Australopithecus afarensis.
Australopithecus afarensis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
This species has basal ape characteristics such as heavy brow ridges, sloped forehead, relatively small cranium size, barrel shaped chest, and long arms.
This species also has human-like features such as a short and wide pelvis, ilia on the sides of the pelvis, inward angled femur, reduced canines, a wider palate than in other apes.
This species has a mixture of human-like and ape-like features which is the hallmark of a transitional species.
The only logical fallacies I have seen are the ones put forward by creationists. First, they conflate ancestral and transitional. A fossil can be transitional without being the ancestor to any living individual. Transitional simply means having a mixture of characteristics from two divergent taxa.
The whole point is that evolution predicts which transitionals should have existed in the past, and which should not have existed. That is how the fossil record is used to test the theory. For example, the theory predicts that there should have been species with a mixture of reptile and mammal features, but not mammal and bird features. When we find a fossil with a mixture of mammal features and non-mammal features, each and every time it is a mixture of reptile and mammal features. Never is it a mixture of bird and mammal features. We have thousands of transitional fossils, and each one of them fits the predictions made by the theory of evolution. All of the fossils support the theory.
Your first logical fallacy: unsupported conclusion.
Be careful not to commit the fallacy of begging the question.
Notice how many times you use the word "like." This is the very fave logical fallacy of evolution: Correlation Does Not Imply Causation. Sharks & dolphins look "like" one another. Spiders have 8 legs "like" octopi. Bats and bees and moths fly "like" birds.
Then there is the magical thinklng, the presumed ability to see into the distant past. There are some similarities between apes (which is all your example is - its an ape fella)
and humans. There are many similarities between different kinds of animals. But where is there any daaaata, any ev-i-dence, you know, real science, to show that the descendants of those animals were ever in any way significantly differernt from the fossil?
Well, of course there is no such evidence or data. But if there is, maybe through magical thinking you can also tell me how many descendants they had, if they had family squabbles, what their favorite bugs were to eat?
There is a place for theorizing in science. There is a place for a hypothesis. But when all you have is "Looks like....similar morphology...must have....could have....probably....likely...." words such as evolutionary literature is absolutely replete with, and then when you try to foist those purely conjectural ideas off as if they are absolute scientific fact, then you have a scam going on. It is one thing to say "I think that this similarity might possibly have led to" and another to turn around and tell the public, "Look! We have a bonified transitional form. See! Evolution is true."
"The whole point is that evolution predicts...." I'm sorry but if your premise is wrong, then your "logical conclusion" has to be wrong. Evolulutionary premise: If you see change, that's evolution! No, for example even with intelligent design for thousands of years all kinds of dogs have been changed all kinds of ways. But...every last one of them is still a dawg!
Also, "If you see a similarity and we think it led to some other animal in the invisible and untestable 'millions of years ago' then that's evolution! Golly gee, evolution is all around us."
Sorry, I don't care what they predicted in their self fulfilling prophecies, there is no data whatsoever to indicate your specimen ever had a single descendant that wasn't an ape, or that was significantly different from itself in any way. If I'm wrong, give your data.
It's easy to give theories but showing data is real evidence.
Tell me how they know the descendants of your example were ever significantly different than the ones now. How, in fact, do you know it even had any descendants at all? Since you know so much, how many did it have? Give your data. Don't tell me what they predict. Don't tell me their theories. Give me actual scientific data. How do you know its palate ever changed for instance? Give any data whatsoever to show you know it didn't stay just what it was andthat the animals isn't just what it looks like, a dead end extinct life form going nowhere.
What the rocks actually show is that apes stay apes, people stay people. Fish stay fish. Reptiles stay reptiles. It also shows, as mentioned earlier, that the evolutinoists themselves don't even agree on a single one of your so called "thousands of transitional forms." For ex. when Elliot Gould, in a personal letter, asked Colin Patteron, the curator of Britain's Natutral History Museum - an evolution believing paleontologist - for one good example of a transitional form, Patternson admitted "there is not one water tight case for" a single one.
Don't bother to tell me quote mine. Whenever people tell me that about Patterson - including other even more damning quotations about evolution from him - I always ask for a quote from him (not Talk Spin/Talk Origins) from him, where he ever said he was misquoted or quoted out of context. They never answer that Q. But I bet you think you can! Give one and your source. IF you can!
Waiting for actual data based evidence, not correlation does not imply causation, to show that you know those fossils ever had any descendants whatsoever different from themselves.
You will never answer those questions but will dodge them, as we both know there is no answer, no data, to support what kinds of offspring they had. Sorry, fella, but you are the one with an "unsupported conclusion." But that's all evolution ever has.
Kindly answer the Qs. Kindly don't do a red herring by changing the subject. Enlgihten us. Answer the Qs.
