The systematic classification of life

[mark kennedy]

Now for the first question about your acceptance of cladistics or of your place in taxonomy: As creationists, do you accept that, as a life-form, you are also an organic RNA/DNA protein-based metabolic organism? A simple answer is all I need, and we'll continue from there.

With regards to what; Physiology anatomy, histology, or more to the point, are we discussing ontogenesis or morphogenesis. I just wanted clarification since I need to know if we will be discussing scientific facts or science fiction stories. Typically when you accept a definition for a term in evolutionary biology you can't, for instance, accept the definition 'change in gene frequencies in populations over time' without accepting the single common ancestor mythology and I have fallen for that bait and switch too many times.

 

[Aron-Ra]

I know a good deal about evolution. But how organic molecules and nucleotides came together to form DNA is a whole other process. Life couldn't evolve as we know it until DNA became part of the equation. We have no good theories to explain the formation of life and genetics to that point. But we've got a really solid argument for what happened after that.

Perhaps, but as with any good theory one must have the basic foundation to form the "house" so to speak. Now if we are all decendants that began with the RNA/DNA equation and the story goes on from there we must have the beginning to start this process. If RNA/DNA is the "beginning" we must have the story of this beginning...right? If we don't have this first evolutionary step that is a gap and you told me in the other thread that there are no gaps in the theory.

I said there were no 'significant' gaps. I am aware of some gaps, but they're not significant ones. For example, I'm anxious to see the missing link between Mixopterycean eurypterids and Devonian aquatic scorpions. But what you're talking about is not a gap of any kind. Evolution is defined as the change in allele frequencies in a population over time/generations. By definition, no alleles = no evolution. Therefore, as I said, the formation of DNA is an entirely different process.

However, as I told JohnR7 earlier in this thread, I do know that cellular membranes are made of a phospholipid bilayer, and that these form automatically and immediately upon contact with water due to their molecular polarity. And intracellular transport vesicles also work by what seems to be entirely incidental circumstances. Enzymatic reactions naturally build a system of chemical activity that is greater inside the bilayer than out, leading to the creation of pathways which control energy and require "food" molecules from the surrounding environment. My cellular biology professor said that at its most fundamental level, biology was just chemistry. I also know that the Miller-Urey experiment proved Oparin and Haldane's hypothesis about how an early Earth actually synthesized organic compounds from inorganic precursors. So we have lots of good evidence in support of replicative polymers and peptides already. But I've also seen Eigen and Schuster's model for the Hypercycle and a number of seemingly sound models for protobionts. So the story you're looking for, (and don't want to find) is out there. Its just that we don't have any really rock-solid evidence of that like we do for evolution. But then, we don't have any better explanations than that either. And I'm not well-versed in abiogenesis, frankly, because chemistry bores me, even when it is this advanced. I study evolution instead. That's the story I'm telling. And that story doesn't begin until DNA is already on the scene.

But I can't resist tossing this out there, since you asked for it. A few months ago, Mark Kennedy showed me this:

"After extensive analyses, astonishing to him, he [Dr. Senapathy] solved the problem of the origin of first living cell on earth-that it was not the bacterium like cell that was the very first life on earth but the eukaryotic cells with nucleus and other paraphernalia and all of their complexity. This finding showed that the branching model of evolution was not necessary to explain the diversity of living forms on earth, and, in fact, that it was basically incorrect. He could show that the same mechanisms that lead to the genome of one eukaryotic cell could lead to the genomes of zygotic cells of many different multicellular organisms. He formulated a new model for explaining the multiple and simultaneous origins of diverse and unique organisms on earth from a given primordial pond-the model of parallel origin of genomes from a common pool of genes. It took him many more years to complete the research and publish all his findings in a book titled Independent Birth of Organisms in 1994 (Genome Press)."

Dr. Senapathy has a Ph. D. in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, and once worked on the human genome project as a legitimate scientist, believe it or not. Or at least he was one before he broke away from genetics and proposed his new "theory". What Senapathy proposed is that complex Eukaryotes came before Prokaryotes, (not the other way around) and that both accidentally assembled themselves by falling together in a naturally DNA-rich primordial soup, which he says existed until just before recorded history. Its an interesting notion, not supported by anything, but which he believes he has substantial evidence for. But then he takes a dive right off the deep end, and ignores everything I'm trying to show in this thread by proposing that it wasn't only single-cellular life that came about this way. Senapathy proposed that evolution was "fundamentally wrong" because whole human beings accidentally assembled themselves the same way, and walked out of the primordial soup, all at once, fully-formed, and purely by accident, as did everything else in the biosphere. Mark Kennedy tried to deny this, but its plainly illustrated right on the cover. And Senapathy actually believes that this idea can challenge evolution and overturn the concept of common ancestry. This is just one more reason why I say that authority opinion is worthless and that nothing should be above scrutiny.

So when did this sub-group evolve the flagellum and how did it evolve?

Cillia and flagellum are common among the majority of bacteria and other single-celled organisms. Scientists estimate that bacteria has been alive on the Earth for 3.5 billion years or so. And these appendages, (like any affectation on a functional foundation) are much easier to accomplish than the foundation itself. But opisthokonts didn't evolve these. They simply inherited them, and lost that trait on all the cells that didn't need to move. Obviously gamete cells (spores and sperm) still needed that ability.

Define specially-created.

Designed and constructed entirely separate and unrelated to anything else, either artificially (man-made) carved out of clay and breathed on by a god, or poofed out of nothing by magic words.

Why would you think that some animals would have bikont reproductive cells....etc. if they were "specially-created?

There is no reason for anything that is specially-created unrelated to anything else to exactly adhere to every commonality we would expect only from the result of derived synapomorphies. God could have made marsupial monkeys, four-legged birds, whales with gills, or anything else he wanted to. So why would he make sure to only make one group, (and all of that group) bikont, and every last one of another group opisthokont, as if these were inherited?

Here is the sort of thing which evolution doesn't permit. But there would be no reason why specially-created things couldn't be this way. God could have made hexopoidal dragons or even Pegusus if he wanted to. But if such a thing were ever found, it would instantly reduce evolution to horsefeathers. Evolution has rules which must be followed, and always are without exception. Miraculous creation doesn't have any rules at all, yet absolutely always adheres to the ones only evolution has to follow.

They are all opisthokont, as if that trait appeared as an extremely rare and pivotal mutation among certain protists, and was then inherited by all the generations to flower out of that line since.

If it were extremely rare what gave it the extra edge so to speak to be inherited by all the generations since?

I explained this in the OP. Single-celled organisms are under the direct control of their DNA, unlike multicellular organisms, where it is harder to maintain strict adherence to the code. Changes in multicellular organisms happen literally all the time. But any kind of inherited alteration in the structure of the cell itself is going to be comparatively rare partly because that very cell has to be the one transmitted in fertilization. However, if it is still functional, as this mutation obviously is, then there is nothing to stop it from being carried down through the generations indefinitely.

They are all opisthokont, as if that trait appeared as an extremely rare and pivotal mutation among certain protists, and was then inherited by all the generations to flower out of that line since. The common ancestry model obviously explains this fact, but to date, no creationist of any sort has ever been able to offer any alternative explanation for this or any of the other trends we see in taxonomy.

You haven't really explained it, you have stated it as something that is present but you haven't explained it. What explanation does evolution give this event?

I did just explain it. The fact to be explained (in this case) is ''why are all microspores and fungi, choanoflagellates and animals opisthokonts when no plants or algae are, but some of the protists are?' And the explanation for that is because somewhere among the ancient Protists there was a simple mutation, a birth-defect of sorts reversing the position of the flagellum, (or the direction of motion) in one of the germ-line cells of a gamete that happened to be functional, and so was inherited by everything descending from that protist including fungus and animals. So yes, I did explain this, but no creationist to date ever has.

If they are so diverse why do you think it is that there are so few of them and in the few that there are they are "nested" into their own siblings?

Try and understand that if you were trace back everyone's family today, they would all have ancestors of course. But if you went back in time, and traced descendants forward, you would find an awful lot of family lines dying out just within human society. Yet even though we know this happens, the relatively few families who remain have all multiplied so that there are now billions of people anyway.

The position of evolutionary theory and the model of common ancestry is that "simple" single-celled organisms are a lot harder to form than it is to form complex multicellular forms out of them.

The reason of this being what?

Again, I already explained this in the OP and I did so again earlier in this post.

What was the mechanism that allowed for the organism to stop dissolving and what were the mechanisms that allowed development of the internal cells that facilitated the means of internal distribution? How did they become dependant on the surrounding body when most of those around those first non-desolving cells were desolving?

I already explained this too; But I'll paraphrase. Even animal cells have the ability to eat and even to drink all on their own. But in the case of the cells we're talking about, they also had the ability to move, and when they moved, they carried nutrients with them, not unlike the function of an ant colony. If other internal cells were already being fed, and their wastes were already being expelled, (cellular respiration) then there was no need for them to dissolve anymore. This allowed the internal cells to become more specialized.

Another of the evident trends of evolution is that the offspring of two closely-related organisms will be more primitive than its parents, in that it will look more like the common ancestor of both than the adults of either species will.

An example of this would be?

Crab larvae for example, because they still have tails just like their shrimp and lobster cousins.

And of course baby gorillas look much more like humans than adult gorillas do. And coincidentally, human children tend to look more like monkeys that their parents do.

Recently, a team of taxonomists, geneticists, and microbiologists sampled DNA from dozens of animals, and sequenced a single gene common to all animal species. This revealed a parent pattern implicating the sponge as the most basal of all macroscopic animals.
Sogin Labs' "Shape of Life" project

Haven't read it yet.

The televised special was pretty good, if you're into that whole love of natural science thing like I am.

I accept that mankind has developed a classification system that created taxon's that represent the known life forms on earth. I believe that within that classification system I would reside in the animal kingdom.

Unless you have an alternative definition for what an animal is, we'll have to run with the only one out there.

 

[Aron-Ra]

Obviously, if you and all the ancestors you know of for certain are (by definition) animals, then there shouldn't be any argument about whether you descended from animals. And you wouldn't be able to generalize differences between you and "an animal" for the same reason. Instead, you could only cite differences between you, and certain other animals.

From here, you must understand that taxonomy is based as much on an organism's reproduction, life cycle and development as it is on the physiognomy or function of the form itself. The next few stages should illustrate this.

For example, sponges aren't always sedentary. Their nymph form is mobile and transports itself to the site where it will settle down for the rest of its life. Some of the other primitive animal forms also have a nymph stage nearly identical to that of the sponge, particularly in the case of the hydra, which never seems to develop beyond that point. Corals and anemonies are also similar and considered closely-related. Others may be similar to the sponge nymph except that they remain mobile their entire lives. Comb jellies are like that, except a bit more sleek. And the last (and most advanced) group are slightly different in that they only represent the earliest phase of development, and begin life with a shape usually more like that of worms. Some of these can develop into beings that are much much more complex.

Sponges, the most basal of all animals, are classified in the sub-kingdom, Porifera. All other animals are in a sister subkingdom called Eumetazoa. Most of these develop differently than sponges in adulthood so that their cells are organized into various tissues. And except for the shapeless placozoans, they also have some degree of symmetry in that they are at least tubular with a definite front and rear. These include the cnidarians, the first animals to reveal the continuously repeating rhythmic pulse which scientists believe led to a heartbeat once such organs began to appear.

The first hints of that circulatory system appear in one line of a group of Eumetazoans which have achieved a bilateral symmetry. Almost all of the animals which come to mind, (including starfish) are bilaterally symmetrical. But Bilateria has more criteria than just that. All bilaterally symmetrical animals are triploblastic, which means they develop three germ layers; The three germ layers are;

Ectoderm
- Covers the surface of the embryo and forms the outer covering of the animal and the central nervous system in some phyla.

Endoderm
- the innermost germ layer which lines the archenteron (primitive gut). It forms lining of the digestive tract and outpocketing give rise to the liver and lungs of vertebrates.

Mesoderm
- located between the ectoderm and endoderm. Forms the muscles and most organs located between the digestive tract and outer covering of the animal. The circulatory and (in vertebrates) the skeletal system stems from this

Note that only Bilateria have a mesoderm.

There are two subdivisions of Bilateria, one based on body cavity or the lack thereof. Acoelomata have no body cavity present between the digestive tract and the outer body wall. Platyhelminthes (flatworms) belong here. All other animals have some sort of body cavity which joins a mouth of some kind at one end and an anus at the other.

In the Psuedocoelomata, a fluid-filled body cavity separates the digestive tract and the outer body wall. This cavity ( the psuedocoelom) is not lined or not completely lined with mesodermal tissue. The "Aschelminthes" (including the Nematoda, Rotifera and other groups of mostly tiny animals) are psuedocoelomate.

The true Coelomata have a body cavity which is completely tissue-lined, resulting in a "tube-within-a-tube" design. The fluid filled body cavity completely lined with mesoderm (the coelom) separates the digestive tract from the outer body wall. Mesenteries connect the inner and outer mesoderm layers and suspend the internal organs in the coelom. All vertebrates and most invertebrates [arthropods] are coelomates.

The adaptive advantages of a body cavity are that it cushions the organs, preventing internal injury, and allowing them to grow independent of body wall. The non-compressible internal fluid also acts as a hydrostatic skeleton
[source; Paleos.com]

Living organisms consist of two (or three) groups including Eukaryotes
The Domain, Eukarya consists of several subgroups including opisthokonts
Opisthokonta consists of a couple of sub-groups including animals.
Kingdom Animalia consists of two subkingdoms including Eumetazoa.
Eumetazoans consist of three grades including coelomates.
Coelemata consists of at least three branches including bilaterally symmetrical animals.

In any case, as an organic RNA/DNA protein-based metabolic, metazoic, nucleic, diploid-celled bilaterally-symmetrical opisthokont with three germ layers, and a mouth joined to an anus by a "tube-within-a-tube" digestive fluid-filled body cavity, would you agree that you are accurately classified within the taxonomic branch of the animal kingdom called Bilateria?

 

[Oncedeceived]

Aron-ra I happen to know that you put in hours on this and want you to know that I appreciate the time and effort when I know how busy your life is.

As usual I have to work this morning and I haven't the time to respond. I was thinking on starting my response but that sometimes doesn't work as well as if I wait and can give the entire post my full attention.

Did you get any sleep?

 

[Oncedeceived]

P.S.

Your use of pictures always keeps things interesting.

 

[Imblessed]

Yes i'm impressed with your study though as i've said before you can study for years and still not understand it correctly. I've studied the Bible and see many that totally see it wrong and misinterrprite it into how they want to see it. This is only human nature. But yes according to this process i would be in the class of bilatera. I would also be in every class of animal because we all have simmiliar functions. Its only natural that we would if a creater created every thing. Your insertion that a creator could create a jackolope is true but not needed. A creator would do things correctly. evolution should not if it is random mutations. you would show vestigies as proof of evolution and this randomness and also bad design which i think is funny since you all never seem to be able to find or produce a better one. The vestigials are ignorant and just opinionated as is bad design. But this is my opinion and you can go on.

 

[Hermit]

YI've studied the Bible and see many that totally see it wrong and misinterrprite it into how they want to see it.

How do you know when someone interprets the bible wrong? What do you compare that interpretation to? How do you know which interpretation is right?

 

[Aron-Ra]

Your insertion that a creator could create a jackolope is true but not needed. A creator would do things correctly. evolution should not if it is random mutations. you would show vestigies as proof of evolution and this randomness and also bad design which i think is funny since you all never seem to be able to find or produce a better one. The vestigials are ignorant and just opinionated as is bad design.

I hadn't mentioned any "vestigials" yet, and don't think I was going to. But since you bring them up, I must point out some "opinionated ignorance" from your side. Until a few month's ago, I had a pet emu living in my back yard. I don't have him anymore because one of my neighbor's is a complete @$%&, and complained to the city, forcing me to turn my beloved bird over to a petting zoo. Anyway, my emu was the poster-child for vestigial limbs.

Didn't Hovind say you can't have "half a wing"? Well, my bird did. Well, actually, he didn't have wings at all. What he really had were arms. Now sure, God could choose to give a bird arms instead of wings if he wanted to. But what good would these spindly little things be? -Especially if they have lost all muscularity, and can't even move anymore? Now, do you see the claw on the end of the one remaining finger? Tell me what a good design that is on a set of arms that can't more? I don't know if you can explain this from a creationist's perspective, but I know that evolution can explain it very well.

Emus, ostriches, rheas, cassowaries, and the giant moahs are ratites, paleognaths, the most primitive order of birds which still survive. Mitochondrial analysis and the fossil record indicate they diverged from neognaths, (the line leading to all modern birds) about eighty million years ago, during the Cretaceous period. All ratites are still dinosaur-like, each having reptilian fingers in their "wings" (ostriches still have three on each arm). And unlike all "modern" birds who's skull sections have fused into a single carapace, ratites still have sutures in their skulls just like reptiles always had. Now do you have a creationist explanation for these vestigial features? Because I know evolution certainly does.

I would caution you against accusing me of "opinionated ignorance" until you have your own in check.

 

[Aron-Ra]

Did you get any sleep?

I really don't sleep much. I can't seem to do anything on the computer until the kids are in bed and the TV is off. Otherwise, I can't think.

Your use of pictures always keeps things interesting.

Thank you.

 

[Lilandra]

I'd like to thank you for the attempt you are making.

I really don't sleep much. I can't seem to do anything on the computer until the kids are in bed and the TV is off. Otherwise, I can't think. [/font]
Thank you.

 

[Oncedeceived]

I said there were no 'significant' gaps.

What one feels is significant and what another feels is significant can be very subjective and based on the very worldview one holds.

I am aware of some gaps, but they're not significant ones. For example, I'm anxious to see the missing link between Mixopterycean eurypterids and Devonian aquatic scorpions. But what you're talking about is not a gap of any kind. Evolution is defined as the change in allele frequencies in a population over time/generations. By definition, no alleles = no evolution. Therefore, as I said, the formation of DNA is an entirely different process.

True, but without the formation of DNA the whole process doesn't get off the ground (no pun intended).

However, as I told JohnR7 earlier in this thread, I do know that cellular membranes are made of a phospholipid bilayer, and that these form automatically and immediately upon contact with water due to their molecular polarity.

Don't you mean that phospholidids desolve in water forming a bilayer? To me this seems more of a changing process rather than a building process which seems to be the implication of your post. It is rather more like ice turning to water rather than ice turning to tea for instance. Do you agree?



And intracellular transport vesicles also work by what seems to be entirely incidental circumstances.

Are you talking about flagella's?

Enzymatic reactions naturally build a system of chemical activity that is greater inside the bilayer than out, leading to the creation of pathways which control energy and require "food" molecules from the surrounding environment. My cellular biology professor said that at its most fundamental level, biology was just chemistry. I also know that the Miller-Urey experiment proved Oparin and Haldane's hypothesis about how an early Earth actually synthesized organic compounds from inorganic precursors. So we have lots of good evidence in support of replicative polymers and peptides already.

Wouldn't you say that there are hypothesis's that seem to give a credible explanation based on assuming a chemical reaction and I say assuming because in reality this process is not proven...correct?

But I've also seen Eigen and Schuster's model for the Hypercycle and a number of seemingly sound models for protobionts. So the story you're looking for, (and don't want to find) is out there. Its just that we don't have any really rock-solid evidence of that like we do for evolution.

How do you define one evolution and the other something else? In the theory of evolution life had to begin and abiogenesis is consistant with the theory in that in theory one life form lead to the next and to that it had to begin. If you separate the beginning from the following events you are asking people to believe that life just popped up magically.

But then, we don't have any better explanations than that either. And I'm not well-versed in abiogenesis, frankly, because chemistry bores me, even when it is this advanced. I study evolution instead. That's the story I'm telling. And that story doesn't begin until DNA is already on the scene.

Alright, I will let the first step be put aside for now.

But I can't resist tossing this out there, since you asked for it. A few months ago, Mark Kennedy showed me this:

I asked for this? When did I ask you to put forth another person's response to you? I don't remember doing that.

Here is the sort of thing which evolution doesn't permit. But there would be no reason why specially-created things couldn't be this way. God could have made hexopoidal dragons or even Pegusus if he wanted to. But if such a thing were ever found, it would instantly reduce evolution to horsefeathers.

Yes, He could have. But you forget that evolution is an explanation for the way life is. There are patterns and the development of life follows a very patterned evolution. The theory of evolution is a hypothesis of how life developed by looking back in time. We know that life is the way it is and we can then go and look back and see what life was in the fossil record. We using our reasoning and intelligence then look at these factors (looking back in time with the knowledge we hold today) and come up with the way life progressed. Evolution does not disprove Creation.

Evolution has rules which must be followed, and always are without exception.

Are you sure? Evolution began by the theory that life progressed in a slow and gradual way. Then we had to revamp that somewhat because we find that that didn't hold up to the evidence and then we believed that the tree of llife looked like a tree (the reason it is called the "tree" of life) then we discover that it looks more like a bush.

Miraculous creation doesn't have any rules at all, yet absolutely always adheres to the ones only evolution has to follow.

Earth is contigent on rules and miraculous or divine creation does not conflict with any of them.

I explained this in the OP. Single-celled organisms are under the direct control of their DNA, unlike multicellular organisms, where it is harder to maintain strict adherence to the code. Changes in multicellular organisms happen literally all the time. But any kind of inherited alteration in the structure of the cell itself is going to be comparatively rare partly because that very cell has to be the one transmitted in fertilization. However, if it is still functional, as this mutation obviously is, then there is nothing to stop it from being carried down through the generations indefinitely.

I don't really disagree with this.

I did just explain it. The fact to be explained (in this case) is ''why are all microspores and fungi, choanoflagellates and animals opisthokonts when no plants or algae are, but some of the protists are?' And the explanation for that is because somewhere among the ancient Protists there was a simple mutation, a birth-defect of sorts reversing the position of the flagellum, (or the direction of motion) in one of the germ-line cells of a gamete that happened to be functional, and so was inherited by everything descending from that protist including fungus and animals. So yes, I did explain this, but no creationist to date ever has.

Okay, you tell me that "somewhere" among ancient Protists there was a mutation but you don't know how that reversed the position. Yet how does this occur? You are telling me that it was a birth defect (so to speak)? How was this possible? We are not talking here about a simple blimp in the DNA but changing the whole organism to make this change. Asking me to believe that there may have been an organism that just happened to have a mutation that brought about this change is not an explanation. You are asking me to believe this happened without any evidence at all. Where is the empirical evidence for this mutation and how did it occur? I would like your best hypothesis of this occurance and we will then discuss the specifics of it. Generally saying that this happened sometime in an ancient but unkown Protist is not an explanation. Okay?

Try and understand that if you were trace back everyone's family today, they would all have ancestors of course. But if you went back in time, and traced descendants forward, you would find an awful lot of family lines dying out just within human society. Yet even though we know this happens, the relatively few families who remain have all multiplied so that there are now billions of people anyway.

This isn't really important. I know that there are billions of people. That does nothing to supply explanation of how we arrived here.

Again, I already explained this in the OP and I did so again earlier in this post.
I already explained this too; But I'll paraphrase. Even animal cells have the ability to eat and even to drink all on their own. But in the case of the cells we're talking about, they also had the ability to move, and when they moved, they carried nutrients with them, not unlike the function of an ant colony. If other internal cells were already being fed, and their wastes were already being expelled, (cellular respiration) then there was no need for them to dissolve anymore.

How did they begin to move? This is circular. How did the cells acquire the ability to expel? They were evolved to dissolve so what happened to give them the ability to expell the waste that they acquired by moving about while eating?

Crab larvae for example, because they still have tails just like their shrimp and lobster cousins.

Something is tickling my mind on this one. I need to think about it.

And of course baby gorillas look much more like humans than adult gorillas do.

In your opinion I think because I don't see it.

And coincidentally, human children tend to look more like monkeys that their parents do.

What!! I am sorry but I don't see that either. But the pic is nice. I love baby gorillas or baby anything really.

The televised special was pretty good, if you're into that whole love of natural science thing like I am.

I love nature and science does that count?

Unless you have an alternative definition for what an animal is, we'll have to run with the only one out there.

No, I can go with this one.

 

[Oncedeceived]

In any case, as an organic RNA/DNA protein-based metabolic, metazoic, nucleic, diploid-celled bilaterally-symmetrical opisthokont with three germ layers, and a mouth joined to an anus by a "tube-within-a-tube" digestive fluid-filled body cavity, would you agree that you are accurately classified within the taxonomic branch of the animal kingdom called Bilateria?

Yes, as defined by man's classifications.

 

[mark kennedy]

But I can't resist tossing this out there, since you asked for it. A few months ago, Mark Kennedy showed me this:

"After extensive analyses, astonishing to him, he [Dr. Senapathy] solved the problem of the origin of first living cell on earth-that it was not the bacterium like cell that was the very first life on earth but the eukaryotic cells with nucleus and other paraphernalia and all of their complexity. This finding showed that the branching model of evolution was not necessary to explain the diversity of living forms on earth, and, in fact, that it was basically incorrect. He could show that the same mechanisms that lead to the genome of one eukaryotic cell could lead to the genomes of zygotic cells of many different multicellular organisms. He formulated a new model for explaining the multiple and simultaneous origins of diverse and unique organisms on earth from a given primordial pond-the model of parallel origin of genomes from a common pool of genes. It took him many more years to complete the research and publish all his findings in a book titled Independent Birth of Organisms in 1994 (Genome Press)."

The point was that he started with fully formed organisms and that evolutionary explanations are basiclly wrong.

Dr. Senapathy has a Ph. D. in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry, and once worked on the human genome project as a legitimate scientist, believe it or not. Or at least he was one before he broke away from genetics and proposed his new "theory". What Senapathy proposed is that complex Eukaryotes came before Prokaryotes, (not the other way around) and that both accidentally assembled themselves by falling together in a naturally DNA-rich primordial soup, which he says existed until just before recorded history. Its an interesting notion, not supported by anything, but which he believes he has substantial evidence for. But then he takes a dive right off the deep end, and ignores everything I'm trying to show in this thread by proposing that it wasn't only single-cellular life that came about this way. Senapathy proposed that evolution was "fundamentally wrong" because whole human beings accidentally assembled themselves the same way, and walked out of the primordial soup, all at once, fully-formed, and purely by accident, as did everything else in the biosphere. Mark Kennedy tried to deny this, but its plainly illustrated right on the cover. And Senapathy actually believes that this idea can challenge evolution and overturn the concept of common ancestry. This is just one more reason why I say that authority opinion is worthless and that nothing should be above scrutiny.

You have got to be putting me on, he thinks human being popped out of primordial soup? Senapathy simply abandoned the single common ancestory model because it is useless to explain the origins of life. The primary principle of Creationist thought is that creatures had to be fully formed and while they change over time adaptation is a result of variations in an originally created 'kinds'. Prokaryotes do not become Eukaryotes and the fact is that this gradual accumulation of traits and fundamental changes in metabolic organization happens only in the mind, it never happens in nature.

 

[Aron-Ra]

as I told JohnR7 earlier in this thread, I do know that cellular membranes are made of a phospholipid bilayer, and that these form automatically and immediately upon contact with water due to their molecular polarity.

Don't you mean that phospholidids desolve in water forming a bilayer? To me this seems more of a changing process rather than a building process which seems to be the implication of your post. It is rather more like ice turning to water rather than ice turning to tea for instance. Do you agree?

I really don't understand what you mean. In this case, I mean't "form", not "change". Phospholipid molecules have hydrophilic heads and hydrophobic tails. So they arrange themselves into bilayer membranes automatically.

And intracellular transport vesicles also work by what seems to be entirely incidental circumstances.

Are you talking about flagella's?

No. I'm talking about the traits and functions which make the cell walls selectively permeable.

Wouldn't you say that there are hypothesis's that seem to give a credible explanation based on assuming a chemical reaction and I say assuming because in reality this process is not proven...correct?

Sure. I'll go with that.

How do you define one evolution and the other something else? In the theory of evolution life had to begin and abiogenesis is consistant with the theory in that in theory one life form lead to the next and to that it had to begin. If you separate the beginning from the following events you are asking people to believe that life just popped up magically.

Since most evolutionists are Christians, I suppose they believe that already. Some intelligent design theorists like Michael Denton and Richard Colling now believe that too; that God created life, in its most basic form, and allowed it to go on from there. Both groups agree that life evolves and has been evolving for a long time. And both groups believe that life wasn't always here. So at some point, life either had to form by some string of fortuitous chemical circumstances, or it was formed by magic. It either happened according to the laws of physics, or it didn't adhere to physical laws and happened miraculously instead. Either way, it couldn't have formed by changing alleles that weren't there yet. So until they were, it can't be considered evolution.

But I can't resist tossing this out there, since you asked for it. A few months ago, Mark Kennedy showed me this:

I asked for this? When did I ask you to put forth another person's response to you? I don't remember doing that.

You asked me for a beginning to the story of life, an explanation for the origin of the first replicative DNA proteins. So I showed you that Dr. Senapathy has one for sale.

Evolution does not disprove Creation.

This is true. Taoist or Shamanic creation concepts could be true. With some modifications, even some version of Hindu tradition could be true I suppose. But Biblical creationism still couldn't be.

Evolution has rules which must be followed, and always are without exception.

Are you sure? Evolution began by the theory that life progressed in a slow and gradual way. Then we had to revamp that somewhat because we find that that didn't hold up to the evidence and then we believed that the tree of llife looked like a tree (the reason it is called the "tree" of life) then we discover that it looks more like a bush.

I prefer to think of it as a tumbleweed myself. I also accept most, if not all, of the concept of punctuated equilibrium, but I would still be considered a gradualist. I've debated this issue with staunch (dare I say) "followers" of Niles Eldredge. And I have yet to see anything which challenges the gradualist position. Even in cases of punctuated equilibrium, the changes are still quite gradual, much more so than anti-evolutionists and Eldredge supporters indicate them to be. That's why Ernst Mayr, one of the most respected "evolutionists" of all time, survived the punk eek controversy and remained a gradualist. But in answer to your question, yes. Evolution has rules, and definitely follows them without exception. But the rules I'm talking about aren't about how one depicts evolution on a chart or in a drawing. What I'm talking about is the taxonomic rule of inheritance; that all evolution is a matter of superficial changes compiled atop tiers of fundamental similarities.

Miraculous creation doesn't have any rules at all, yet absolutely always adheres to the ones only evolution has to follow.

Earth is contigent on rules and miraculous or divine creation does not conflict with any of them.

Yes it does, completely. Don't you remember what a miracle is? It is something which is outside, beyond, even counter to the laws of physical reality.

The fact to be explained (in this case) is ''why are all microspores and fungi, choanoflagellates and animals opisthokonts when no plants or algae are, but some of the protists are?' And the explanation for that is because somewhere among the ancient Protists there was a simple mutation, a birth-defect of sorts reversing the position of the flagellum, (or the direction of motion) in one of the germ-line cells of a gamete that happened to be functional, and so was inherited by everything descending from that protist including fungus and animals. So yes, I did explain this, but no creationist to date ever has.

Okay, you tell me that "somewhere" among ancient Protists there was a mutation but you don't know how that reversed the position. Yet how does this occur? You are telling me that it was a birth defect (so to speak)? How was this possible? We are not talking here about a simple blimp in the DNA but changing the whole organism to make this change.

I personally think it didn't reverse the position, only the function. These flagellum simply pushed instead of pulled. But the alternative notion is not what you suggest either. If there is a definite front and back to cells, then the flagellum simply formed on the wrong side. That's all.

Asking me to believe that there may have been an organism that just happened to have a mutation that brought about this change is not an explanation. You are asking me to believe this happened without any evidence at all. Where is the empirical evidence for this mutation and how did it occur? I would like your best hypothesis of this occurance and we will then discuss the specifics of it. Generally saying that this happened sometime in an ancient but unkown Protist is not an explanation. Okay?

The evidence of this mutation is as follows: (1.) We know mutations happen randomly in nature, and that on rare occasions, they can be quite dramatic. (2.) And we know that even dramatic mutations can be inherited, especially if they're of a beneficial nature. And a rear-mounted flagellum is more efficient in a fluid environment than a front-mounted one, so there certainly would be a selective advantage there. (3.) We know from traveling freak show attractions (among other things) that it is even possible to grow too many limbs, or for limbs to appear in the wrong place. (4.) And we know from early laboratory experiments on the genetics of flies that certain genes can be activated by a deliberate mutation to cause legs to grow out of the head instead of the thorax (for example). And these are significantly more complex animals which are much more dependant on integrity of the foundational structure to support their legs than are any single-celled organisms are for their elongated cillia. So for a flagellum to appear on the wrong side, or simply to work backwards is not a very big change. It may not even have been a change in position. Many of these cells, (including Ameobas) are surrounded by cillia. In bikonts, one anterior cillia is pronounced to become a flagella, and the other cillia are made superfluous by the efficiency of the one. It may be that the same thing happened in opisthokonts as well, except that the pronounced cillia was posterior. (5.) All plants and algae share the opposite configuration from microspores, choanoflagellates, and all their presumed descendants. But the protist groups could be of either (or neither) configuration being the most diverse, most ancient, and most basal of all eukaryote life-forms. So if there was a change such as I'm talking about, it had to have happened within that collective group. And (6.) the evidence that such a change did occur is in the fact that there are no known opisthokont plants or algae, but every last one of the descendants of microspores or choanoflagellates all maintain this trait consistently, whereas, if they were specially and separately created, they wouldn't have to. Lions could be opisthokonts and tigers could be bikonts in that case. But that sort of thing is never ever what we see.

Try and understand that if you were trace back everyone's family today, they would all have ancestors of course. But if you went back in time, and traced descendants forward, you would find an awful lot of family lines dying out just within human society. Yet even though we know this happens, the relatively few families who remain have all multiplied so that there are now billions of people anyway.

This isn't really important. I know that there are billions of people. That does nothing to supply explanation of how we arrived here.

I wasn't trying to answer that. I was answering your question about why I thought there were only fourteen protist kingdoms. Actually that's more than enough really, considering there is only one plant or animal kingdom.

Even animal cells have the ability to eat and even to drink all on their own. But in the case of the cells we're talking about, they also had the ability to move, and when they moved, they carried nutrients with them, not unlike the function of an ant colony. If other internal cells were already being fed, and their wastes were already being expelled, (cellular respiration) then there was no need for them to dissolve anymore.

How did they begin to move? This is circular. How did the cells acquire the ability to expel? They were evolved to dissolve so what happened to give them the ability to expell the waste that they acquired by moving about while eating?

They didn't "begin" to move. In communal organisms like Dictyostellium, they already could move. And each of your own cells is capable of respiring, and of expelling waste. What they needed was something similar to a line of worker ants bringing them food and carrying away the waste. This system of involuntary circulation is so efficient that I think it could hardly be avoided forever, especially considering the manner in which these things eat. If dictyostellium encounters a food source smaller than itself, then it doesn't need to dissolve into its amoebic componants (which can all already move). Instead, it simply engulfs whatever it seeks to consume. Once the food is inside it, other cells milling about will be caked with it, and will inadvertently transport bits of it to other parts of the collective beastie.

And of course baby gorillas look much more like humans than adult gorillas do.

In your opinion I think because I don't see it.

Whether you chose to see it or not, its still a fact. Adult gorillas vary from humans in many more anthropomorphic proportions than do their young. Human adults also vary from baby gorillas, (and baby orangutans, chimpanzees, etc.) in the same way. Our young resemble their young more than our adults resemble theirs. This is measurable, and therefore not just my opinion.

And coincidentally, human children tend to look more like monkeys that their parents do.

What!! I am sorry but I don't see that either. But the pic is nice. I love baby gorillas or baby anything really.

Then you'll love this, and you'll get a chance to see what I doubt you've ever looked for.

The televised special was pretty good, if you're into that whole love of natural science thing like I am.

I love nature and science does that count?

Yes. One of the scientists in this group, Christine Diaz, is a taxonomist. Her job of observing marine life in the wild, (to classify them) requires her to spend most of her time in a bikini on her schooner when she isn't scuba diving the coral reefs of some tropical island chain. Now how would you like to have that job?

 

[mark kennedy]

You asked me for a beginning to the story of life, an explanation for the origin of the first replicative DNA proteins. So I showed you that Dr. Senapathy has one for sale.

Actually I quoted Senapathy to demonstrate that the single common ancestor model cannot be demonstrated empirically. What he did was to abandon the progressive accumulation of traits and went on the assumption that the Eukayrote was fully formed originally.

 

[Aron-Ra]

In any case, as an organic RNA/DNA protein-based metabolic, metazoic, nucleic, diploid-celled bilaterally-symmetrical opisthokont with three germ layers, and a mouth joined to an anus by a "tube-within-a-tube" digestive fluid-filled body cavity, would you agree that you are accurately classified within the taxonomic branch of the animal kingdom called Bilateria?

Yes, as defined by man's classifications.

I'll assume Jay and Lilly's answer will be the same so that we may continue.

There are some bilateral animals that may not look bilateral, as they seem more like mosses or plants. But their bodies can still be divided left-to-right with equal sides. Most bilateral animals look like slugs, cucumbers, or worms. One group typically have multiple legs like caterpillars, and within that group are some with hard shells of keratin forming exoskeletons. These are the arthropods; insects, crustaceans, arachnids, and trilobites, etc. These have hearts which (again) appear to have been inherited from an ancestor shared in common.

All the various types of bilateral animals still fall within two basic types, which are each defined by a particular stage of their development. In all these animals, the blastopore, (the cavity that will become the digestive tract) develops internally, and eventually that internal cavity connects with an opening at one end of the animal, and then the other, completing the oral-to-anal passageway. In lophotrochozoans, ecdysozoans, and others, the mouth opens first, and the anus after that. But among one line of bilateral animals got it backwards. In deuterostomes, the anus is the first to open the connection to the blastopore, and the mouth makes the connection after that.

Now this is a strange thing to have in common with every single 'higher" life form. All other life, arthropods, mollusks, bryozoans, and brachiopods, (etc.) all develop a connection from the blastopore to the mouth first. This is without exception in any case we've seen so far. If they were specially-created, one might think that any of them could develop by some other means, or in some other order. Maybe snails would develop like mammals, and fish develop like squids, something like that, something that wouldn't indicate an inherited trait consistent with both the genetics and morphology of common ancestry. But that is never what we see. Everything in nature consistently adheres to everything we would expect of a chain of inherited variations carried down through flowering lines of descent. Starfish, urchins, acorn worms and every single thing that ever had a spinal chord all develop the opening for the anus first. Isn't that odd?

Now, its not so strange that some members of these three groups, (which seem so different) have this one peculiarity in common, even though their genetics do indicate their relationship. But what is significant is that absolutely every last one of the [presumed] descendants of these basal forms (tested to date) share this developmental peculiarity too. That's one of many indications of common ancestry so far. But wait, there's more!

One specific line of Deuterostomes is evidently very closely-related to another by virtue of two factors, both possess a single central nervous structure and even pharyngeal gill slits. However, one of these is a worm! This worm with a mouth, anus, heart and gills, (which aren't typical of any other worm) also has a sort of spinal chord almost like that of a real (fully-developed) spinal chord. The family name for these worms is Hemichordata, which means "half-chordate". Those looking for transitional species here need look no further.

But the fossil record bears still more examples for the origin of chordates from creatures like this. Tiny swimming worms have been identified from a particular cache of Cambrian (and pre-Cambrian) fossils in Canada's Burgess Shale. Some of these "worms" have teeth, (pretty serious ones too) even though they as yet have no jaws or places to mount jaws. One particular specimen called Pikaia is considered to be the oldest example of a true chordate. It is a sort of slender slug with a elaborate body-length fin for swimming, and a definite indication of a spinal chord, even though it didn't yet have a spine to keep it in.

Every single modern chordate we know of so far appears to be a deuterostome at the same time. So it is reasonable to assume that Pikaia developed that way too.

Once again, there certainly doesn't seem to be any separate origin for humans apart from other animals at any point. All these groups within groups are completely consistent with what we would expect as a result of evolution from a single universal common ancestor of all life. But if all life was individually and specially created, unrelated to each other, then all of these seemingly-inherited clades within clades would be reduced to a bizarre string of compiled coincidences, the like of which would extremely improbable and which could not otherwise be explained. Certainly no creationist (to my knowledge) has ever offered any explanation for these tiers of shared commonality.

God would certainly realize this. So if he did create humans separately, he went to great lengths to make sure it looked like he had allowed us to evolve instead. This raises a serious question about the Bible: Why would God write his guidebook in such a way that it seems to contradict the way in which he created the world? Why create life in such a way that it seems to completely counter the guidebook? The only answer I think likely in this case is that creation and the Bible came from different sources.

Oncedeceived, do you remember thinking that taxonomy was too simplistic? Do you still?

As an organic RNA/DNA protein-based, metabolic, metazoic, nucleic, diploid bilaterally-symmetrical, digestive, tryploblast, opisthokont, deuterostome coelemate, would you agree that you are accurately classified within the taxonomic phylum, Chordata based on the fact that you also have a spinal chord?

 

[Aron-Ra]

You have got to be putting me on, he thinks human being popped out of primordial soup?

Yes sir. He thinks that all living things including human beings accidentally assembled themselves from non-living chemicals, and strode out of the muck fully-formed.

Actually I quoted Senapathy to demonstrate that the single common ancestor model cannot be demonstrated empirically.

Yet that is exactly what I am doing. At the same time, I am showing that Senapathy is basically wrong.

 

[Oncedeceived]

I really don't sleep much. I can't seem to do anything on the computer until the kids are in bed and the TV is off. Otherwise, I can't think. [/font]
Thank you.

That's why I try to post in the morning before everyone wakes up.

 

[Oncedeceived]

I really don't understand what you mean. In this case, I mean't "form", not "change". Phospholipid molecules have hydrophilic heads and hydrophobic tails. So they arrange themselves into automatically.

Yes, I agree but with what you previously said was that this happened accidently or for no apparant reason. At least that is how I felt you meant it.

No. I'm talking about the traits and functions which make the cell walls selectively permeable.

I see.

Sure. I'll go with that

That is twice that we have agreed so far.....interesting.

Since most evolutionists are Christians,

I think you meant most Christians are evolutionists but it was a nice though anyway.

I suppose they believe that already. Some intelligent design theorists like Michael Denton and Richard Colling now believe that too; that God created life, in its most basic form, and allowed it to go on from there. Both groups agree that life evolves and has been evolving for a long time. And both groups believe that life wasn't always here. So at some point, life either had to form by some string of fortuitous chemical circumstances, or it was formed by magic

See therein lies the problem. You and others think that it has to be one extreme or the other never once considering that there could be another option. Creation does not mean magic, it does not mean that a process has not occurred that mankind has labled evolution. On one hand you have the evolutionists (theist and secular alike) that feel the process is either 1. God set the whole ball rolling and stepped aside (Theist) or 2. There is no need for God and everything occurring was due to natural selection and environmental influences(secular. Any stepping over those lines creates chaos in both camps.

It either happened according to the laws of physics, or it didn't adhere to physical laws and happened miraculously instead. Either way, it couldn't have formed by changing alleles that weren't there yet. So until they were, it can't be considered evolution.

See case in point. It either had to be laws of physics or miracles. Has it occurred to you that God being the Creator and the originator of all intelligence would and could use such laws in His creation?

You asked me for a beginning to the story of life, an explanation for the origin of the first replicative DNA proteins. So I showed you that Dr. Senapathy has one for sale

I wasn't in the market. LOL I didn't really read the whole thing so I won't comment on the article.

This is true. Taoist or Shamanic creation concepts could be true. With some modifications, even some version of Hindu tradition could be true I suppose. But Biblical creationism still couldn't be.

I imagine that this will come up again in this thread but I want to give you my theory and hopefully you can at least see that I have a reasonable hypothesis regarding Genesis. But the time is not right for it now in this thread.

I prefer to think of it as a tumbleweed myself.

Yes, that is a good analogy.

I also accept most, if not all, of the concept of punctuated equilibrium, but I would still be considered a gradualist. I've debated this issue with staunch (dare I say) "followers" of Niles Eldredge. And I have yet to see anything which challenges the gradualist position. Even in cases of punctuated equilibrium, the changes are still quite gradual, much more so than anti-evolutionists and Eldredge supporters indicate them to be. That's why Ernst Mayr, one of the most respected "evolutionists" of all time, survived the punk eek controversy and remained a gradualist. But in answer to your question, yes. Evolution has rules, and definitely follows them without exception. But the rules I'm talking about aren't about how one depicts evolution on a chart or in a drawing. What I'm talking about is the taxonomic rule of inheritance; that all evolution is a matter of superficial changes compiled atop tiers of fundamental similarities.

But would you not agree that many of these tiers and fundamental similarities are unproven and many are assumed by pieced together information that has some elements unknown. To clarify, we see similarities with organisms and classify them accordingly but at times these classifications are very limiting and have become problematic. Case in point Kingdom has begun to be almost obsolete due to the advances of biology today.

The taxonomic classifications in fact sometimes contridict or do not correlate with the geological evidence.

Yes it does, completely. Don't you remember what a miracle is? It is something which is outside, beyond, even counter to the laws of physical reality.

No, that is one aspect to a miracle. A miracle can be within the scope of physical reality. Creation is not defined by the process of miraculous events that do not relate to the physical reality of our universe. Creation if defined would be the event that created the laws of our physical reality.

I personally think it didn't reverse the position, only the function. These flagellum simply pushed instead of pulled. But the alternative notion is not what you suggest either. If there is a definite front and back to cells, then the flagellum simply formed on the wrong side. That's all.

Eukaryotic flagella form at the tip, posing a problem with assembly. I mean how do you get all these proteins into the flagellum so that they get in the right formation? Many of the pieces are partly assembled at the base of the flagellum and then transported into the flagellum by a specialized pathway known as Intraflagellar Transport. The basic ingredients are a kinesin-II motor that shuttles precursors into the flagellum, a dynein motor and an IFT “raft” which carrys the material in/out of the flagellum.

So it can not "simply form on the wrong side".

The kinesin and dynein motors could be explained by gene duplication. Yet here we would seem to require concurrent duplications, as both motors are essential for flagellar assembly. If you knock out the kenesin-II (also known as fla10), no flagella assemble (the phenotype of called “bald”), as the machine for moving the material into the flagellum is missing. If you knock out the transport dynein, stumpy, non-functional flagella form, as material (including the kinesins) is not carried out of the flagella and so accumulate into a disordered tangle.

The evidence of this mutation is as follows: (1.) We know mutations happen randomly in nature, and that on rare occasions, they can be quite dramatic.

Although I agree that this is true, we can not always postulate any unexplained or unproven mechanism in evolution to this : mutations happen so it could happen... explanation. It is an equalivent of God of the Gaps only we replace God with evolution.

(2.) And we know that even dramatic mutations can be inherited, especially if they're of a beneficial nature. And a rear-mounted flagellum is more efficient in a fluid environment than a front-mounted one, so there certainly would be a selective advantage there.

Again we can always come up with an advantageous explantation which takes the place of actual evidence for such a event.

(3.) We know from traveling freak show attractions (among other things) that it is even possible to grow too many limbs, or for limbs to appear in the wrong place.

Yes this is true but the DNA for these "limbs" (or whatever) are already developed (established) within the organism. This is not the case with the flagellum.

(4.) And we know from early laboratory experiments on the genetics of flies that certain genes can be activated by a deliberate mutation to cause legs to grow out of the head instead of the thorax (for example). And these are significantly more complex animals which are much more dependant on integrity of the foundational structure to support their legs than are any single-celled organisms are for their elongated cillia.

As above we can cause this to happen but you must remember that we "intelligent designers" so to speak are manipulating the circumstances in these iinstances.

So for a flagellum to appear on the wrong side, or simply to work backwards is not a very big change. It may not even have been a change in position. Many of these cells, (including Ameobas) are surrounded by cillia.

As I have explained this is not probable.

5.) All plants and algae share the opposite configuration from microspores, choanoflagellates, and all their presumed descendants. But the protist groups could be of either (or neither) configuration being the most diverse, most ancient, and most basal of all eukaryote life-forms. So if there was a change such as I'm talking about, it had to have happened within that collective group.

It seems to me that there is a discrepancy in the geological evidence regarding when this would have happened. The fossil record does not support the time range for this change.

And (6.) the evidence that such a change did occur is in the fact that there are no known opisthokont plants or algae, but every last one of the descendants of microspores or choanoflagellates all maintain this trait consistently, whereas, if they were specially and separately created, they wouldn't have to.

But creation does not necessitate specially and separtely created organisms as you have implied.

Lions could be opisthokonts and tigers could be bikonts in that case. But that sort of thing is never ever what we see.

But if God created organisms in the way we see as exemplifed in the geological record we could assume that God created opistohkonts and bikonts and the creation of such does not necessitate anything other than what we do find.

I wasn't trying to answer that. I was answering your question about why I thought there were only fourteen protist kingdoms. Actually that's more than enough really, considering there is only one plant or animal kingdom.

I see, sorry.

They didn't "begin" to move. In communal organisms like Dictyostellium, they already could move. And each of your own cells is capable of respiring, and of expelling waste.

Now they do.

What they needed was something similar to a line of worker ants bringing them food and carrying away the waste. This system of involuntary circulation is so efficient that I think it could hardly be avoided forever, especially considering the manner in which these things eat. If dictyostellium encounters a food source smaller than itself, then it doesn't need to dissolve into its amoebic componants (which can all already move). Instead, it simply engulfs whatever it seeks to consume. Once the food is inside it, other cells milling about will be caked with it, and will inadvertently transport bits of it to other parts of the collective beastie.

But there is no evidence for this correct?

Whether you chose to see it or not, its still a fact.

A fact? Truth? I thought that you didn't feel that there was an absolute truth or fact. So if I say that I don't see it, that means I don't see that and to say that I don't "choose" to see it is meaningless. Correct?

This is measurable, and therefore not just my opinion.

Measurable in what way?

Then you'll love this, and you'll get a chance to see what I doubt you've ever looked for.

Dress up a monkey and see how it looks like a baby? I see simularity with monkeys. I see simularity in many creatures but to say that are babies are closer to gorillas or vice versa is opinion only.
That being said, I loved the pics. I found them adorable.

Yes. One of the scientists in this group, Christine Diaz, is a taxonomist. Her job of observing marine life in the wild, (to classify them) requires her to spend most of her time in a bikini on her schooner when she isn't scuba diving the coral reefs of some tropical island chain. Now how would you like to have that job?

Where do I sign up?

 

[Jet Black]

Dress up a monkey and see how it looks like a baby? I see simularity with monkeys. I see simularity in many creatures but to say that are babies are closer to gorillas or vice versa is opinion only.
That being said, I loved the pics. I found them adorable.

It is well worth noting actually that humans are in many respects neotenous great apes. a number of growth processes in humans are arrested at certain stages and never progress as they do in the other apes, such as the positioning of the foramen magnum, which does not drift as far round the back as in humans (if you look at the embryological progesses of other mammals and so on, you will notice that the foramen magnum starts at the base of the skull and drifts to the back. The length of the arms is also arrested. Add to this that we can see in the fossils how the change of structures such as the foot occur, becoming progressively more human.