Posted on 03/25/2009 9:29:08 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Is a Hippo a Pig or a Whale?
March 24, 2009 Two teams of evolutionists are having a spat over whale evolution. Thewissen and team (Northeastern Ohio U) say the hippo is close to the pig, but Jessica Theodor (U of Calgary) and Jonathan Geisler (Georgia Southern U) say its in the whale family tree. Their arguments and counter-arguments were published in Nature last week...
(Excerpt) Read more at creationsafaris.com ...
Technically, it's a Moore.
Neither! Its just big boned!
Comment from http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7236/full/nature07776.html by Giesler and Theodor:
“Thewissen et al. describe new fossils from India that apparently support a phylogeny that places Cetacea (that is, whales, dolphins, porpoises) as the sister group to the extinct family Raoellidae, and Hippopotamidae as more closely related to pigs and peccaries (that is, Suina) than to cetaceans. However, our reanalysis of a modified version of the data set they used differs in retaining molecular characters and demonstrates that Hippopotamidae is the closest extant family to Cetacea and that raoellids are the closest extinct group, consistent with previous phylogenetic studies. This topology supports the view that the aquatic adaptations in hippopotamids and cetaceans are inherited from their common ancestor.’
And the shocking (to the knuckleheads at creation safaris) reply from Thewissen et al at http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v458/n7236/full/nature07775.html:
“The analysis of Geisler and Theodor confirms our main phylogenetic result, that raoellids are, or include, the sister group to cetaceans. Their study expands on our findings by inferring that hippopotamids are the sister group to the combined raoellidcetacean clade, whereas our paper had explicitly stated that our data could not address the position of the extant artiodactyl families.”
Does it really matter? Global warming is going to make them go bye-bye anyway!
Remind me never to send an evolutionist out to buy bacon.
Why was my first thought that the hippo is actually related to the horse?
Any persons studing zoology out there? I can hear Jack Hanna in my ear saying this.
i thought a hippo was a horse...
We have a winner.
I thought it was in the cow family.
more hsocking to the knuckleheads at nature is the idea that the ‘studies’ apparently aren’t ‘studies’ at all, but rather nothign more than ASSUMPTIONS based on what again? The fact that different species have similar designs? EEEEEEK! Are there ANY evidences showing the trillions of differences between the two species evolving one way or hte other? ANy evidences showing even one small morphological change evolving from a blowhole to nostrils? Nope- just pure ASSUMPTIONS that there are MISSING SPECIES somewhere that must have shown a nice neat little evolutionary line of change- but fret not- ‘One day, we’ll discover these missing links’- until then we have these incomplete ‘Studies’ that ASSUME hippos evolved from whales- oh wait- ooops- I mean Pigs, or was that horses?
Put the word ‘Study’ i nthe article, and everyone simply assumes it’s scientific with all manner of evidences to support it- little do they realize though that ALL these scientists have to base their ASSUMPTIONS on are a could of entirely moot examples of homology- but as we KNOW from science, homological smilarities do NOT a descendant make- But let’s not let these icky little details cloud our vision of evolution eh?
It was powerfully important to teach schoolchildren that, decades ago, but you're being terribly impolite in pulling this out of the memory hole. Shame on you, you're embarrassing FR, lol.
Does that mean that Barney Frank is a whale?
A hippo is closer to a horse than a pig or a whale. I learned that in grade 10 biology.
It's HorseWhalePig, newly discovered big brother of ManBearPig. Al Gore is beaming.
It’s a horse.
Scientists do not debate whether evolution (descent with modification) took place, but they do argue about how it took place. Details of the processes and mechanisms are vigorously debated. Antievolutionists may hear the debates about how evolution occurs and misinterpret them as debates about whether evolution occurs. Evolution is sound science and is treated accordingly by scientists and scholars worldwide.
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/misconceptions_faq.php#b2
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