How ancient whales lost their legs, got sleek and conquered the oceans

EurekAlert (AAAS) ^ | 22 May 2006 | Staff

[PatrickHenry]

If two (or more) parts happen to latch on to each other, the whole bag becomes full of that configuration.

And in organic chemistry, they can't help doing so. The oceans quickly fill with sub-assemblies of organic molecules.

[js1138]

Wilma?

[shuckmaster]

I don't believe it.

I should hope not. Wristwatch parts don't replicate.

[shuckmaster]

isn't it reasonable to assume that there would be the occasional "throwback" that exhibited the properties of an earlier version?Sure. That's where hen's teeth and horses toes come from.

[ahayes]

Wristwatch parts don't replicate.

These, however, do.

[Old_Mil]

Amazing (not). Now if they could just explain how half of a whale/dolphin brain falls asleep at a time so the creature doesn't drown we might be on to something. Hint: it really is a big deal, because each hemisphere must have the necessary tracts and nucleii for full function. That's something that isn't present in human brains, btw.

There's a great deal about science that members of the Darwin fan club won't - or perhaps can't - understand.

[shuckmaster]

Scary. What do you call that thing?

[Stultis]

"By integrating data from fossils with developmental data from embryonic dolphins, we were able to trace these genetic changes to the point in time when they happened," Thewissen said.

I'm sorry, but this can't possibly be true. Everyone knows that Haeckel guy was a fraud, so therefore embryology can never, ever, ever tell us anything at all about evolution. Or something.

What's more Intelligent Denial proponents assure us that "Darwinists" NEVER conduct studies into the actual history of genetic/molecular changes, so obviously none of this article can be true.

[OmegaMan]

Then it is based on the game, I thought that was just a coincidence. I see now, its biologists just having a little fun. Those molecular biologists are wild and crazy guys lol.

[The Iguana]

Evolution at sea bump:

[Frapster]

I'm ALWAYS amazed when these folks think that MAN knows better than GOD. God set it up this way, all we have to do is live by the rules. Figuring out those rules is what science does. To deny obvious truths spread about you by the creator is blasphemous!

You tell him!

[ahayes]

It's a replicator from StarGate. They eat up any available metal and turn it into new replicators. When they're done with a planet it's just rock covered in layers and layers of replicator tiles.

[WKB]

This is why humans are sometimes born with little tails.



Correction:
Humans are born because someone got a little tail.

[ahayes]

I am shocked, SHOCKED!! :-o

[Stultis]

"How Opal Mehta Got Kissed, Got Wild and Got a Life" this sounds familiar and about as credible

So, what? You mean it's not credible that whales, over 15 millions years, reduced and eventually lost their rear limbs?

If so, then precisely which of the rear limbed whales do you suggest ISN'T really a whale?

It would really help if you could clarify this, since antievolutionists have been all over the map. For instance they typically claimed, for years and years, that the common Eocene whale, Basilosaurus Isis, was "just a whale," and therefore did not provide any evidence of evolution despite the primitive nature of its skull morphology and etc wrt modern whales.

But then Basilorsaurs turned out to be the first whale discovered to have (tiny but perfectly formed) rear limbs. The creationist fossil "expert" Duane Gish, who had formerly dismissed the same creature as "just a whale," and had ridiculed the notion that any whale could have rear limbs, was thrown into such a panic that he suddenly declared that Basilosaurus wasn't even a mammal, let alone a whale, but some sort of reptile!!!

[trashcanbred]

The replicators of course evolved into something less scarier though...

[Stultis]

Neither do I believe the Darwinists subjective nonsense.

Activity (or lack thereof in modern ceteceans) of "Sonic Hedgehog" gene = OBJECTIVE.

Studies of embryological development in living ceteceans = OBJECTIVE.

Existence of fossil whales with rear limbs (in various stages of development, with larger, more functional and more complete ones generally earlier geologically) = OBJECTIVE.

So what's "subjective"?

[colorado tanker]

Maybe it's just me, but there has to be a good story how sonic hedgehog got it's name.

[PatrickHenry]

Maybe it's just me, but there has to be a good story how sonic hedgehog got it's name.

Wouldja believe it? Wikipedia has this: Sonic hedgehog, which says: "... sonic hedgehog was named for Sega's video game character Sonic the Hedgehog."

[skinkinthegrass]

thxs, PH for the ping. :^)