Oh golly gee Jim you hurt me terribly with this charge. I am an Okie not an
Aggie. After this I don't know if we can continue our discussions as long as
you throw such insults at me. :-)
>I never questioned the existence of the
>catfish or the article. I wanted more information from you, which you
> wouldn't give, you sly one. But it was a good excuse to get me out to the
>library.
Ah but at least two people thought that was what you were saying. Your
writing is unclear. Have you ever considered taking one of those "English as
a second language" classes? :-)
>
><<And as I noted above, gaps in the fossil record proliferate with every
> find of a transitional form.>>
>
>As I've noted in the past, your notes are not convincing. Nor is this bald
>statement of evolutionary faith. (I recommend the Hair Club for Theories.
> I'm not just the President, I'm also a client).
>
><<I am sorry Jim. I can not accept Walter as an authority on anything.
> When he was here on the list he presented an argument which was based upon a
> faulty definition of an allele.>>
>
>The portions of Walter's book I presented were philosophical. The arguments
>are sound. Try dealing with those.
>
You quote Remine:
"An intermediate or transitionial form is determined by lineage. Once a clear
lineage is identified between organisms X and Y, then the intermediate forms
are self-evident. Intermediates and lineage are bount-up together; you cannot
have one without the other. In principle, an intermediate can be entirely
different from the endpoints X and Y. It only requires a significant pattern
of lineage. This uses the terminology in a self-apparent manner, consistent
with common understanding."
Like much of what Walter writes, I don't see the point. Since we have no
lineages (as in genealogies) for Egyptian cats, I guess we can safely say that
none of the thousands of mummified cats in ancient egypt are in the ancestry
of modern Egyptian cats. Those intermediate cats which lived in 400 A.D.
simply cannot be true intermediates because we don't have the lineage. What a
an amazing thing. Every individual cat is created ex nihilo. Why do those
pesky biologists tell us things about sperms and eggs?
>You're fond of quoting the same stuff over and over again, so it is no
>surprise you use the Wise quote once more.
sorry, I don't believe that I had quoted what I did before. Besides, you said
creationists reasonably argue that there are no transitional forms. Kurt is a
creationists who disagrees with that view.
>"As a result, the total list of claimed transitional forms is very samll (the
>above list is very nearly complete) compared to the total number of mosaic
>forms. The frequency seems intuitively too low for evolutionary theory."
>
Jim do you know what "mosaic evolution" is? There are lots of evolutionist who
say that evolution proceeds by just one part of the body changing at a time.
Keith Stewart Thompson, whom you quoted a couple of weeks ago, wrote of a list
of traits for tetrapods,
"These lists are somewhat misleading, for paradoxically opposite reasons.
First, characters may change in isolation, leading to a mosaic condition."
American Journal of Science 293A, 1993, p. 37
Thus the animals are a mosaic of old and new traits. Kurt has just said,
implicitly, that the fossil record supports the mosaic version of evolution.
modern man, I would agree with that view. Kurt is saying that the fossil
record does not support the gradual morphing view of evolution. so what? If
you want someone to say that the model of evolution which has an infinite
series of morphed forms is wrong, then I will say it. IT IS WRONG. But that
does not rule out other models of evolution. Nor does morphing evolution being
wrong, prove creation.
>I'm happy to agree with you and Kurt on this one. In fact, all of Kurt's
>chapter is excellent. Thanks for reminding us.
>
>JB <<They found some osteolepiform lungs? Where?
>
>GM <<They find the markings for these features in the bones.
>
>I don't think so. Authority?
>
Jim, Jim, Jim. Tsk, tsk tsk. I said they find markings in the bones for the
presence of lungs. And yes they do. Chang Mee-Mann wrote:
"The presence of a choana still is regarded as one of the most important
synapomorphies of osteolipiforms (or Eusthenopteron) and tetrapods." "Chang
Mee-Mann, "Rhipidistians, Dipnoans and Tetrapods", in _Origins of the Higher
Groups of Tetrapods_, ed H.P. Schultze and L. Trueb, 1991,p. 8-9
Having established that the Osteolepiforms have a choana, what is the
importance of this. Hans Peter Schultze tells us,
"Tetrapods posssess one external nasal opening for air intake, the air passes
over the olfactory tissue withint he nasal capsule and enters the mouth cavity
via the internal nasal opening, the choana." H.P. Schultze, "controversial
Hypotheses on the Origin of Tetrapods," in _Origins of the Higher Groups of
Tetrapods_, ed H.P. Schultze and L. Trueb, 1991 p.33
This type of air flow requires lungs. In order for the air to flow through the
nares into the choana there needs to be a suction device behind the choana.
The nasal cavity does not expand and contract, because it is surrounded by
bone and so the only way to force air or water through it is to have a bellows
or a suction device attached to it. In all tetrapods, it is the lungs which
when expanding, create a suction at the back of the mouth, and thus perform
the bellows function.
If you find a human skull on a road, you can safely assume that there was once
a body attached to the head. If you find a choana, you can safely assume that
there are lungs.
><<What? Is this a special price for me? :-) Don't you do pro bono work?>>
>
>Did you almost write "pro bozo"? ;-)
That would be fine with me but Bozo lives in Chicago and has a TV show there,
I believe. Is he in trouble?
glenn
Foundation,Fall and Flood
http://members.gnn.com/GRMorton/dmd.htm