More feathered dinosaurs

[Mallon]

I'm not asking you whether you think dinosaurs and birds are similar, Jim. I'm asking you WHY they are similar. What scientific mechanism accounts for that similarity? Evolution provides such a mechanism. Does creationism?

 

[Jimlarmore]

I'm not asking you whether you think dinosaurs and birds are similar, Jim. I'm asking you WHY they are similar. What scientific mechanism accounts for that similarity? Evolution provides such a mechanism. Does creationism?

Why is anything similar in nature? My take on it is function intelligently designed by the Creator. We see similarity in morphological structures thru out the biota. The amazing thing is that genotypic allelles that produces the phenotypic morphology in one species is not the same or in the same place in the genome of a similar morphological structure in another. IOW, what causes a wing to form in one species is not in the same place genotypically in another species.

So this you can be sure of, biochemically evolution does not provide a viable mechanism to explain why dinosaur morphology is similar to bird morphology. This does not even address the daunting problem of placing all biodiversity on mutations of those genomes to produce a new genomic structure that new bio-information to produce macroevolution. Natural selection works as a modality of taking away not adding so that does not improve the situation either.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[crawfish]

Why is anything similar in nature? My take on it is function intelligently designed by the Creator. We see similarity in morphological structures thru out the biota. The amazing thing is that genotypic allelles that produces the phenotypic morphology in one species is not the same or in the same place in the genome of a similar morphological structure in another. IOW, what causes a wing to form in one species is not in the same place genotypically in another species.

So this you can be sure of, biochemically evolution does not provide a viable mechanism to explain why dinosaur morphology is similar to bird morphology. This does not even address the daunting problem of placing all biodiversity on mutations of those genomes to produce a new genomic structure that new bio-information to produce macroevolution. Natural selection works as a modality of taking away not adding so that does not improve the situation either.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

If the bolded part were true, you'd have a point.

 

[Mallon]

Jim, your argument boils down to "dinosaurs and birds are similar because God made them that way". That is not a scientific argument because it posits no mechanism. Think about it: If you asked someone why the sky was blue and they answered, "Because God made it that way", would you be satisfied that your question was answered? Or more appropriately, if you asked someone why siblings look more like each other than cousins and the answer came "Because God made them that way", would you accept that as a scientific explanation?
In science, "Goddidit" is a non-answer, Jim. Please don't pretend that creationism is science. You've aptly demonstrated that it is not.

 

[shernren]

Hey Mallon, I promise I'm not trying to cast doubt on evolution but I'm a little confused by this picture:

Firstly, is there a paper that goes with this picture? That would aid my comprehension greatly.

Secondly, are subpictures I and II the same scale (heh heh) or (as I suspect) is subpicture I actually a blown-up diagram of the precursor to the little nub at the bottom of subpicture II?

And are IIIA and IIIB supposed to be entire feathers, or just blow-ups of one particular "hair" on each feather?

(As you can see, I am clearly flying blind in this area!)

 

[Mallon]

It's all explained in this paper, shern:
http://www.mcorriss.com/Prum_&_Brush_2002.pdf

 

[Jimlarmore]

Jim, your argument boils down to "dinosaurs and birds are similar because God made them that way". That is not a scientific argument because it posits no mechanism. Think about it: If you asked someone why the sky was blue and they answered, "Because God made it that way", would you be satisfied that your question was answered? Or more appropriately, if you asked someone why siblings look more like each other than cousins and the answer came "Because God made them that way", would you accept that as a scientific explanation?
In science, "Goddidit" is a non-answer, Jim. Please don't pretend that creationism is science. You've aptly demonstrated that it is not.

Science can't answer everything my friend. That doesn't keep us from trying and that's ok because we are searchers by nature. I mean think of this. With all we know we still don't really truely understand how gravity works and that is a fundamental aspect of cosmology/physics. The life sciences are not too far behind. There are so many phenomenon/s we just don't know or understand what is going on. From what we know and understand about the cell and the DNA we know that it takes novel information or an increase in the information in the allelles/genome to cause the changes macroevolution demands. However, when it comes to the modalities of mutation and natural selection you don't really get that. IOW, you can't get there from here! Natural selection will only select for what is already there genetically and has an essential negative impact on the available diversity in the genome. Mutations, even if you allow for neutral episodes, are rarely if ever shown to be something that would produce macroevolution. We accept it because it's all we have but I don't know of any genetists who would really rather have something else to prove that kind of change taxonomically in the biota.

Let's face it when it comes to the evidence/s for and against we both know that bias can and does enter into the intepretive aspect of the scientific method both mainstream and creation science. I'll be the first to admit there are things that baffle me in the evidence and truely supports the mainstream paradigm. However, there are also many things in the evidence that (if interpreted without a mainstream bias) supports the creation side.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[Mallon]

Jim, one of the attributes of a solid scientific theory is the ability to predict what we will find in nature. The theory of evolution predicted that we would find feathered theropod dinosaurs in the fossil record. Scientists in the '70s and '80s were depicting small theropods with feathers on the basis of evolutionary inference, and lo and behold, the first feathered non-avian theropods were found in China a decade later.
The theory of evolution also explains WHY birds and feathered dinosaurs look so similar: because birds inherited features such as feathers, hollow bones, gizzards, air sacs, breastbones, and wishbones from their dinosaurian ancestors, as encoded in their DNA. And features unique to birds were subsequently brought about by natural selection acting on variation at the population level. These kinds of explanations are completely consistent with processes known to occur in the natural world, which is the reason why 99.99% of all biologists (including the creationists I mentioned earlier) accept the evolutionary theory. It works.

Does creationism make predictions about what we should find in nature? Did it predict that we would find feathered dinosaurs? No. Did it predict that we would find termite mounds in Jurassic deposits? No. Creationism doesn't really predict anything because it is not a scientific form of inquiry. Instead, creationists begin by assuming that creation ex nihilo and a global Flood truly happened, and then retrofit their "theory" to the evidence (sometimes simply ignoring evidence that goes contrary to such ideas, as you have done concerning Jurassic termite mounds in another thread).
Creationism doesn't explain anything scientifically either, as we've already discussed. Why are birds and dinosaurs alike? Because God made them that way. Why are they different? Because God made them that way. Those aren't scientific explanations. They're answers one would expect to hear in Sunday School. In fact, it seems the best evidence a creationist can muster is not positive evidence for YECism, but negative evidence against evolution (all of which is addressed here: An Index to Creationist Claims). Just look at your own arguments so far, Jim: feathered dinos aren't real because a Chinese farmer once created a hoax; mutations cannot produce novel information; natural selection does not lead to macroevolution. These aren't arguments in your favour, Jim. They're arguments against evolution. There is no evidence that supports the creation side, as you say.

 

[Smidlee]

Science can't answer everything my friend. That doesn't keep us from trying and that's ok because we are searchers by nature. I mean think of this. With all we know we still don't really truely understand how gravity works and that is a fundamental aspect of cosmology/physics. The life sciences are not too far behind. There are so many phenomenon/s we just don't know or understand what is going on. From what we know and understand about the cell and the DNA we know that it takes novel information or an increase in the information in the allelles/genome to cause the changes macroevolution demands. However, when it comes to the modalities of mutation and natural selection you don't really get that. IOW, you can't get there from here! Natural selection will only select for what is already there genetically and has an essential negative impact on the available diversity in the genome. Mutations, even if you allow for neutral episodes, are rarely if ever shown to be something that would produce macroevolution. We accept it because it's all we have but I don't know of any genetists who would really rather have something else to prove that kind of change taxonomically in the biota.

Let's face it when it comes to the evidence/s for and against we both know that bias can and does enter into the intepretive aspect of the scientific method both mainstream and creation science. I'll be the first to admit there are things that baffle me in the evidence and truely supports the mainstream paradigm. However, there are also many things in the evidence that (if interpreted without a mainstream bias) supports the creation side.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

There is no doubt bias when it comes to paleontology. This field is very competitive which is why it didn't take long of the example in your link to be discovered as fake. Paleontology itself is pretty much useless unless you want to get your dog a bone to chew on. Paleontology totally relies on ToE as a fact as without it reveals just how much of a waste time and money digging up bones really are. Not only that but paleontotlogy relies on finding new fossil and creating new fairytale in order to keep anyone interested.

You should know also that paleontologist often tries to keep other paleontologist away from their area. Notice that almost all these so called feather dinosaurs fossil come from the same guy. Just like Darwin's "The Little Eyeball That Could" story, you can easily slap anything together and make up a story.

 

[Mallon]

A very insightful reply, Smidlee. You're right -- palaeontology is virtually useless. It definitely cannot inform us about things like past biodiversity, extinction, recovery, and climate change. Those are all things that we palaeontologists pretend to know about in order to pay the rent. And you're right about "the same guy" being involved with the description of every feathered dinosaur. He makes these things up, you see, and hides his fabrications away in his desk so that no one else can see them and test his ideas for themselves.

And yes, we do feed dinosaur bones to our dogs.

Oh, and the Bible definitely doesn't tell us not to give false testimony against our neighbours.

 

[Jimlarmore]

Jim, one of the attributes of a solid scientific theory is the ability to predict what we will find in nature. The theory of evolution predicted that we would find feathered theropod dinosaurs in the fossil record. Scientists in the '70s and '80s were depicting small theropods with feathers on the basis of evolutionary inference, and lo and behold, the first feathered non-avian theropods were found in China a decade later.
The theory of evolution also explains WHY birds and feathered dinosaurs look so similar: because birds inherited features such as feathers, hollow bones, gizzards, air sacs, breastbones, and wishbones from their dinosaurian ancestors, as encoded in their DNA. And features unique to birds were subsequently brought about by natural selection acting on variation at the population level. These kinds of explanations are completely consistent with processes known to occur in the natural world, which is the reason why 99.99% of all biologists (including the creationists I mentioned earlier) accept the evolutionary theory. It works.

It works on some levels sure but not in all and you I both know it. We can hash this over and over till the cows come home but you will never really have a good fool proof solid modality in the mainstream science to explain bio-diversity. Genomes produce specific things i.e. proteins, enzymes etc. based on what they have in the existing genes/biochemistry. Mutation and natural selection does not produce new alleles that will work to produce an increase in complexity as we see in the biota. IOW, similarity's in the morphology of dinosaurs ( feathered or not ) does not mean they biochemically/genomically give rise to similar morphologies in birds. Why? Because if you look at the genes in modern birds which are certainly similar in morphology the ones that produce certain parts of those morphologies ( let's say wings ) are not necessarily the same or in the same location in the genome in another species.

Does creationism make predictions about what we should find in nature? Did it predict that we would find feathered dinosaurs? No.

Why not? I mean there is really no rationale for you to say this other than you probably wouldn't find a creationists who would do that. We can certainly say similar morphologies exist in the biota. Cladistics is only necessary if you assume a very slow and long period of time for the biota to develope. We believe God created it all during creation week.

Did it predict that we would find termite mounds in Jurassic deposits? No. Creationism doesn't really predict anything because it is not a scientific form of inquiry. Instead, creationists begin by assuming that creation ex nihilo and a global Flood truly happened, and then retrofit their "theory" to the evidence (sometimes simply ignoring evidence that goes contrary to such ideas, as you have done concerning Jurassic termite mounds in another thread).
Creationism doesn't explain anything scientifically either, as we've already discussed. Why are birds and dinosaurs alike? Because God made them that way. Why are they different? Because God made them that way. Those aren't scientific explanations. They're answers one would expect to hear in Sunday School. In fact, it seems the best evidence a creationist can muster is not positive evidence for YECism, but negative evidence against evolution (all of which is addressed here: An Index to Creationist Claims). Just look at your own arguments so far, Jim: feathered dinos aren't real because a Chinese farmer once created a hoax; mutations cannot produce novel information; natural selection does not lead to macroevolution. These aren't arguments in your favour, Jim. They're arguments against evolution. There is no evidence that supports the creation side, as you say.

Nonsense, microevolution completely supports creation and it's irrefuteable. Let me ask you this Mallon. Does science predict things like bee hives in fossilzed tree trunks in the painted desert where they supposedly couldn't have existed? How about fossils in stratas that are not supposed to be there like angiosperm/flowering plant spores in the pre-cambrian? Or better yet how about modern day live animals that exist in the fossil record hundreds of millions of years ago that are basically unchange. (coelacanth ,,,, mispelled)?

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[Jimlarmore]

There is no doubt bias when it comes to paleontology. This field is very competitive which is why it didn't take long of the example in your link to be discovered as fake. Paleontology itself is pretty much useless unless you want to get your dog a bone to chew on. Paleontology totally relies on ToE as a fact as without it reveals just how much of a waste time and money digging up bones really are. Not only that but paleontotlogy relies on finding new fossil and creating new fairytale in order to keep anyone interested.

You should know also that paleontologist often tries to keep other paleontologist away from their area. Notice that almost all these so called feather dinosaurs fossil come from the same guy. Just like Darwin's "The Little Eyeball That Could" story, you can easily slap anything together and make up a story.

Evidence has been tampered with on both sides of the fence. Even though I disagree with the interpretation of the evidence I respect most of the paleontologists as true professionals in their fields. I refuse to sling mud or denegrate when I debate issues. What I have a problem with is that many ( over 90% ) of the mainstream scientists refuse to even look at some of the alternative interpretations of the same evidence. Things like the termite mounds, greenland icesheets are all easily explanable in the flood scenario. I was educated in the same schools and was taught the same things they were yet I certainly saw thru the facade. Science for the most part is based on good logical deductions based on the interpretation of evidence. However, the bias that goes into that interpretation makes all the difference in the world as to what reasonable conclusion is reached.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[Smidlee]

I'm have no doubt paleontologists are professionals in their field yet they depend on evolution interpretation just like there are many corporations who makes a lot of money on war. War after all is big business. Still when is the last time you heard of paleontologists went on strike and just how much effect it would have if they did?

As far as feathered dinosaurs goes, if you really want to find a feather dinosaur then you will no doubt find one even though you may have to fudge a bit on what exactly you mean by feather and dinosaur. Dinosaur was supposed to be giant terrible lizards. One of the reasons many scientist believe dinosaurs were cold-blooded was their body mass vs skin surface ratio. Dinosaurs having feathers wouldn't help very much with their ability removing body heat.
It was the same when evolutionists want to find a fish with arms and legs they found it. Yet when a living coelacanth was found we learn all the claim made over the fossil was false. Coelacanth was found not living in swallow waters as predicted but deep waters.
So my point is you can only learn so much from just a fossil without a living one to go by. This really puts a limit of how useful paleontology really is.

 

[Mallon]

It works on some levels sure but not in all and you I both know it. We can hash this over and over till the cows come home but you will never really have a good fool proof solid modality in the mainstream science to explain bio-diversity. Genomes produce specific things i.e. proteins, enzymes etc. based on what they have in the existing genes/biochemistry. Mutation and natural selection does not produce new alleles that will work to produce an increase in complexity as we see in the biota. IOW, similarity's in the morphology of dinosaurs ( feathered or not ) does not mean they biochemically/genomically give rise to similar morphologies in birds. Why? Because if you look at the genes in modern birds which are certainly similar in morphology the ones that produce certain parts of those morphologies ( let's say wings ) are not necessarily the same or in the same location in the genome in another species.

You keep saying that known mechanisms cannot produce new alleles, but the fact of the matter is that they do. This has been documented time and again. I did a search on Google Scholar for you, so feel free to check out the relevant literature:
"new alleles" - Google Scholar
Give this a read, too:
CB102: Mutations adding information
And for what it's worth, the genes that give rise to limbs in birds are the same that give rise to limbs in ALL tetrapods. They're called Hox genes, and they're universal among tetrapods. There's no reason to think things would be any different between birds and non-avian dinosaurs.

Why not?

Why didn't creationism predict feathered dinosaurs? Because, once upon a time, YECs used to think "kinds" were these immutable groups of organisms that shared little in common. They were thought to be distinct so that features unique to one group would not be found in another. YECs even went so far as to argue that dinosaurs would never be found with feathers (as you yourself still seem to be questioning, judging from your hang-up with regards to "Archaeoraptor").
But now some YECs are coming to accept feathered dinosaurs for what they are. You'd think that would essentially do away with the concept of "kinds" since so many features are continuous across their supposed barriers, but that doesn't seem to be the case. YECs somehow still see this as consistent with the ex nihilo creation of "kinds", which suggests that there's really nothing that creationism doesn't expect to see (i.e., it predicts nothing concerning biodiversity; it is not science).

Nonsense, microevolution completely supports creation and it's irrefuteable. Let me ask you this Mallon. Does science predict things like bee hives in fossilzed tree trunks in the painted desert where they supposedly couldn't have existed? How about fossils in stratas that are not supposed to be there like angiosperm/flowering plant spores in the pre-cambrian? Or better yet how about modern day live animals that exist in the fossil record hundreds of millions of years ago that are basically unchange. (coelacanth ,,,, mispelled)?

Microevolution is consistent with both YECism and evolutionary theory, so it cannot be used to distinguish between them, if that's what you're saying. Mind you, if you believe that there were only a few hundred different "kinds" on the ark and that all modern biodiversity radiated from those kinds within just a few thousand years, then you require a lot more than just microevolution to account for it. You'd need some sort of hyperevolutionary mechanism that is not known to operate today.
As for your questions about what science predicts:
1) Not sure what you're referring to about bee hives in the desert. Source?
2) Angiosperm spores have not been found in the pre-Cambrian fossil record. Evolutionary theory would predict that they should not be there. In fact, most creation scientists would be at a loss to explain them, too, given that they believe the Flood sorted organisms in part according to their ecology and angiosperms don't live at the bottom of the ocean. They know modern taxa aren't found in the oldest sediments.
3) No modern-day animal is the same species found in the fossil record. Coelacanths comprise dozens of species, only two of which remain today. And although they have changed relatively little since the Devonian, this is entirely in line with that we know about evolution. Evolutionary theory does not say that all organisms must evolve at the same rate. Some things evolve slowly, some quickly, depending on how quickly the environment changes. Aquatic environments tend to be buffered against the extreme changes seen in terrestrial environments, and so aquatic (particularly marine) fauna don't tend to change all that much if they don't have to.

Anyways, getting back to the point of this thread: Evolution predicted feathered dinosaurs, which are now being found in abundance. We can even determine the colour of the feathers based on the shapes of the preserved melanosomes. It's interesting that YECs are now grudgingly coming to accept that fact.

Anyways, I'm off for a vacation in the DR this weekend, so I likely won't be able to respond for another week or so.

 

[Mallon]

I'm have no doubt paleontologists are professionals in their field yet they depend on evolution interpretation just like there are many corporations who makes a lot of money on war.

I'll ignore your conflation of palaeontologists with war mongers because it's stupid, but I do agree that palaeontology does rely heavily on evolutionary theory. In fact, the theory is owed in large part to findings from palaeontology. And the reason why palaeo relies so heavily on evolution is because the theory works. It tells us what kinds of animals we should anticipate to find in the fossil record and where we should expect to find them. Darwin first predicted that we would find the fossil ancestors of humans in Africa -- and we did. 150 years later, Neil Shubin predicted that we should find the ancestors of tetrapods in the Devonian strata of the Arctic -- and we did. The predictions were made on the basis of evolutionary theory, and they were borne out. Chalk up another one for evolution. Creationism predicts no such things.

As far as feathered dinosaurs goes, if you really want to find a feather dinosaur then you will no doubt find one even though you may have to fudge a bit on what exactly you mean by feather and dinosaur. Dinosaur was supposed to be giant terrible lizards. One of the reasons many scientist believe dinosaurs were cold-blooded was their body mass vs skin surface ratio. Dinosaurs having feathers wouldn't help very much with their ability removing body heat.

First, I'll point out that body size was never a defining feature of dinosaurs. When the public hears the word "dinosaur", they generally think of large lumbering beasts like "brontosaurus" or Stegosaurus, but the public perception of what a dinosaur is is not the same as the scientific one. Not all big dead animals are dinosaurs. Dinosaurs are defined on the basis of various skeletal characters found in in the hips, feet, and skull. See here:
Dinosaur - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
That said, not all dinosaurs were big. Some were quite small, and in fact, it is the small, carnivorous dinosaurs that are thought to have given rise to birds. No one is positing that big, herbivorous sauropods like Brachiosaurus had feathers, Smidlee. Maybe read a book on the matter?

It was the same when evolutionists want to find a fish with arms and legs they found it. Yet when a living coelacanth was found we learn all the claim made over the fossil was false.

Scientists thought the coelacanths were extinct because their fossils have not yet been found in rocks post-dating the Mesozoic. That doesn't somehow negate evolutionary theory, though.

So my point is you can only learn so much from just a fossil without a living one to go by. This really puts a limit of how useful paleontology really is.

There are certainly limits to palaeontology. Palaeo isn't useless like you first implied, though. Glad to see you're changing your tune. Maybe you'll accept feathered dinosaurs one day, too.

 

[Jimlarmore]

You keep saying that known mechanisms cannot produce new alleles, but the fact of the matter is that they do. This has been documented time and again. I did a search on Google Scholar for you, so feel free to check out the relevant literature:
"new alleles" - Google Scholar
Give this a read, too:
CB102: Mutations adding information
And for what it's worth, the genes that give rise to limbs in birds are the same that give rise to limbs in ALL tetrapods. They're called Hox genes, and they're universal among tetrapods. There's no reason to think things would be any different between birds and non-avian dinosaurs.

Well the only way to really be able to proove that would be to examine some dinosaur DNA I guess and then compare that to modern bird genomes. However, genetically the alleles that give rise are not exactly the same in all species either in sequence or location. Here's an article on Homology and macroevolution:http://www.creationresearch.org/creation_matters/pdf/1999/cm0405.pdf
Additionally, when I was taking genetics in college we did a lot of work with the fruit fly, drosophia (ms). This specie has been purposely mutated more than any other multiple celled life form on earth,,,,, for over 90 years. Hundreds of thousands of mutations are now documented. To my knowledge not one of them have ever been considered as beneficial or one that would increase the genomic information of that specie. As a matter of fact if a mutated fly somehow is allowed to interbreed with normal fruit flys the defect is usually rapidly eliminated out of the genome rapidly and the offspring return to normal. Mutations are generally bad not good and they certainly have not been the modality that has produced all of the biodiversity we see in the biota.

Microevolution is consistent with both YECism and evolutionary theory, so it cannot be used to distinguish between them, if that's what you're saying. Mind you, if you believe that there were only a few hundred different "kinds" on the ark and that all modern biodiversity radiated from those kinds within just a few thousand years, then you require a lot more than just microevolution to account for it. You'd need some sort of hyperevolutionary mechanism that is not known to operate today.

I respectfully disagree. Today, we have shown in just a few hundred years the incredible power of manipulating genomes and achieving massive diveristy,,,, that is microevolution. Look at the dogs, cattle etc. Macroevolution demands much larger changes that go way outside the existing genomes that exist. Macroevolution demands origins beginning from a single cell to all of the biodiversity we see today. Macroevolution is just not supported by the evidence fossilized or otherwise. Here's an article that explains a little about microevolution and the problem with natural selection: http://www.creationresearch.org/crsq/articles/29/natsel.html

As for your questions about what science predicts:
1) Not sure what you're referring to about bee hives in the desert. Source?
2) Angiosperm spores have not been found in the pre-Cambrian fossil record. Evolutionary theory would predict that they should not be there. In fact, most creation scientists would be at a loss to explain them, too, given that they believe the Flood sorted organisms in part according to their ecology and angiosperms don't live at the bottom of the ocean. They know modern taxa aren't found in the oldest sediments.

Look at this article from a creation web site where pollens were indeed recovered from the pre-cambrian "Hitaki" shale. More Creationist Research, PART Ia: GEOLOGICAL RESEARCH, What this shows is that life in it's present form has existed from the very start. Angiosperm pollen in the pre-cambrian only serves to proove that. Evolutionists can't account for their presence any more than they can account for the cambrian explosion where even vertabrates are found.

3) No modern-day animal is the same species found in the fossil record. Coelacanths comprise dozens of species, only two of which remain today. And although they have changed relatively little since the Devonian, this is entirely in line with that we know about evolution. Evolutionary theory does not say that all organisms must evolve at the same rate. Some things evolve slowly, some quickly, depending on how quickly the environment changes. Aquatic environments tend to be buffered against the extreme changes seen in terrestrial environments, and so aquatic (particularly marine) fauna don't tend to change all that much if they don't have to.

There's so much similarity that the modern specie is "essentially" the same as the fossil one. Just as there are a few variations of ocean perches that are not exactly the same but are "essentially" and morphologically the same. Anyway, given the fact that your side claims several millions of years for evolution to occurr there is really no change, why? My guess is because there really hasn't been several hundred millions of years pass by.

Anyways, getting back to the point of this thread: Evolution predicted feathered dinosaurs, which are now being found in abundance. We can even determine the colour of the feathers based on the shapes of the preserved melanosomes. It's interesting that YECs are now grudgingly coming to accept that fact.

Anyways, I'm off for a vacation in the DR this weekend, so I likely won't be able to respond for another week or so.

Creationists don't have to predict very much with regards to what happens in evolution because we don't accept macroevolution. For those http://www.creationism.org/symposium/symp3no2.htm who would like to see the fundamental difference between yours and my arguements ,,, may I invite them to read this article by a christian geologists: In this article you will find evidences of a global flood presented by someone who has true geological credentials. I hope you have a great vacation.

God Bless
Jim Larmore

 

[Mallon]

Time for another quick post before I leave tomorrow:

Jim, with respect, I'm not sure that it's worth continuing our discussion here. Your understanding of biology and evolution is so poor that I just don't think fruitful discussion about these issues is possible. To start, the singular of "species" is "species". This is basic high school biology and it really makes me question your ability to discern valid arguments from invalid ones in biology when you make such simple yet fundamental mistakes.
Second, individuals don't evolve; populations do. So your argument that there is no such thing as macroevolution because fruit flies always give birth to fruit flies is a strawman. Evolution doesn't predict otherwise. In evolution, you cannot outgrow your ancestry. Fruit flies (not "flys") will always be fruit flies will always be insects will always be bilaterians will always be metazoans, etc. Indeed, this hierarchy is another objective pattern of life that only evolution accounts for. In fact, I would argue that it is possibly the strongest evidence for evolution.
Third, your example of Precambrian pollen, as touted by Clifford Burdick, has been shown by creationists themselves to be dubious at best because Burdick's sampling techniques were flawed. It's amazing to me how you can be so skeptical of finds like "Archaeoraptor" (and rightly so), yet never question the far-out claims made by known YEC sensationalists (and frauds) like Burdick. Read more here:
Burdick
Fourth, for you to say that coelacanth diversity is so minimal that all their fossils might as well pertain to the same species betrays an ignorance of the coelacanth fossil record. Again, you are offering an opinion on something that you obviously know little about. To wit, here is a sampling of coelacanth diversity:

I don't know of a single biologist (even among the "lumpers") who would classify those all the same species. More here:
Coelacanth evolution : Pharyngula

Honestly, Jim, I think if we were to continue this conversation, it only be more of the same correcting of misconceptions on my part rather than forward-moving discussion. And given that I don't have time left to keep it up, I think I'll bow out now. It's exhausting. God bless, and I hope that you'll continue to learn about what evolution actually is, as opposed to what creationists think it is. As YEC baraminologist Dr. Todd Wood has stated:

"Evolution is not a theory in crisis. It is not teetering on the verge of collapse. It has not failed as a scientific explanation. There is evidence for evolution, gobs and gobs of it. It is not just speculation or a faith choice or an assumption or a religion. It is a productive framework for lots of biological research, and it has amazing explanatory power. There is no conspiracy to hide the truth about the failure of evolution. There has really been no failure of evolution as a scientific theory. It works, and it works well."

 

[lucaspa]

We can hash this over and over till the cows come home but you will never really have a good fool proof solid modality in the mainstream science to explain bio-diversity.

But we do: evolution. Ever hear of allopatric or sympatric speciation?

Genomes produce specific things i.e. proteins, enzymes etc. based on what they have in the existing genes/biochemistry. Mutation and natural selection does not produce new alleles that will work to produce an increase in complexity as we see in the biota.

Mutation does. Even point mutations produce new alleles. You do know that an allele is a form of a gene, right? So point mutations -- substitution or addition or deletion -- do produce new alleles and new abilities. Here are 2 examples out of hundreds:
1a. Page not found : Nature Publishing Group Hox protein mutation and macroevolution of the insect body plan. Ronshaugen M, McGinnis N, McGinnis W. Nature 2002 Feb 21;415(6874):914-7 Mutate one serine to alanine and change limb # from multiple limbs of crustaceans to 6 limbs of insects. "To test this, we generated mutant versions of Artemia Ubx in which C-terminal Ser/Thr residues were mutated to Ala. In the first such mutant (Art Ubx S/T to A 1–5), the first five Ser and Thr residues in the C-terminus are changed to Ala. This mutant Ubx has little limb-repression function, similar to wild-type Artemia Ubx (Fig. 3). However, the mutation of one additional Ser in a CKII consensus site (Art Ubx S/T to A 1–5 and 7) results in a Ubx that strongly represses embryonic limbs (Fig. 3)."
1. Birth of a unique enzyme from an alternative reading frame of the pre-existed, internally repetitious coding sequence", Ohno, S, Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 81:2421-2425, 1984. Frame shift mutation yielded random formation of new protein, was active enzyme nylon linear oligomer hydrolase (degrades nylon) Evolution and INFORMATION - the Nylon Bug!

There are also mutations that create new DNA.
1. Gene duplication. An entire gene can be doubled. So now you have 2 of the same gene. The second can accumulate mutations to a new activity because the original is still doing what it originally did.
2. Chromosome duplication. The entire chromosome (thousands of genes) is duplicated.
3. Translocations. Here part of a chromosome is duplicated, breaks off and is attached to another chromosome.

Because if you look at the genes in modern birds which are certainly similar in morphology the ones that produce certain parts of those morphologies ( let's say wings ) are not necessarily the same or in the same location in the genome in another species.

??? What example do you have? The genes that form "wings" are those that form the forelimbs in other tetrapods. Those genes are the same. IOW, the genes that form our arms are the same genes that form the wings of birds.

We believe God created it all during creation week.

And that gets you into lots of problems. Problems for God. Now you are making God directly responsible for all the bad and sadistic designs in living organisms.

Does science predict things like bee hives in fossilzed tree trunks in the painted desert where they supposedly couldn't have existed? How about fossils in stratas that are not supposed to be there like angiosperm/flowering plant spores in the pre-cambrian? Or better yet how about modern day live animals that exist in the fossil record hundreds of millions of years ago that are basically unchange. (coelacanth ,,,, mispelled)?

Can you provide citations for the first two? Particularly the flowering plant spores in pre-cambrian strata.

In the last one, the key here is "basically". The coelencanths that exist today are in the same Family as extinct coelencanths, but are not the same species. The same applies to the horseshoe crab and other examples. So there have been changes; they are not the same species.

The reason for this is very simple: in an environment that is constant, natural selection will work to keep a species unchanged.

Most people consider natural selection as only changing populations, but there are really 3 forms of natural selection:
1. Directional. This is the one we are most familiar with. In a changing environment (or a new environment), directional selection will alter a population in a particular direction.
2. Stabilizing or purifying selection. In a constant environment, when a population is well-adapted to the environment, any change in an individual will make that individual less fit. Thus, stabilizing selection keeps the population the same -- as long as the population occupies the same ecological niche. This is the situation with coelencanths, horseshoe crabs, etc. The species today occupy ecological niches nearly identical to the niche of the ancestors, so the design doesn't need to change. They already have a good design for that niche, so stabilizing selection keeps the basic design.

3. Disruptive selection. This happens when a population occupies a range where there are several environments. Subpopulations in each environment face directional selection to change them, but gene flow between the populations keeps them a single species. Ring species -- such as the Arctic gull and California salamander -- are products of disruptive selection.

 

[lucaspa]

Additionally, when I was taking genetics in college we did a lot of work with the fruit fly, drosophia (ms). This specie has been purposely mutated more than any other multiple celled life form on earth,,,,, for over 90 years. Hundreds of thousands of mutations are now documented. To my knowledge not one of them have ever been considered as beneficial or one that would increase the genomic information of that specie. As a matter of fact if a mutated fly somehow is allowed to interbreed with normal fruit flys the defect is usually rapidly eliminated out of the genome rapidly and the offspring return to normal.

Wow. They left out a lot of information in that course, or you either missed or slept thru those classes. New species of Drosophila have happened. By simply putting populations in new environments. Let's look at just 2 examples:

1. G Kilias, SN Alahiotis, and M Pelecanos. A multifactorial genetic investigation of speciation theory using drosophila melanogaster Evolution 34:730-737, 1980. They split a wild population of Drosophila into subpopulations and put one subpopulation in a colder environment. After 5 years (2500 generations) they tested the subpopulations against each other and against fresh caught wild flies. The subpopulation in the colder environment could not interbreed with the control subpopulation or the wild population. Most of the time mating would not occur (males and females would not mate with members of the other subpopulation) but any offspring from the infrequent matings were infertile. So there goes your genome returning to "normal". They did a genetic analysis on serveral of the proteins and found a genetic difference of 3% betweent the new species and the original. Humans and chimps differ by only about 1%.

2. 2. D Dodd. Reproductive isolation as a consequence of adaptive divergence in Drosophila pseudoobscura. Evolution 43(6): 1308-1311, 1989. JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie Got new species on different diets: starch vs maltose. Think about that one in terms of "considered beneficial". Now there are 2 new species of "fruit" flies that do not eat fruit. One can eat potatoes or other starchy food and the other can eat malt. So they are not even "fruit" flies anymore.

In an environment where fruit is scarce but the other food sources are plentiful, the changes are certainly beneficial.

 

[lucaspa]

I'm have no doubt paleontologists are professionals in their field yet they depend on evolution interpretation just like there are many corporations who makes a lot of money on war.

No, they do not "depend" on evolution. Paleontologists did not originally depend on evolution. The first paleontologists (in the late 1700s and early 1800s) were all creationists. One of them -- Rev. Adam Sedgwick -- taught geology and paleontology to Darwin.

What Sedgwick and other paleontologists came up with in the early 1800s was "successive creations". That is, they hypothesized that God had many creative episodes, not just one. By their theory, God created the cartilaginous fishes, then the amphibians, then the reptiles, then the mammals, etc.

However, first transitional individuals like Archeopteryx and then entire transitional series caused the paleontologists to abandon successive creation and accept evolution. You imply that paleontologists would not give up "evolutionary interpretations". That they are so rigid in mind set that they cannot look at new data to abandon the theory.

YET ... history shows that paleontologists were flexible enough to abandon creationism as their theory when the data refuted it. I'm sorry, Smidlee, but you cannot have it both ways. If paleontologists were flexible enough to give up creationism then they are flexible enough to give up evolution if the data warrants it. OTOH, if they are so rigid that they cannot give up a current theory, then they never could have given up creationism in the first place.

As far as feathered dinosaurs goes, if you really want to find a feather dinosaur then you will no doubt find one even though you may have to fudge a bit on what exactly you mean by feather and dinosaur. Dinosaur was supposed to be giant terrible lizards.

Not really "giant". Dinosaur simply means "terrible lizard". No "giant" in there. The first dinos discovered were indeed large, but many smaller dinos -- such as Compsagnathus -- were quickly discovered. Indeed, many Archie fossils without feather impressions were classified as Compsagnathus. The skeletons are that close.

There are characteristics in the skeleton that are unique to dinos. The openings in the skull are one. So when you find a fossil with those unique dino characteristics but also feather impressions, then you know you have a feathered dino.

One of the reasons many scientist believe dinosaurs were cold-blooded was their body mass vs skin surface ratio. Dinosaurs having feathers wouldn't help very much with their ability removing body heat.

I'm afraid you have that backwards. Having a large body means a high body volume to surface ratio. This lets the animal retain heat in a cold-blooded animal. So that it can be active. There isn't a problem with removing heat in a large cold-blooded animal, but retaining heat for a smaller warm-blooded animal. Think of elephants or rhinos. Very big and do not, even as warm blooded, have a problem of shedding heat. They are simply pretty hairless.

But then think of a mouse. Pretty small with a very low volume to surface ratio. Lots of surface to radiate heat, making the animal susceptible to hypothermia. So they are furred.

Same thing with dinos. So far, most of the feathered dinos have been small -- chicken sized or smaller. The feathers serve as insulation.

Yet when a living coelacanth was found we learn all the claim made over the fossil was false. Coelacanth was found not living in swallow waters as predicted but deep waters.

No one made the claim that the "fossil" or the sample was false. Ancestors of the modern coelencanths did live in shallow waters. But no scientist denied the authenticity of the modern coelencanth carcasses. Where did you get this misinformation?

So my point is you can only learn so much from just a fossil without a living one to go by. This really puts a limit of how useful paleontology really is.

Yes, we know there are limitations. We can't know color of feathers or scales, for instance. We can make informed speculations based on modern animals in similar ecological niches, but they remain speculations.

However, we are not talking about those known limitations here. What we have are fossils of animals that are definitely not birds but have one or more characteristics of birds. Those animals still have characteristics of dinos but not of birds, i.e. teeth.

Birds did not arise by one speciation. They are the result of hundreds of speciations over millions of years. An article that traces the various features we associate with birds and when those individual features appeared among dinosaur genera is here:
The Evolution of Dinosaurs Science 25 June 1999: 2137-2147.
(you can find issues of Science in any public library)

You can also look at dino to bird transitionals:
http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/diapsids/avians.html