Speedwell said:
You still appear to me to be laboring under a misconception as to how higher taxa are formed. They are created as speciation proceeds. Imagine a growing tree. A sprout comes out of the ground--a species. Then it splits into two twigs--now you have two species (the two new twigs) and the original sprout has become a genus. Each of the two new twigs splits again. Now you have four species (the four new twigs) divided into two new genera (the original two twigs) and the original sprout has become a family. And so on. As I understand your comments, I don't think that the kind of transition you are looking for ever occurs.[/n of creatures evolved from the first then there were two species. When there were enough species around (and if anyone had been around to do it) it might have been convenient to classify them into two or more groups called genera. As more species formed and more genera designated, the genera might be grouped into families. As more speciation occurred and more genera and families formed, it would have been useful to group them into orders, and so on. So all the higher taxa are just human constructs designed to classify a wide and diverse variety of creatures. But the only physical thing that's happening is speciation. The higher taxa don't exist until they are created to classify the results of continued speciation.
So you mean there are no higher categories until categories are separated from original lower categories without the higher categories, though they are looked at with classifying in later times. Right?
pitabread said:
Taxonomic designations like "family", "genus", and even "species" are completely artificial. Those are just human classifications to make discussing biological forms easier to talk about. You won't find any fossils with Panderichthys rhombolepis or Hynerpeton bassetti stamped on them.
Fossils themselves are simply representatives of particular groups of organisms that happen to be alive at a given point in time.
What matters is the respective patterns of morphological change over time and whether those patterns show evolutionary changes. And the fossils definitely do show that, as we have numerous transitional forms that are intermediaries between previous forms and subsequent forms.
Where we draw the taxonomic boundaries between those forms is immaterial.
Of course categories are constructed by people, not something naturally there, but categories of life are still thought of with real basis. This is irrelevant to what I am asking.
Subduction Zone said:
You have been given examples. You also have a flawed concept of how evolution works. There is no transition from one family to another. You are still an ape for example. In fact you are still a "fish".
What "assumptions"? If you claim that there is an assumption the burden of proof to show that it is an assumption is on you.
Your questions continually demonstrate a lack of education when it comes to evolution. People have tired to help you, that raises the question why can you not learn from your errors?
Really? I noticed that you made that mistake right away. I am reading this as I respond. I am betting that this correction has been made earlier. As a creationist you should know that a "change of kind" is a strawman argument.
That is false. Creationists cannot "connect the dots". And there is much more than that. You see many of those "dots" were not known ahead of time. That makes each dot a test of the theory of evolution. I would suggest going over the basics of science first.
This thread, Evolution Lesson, is for answering questions of those who might object. So questions should be answered right here.
FrumiousBandersnatch said:
The evidence is out there if you look for it. I saw a very good PBS documentary recently, describing the evolution of crocodilians, elephants, whales, and birds, from the evidence in the fossil record. What surprised me was the huge diversity of species in the families that were mostly wiped out in global extinctions. What we see today are the select descendants of the few species to survive those cataclysms.
Based on that documentary, the best evolutionary fossil sequence seems to be for birds - the fairly recent Chinese discoveries have revealed a huge number of fossils of feathered dinosaurs in various stages of development along the sequence that led to birds. Interesting that most of the features we associate with bird flight were actually present well before flight evolved, e.g. lightweight & hollow bones, 'wishbone', clawed & feathered forelimbs, even the shoulder girdle and 'flight stroke' motion.
It can be shown then if there is fossil evidence from species to species with every species in between, so that there is more than connecting animals according to analogous parts.
The following from the Transitional Vertebrate Fossils FAQ that I was referred to makes the points that there are fossils for transition between species, showing speciation, which I already accept, and fossils for transition between higher categories, with gaps in places. I can see gaps might happen even with millions of fossils already found, if evolution is being shown, aren't there any exceptions that show progression from species to species through higherer categories without the gaps of species, or is there no exception anywhere and all examples have gaps of missing species?
"General lineage":
This is a
sequence of similar genera or families, linking an older group to a very different younger group. Each step in the sequence consists of some fossils that represent a certain genus or family, and the whole sequence often covers a span of tens of millions of years. A lineage like this shows obvious morphological intermediates for every major structural change, and the fossils occur roughly (but often not exactly) in the expected order. Usually there are still gaps between each of the groups -- few or none of the speciation events are preserved. Sometimes the individual specimens are not thought to be
directly ancestral to the next-youngest fossils (i.e., they may be "cousins" or "uncles" rather than "parents"). However, they are assumed to be closely related to the actual ancestor, since they have intermediate morphology compared to the next-oldest and next-youngest "links". The major point of these general lineages is that animals with intermediate morphology existed at the appropriate times, and thus that the transitions from the proposed ancestors are fully plausible. General lineages are known for almost all modern groups of vertebrates, and make up the bulk of this FAQ.
"Species-to-species transition":
This is a set of
numerous individual fossils that show a change between one species and another. It's a very fine-grained sequence documenting the actual speciation event, usually covering less than a million years. These species-to-species transitions are unmistakable when they are found. Throughout successive strata you see the population averages of teeth, feet, vertebrae, etc., changing from what is typical of the first species to what is typical of the next species. Sometimes, these sequences occur only in a limited geographic area (the place where the speciation actually occurred), with analyses from any other area showing an apparently "sudden" change. Other times, though, the transition can be seen over a very wide geological area. Many "species-to-species transitions" are known, mostly for marine invertebrates and recent mammals (both those groups tend to have good fossil records), though they are not as abundant as the general lineages (see below for why this is so). Part 2 lists numethe transition can be seen over a very wide geological area. Many "species-to-species transitions" are known, mostly for marine invertebrates and recent mammals (both those groups tend to have good fossil records), though they are not as abundant as the general lineages (see below for why this is so). Part 2 lists numerous species-to-species transitions from the mammals.
