Denying all evidence

[Calypsis4]

It's an animal with both reptilian (teeth, long tail, unfused fingers) and avian (feathers, sternum, hollow bones) features: exactly what you would expect of a transitional fossil that links dinosaurs and birds.

And BTW, that's not Archaeopteryx. It's Microraptor. A dinosaur; not a bird.

No, it is not a transitional form. But if you can explain how scales can become feathers genetically and then demonstrate it you might have a case.

However, your position is flawed almost altogether. Here's why:

The following six points are quoted from Luther Sunderland's book, Darwin's Enigma: Fossils and Other Problems, pp. 74-75, the facts of which points he gathered from Hitching's book.

1. It had a long bony tail, like a reptile's.
In the embryonic stage, some living birds have more tail vertebrae than Archeopteryx. They later fuse to become an upstanding bone called the pygostyle. The tail bone and feather arrangement on swans are very similar to those of Archeopteryx.
One authority claims that there is no basic difference between the ancient and modern forms: the difference lies only in the fact that the caudal vertebrae are greatly prolonged. But this does not make a reptile.
2. It had claws on its feet and on its feathered forelimbs.
However, many living birds such as the hoatzin in South America, the touraco in Africa and the ostrich also have claws. In 1983, the British Museum of Natural History displayed numerous species within nine families of birds with claws on the wings.
3. It had teeth.
Modern birds do not have teeth but many ancient birds did, particularly those in the Mesozoic. There is no suggestion that these birds were transitional. The teeth do not show the connection of Archeopteryx with any other animal since every subclass of vertebrates has some with teeth and some without.
4. It had a shallow breastbone.
Various modern flying birds such as the hoatzin have similarly shallow breastbones, and this does not disqualify them from being classified as birds. And there are, of course, many species of nonflying birds, both living and extinct.
Recent examination of Archeopteryx's feathers has shown that they are the same as the feathers of modern birds that are excellent fliers. Dr. Ostrom says that there is no question that they are the same as the feathers of modern birds. They are asymmetrical with a center shaft and parallel barbs like those of today's flying birds.
5. Its bones were solid, not hollow, like a bird's.
This idea has been refuted because the long bones of Archeopteryx are now known to be hollow.
6. It predates the general arrival of birds by millions of years.
This also has been refuted by recent paleontological discoveries. In 1977 a geologist from Brigham Young University, James A. Jensen, discovered in the Dry Mesa quarry of the Morrison formation in western Colorado a fossil of an unequivocal bird in Lower Jurassic rock.
This deposit is dated as 60-million years older than the Upper Jurassic rock in which Archeopteryx was found. He first found the rear-leg femur and, later, the remainder of the skeleton.
This was reported in Science News 24 September 1977. Professor John Ostrom commented, "It is obvious we must now look for the ancestors of flying birds in a period of time much older than that in which Archeopteryx lived."
17 EVIDENCES AGAINST EVOLUTION

Femora aren't necessary for birthing offspring. Hips are. Legs aren't. And whales not only have hips; they have vestigial legs. Dolphins, too. These are relics of their terrestrial ancestors.

You aren't telling the truth. You assign them as legs without justification.

Actually, we can tell from the sediments that an animal was buried in what the environment was like when it died. In Archaeopteryx's case, it died and fell to the bottom of a quiet, oxygen-poor lagoon.

It fell to the bottom of "a quiet, oxygen-poor lagoon ()...." and became a fossil? Really? Say Mallon, I've got this bridge I'd like to sell you.

It definitely wasn't buried in a catastrophic flood. Those kinds of floods don't deposit fine muds and silts like the ones Archaeopteryx is found in.

You don't know what you're talking about. Check out the 'fine muds' and/or varves in what happened after the eruption of Mount St. Helens in Washington, 1980. What Dr. John Morris says about this matter is devastating to evolutionary geology.

YouTube - Mt St Helen's : Monument to the Flood

Reality bites if you're a YEC.

Reality bites all right; evolutionists.

Evolution is a lie and the scriptures are telling the truth about our world.

 

[Calypsis4]

P.S. Hey, C4 is back! He's the one who quoted a heretic that denies the trinity in a post against me, and then in the same post called me a heretic. big fun.

Exactly. But tell me, my lost counterpart; if you dug up a quote from Adolph Hitler that affirmed the 91 to 94 million mile average elliptical orbit of the earth around the sun would you say he is in error on that point?

What does acceptance of the triune nature of Almighty God have to do with the truthfulness or error of evolution?

 

[Mallon]

So much for the nested hierarchy.

Actually, Archaeopteryx fits perfectly within a nested hierarchy. Birds are a subset of reptiles because they evolved from reptiles, as evidenced by the unique, derived features that they share with some reptiles (e.g., antorbital fenestrae, elevated metabolisms, etc.).

For one, the Archeopteryx as the ancestor of birds is found in the same strata as modern birds, there are even birds which exhibit the same features as modern birds in strata below that of said organism.

Not sure why you're arguing that Longisquama is a "modern bird". It's supposed "feathers" were discredited long ago. They're modified scales:

So no, there were no "modern birds" around at the time of Archaeopteryx.

There are other studies which challenge the dinosaur to bird transition.

And they've all been discredited by subsequent work. There are only a handful of researchers (Reuben, Feduccia, and a couple others) who still argue that birds did not descend from dinosaurs -- that they came from other, unidentified reptiles -- but they're pretty much considered crack-pots these days by 99% of palaeontologists. In fact, birds are so similar to some meat-eating dinosaurs, like Velociraptor, that these same crack-pots have recently tried arguing that Velociraptor wasn't, in fact, a dinosaur.

Claws on the wings have been found on birds other than the archeopteryx including the Tauraco corythaix and Opisthocomus hoazin and is not a reptilian trait.

Of course it's a reptilian trait. The couple of bird exceptions you mentioned are just that -- exceptions. They're birds that have retained the primitive reptilian condition of having clawed fingers, like whales or snakes that retain pelves. In fact, the hoatzin you mentioned even loses its claws as it matures into an adult.

The long tail is actually a pygostyle

No, a pygostyle is not a long, bony tail. A pygostyle is a short series of fused vertebrate that anchor the tail feathers in more modern birds. Archaeopteryx did not have a pygostyle like so:

It had a long, dinosaurian tail. Please research these things before you pretend to know anything about them.

Whales don't have legs.

Right. But they do have remnants of legs (e.g., thigh bones). These do not anchor the reproductive organs, as you say, just as your legs do not anchor your reproductive organs.

 

[Mallon]

No, it is not a transitional form. But if you can explain how scales can become feathers genetically and then demonstrate it you might have a case.

Moving the goalposts again, eh?
Feather evolution has actually been studied in some detail. If you're genuinely interested in learning about it, and not just trying to throw up a smoke screen, check out the work of Prum and Brush for starters:
http://www.yale.edu/eeb/prum/pdf/Prum_n_Brush_2002.pdf

1. It had a long bony tail, like a reptile's.
In the embryonic stage, some living birds have more tail vertebrae than Archeopteryx. They later fuse to become an upstanding bone called the pygostyle. The tail bone and feather arrangement on swans are very similar to those of Archeopteryx.

As I just explained, Archaeopteryx clearly did not have a pygostyle. You guys should really examine your sources more closely. You're actually unwittingly citing evidence that birds are derived reptiles that alter the primitive condition of having unfused tail vertebrae as they develop. This is exactly what evolution predicts.

2. It had claws on its feet and on its feathered forelimbs.
However, many living birds such as the hoatzin in South America, the touraco in Africa and the ostrich also have claws. In 1983, the British Museum of Natural History displayed numerous species within nine families of birds with claws on the wings.

Again, these are exceptions to the avian rule that clearly have retained the primitive reptilian pattern of clawed fingers. And again, the loss of claws in adult hoatzins shows that they are simply derived reptiles that modify the primitive condition of having clawed fingers as they progress into adulthood... again, as evolution predicts.

3. It had teeth.
Modern birds do not have teeth but many ancient birds did, particularly those in the Mesozoic. There is no suggestion that these birds were transitional.

Of course they're transitional if they have teeth. As your source says, teeth aren't characteristics of modern birds. They're found only in primitive birds.

4. It had a shallow breastbone.
Various modern flying birds such as the hoatzin have similarly shallow breastbones, and this does not disqualify them from being classified as birds.

Right. No one is arguing otherwise. This is non-sequitur. Shallow breast-bones aren't typical of modern birds, though. They're typically found in birds that do not fly well or not at all, like hoatzins. Or kiwis. Or ostriches.

Recent examination of Archeopteryx's feathers has shown that they are the same as the feathers of modern birds that are excellent fliers. Dr. Ostrom says that there is no question that they are the same as the feathers of modern birds. They are asymmetrical with a center shaft and parallel barbs like those of today's flying birds.

Not sure what the point is here. Archaeopteryx did have asymmetrical feathers (while other feathered dinosaurs did not), but it probably wasn't a great flyer. Look at the weak breast-bone you just mentioned earlier: it's a large bone in flying birds because it anchors the flight muscles. This issue is separate from whether Archaeopteryx was a derived reptile.
Not sure why you're suddenly giving credence to the work of John Ostrom here, anyways: He was a STRONG advocate that birds are dinosaurs. Quote-mining, no doubt. Only cite someone if they appear to agree with what you're saying when quoted out of context, right?

5. Its bones were solid, not hollow, like a bird's.
This idea has been refuted because the long bones of Archeopteryx are now known to be hollow.

Exactly. The bones of theropod dinosaurs are also hollow... like those of birds.

6. It predates the general arrival of birds by millions of years.
This also has been refuted by recent paleontological discoveries. In 1977 a geologist from Brigham Young University, James A. Jensen, discovered in the Dry Mesa quarry of the Morrison formation in western Colorado a fossil of an unequivocal bird in Lower Jurassic rock.

Actually, no bird has ever been identified from the Morrison Formation. Someone once thought they found a bird in the Morrison Formation, but the scrappy fossil has since been shown to be a pterosaur:
Laopteryx - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Your source is waaaay out of date.

You aren't telling the truth. You assign them as legs without justification.

The big bone that fits into the hip socket is, by definition, the femur (thigh bone). Whales have vestigial legs.

It fell to the bottom of "a quiet, oxygen-poor lagoon ()...." and became a fossil? Really?

Yes, really. Study some basic geology. Giant catastrophic floods that wipe out entire ecosystems overnight don't deposit fine muds and silts. They deposit fining-upwards sequences that consist of large boulders, pebbles, and coarse sands. This is Geology 101. Keep citing evidence from volcanic geology when you're talking about sedimentary geology, though: It REALLY helps your credibility.

BTW, for those actually interested in learning about the deposits where Archaeopteryx was found (as opposed to just watching youtube videos as a substitute for scholarly research), I highly recommend the following book:
http://www.amazon.com/Solnhofen-Mesozoic-Palaeontology-Werner-Barthel/dp/0521458307

 

[Mallon]

Interestingly, it looks like a lot of the uncited anti-evolution arguments being presented here come from Harun Yahya's website:
THE EVOLUTION IMPASSE I - Harun Yahya

 

[Greg1234]

Actually, Archaeopteryx fits perfectly within a nested hierarchy. Birds are a subset of reptiles because they evolved from reptiles, as evidenced by the unique, derived features that they share with some reptiles (e.g., antorbital fenestrae, elevated metabolisms, etc.).

So you presume Darwinism then place the nested hierarchy. A bird is fundamentally different than a reptile and is a nest of its own. A bird for example is warm blooded, a reptile is cold blooded, the breathing apparatus is different, bone structure is different etc. Thats like saying a car is a plane because it has an engine. An aircraft can taxi to the runway just like a car so airplanes came from cars. An aircraft is different from a car down to structure of the landing gear, and compression systems. This is actually a breach in nests but you can always transition between transitions and nested hierarchy whenever you like right?

Not sure why you're arguing that Longisquama is a "modern bird". It's supposed "feathers" were discredited long ago. They're modified scales:
So no, there were no "modern birds" around at the time of Archaeopteryx.

I used the Longisquama to show you that feathers are found in strata below said date of theropod origins, from which birds are said to have come. But seeing that you guys have changed feathers to scales, it can be used either way to refute Darwinism. A skin condition in scales, will turn scales into feathers. Osteoporosis will turn an ape into a man. Thats how fragile Darwinism is. The birds found in strata the same as the archeopteryx which have well developed modern features is for one the Liaoningornis, and the Confuciusornis which has a keeled sternum. Both lived alongside with the archeopteryx though Darwinists have attempted to alter the dates.

And they've all been discredited by subsequent work.

Built upon

There are only a handful of researchers (Reuben, Feduccia, and a couple others) who still argue that birds did not descend from dinosaurs -- that they came from other, unidentified reptiles -- but they're pretty much considered crack-pots these days by 99% of palaeontologists. In fact, birds are so similar to some meat-eating dinosaurs, like Velociraptor, that these same crack-pots have recently tried arguing that Velociraptor wasn't, in fact, a dinosaur.

We already know that anybody who does not adhere to Darwinism is a crackpot. another thing overlooked is the fact that Darwinists assert the Velociraptor as the ancestor of birds and still assert that it came into existence 70 million years ago, while the Archeopteryx is found in 150 million year old rock. So the ancestors of birds came into existence after the birds.

Of course it's a reptilian trait. The couple of bird exceptions you mentioned are just that -- exceptions. They're birds that have retained the primitive reptilian condition of having clawed fingers, like whales or snakes that retain pelves. In fact, the hoatzin you mentioned even loses its claws as it matures into an adult.

Its not a reptilian trait. There are mammals with claws. The hoatzin uses its claws for climbing, so does the young Tauraco. Finding claws on a bird is nothing new, whether it is used in the early stages or through out its lifetime. The use as some sort of transition is also negaated and is no different than the natural life cycle of the bird. Humans are not born with teeth an develop teeth as they get into the latter stages of development. This has nothing to do with a transition from animals without teeth but is a part of development. Naturally, finding animals in the latter stages of lfe without teeth, is not a result of these animals having "retained" their infancy status from when they transformed from humans.

No, a pygostyle is not a long, bony tail. A pygostyle is a short series of fused vertebrate that anchor the tail feathers in more modern birds. Archaeopteryx did not have a pygostyle like so:

It had a long, dinosaurian tail. Please research these things before you pretend to know anything about them.

It is an elongated pygostyle and served an essential function.

"One of the most striking features of Archaeopteryx is its relatively long tail. All known modern birds have shortened the bony tail. It is interesting to note that this shortening is usually not achieved by reducing the number of tail vertebrae. Almost all of the 23 vertebrae found in the tail of Archaeopteryx can be identified in modern birds, although reduced in size with some added to either the sacrum or to the pygostyle. In Archaeopteryx, each caudal vertebra has a pair of long feathers that stick out to the side to form an air foil. A significant percentage of the total lift in Archaeopteryx is provided by this surface.

Archaeopteryx lacks an antitrochanter on the acetabulum of the pelvis. In fact, there is no articular surface at the back of the acetabulum, nor a supra-acetabular shelf characteristic of dinosaurs. The pelvis does have a strong articulation at the front of the acetabulum resulting in a vertical posture. In this respect it resembles a monkey (Martin, 1995 ) and is unsettling when compared with the horizontal backs of dinosaurs and modern birds. However, there seems to be little room for alternative postures and a vertical posture fits with the use of the clawed hands for tree trunk climbing and the origin of bipedality through vertical clinging and leaping (Martin, 1983 ). Without an articulation at the back of the acetabulum, the femur could not be easily swung forward, and the legs were not folded under the center of mass during flight as in modern birds. Instead, the femur and tibia would have extended posteriorly, shifting the flight center and requiring a more posterior lift surface provided by the tail (Peters and Gutmann, 1985 ). The tail could not be shortened in flying birds until the development of an antitrochantor so that the femur could be fixed in the forward position."

Not only did the archeopteryx have extra features, but it had an extra means of lift for basic flight and maneuvering. In the words of feduccia, “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”

Right. But they do have remnants of legs (e.g., thigh bones). These do not anchor the reproductive organs, as you say, just as your legs do not anchor your reproductive organs.

Begin here

 

[Greg1234]

Interestingly, it looks like a lot of the uncited anti-evolution arguments being presented here come from Harun Yahya's website:
THE EVOLUTION IMPASSE I - Harun Yahya

The evidence does not belong to Yahya. Here's another one.Apologetics Press - Archaeopteryx—“The Greatest Embarrassment of Paleontology” Maybe you should start a thread of the most ridiculous "creationist websites". This is in fact the mode of refutation taken by your compatriots.

 

[Calypsis4]

Moving the goalposts again, eh?
Feather evolution has actually been studied in some detail. If you're genuinely interested in learning about it, and not just trying to throw up a smoke screen, check out the work of Prum and Brush for starters:
http://www.yale.edu/eeb/prum/pdf/Prum_n_Brush_2002.pdf

Why do you keep sticking your foot in your mouth? If evolutionists cannot establish that there is a genetic connection between the DNA of birds and dinosaurs then how can they possibly say there is such a connection to begin with in light of the fact that there is little or no fossil evidence of that supposed link (archeopteryx notwithstanding)?

As I just explained, Archaeopteryx clearly did not have a pygostyle. You guys should really examine your sources more closely. You're actually unwittingly citing evidence that birds are derived reptiles that alter the primitive condition of having unfused tail vertebrae as they develop. This is exactly what evolution predicts.

Baloney. Evolution does not exist in the first place and the fossil record clearly reveals that fact.

Again, these are exceptions to the avian rule that clearly have retained the primitive reptilian pattern of clawed fingers. And again, the loss of claws in adult hoatzins shows that they are simply derived reptiles that modify the primitive condition of having clawed fingers as they progress into adulthood... again, as evolution predicts.

Blah, blah, blah...mere opinion. I reject that opinion. God's Word however, is not opinion.

Of course they're transitional if they have teeth. As your source says, teeth aren't characteristics of modern birds. They're found only in primitive birds.

No, they are not.

Right. No one is arguing otherwise. This is non-sequitur. Shallow breat-bones aren't typical of modern birds, though. They're typically found in birds that do not fly well or not at all, like hoatzins. Or kiwis. Or ostriches.

Just stop it. You aren't convincing anyone for your arguments are paper thin at best.

Actually, no bird has ever been identified from the Morrison Formation. Someone once thought they found a bird in the Morrison Formation, but the scrappy fossil has since been shown to be a pterosaur:
Laopteryx - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Your source is waaaay out of date.

No, they are not. Your opinions to the contrary are no better than your imagination.

The big bone that fits into the hip socket is, by definition, the femur (thigh bone). Whales have vestigial legs.

You aren't telling the truth nor do you have fossil evidence to establish that they were once femurs.

Yes, really. Study some basic geology.

It is because I studied geology in college and much more since then that I reject evolutionary assumptions about it. It is downright ridiculous.

Giant catastrophic floods that wipe out entire ecosystems overnight don't deposit fine muds and silts.

And if you saw the video clip I posted on Mount St. Helens or any of the others on You Tube then it means that you have been informed otherwise with visible, verifiable evidence in time and history and yet you stubbornly cling to your errors. That's because you don't care about the truth and probably never did.

BTW, for those actually interested in learning about the deposits where Archaeopteryx was found (as opposed to just watching youtube videos as a substitute for scholarly research), I highly recommend the following book:

Dear readers, I urge you not to believe anything Mallon says on this subject and his documentation does no better than his shallow thinking opinions. He and those like him twist the facts and bend the evidence to support their foolish claims of an evolving world. But our world is not evolving it is degenerating. So say both the scriptures and the scientific facts.

 

[Calypsis4]

So you presume Darwinism then place the nested hierarchy. A bird is fundamentally different than a reptile and is a nest of its own. A bird for example is warm blooded, a reptile is cold blooded, the breathing apparatus is different, bone structure is different etc. Thats like saying a car is a plane because it has an engine. An aircraft can taxi to the runway just like a car so airplanes came from cars. An aircraft is different from a car down to structure of the landing gear, and compression systems. This is actually a breach in nests but you can always transition between transitions and nested hierarchy whenever you like right?


I used the Longisquama to show you that feathers are found in strata below said date of theropod origins, from which birds are said to have come. But seeing that you guys have changed feathers to scales, it can be used either way to refute Darwinism. A skin condition in scales, will turn scales into feathers. Osteoporosis will turn an ape into a man. Thats how fragile Darwinism is. The birds found in strata the same as the archeopteryx which have well developed modern features is for one the Liaoningornis, and the Confuciusornis which has a keeled sternum. Both lived alongside with the archeopteryx though Darwinists have attempted to alter the dates.



Built upon
We already know that anybody who does not adhere to Darwinism is a crackpot. another thing overlooked is the fact that Darwinists assert the Velociraptor as the ancestor of birds and still assert that it it came inot existence 70 million years ago, while the Archeopteryx is found in 150 million year old rock. So the ancestors of birds came into existence after the birds.


Its not a reptilian trait. There are mammals with claws. The hoatzin uses its claws for climbing, so does the young Tauraco. Finding claws on a bird is nothing new, whether it is used in the early stages or through out its lifetime.


It is an elongated pygostyle and served an essential function.

"One of the most striking features of Archaeopteryx is its relatively long tail. All known modern birds have shortened the bony tail. It is interesting to note that this shortening is usually not achieved by reducing the number of tail vertebrae. Almost all of the 23 vertebrae found in the tail of Archaeopteryx can be identified in modern birds, although reduced in size with some added to either the sacrum or to the pygostyle. In Archaeopteryx, each caudal vertebra has a pair of long feathers that stick out to the side to form an air foil. A significant percentage of the total lift in Archaeopteryx is provided by this surface.

Archaeopteryx lacks an antitrochanter on the acetabulum of the pelvis. In fact, there is no articular surface at the back of the acetabulum, nor a supra-acetabular shelf characteristic of dinosaurs. The pelvis does have a strong articulation at the front of the acetabulum resulting in a vertical posture. In this respect it resembles a monkey (Martin, 1995 ) and is unsettling when compared with the horizontal backs of dinosaurs and modern birds. However, there seems to be little room for alternative postures and a vertical posture fits with the use of the clawed hands for tree trunk climbing and the origin of bipedality through vertical clinging and leaping (Martin, 1983 ). Without an articulation at the back of the acetabulum, the femur could not be easily swung forward, and the legs were not folded under the center of mass during flight as in modern birds. Instead, the femur and tibia would have extended posteriorly, shifting the flight center and requiring a more posterior lift surface provided by the tail (Peters and Gutmann, 1985 ). The tail could not be shortened in flying birds until the development of an antitrochantor so that the femur could be fixed in the forward position."

Not only did the archeopteryx have extra features, but it had an extra means of lift for basic flight and maneuvering. In the words of feduccia, “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”


Begin here

Nice job, Greg1234. Keep up the good work.

 

[shernren]

Basic comprehension needed.

It is an elongated pygostyle and served an essential function.

"One of the most striking features of Archaeopteryx is its relatively long tail. All known modern birds have shortened the bony tail. It is interesting to note that this shortening is usually not achieved by reducing the number of tail vertebrae. Almost all of the 23 vertebrae found in the tail of Archaeopteryx can be identified in modern birds, although reduced in size with some added to either the sacrum or to the pygostyle. In Archaeopteryx, each caudal vertebra has a pair of long feathers that stick out to the side to form an air foil. A significant percentage of the total lift in Archaeopteryx is provided by this surface.

Archeopteryx -> long tail -> unshortened tail -> full set of 23 vertebrae.
Modern birds -> shortened tail -> some vertebrae "missing" -> added to either the sacrum or to the pygostyle.

The "adding to the pygostyle" is a reference to the tails of modern birds, and not to Archeopteryx, which your own (uncited) source notes has a "relatively long tail".

Begin here

Wonder what Carl Wieland would say about this?

 

[shernren]

Why do you keep sticking your foot in your mouth? If evolutionists cannot establish that there is a genetic connection between the DNA of birds and dinosaurs then how can they possibly say there is such a connection to begin with in light of the fact that there is little or no fossil evidence of that supposed link (archeopteryx notwithstanding)?

Baloney. Evolution does not exist in the first place and the fossil record clearly reveals that fact.

Blah, blah, blah...mere opinion. I reject that opinion. God's Word however, is not opinion.

No, they are not.

Just stop it. You aren't convincing anyone for your arguments are paper thin at best.

No, they are not. Your opinions to the contrary are no better than your imagination.

You aren't telling the truth nor do you have fossil evidence to establish that they were once femurs.

It is because I studied geology in college and much more since then that I reject evolutionary assumptions about it. It is downright ridiculous.

And if you saw the video clip I posted on Mount St. Helens or any of the others on You Tube then it means that you have been informed otherwise with visible, verifiable evidence in time and history and yet you stubbornly cling to your errors. That's because you don't care about the truth and probably never did.

Dear readers, I urge you not to believe anything Mallon says on this subject and his documentation does no better than his shallow thinking opinions. He and those like him twist the facts and bend the evidence to support their foolish claims of an evolving world. But our world is not evolving it is degenerating. So say both the scriptures and the scientific facts.

In other news, creationists believe that evolutionists like to pepper their posts with personal attacks while refusing whatsoever to engage with their actual arguments.

Methinks they've just been staring in the mirror too long.

 

[Greg1234]

Basic comprehension needed.



Archeopteryx -> long tail -> unshortened tail -> full set of 23 vertebrae.
Modern birds -> shortened tail -> some vertebrae "missing" -> added to either the sacrum or to the pygostyle.

The "adding to the pygostyle" is a reference to the tails of modern birds, and not to Archeopteryx, which your own (uncited) source notes has a "relatively long tail".

See last.

Wonder what Carl Wieland would say about this?

Its good that you posted the picture. Now everybody can have a look at the legs in dolphins.

 

[Greg1234]

Nice job, Greg1234. Keep up the good work.

All tests indicate that random mutation cannot build a man. In another scenario,there are those like you and me who have to tell these materialists that this
YouTube - First Flight: "Flying Car" Terrafugia Transition Roadable Aircraft
was designed seeing that all tests indicate that cars don't turn into aircraft through randomly shuffling the assembly manual..

 

[Mallon]

So you presume Darwinism then place the nested hierarchy.

The theory of evolution actually stems from the nested hierarchy into which animals are arranged. Linnaeus identified this hierarchy over 100 years before Darwin developed his theory of evolution. The fact that animals continue to be found that do not violate the nested hierarchy is good evidence that evolution is a solid theory.

A bird is fundamentally different than a reptile and is a nest of its own. A bird for example is warm blooded, a reptile is cold blooded, the breathing apparatus is different, bone structure is different etc. Thats like saying a car is a plane because it has an engine. An aircraft can taxi to the runway just like a car so airplanes came from cars. An aircraft is different from a car down to structure of the landing gear, and compression systems. This is actually a breach in nests but you can always transition between transitions and nested hierarchy whenever you like right?

No one is denying that reptiles and birds are different. Birds share many unique features in common with reptiles, however, which is why they are classified within reptiles. Reptiles and birds share scales, for example (look at a bird's feet). Their skulls also contain the same bones, and birds and archosaurian reptiles have the same skull openings. And as has been explained to you many times before, birds have even more features in common with dinosaurian reptiles, including hollow bones, feathers, moon-shaped wrist bones, etc, etc, etc. This is why birds are classified within dinosaurs.
Any more than a cursory glance at birds reveals that they are simply highly modified reptiles. You want to focus only on those differences between birds and reptiles, which will tell you nothing about how they're related. But if you also look at the similarities between them, it becomes pretty obvious that they are closely related.

I used the Longisquama to show you that feathers are found in strata below said date of theropod origins, from which birds are said to have come.

Except the scales of Longisquama aren't feathers so your argument made no sense.

The birds found in strata the same as the archeopteryx which have well developed modern features is for one the Liaoningornis, and the Confuciusornis which has a keeled sternum. Both lived alongside with the archeopteryx though Darwinists have attempted to alter the dates.

For one, palaeontologists no longer argue that Archaetoperyx was the first bird, except in the loosest terms. We have no way of identifying the first bird. What we can say is that Archaeopteryx retains the morphology we would expect to see in a dinosaur-bird transition. So it matters not for the theory of evolution that other, more derived birds lived alongside Archaeopteryx because Archaeopteryx was not the first bird. It is a little-modified descendant of the first bird.

We already know that anybody who does not adhere to Darwinism is a crackpot. another thing overlooked is the fact that Darwinists assert the Velociraptor as the ancestor of birds and still assert that it it came inot existence 70 million years ago, while the Archeopteryx is found in 150 million year old rock. So the ancestors of birds came into existence after the birds.

People are referred to as crack-pots when they yell and scream about things they clearly don't understand. For example, no one has ever argued that Velociraptor is the ancestor of birds. It shares a more recent common ancestor with birds than with other meat-eating dinosaurs, but that doesn't mean that Velociraptor was the ancestor of birds. As such, the time disparity between Velociraptor and Archaeopteryx is not an issue for evolutionary theory because the former did not give rise to the latter.

Its not a reptilian trait. There are mammals with claws. The hoatzin uses its claws for climbing, so does the young Tauraco. Finding claws on a bird is nothing new, whether it is used in the early stages or through out its lifetime.

The point is that claws are not typically found in birds. And when they are found in birds, they disappear with development. They're vestigial (note: this does not mean they are useless when present).

It is an elongated pygostyle and served an essential function.

You have no idea what you're talking about, here. Again, a pygostyle is a short series of fused vertebrae used to anchor the tail feathers in modern birds. The tail of Archaeopteryx is long and unfused. It does not have a pygostyle. Even the un-sourced quote you cited doesn't support what you're saying. Honestly, read your sources before you unthinkingly quote them.

Begin here

Whales clearly have femora that connect to the hip socket. Deal with it. Thanks to shernren for posting the picture of the dolphin with vestigial legs.

 

[shernren]

See last.

You mean your quote of Alan Feduccia: “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”?

Of course! My good buddy Alan is the world's foremost expert on bird evolution! And he believes that birds were specially created by God!

I envision a hypothetical proto-bird as a rather small, arboreal creature, the size of a small lizard and weighing less than a couple of pounds, with feathers or proto-feathers. It would have used all four legs to jump from branch to branch and parachute, and then began gliding and active flight.
​

Hang on - but surely he believes that the evolution of feathers from scales is impossible!

The difference between feathers and scales is very, very small. You can transform bird scutes [the scales on bird feet] into feathers with the application of bone morphogenic protein. So while people imagining models for the evolution of feathers feel that filaments must be an intermediate step between scales and feathers, you really don't need that stage.​

But - but - he provides us creationists with so much fodder for argument! Surely he must love us to bits!

Creationists are going to distort whatever arguments come up, and they've put me in company with luminaries like Stephen Jay Gould, so it doesn't bother me a bit. Archaeopteryx is half reptile and half bird any way you cut the deck, and so it is a Rosetta stone for evolution, whether it is related to dinosaurs or not. These creationists are confusing an argument about minor details of evolution with the indisputable fact of evolution: Animals and plants have been changing. The corn in Mexico, originally the size of the head of a wheat plant, has no resemblance to modern-day corn. If that's not evolution in action, I do not know what is.​

Ornithologist and Evolutionary Biologist Alan Feduccia—Plucking Apart the Dino-Birds | Unusual Organisms | DISCOVER Magazine

Come back when you've learned how to quote people properly, instead of lying about what they believe.

 

[Papias]

Greg wrote:

In the words of feduccia, “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”

Feduccia, seeing creationists lie about him by quotemining writes:

"Creationists are going to distort whatever arguments come up.... Archaeopteryx is half reptile and half bird any way you cut the deck, and so it is a Rosetta stone for evolution, whether it is related to dinosaurs or not. These creationists are confusing an argument about minor details of evolution with the indisputable fact of evolution."

-Dr. Alan Feduccia, February 1, 2003

Greg lied by quotemining. Not that it’s a surprise or a rare thing for creationists, but something that should be pointed out. In response to deception like this, C4 writes:

Nice job, Greg1234. Keep up the good work.

Creationists not only lie, they encourage lying.

Greg wrote:

Both {confuciusornis & another} lived alongside with the archeopteryx though Darwinists have attempted to alter the dates.

Archeopteryx (~150 mya) is older than confuciusornis (120-125 mya). I suggest that when you go about distorting things, you’ll do better if you at least avoid obvious falsehoods. As other creationists have shown, using half-truths and misleading statements is a more defensible tactic, though still dishonest.

With creationists so often claiming that one must be creationist to be Christian, and that they are the true Christians ™, and then being seen so often lying, denying all the evidence, and arguing when they clearly don’t understand what they are talking about, it is any surprise that people are leaving Christianity in droves? You creationists are much more effective in doing this than any of the new atheists could dream of being, because you are talking to other Christians from within Christianity, so they think you really represent what Christianity is all about. So what do we see today? Over 1,000 Christians become atheists in America alone, every day.

Greg wrote:

A bird is fundamentally different than a reptile and is a nest of its own. A bird for example is warm blooded, a reptile is cold blooded, the breathing apparatus is different, bone structure is different etc.

A bulldog is fundamentally different than a wolf and is a nest of its own. A bulldog for example has floppy ears, a wolf has erect ears, the skin folding is different, snout structure is different etc.

As we saw from the questions that Greg refuses to answer, Greg doesn’t apparently understand what a nested hierarchy is, as is again made clear by his statement that the evolution of birds from dinosaurs somehow violates the nested hierarchy of life. We are still waiting on Greg’s bluff that he can make a good nested hierarchy of cars.

C4, I mentioned the heretic thing because I remember that from you. I wasn’t claiming it was evolution related. Though on a heretic related theme, do you, C4, consider the Gospel of Thomas to be scripture?

Papias

Edited to add:
Hey, Shernren beat me to the paleobabble!

 

[Mallon]

Why do you keep sticking your foot in your mouth? If evolutionists cannot establish that there is a genetic connection between the DNA of birds and dinosaurs then how can they possibly say there is such a connection to begin with in light of the fact that there is little or no fossil evidence of that supposed link (archeopteryx notwithstanding)?

The inferred relationship between dinosaurs and birds is based largely on morphology. Fossils like Sinosauropteryx show that dinosaurs had feathers just like birds:

It's pretty hard to use DNA to show that birds and dinosaurs are related only because DNA doesn't preserve well in the fossil record. Then again, birds do retain the DNA of their dinosaurian ancestors, which can be manipulated to produce teeth, scales, and long tails, just as their ancestors had.

Baloney. Evolution does not exist in the first place and the fossil record clearly reveals that fact.

Just saying so doesn't make it true.

Blah, blah, blah...mere opinion. I reject that opinion. God's Word however, is not opinion.

But how you interpret the Bible IS your opinion. You have no more unfettered access to the original intention of the Bible than I do.

No, they are not.

Oh, what an excellent, iron-clad argument.

Just stop it. You aren't convincing anyone for your arguments are paper thin at best.

Another awe-inspiring refutation.

No, they are not. Your opinions to the contrary are no better than your imagination.

Am I detecting a hint of anger? Why are YECs always so angry?

You aren't telling the truth nor do you have fossil evidence to establish that they were once femurs.

Femora. The plural of femur is femora.
I guess if you don't want to believe that the bone that sticks out of the hip-socket is the thigh bone, there's no convincing you.

It is because I studied geology in college and much more since then that I reject evolutionary assumptions about it. It is downright ridiculous.

So tell me what you learned in college about catastrophic flood sequences. What do they look like? Do they tend to deposit silts and muds? Do the same floods that supposedly tear giant rifts through the earth like this:

... also tend to preserve delicate fossils like this?

The answer is no. Feather impressions, trackways, and invertebrate fossils -- such as those preserved in the Solnhofen laggerstatten where Archaeopteryx was found -- are only preserved in quiet, undisturbed environments.

And if you saw the video clip I posted on Mount St. Helens or any of the others on You Tube then it means that you have been informed otherwise with visible, verifiable evidence in time and history and yet you stubbornly cling to your errors. That's because you don't care about the truth and probably never did.

You sure are mean. Is that Christ's love you're reflecting?

Dear readers, I urge you not to believe anything Mallon says on this subject and his documentation does no better than his shallow thinking opinions. He and those like him twist the facts and bend the evidence to support their foolish claims of an evolving world. But our world is not evolving it is degenerating. So say both the scriptures and the scientific facts.

Hey, ignore me if you like. Then again, I'm a palaeontologist with PhD training, unlike C4, so I have some idea of what I'm talking about when it comes to things like geology and the fossil record.

 

[Greg1234]

The theory of evolution actually stems from the nested hierarchy into which animals are arranged. Linnaeus identified this hierarchy over 100 years before Darwin developed his theory of evolution.

Irrelavant

The fact that animals continue to be found that do not violate the nested hierarchy is good evidence that evolution is a solid theory.

The nested heirarchry need not need to be violated to refute Darwinism. It already has been. The hierarchy also fits the fact that organisms were created. Whether or not a human and a lion are mammals have nothing to do with lemur like postulations or any other beast, becoming a man.

No one is denying that reptiles and birds are different. Birds share many unique features in common with reptiles,however, which is why they are classified within reptiles.

As they do with mammals. They are not cold blooded. They also have features unique to them. The breathing apparatus is specially made. The metabolic rate etc etc

Reptiles and birds share scales, for example (look at a bird's feet).

Cars and planes share tires. For example, look at a plane's tires.

You want to focus only on those differences between birds and reptiles, which will tell you nothing about how they're related.

Similarities between an aircraft and a car has nothing to do with a car transforming into a plane. This is a revamped version of comparative anatomy, and will be treated as such.

For one, palaeontologists no longer argue that Archaetoperyx was the first bird, except in the loosest terms. We have no way of identifying the first bird.

Then you are free to speculate.

People are referred to as crack-pots when they yell and scream about things they clearly don't understand. For example, no one has ever argued that Velociraptor is the ancestor of birds. It shares a more recent common ancestor with birds than with other meat-eating dinosaurs, but that doesn't mean that Velociraptor was the ancestor of birds.

Velociraptor is dismissed then.

The point is that claws are not typically found in birds. And when they are found in birds, they disappear with development. They're vestigial (note: this does not mean they are useless when present).

Echolocation are not typically found in mammals. Neither is bipedalism.

You have no idea what you're talking about, here. Again, a pygostyle is a short series of fused vertebrae used to anchor the tail feathers in modern birds. The tail of Archaeopteryx is long and unfused. It does not have a pygostyle. Even the un-sourced quote you cited doesn't support what you're saying. Honestly, read your sources before you unthinkingly quote them.

"In Archaeopteryx, each caudal vertebra has a pair of long feathers that stick out to the side to form an air foil. A significant percentage of the total lift in Archaeopteryx is provided by this surface." And there are other reasons. This has nothing to do with Darwinism.

Whales clearly have femora that connect to the hip socket. Deal with it. Thanks to shernren for posting the picture of the dolphin with vestigial legs.

Lol. Yes, thank you shernren

 

[Mallon]

Irrelavant

Sure it's relevant. You implied that the nested hierarchy into which animals fit was created in order to accommodate the theory of evolution. But the fact is that Linnaeus recognized that life was hierarchical long before Darwin was born.

The nested heirarchry need not need to be violated to refute Darwinism. It already has been.

What animals do you know of that refute the nested hierarchy? Do you believe in unicorns or mermaids? Minotaurs, maybe?

As they do with mammals. They are not cold blooded. They also have features unique to them. The breathing apparatus is specially made. The metabolic rate etc etc

Actually, the advanced lungs of birds have their origins in theropod dinosaurs. See here:
Carnivorous Dinosaur With Bird-Like Lungs Discovered | 80beats | Discover Magazine
Really, most features thought to be unique to birds are found in dinosaurs (e.g., hollow bones, feathers, semi-lunate carpals, avian lung system, elevated metabolisms, etc.). Thanks for helping me to prove my point.

 

[Greg1234]

Sure it's relevant. You implied that the nested hierarchy into which animals fit was created in order to accommodate the theory of evolution.

I implied? Lol I didnt. I said Darwinists use the nested hierarchy, like they use adaptation, to fuel a materialistic persuasion. Not "accommodated."

What animals do you know of that refute the nested hierarchy? Do you believe in unicorns or mermaids? Minotaurs, maybe?

Again we don't need to refute the nested heirarchy of created organisms to show that organisms are created and are not a result of random alterations.

Actually, the advanced lungs of birds have their origins in theropod dinosaurs. See here:
Carnivorous Dinosaur With Bird-Like Lungs Discovered | 80beats | Discover Magazine

” Instead of lungs that expand and contract, Sereno thinks this beast had air sacs that worked like a bellows, blowing air into the beast’s stiff lungs, much like modern birds…. Most paleontologists believe birds evolved from small, feathered meat-eating dinosaurs, and the earliest known birds were strikingly similar to these dinosaurs"
Sereno is free to "think" and speculate.. But lets look at the what he attributes to this.

"In Argentina, Sereno’s team found the wishbone, hipbone, and stomach ribs of the newly found dinosaur species hollowed out—a telltale sign of air sacs"
Really? But anyways, an alligator's bronchi is structurally similar to a bird, and a "bird like" alligator fossil can be explained through these means. Alligators share some of the characteristics of a bird's breathing system. Darwinists postulations aside, we see the sharing of traits in the link. Tuna and swordfish share some of the characteristics of the mammalian thermo regulation system. Humans share some of the characteristics of the eagle's eye system. The platypus. Well...the platypus. But the eagle's breathing system is specially designed for flight enabling it to reach altitudes that would cause a mammal or an alligator to pass out. We find this kind of sharing with airplane spoilers as well.

Really, most features thought to be unique to birds are found in dinosaurs (e.g., hollow bones, feathers, semi-lunate carpals, avian lung system, elevated metabolisms, etc.). Thanks for helping me to prove my point.

Most features thought to be unique to aircraft, for example the spoiler.in which the most function is utilized, in decent, deceleration and turning, are also found on cars, and even racing boats Which serves a minimalistic function compared to aircraft.