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To: Right Wing Professor
That's WAY better than what I'd view as normal for you guys:

Obviously, somewhere, somehow, somebody or something at least thought about the possibility of having something with teeth strain for krill. I still don't see a possibility of that "evolving" into baleen or of an animal any larger than a seal living that way since there is a sort of a square/cube problem inherent in the process so that a larger animal would not be able to take in sufficient amounts of krill in such a manner.

Whales on the other hand had already gotten much larger before baleen whales first appeared and there is no evidence of any whale ever using teeth to strain for krill or plankton, at least to my knowledge.

Baleen of course do not look like teeth at all:

Again, predatory whales kill large fish and mammals with their teeth and eat them. A whale whose teeth started to look the least bit like baleen would be lost as to what to do next. All his instincts would be worthless.

What the evidence indicates is that the changes which produced baleen and the teeth of the crabeater seal alike were engineering changes and modifications in prehistoric times, and that whatever or whoever was making such changes has since found other avocations and is no longer doing so.

742 posted on 01/27/2005 4:03:08 AM PST by judywillow
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To: judywillow
Some embryos of the baleen whales begin to develop teeth. As with body hair, the teeth disappear before birth. Since there is no use for teeth in the womb, only inheritance from a common ancestor makes any sense; there is no reason for the intelligent designer or special creator to provide embryonic whales with teeth

http://www.talkorigins.org/features/whales/

743 posted on 01/27/2005 4:14:03 AM PST by neutrality
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To: judywillow
That's WAY better than what I'd view as normal for you guys

Let me tell you what an intellectually honest person would have replied

"In order to try to refute the hypothesis that baleen evolved from teeth, I tried to spread scorn on the idea that the teeth of a carnivorous animal could be used to strain for krill. So I issued a challenge for anyone to identify a living animal that does that. Unfortunately, my ignorance of zoology was such that I was unaware of the existence of the crabeater seal, which, in fact strains for krill with its teeth. I was caught red-handed. How embarrassing! I will now re-evaluate my entire attitude."

747 posted on 01/27/2005 5:43:02 AM PST by Right Wing Professor (Evolve or die!)
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