Transitional fossils: What are they?

[Loudmouth]

So, just for my own understanding, you could have two fossils from the same transitional species (we will say it is just for the purposes of this statement, but that might be a whole 'nother bucket o worms) and if one fossil shows the parts decided to be transitional while the other is damaged and doesn't, one will be transitional, and the other won't.

Like if species X had a clear transition around frontal limb characteristics, say, fins to forelimbs. If fossil A was of this species and only contained the spine and the skull, while fossil B contained the spine, skull, AND forelimbs in question, B would be transitional, but A would not, despite being from the same species. Correct?

Metherion

Species X would be considered a transitional SPECIES while only fossil B would be considered a transitional FOSSIL.

 

[Meshach]

This is too funny, all this boasting and bragging about all the transitionals fossils there are and NO one can agree on what a transitional fossil is. Everyone has a different opinion. I truly understand the confusion though.
I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

 

[Pete Harcoff]

Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

This question is nonsensical.

a) First of all, "we" were never fish. Our distant (very distant) ancestors were.

a) Second of all, we have zero way of knowing if something is absolutely in any line of decent. The likelyhood is also extremely low, so much so that I would wager not one single fossil found is in the precise line of descent of anything contemporary.

c) Third of all, it's completely irrelevant. Fossils are representative of populations of life forms at any given period. And populations evolve, not individuals. We have fossils showing a progression from fish to land animals, therefore we know that life evolved from early fish to early land animals. Asking for specific fossils in an exact, specific line of descent is just silly.

 

[Pete Harcoff]

Species X would be considered a transitional SPECIES while only fossil B would be considered a transitional FOSSIL.

Exactly. This is precisely what I am getting at, differentiating between species and individual fossils. I think a lot of people mix the two. For example, many people refer to Archaeopteryx as a transitional fossil, when in fact there are several fossil specimens. It's a transitional species, based on findings of several transitional fossils.

 

[Thistlethorn]

This is too funny, all this boasting and bragging about all the transitionals fossils there are and NO one can agree on what a transitional fossil is. Everyone has a different opinion. I truly understand the confusion though.
I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

You should copy this post into your clipboard and then just paste it in every post you make. It's all you ever say anyway, and it'll save you some typing.

 

[AV1611VET]

--- I'm leaving this thread.

It's getting too technical.

 

[Loudmouth]

I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

You have things way out of whack. You need to understand how science works. Fossils are a TEST for the theory of evolution. The theory states that terrestrial tetrapods like ourselves share a common ancestor with lobed finned fish. This means that the theory predicts that in the past there should have existed a species that has features of both lobed finned fish and terrestrial tetrapods. That's exactly what we observe in the fossil record in such species as Tiktallik rosae, Icthyostega, and Acanthostega. They are even found in the correct strata which is the Devonian. Before the Devonian no terrestrial tetrapods. After the Devonian a whole bunch of tetrapods.

Fossils don't come with birth certificates, but they do have morphology which one can use to test the theory of evolution.

 

[MoonLancer]

This is too funny, all this boasting and bragging about all the transitional fossils there are and NO one can agree on what a transitional fossil is. Everyone has a different opinion. I truly understand the confusion though.
I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

your asking for a fossil that shows a transition of two organisms that are very far apart from eachother. You want to place then this fossil in between and want it to be the fossil that shows this transition. It would be just as hard to show a letter in between A and Z.

We in turn show you fossal M. You in turn say that this is in between L and N and L and N are nothing like A and Z.

Only now imagain that every generation of creature is slightly different then the generation before it and after. Fossal gaps has an almost infinite regress.

and you ask for a fossil to prove the huge span of time it took for fish to evolve into humans. It wont happen, because you cant even accept that apes evolved into humans which is a much smaller change.

 

[sbvera13]

Defining a transitional fossil is rather like finding the corners on a circle. Look at the following image:

Now, draw a line exactly between black and white. One one side of this line, everything will be black. On the other side, everything will be white.

Can you do it?

Looking at the fossil record is much like this. Imagine the image represents an animal population. Every pixel represents an individual. Black and white represent two species. Where does one end and the other begin? Which pixels are transitional and which ones aren't?

If you had one pixel, and only one, you could probably tell which end of the image it was closer to. You could tell roughly how far away from either end it was. You could probably even give a name to it's exact shade. But that one pixel is no more, or less, transitional then any of the others. It just happens to be the only one you have. That is how judging fossils works.

 

[Split Rock]

This is too funny, all this boasting and bragging about all the transitionals fossils there are and NO one can agree on what a transitional fossil is. Everyone has a different opinion. I truly understand the confusion though.
I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

We have such transitional groups, and I mentioned a couple in the other thread.
Fishapods
Early reptiles
Mammal-like reptiles
Early primates
Hominids

Not that you care. You will continue to mock and scoff in ignorance. If I had a dime for every time you repeated "oh, this is too funny," regardless of what the poster wrote, I'd be rich.

 

[Split Rock]

Defining a transitional fossil is rather like finding the corners on a circle. Look at the following image:

Now, draw a line exactly between black and white. One one side of this line, everything will be black. On the other side, everything will be white.

Can you do it?

Looking at the fossil record is much like this. Imagine the image represents an animal population. Every pixel represents an individual. Black and white represent two species. Where does one end and the other begin? Which pixels are transitional and which ones aren't?

If you had one pixel, and only one, you could probably tell which end of the image it was closer to. You could tell roughly how far away from either end it was. You could probably even give a name to it's exact shade. But that one pixel is no more, or less, transitional then any of the others. It just happens to be the only one you have. That is how judging fossils works.

The thing is, we only have found a few parts of that continuum. Usually, it is those "pixels" that show clear characteristics of two different taxonomical groups (like aves or cetaceans, etc.) that are referred to as "transitional." I admit, however, the term "group" here is very flexible.

 

[sbvera13]

It works (I hope) as a basic demonstration of a continuum. The fine details of taxonomy are a little complicated to teach on an internet board

 

[tanzanos]

This is too funny, all this boasting and bragging about all the transitionals fossils there are and NO one can agree on what a transitional fossil is. Everyone has a different opinion. I truly understand the confusion though.
I already know your responses to this post so save yourself some time if you like. Are there any transitional fossils that are most certainly, without a doubt , smoking gun proof, absolutely in the line of Homo sapien back when we were a fish? If you dont know for sure, then dont you have to guess, hope or have faith?

One thing is for sure, so long as mutations occur; then Evolution will continue. This means that all life is in a transitional state.

 

[MoonLancer]

now the question is how many grey scale swatches do you need to show the transition from white to black? 5? 6? 3? well not nearly as many as the total possible on a computer which is 255.

now lets assume that there is 1 trillion steps from white to black. One could still show a transition from white to black or vise versa with a few swatches.

And this is why creationists will never understand evolution. They are looking for evidence of the strawman they invented. the funny thing is, if they found a fishman, that might just disprove evolution.

 

[AV1611VET]

If you had one pixel, and only one, you could probably tell which end of the image it was closer to. You could tell roughly how far away from either end it was. You could probably even give a name to it's exact shade. But that one pixel is no more, or less, transitional then any of the others. It just happens to be the only one you have. That is how judging fossils works.

That's a very good description of what I've been saying all along, sbvera.

Evolution, in this case, has what --- maybe 20 pixels?

And no two pixels next to each other at that (or rather, one over the other, in your vertical display).

And they claim that all 20 pixels are interconnected into one analog movie from top to bottom.

Well --- in my opinion --- evolution is a cheap fps movie that isn't worth watching.

 

[AV1611VET]

now lets assume that there is 1 trillion steps from white to black. One could still show a transition from white to black or vise versa with a few swatches.

Exactly ---

Now assume that time itself, i.e. your 14 billion years, is comprised of only 900 billion seconds.

You'll run out of actors in this movie, before you run out of frames.

 

[godsmission]

AV you are going to believe what you want no matter what the truth is because you are religious, religious means believing and having faith in something that can not be shown to be true hence the need for faith and a belief, if it could be shown to be true faith and a belief would not be needed, creationists want to have their cake and eat it, it just can not be done, you can try but you will fail every time.

 

[tanzanos]

That's a very good description of what I've been saying all along, sbvera.

Evolution, in this case, has what --- maybe 20 pixels?

And no two pixels next to each other at that (or rather, one over the other, in your vertical display).

And they claim that all 20 pixels are interconnected into one analog movie from top to bottom.

Well --- in my opinion --- evolution is a cheap fps movie that isn't worth watching.

OK! Here goes: Free drinks to you if you can show me the logical sequence by filling in the unknown numbers. (remember no cheating here, just simple arithmetic will suffice):

*
2
*
*
*
*
*
*
9
*
*
*
*
*
15

etc. ad infinitum

 

[Aggie]

That's a very good description of what I've been saying all along, sbvera.

Evolution, in this case, has what --- maybe 20 pixels?

And no two pixels next to each other at that (or rather, one over the other, in your vertical display).

And they claim that all 20 pixels are interconnected into one analog movie from top to bottom.

Well --- in my opinion --- evolution is a cheap fps movie that isn't worth watching.

Are you saying that it’s around 20 intermediate steps for all evolutionary transitions put together, or 20 intermediate steps for each of them? If the latter is what you mean, that’s about right, and post #3 shows 14 of them for the transition between apes and humans. I could provide a similar number for the transition between dinosaurs and birds. But 14 to 20 of them really ought to be enough, considering the gaps between each “pixel” and the next generally aren’t greater than the gaps between animals that creationists already regard as being related to one another, due to being members of the same “kind”.

How many intermediate steps would you need to see in an evolutionary transition before you’d be willing to admit that it actually happened?

 

[Pete Harcoff]

Defining a transitional fossil is rather like finding the corners on a circle. Look at the following image:

<snip>

Now, draw a line exactly between black and white. One one side of this line, everything will be black. On the other side, everything will be white.

Evolutionary change, however, isn't so smooth. So you might get a period of just white or black (i.e. little change) with relatively short periods of rapid evolutionary change. It's those shorter periods of change in which finding transitional fossils is key.