[microgood]

So what word is the common ancestor?

I think you would answer ENCYC. What I would say is all 26 letters of the alphabet came into existence at the same time and that life shares common characteristics and are not necessarily related by common descent, but by similarity; i.e. all life is similar. I think a more relevant representation would be:

ENCYCLOPEDLA
ENCYCLNPEDIA
ENCYCLOPEJIA
ENCYCNOPEDIA
ENCYCLIPEDIA
????????????
????????????
????????????
the question marks represent the common ancestor(s) we have with the chimp. And unless you assume we evolved from other creatures that are still alive, like rats or whatever, the chain is broken at that point. Otherwise you are assuming what you are trying to prove.

You see similarity and see common ancestry. I see similarity and see similarity.

I take it from your non-answer to my question you do agree that if you and all your siblings and first cousins have blue eyes, you can deduce your grandfather had blue eyes. Therefore, it is not necessary to have a picture of your grandfather to figure out his eye color.

I agree you could do that. But I do not see its relevance to speciation. Nor do I see how this gets you to a creature which you have no genetic information for? One without eyes or ears or limbs or organs at all for which we have no genetic information since it became extinct 1 billion years ago?

I know you think it is just a matter of one baby step at a time back to the beginning, switching back and forth from the genome to morphology and back to the genome as needed.

I'm trying to lead you, slowly, though that logic. But I can't lead you where you refuse to go.

I am probably a lost cause, but thanks for the effort.

[js1138]

You see similarity and see common ancestry. I see similarity and see similarity.

Of course words don't reproduce, and living things do.

Words are not subject to selective breeding for desired traits, and living things are.

Most of your word variants would be considered nonsense, but bulldogs and teacup poodles are both dogs (at least to their owners).

[Right Wing Professor]

I think you would answer ENCYC. What I would say is all 26 letters of the alphabet came into existence at the same time and that life shares common characteristics and are not necessarily related by common descent, but by similarity; i.e. all life is similar. I think a more relevant representation would be:

No. I'd answer encyclopedia. Each of the word is related to 'encyclopedia' by a one letter change.

Otherwise you are assuming what you are trying to prove.

If I list those five versions of 'encyclopedia', and say they look like they're all copies of a single word with a small number of errors, what am I assuming?

I see similarity and see similarity.

You see similarity and choose to look no further. Fine. But don't say we have no evidence, because similarity is evidence. It's one thing to decide not to look at it. That's a choice. It's another to claim there is none. That's a falsehood.

Nor do I see how this gets you to a creature which you have no genetic information for?

But I gave you the eyecolor - which is genetic information - for a creature - your grandfather -for which you had no genetic information. All I had to do was look what was common to his descendants. Is it really for hard for you to see that if we have gigabytes of genetic information - not just one characteristic- for hundreds of different descendants, we can piece together what the genome of the ancestor looked like, even though we don't have any direct information about it?