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To: Dominic Harr
13. Evolutionists cannot point to any transitional fossils—creatures that are half reptile and half bird, for instance.
Actually, paleontologists know of many detailed examples of fossils intermediate in form between various taxonomic groups.

Actually, Charles Darwin was worried that the fossil record did not show what his theory predicted:

‘Why is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely-graduated organic chain; and this is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory.’13

More recently, Gould said:

‘The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology.’14

But modern evolutionists, including Gould, assert that there are nevertheless some transitional forms, but they always seem to name the same handful of disputable ones, instead of the many that Darwin hoped for. It’s the same with Rennie below.

One of the most famous fossils of all time is Archaeopteryx, which combines feathers and skeletal structures peculiar to birds with features of dinosaurs.

This hardly qualifies for a fossil ‘intermediate in form’; it is more like a mosaic or chimera like the platypus. However, Alan Feduccia, a world authority on birds at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and an evolutionist himself, says:

‘Paleontologists have tried to turn Archaeopteryx into an earth-bound, feathered dinosaur. But it’s not. It is a bird, a perching bird. And no amount of ‘paleobabble’ is going to change that.’15

Archaeopteryx had fully-formed flying feathers (including asymmetric vanes and ventral, reinforcing furrows as in modern flying birds), the classical elliptical wings of modern woodland birds, and a large wishbone for attachment of muscles responsible for the downstroke of the wings.16 Its brain was essentially that of a flying bird, with a large cerebellum and visual cortex. The fact that it had teeth is irrelevant to its alleged transitional status—a number of extinct birds had teeth, while many reptiles do not. Furthermore, like other birds, both its maxilla (upper jaw) and mandible (lower jaw) moved. In most vertebrates, including reptiles, only the mandible moves (see Bird Evolution flies out the window). Finally, Archaeopteryx skeletons had pneumatized vertebrae and pelvis. This indicates the presence of both a cervical and abdominal air sac, i.e. at least two of the five sacs present in modern birds. This in turn indicates that the unique avian lung design was already present in what most evolutionists claim is the earliest bird.17

A flock’s worth of other feathered fossil species, some more avian and some less, has also been found.

More elephant-hurling without examples. But our Web site has documented that two famous alleged feathered dinosaurs are ‘dated’ younger than their supposed descendant Archaeopteryx and more likely to be flightless birds (Protarchaeopteryx and Caudipteryx), and one famous example, Archaeoraptor, was a fake.

281 posted on 07/11/2002 2:59:29 PM PDT by f.Christian
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To: f.Christian
I'm not sure what that post has to do with anything I wrote, I have not addressed 'transitional' fossils at all. I'm not going to argue with you over the age of the Earth.

I'm only interested in the fact that you *do* believe species evolve but deny that you believe in evolution.

286 posted on 07/11/2002 3:02:34 PM PDT by Dominic Harr
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