these fossils are related is just as good as the experts. Do you agree?
No, because a) cladistic trees are based on a huge amount of actual evidence, not "guesses", and b) your own "guess" is highly unlikely to be "as good as another" because you're a complete idiot when it comes to biology.
They'll call you dumb,
'Cause don't know
The topic you're relatin'!
Of course I don't!
'Cause if I did,
I'd be a tool of Satan!
A liar!
A liar!
An eeevo's just ...
A liar!
Throw out the evidence that's under dispute. If the sequence of Archaeoperyx was firm, then you might have an issue, but it's not.
And even if you were right, evolution isn't a steady progression from a to z. It's two steps forward, one back. Observing the one back step doesn't invalidate the argument that there's stepping going on.
Sorry, but Ichy clearly makes the point (shouts the point) that these are transistional fossils on the way from dinosaurs to birds. In a nutshell this is the order he listed as a sequence in evolution:
Sinosauropteryx
Protarchaeopteryx
Caudipteryx
Sinornithosaurus
Archaeopteryx
Confuciusornis
Now there are scientists, professors even, well versed and well studied in paleotology and avian evolution who insist that Caudipteryx is a descendent of Archaeopteryx. Their order might look like this:
Sinosauropteryx
Protarchaeopteryx
Sinornithosaurus
Archaeopteryx
Confuciusornis
Caudipteryx
So my question is: Why isn't the matter settled? Why can't they just point and laugh at the idiot scientists who obviously have dated these fossils wrong? After all evolution (as pointed out by so many) is a proven fact. You would think that scientists in the same field would be able to agree on the age of a fossil. But their aging varies by apparently millions of years.
Some people do think that the Chinese feathered dinos "devolved" (I hate that word) from more avian stock, but that's not widely credited. Why? That cladogram in Ichneumon's post. It makes more sense of the wealth of data we have to think Caudi is a revealing throwback to the common ancestor of Caudi and Archy.
It makes "sense"?? Is that a scientific term? It makes sense that God created the universe and the creatures in it to me. Isn't there a way to tell the age of a fossil without looking at it and trying to guess where it should go? Even if the minority are right, you have to wonder what a theropod dinosaur, almost standard issue except for the feathers, is doing "devolving" from a bird if the bird didn't come from saurian stock in the first place. You can't devolve if you didn't E-volve. You can't be a throwback if there's nothing to throw back too.
I'm able to post without calling you names. I would expect the same consideration.
You make the point yourself in your post that there is an evolutionary sequence involving each of those critters. It's in your post. You even have commentary pointing out the evolutionary changes to us dolts.
However, there are evolutionary avian experts who posit the exact opposite...that Caudipteryx evolved from Archaeopteryx.
Feel free to name them, and cite their research to that effect.
Thanks, I will. This is the faculty page for Dr. Allan Feduccia. Dr. Feduccia teaches at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He is an expert in the field of avian evolution. The webpage says :
"Alan Feduccia's research centers on the origin and early evolution of flight, feathers, and endothermy. He is also interested in the evolution of birds through the Tertiary, the origins of flightlessness and the evolution of other morphological specializations in the world avifauna, and avian systematics in general."
The page has references that state:
His new book The Origin and Evolution of Birds was the lead science book for Yale University Press for the fall of 1996, and winner of the 1996 Scholarly and Professional Publishing Award of the Association of American Publishers. Feduccia has recently published cover articles in Science and Naturwissenschaften, and the former was listed in Discover Magazine's top 50 news stories of 1993, and in Science News' science news of the year.
Undoubtedly he is an expert in the field. Yet he thinks that your evolutionary sequence is not correct. His views are best summed up in this article..
Now obviously we're talking about a disagreement in fossil dating that spans hundreds of thousands if not millions of years.
No we're not. You really haven't a clue as to how cladistic trees are constructed, or read, have you?
Well clue me in sport. Obviously I'm not understanding something here. How many years transpired between Caudipteryx and Archaeopteryx and what tests can you show me that prove it?
No, because a) cladistic trees are based on a huge amount of actual evidence, not "guesses", and b) your own "guess" is highly unlikely to be "as good as another" because you're a complete idiot when it comes to biology.
Minus the (5? 10? 15?) actual fossils and how the scientists interpret them, what is the huge amount of actual evidence?
Not well schooled *enough*, it seems. See below.
In my layman's opinion, you appear to operate like a defense attorney who knows his client is guilty, but they have to make the best case they can.
You noticed that too, eh?
You've made a case that ERVs are not completely random (implying 1/3 odds) that counters Ichneumon's evidence that the highest probability of insertion in his study was 280x random.
Oops, you fell for his mistake/propaganda.
He falsely tries to imply that if 3 subjects out of 9 in a gene-therapy study had retroviruses integrate at the same locus, that this means that 3-out-of-9 retroviral integrations somehow "homed in" on the same location.
WRONG!
Hint: How *MANY* retroviruses (and thus retroviral integrations) are induced in *each* patient in a gene-therapy treatment?
This wasn't "3 out of 9", it was "3 out of a mind-bogglingly large number". Those critical three only got noticed because they caused the individual cells which had the "fatal" location disrupted triggered leukemia in their unfortunate recipients, but there were *VAST* numbers of *other* random integration events in *each* patient which caused no problems at all.
Hey, tallhappy, do your own homework for a change, and tell us how many unique integration events there are, in total, in 9 patients in a gene-therapy study?
So what are the *actual* odds of overlapping events, out of *all* integration events, in a study like that, eh?
Sorry, but Ichy clearly makes the point (shouts the point) that these are transistional fossils on the way from dinosaurs to birds.
They show the transition. A whole group of dinosaurs got increasingly birdlike. It's a whole branch growing in the "bird" direction.
You're simply repeating yourself and ignoring me. I can hear you. Hello?
I asked you why anyone would think coelurosaurs came from more avian stock like Archeopteryx if Archaepteryx isn't almost the same thing, just slightly more birdlike? How do you explain that? If evolution doesn't happen (and there are no transtional fossils etc. etc. etc.) why do we have this bridge of forms from dinosaurs to birds?
BTW, how birdlike is Archaeopteryx? Not very. Here's Velociraptor.
Here's Archaeopteryx.
Here's Caudipteryx.
Here's a pigeon.
You think you've got a quibble on Caudipteryx being later than Archy? That makes it all go away? I don't see where you've got much.
So my question is: Why isn't the matter settled?
There's a huge preponderance of opinion that birds are descended from theropods.
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