Replies

Yes, I read the link- and I read it before replying.

What was the point of asking for photos that had already been linked?

If you look at the link I gave you, two of the four sources directly address articles from 2001. The article also directly addresses the skeleton bone find.

There are two skeleton bone finds. In one case, Sarfati makes the tiniest nod toward acknowledging the truth. He mentions the early lack of postcranial bones on Pakicetus, doing the usual jeer at attempts to reconstruct from a few pieces. He goes on to say that later Thewissen found "some more bones." He quietly lets the word "postcranial" slip in, but nowhere acknowledges that recent reconstructions are based on relatively complete information. If you didn't know from better sources what he was spinning here, you'd still think all we know of Pakicetus came from two skull bones.

In the other case, Ambulocetus, he's still telling people there are no pelvic bones. Furthermore, I linked the refutation of the "no pelvis" silliness before you even linked the stupid article containing it. Does no good.

Some people on this thread have been impressed with your performance. I am not one. You know only the pig-ignorant AiG strawman version of evolution. And you're just going through their articles one by one, blasting them out. There's no stopping you and it's not an intelligent dialogue. You just fire the stuff out there.

Out for the night.

I take my previous post back. I had read your other link and thought that was what you were referring to. As for Babinski, his photos are pathetically inconclusive and add no new information to the debate as we already know that whales have bones inside of them. How those bones are to be interpreted is another question.

I'm currently perusing Babinski's page and it seems like he has a definate grudge against Christians, starting with his photograph and the caption "The damned say the damndest things.... former fundamentalist..." Then goes on to I guess show Jesus wasn't really all that significant in history and how apologist Josh McDowell as was a "prime candidate for conversion. He was young, unstable, with manic-depressive tendencies, with no well thought out beliefs of his own." Real swell chap, this Babinski.

He also has a section on the "cretinists" as he calls creationists reaction to his website. Here is a reply by someone you all will recognize:

TED HOLDEN'S CRITICISM:

From: "Ted Holden"
Newsgroups:
alt.bible,sci.bio.paleontology,alt.talk.creationism
Sent: Thursday, July 24, 2003 10:35 PM
Subject: Re: [Evolution of whales - vestigial hind limbs ]
New Information / Pics on Web

There are several things which make whale evolution impossible and not just the question of legs to flippers.

The biggest problem as I see it is baleen. How is a normal predator which kills large animals with its teeth and eats them supposed to start straining plankton through its teeth and somehow or other hold on and survive until his teeth turn into whalebone, 10,000 generations later.

You've got to be seriously stupid to believe anything like that. In fact, the guy who believes that will make Mortimer Snerd look like Albert Einstein by way of contrast:

http://www.bearfabrique.org/evorants/testamonial.html

Ted Holden
www.bearfabrique.org
. . , , ____)/ \(____ _,--''''',-'/( )\`-.`````--._ ,-' ,' | \ _ _ / | `-. `-. ,' / | `._ /\\ //\ _,' | \ `. | | `. `-( ,\\_// )-' .' | | ,' _,----._ |_,----._\ ____`\o'_`o/'____ /_.----._ |_,----._ `. |/' \' `\( \(_)/ )/' `/ `\| ` ` V V ' '
Splifford the bat says: Always remember
*note, unfortunately Splifford had problems transfering over in the formatting. A mind is a terrible thing to waste; especially on an evolutionist.
Just say no to narcotic drugs, alcohol abuse, and corrupt ideological doctrines.

ED's REPLY TO TED HOLDEN:
It's always something with creationists like Ted. If evidence of land-based creatures moving to the sea isn't enough, now they want to know how teeth evolved into baleen. And they add, "baleen disproves evolution could have occured!" So they just keep drawing that line backwards. Now the line is drawn as "Baleen!" Heck, think about the line back when Duane T. Gish of ICR was pumelling even the possibility of whale evolution with his "Cow to Whale" slide.
Evolution's come a long way baby, and it keeps on a-commin.

And you, dear sir, didn't answer a single objection that Ted put forward.

What was the point of asking for photos that had already been linked?
See my reply above. It was a genuine oversight.

If you look at the link I gave you, two of the four sources directly address articles from 2001. The article also directly addresses the skeleton bone find.

There are two skeleton bone finds. In one case, Sarfati makes the tiniest nod toward acknowledging the truth. He mentions the early lack of postcranial bones on Pakicetus, doing the usual jeer at attempts to reconstruct from a few pieces. He goes on to say that later Thewissen found "some more bones." He quietly lets the word "postcranial" slip in, but nowhere acknowledges that recent reconstructions are based on relatively complete information. If you didn't know from better sources what he was spinning here, you'd still think all we know of Pakicetus came from two skull bones.

For the record, here is what he said regarding the other find (including a link to the original article on Nature Magazine's website which is available with a FREE subscription):
A prominent whale expert, Thewissen, and colleagues unearthed some more bones of Pakicetus, and published their work in the journal Nature.2 The commentary on this paper in the same issue3 says, ‘All the postcranial bones indicate that pakicetids were land mammals, and … indicate that the animals were runners, with only their feet touching the ground.’ (See illustration, left) This is very different from Gingerich’s picture of an aquatic animal! But the evolutionary bias is still clear, describing Pakicetus as a ‘terrestrial cetacean’ and saying, ‘The first whales were fully terrestrial, and were even efficient runners.’ But the term ‘whale’ becomes meaningless if it can describe land mammals, and it provides no insight into how true marine whales supposedly evolved.

AIG is not playing the cloak and dagger baloney that you are trying to accuse them of. You, on the other hand are deliberately misrepresenting AIG.

In the other case, Ambulocetus, he's still telling people there are no pelvic bones. Furthermore, I linked the refutation of the "no pelvis" silliness before you even linked the stupid article containing it. Does no good.
He is quoting an evolutionist in Science Magazine who said ‘Since the pelvic girdle is not preserved, there is no direct evidence in Ambulocetus for a connection between the hind limbs and the axial skeleton.' (Berta, A., What is a whale? Science 263(5144):180181, Thewissen, J.G.M., Hussain, S.T., Arif, M., Fossil evidence for the origin of aquatic locomotion in archaeocete whales, pp. 210212, 1994.)

Some people on this thread have been impressed with your performance. I am not one. You know only the pig-ignorant AiG strawman version of evolution. And you're just going through their articles one by one, blasting them out. There's no stopping you and it's not an intelligent dialogue. You just fire the stuff out there.

And you have "fired out" nothing but off the top of your head scientific "proof" of evolution? Regardless, fortunately, I'm not in a popularity contest for your approval. Furthermore, you seem cranky tonight. Maybe it is a good idea for you to go to bed.