More About Another Transitional Fossil

[exchemist]

This work sheds further light on the "transition" from dinosaurs to modern birds. It involves a previously known creature with a toothed beak, called ichthyornis. New analysis involving 3D imaging has revealed that it had a beak and brain looking like modern birds, but other features of the skull are like dinosaurs. I found the following comments interesting:

" The beaks of these primitive birds were very small and seem to have been evolving to take over some of the functions of the hand, like manipulating food and cleaning the feathers, that became impossible once the hands were incorporated into the wing," he said.

"This helps show that the evolution of birds from dinosaurs was a long and gradual process - it didn't just happen overnight, and for much of the Age of Dinosaurs there would have existed these creatures that looked half-dinosaur, half-bird."

BBC report here: How birds got their beaks

 

[Sunstone]

I protest! I strongly resent the current slew of efforts to peg me as "transitional". Oh wait....you're talking about real fossils. Carry on.

 

[corynski]

Fascinating, yes, the structure of evolution must be learned by all..... And how it works. It's really is difficult to imagine the long, long time periods associated with evolution, our minds can hardly do it. The Bible talks about a God 'creating' this universe a couple of thousand years ago, 3 or 4 I think, but in reality we're talking about hundreds and hundreds of thousands of years in which everything slowly changes, or 'evolves'. So first I suggest permitting your minds to learn and believe something other than what your culture taught you, such as evolution, that gets you into the real world. And I think a classic example of evolution is Darwin's 'Finches', on the Galapagos Islands off South America. There, in isolation, the beaks of the Finches slowly changed, they evolved into other forms, some of which were better adapted at acquiring a certain kind of insect, others were not. Those that did, survived and thrived, the others did not. Adaptations follow other worldly changes, such as the famous dinosaur extinctions following an asteroid collision, which wiped them all out and permitted other creatures to express themselves.

 

[Audie]

Fascinating, yes, the structure of evolution must be learned by all..... And how it works. It's really is difficult to imagine the long, long time periods associated with evolution, our minds can hardly do it. The Bible talks about a God 'creating' this universe a couple of thousand years ago, 3 or 4 I think, but in reality we're talking about hundreds and hundreds of thousands of years in which everything slowly changes, or 'evolves'. So first I suggest permitting your minds to learn and believe something other than what your culture taught you, such as evolution, that gets you into the real world. And I think a classic example of evolution is Darwin's 'Finches', on the Galapagos Islands off South America. There, in isolation, the beaks of the Finches slowly changed, they evolved into other forms, some of which were better adapted at acquiring a certain kind of insect, others were not. Those that did, survived and thrived, the others did not. Adaptations follow other worldly changes, such as the famous dinosaur extinctions following an asteroid collision, which wiped them all out and permitted other creatures to express themselves.

You are off by a bit. Try multiplying by a thousand

 

[corynski]

You are off by a bit. Try multiplying by a thousand

Greetings Audie...... Yes, I never have the numbers at my fingertips. And of course they also say that 95% of created species have also gone extinct. All of this gets beyond my imagination, but I do sincerely believe that about everything evolves thru time, whatever that is.......
I try to make some noise without getting ejected, as I really believe that after all those aeons..... after all that time evolving, only recently have we had the mental agility to comprehend something other than gods and goddesses. Or have not been threatened with non-existence if we didn't believe the dominant local beliefs......

 

[exchemist]

You are off by a bit. Try multiplying by a thousand

I suppose strictly speaking that depends on the complexity of the organism, and the trait that is evolving. My wife's cancer eventually evolved resistance to carboplatin after about six years. But then it was both mutating and reproducing abnormally fast of course, compared to normal tissue, and carboplatin represented a very powerful environmental stress for it to respond to. For a complex set of features such as a beak, in an organism as complex as a dinosaur, then clearly yes we have to be talking about millions of years - as the fossil record indeed seems to show.

 

[metis]

The reality is that all current life forms that will reproduce are in reality "transitional" forms-- posted by one whom is old enough-- er, I mean mature enough-- to be a fossil.

 

[Audie]

Greetings Audie...... Yes, I never have the numbers at my fingertips. And of course they also say that 95% of created species have also gone extinct. All of this gets beyond my imagination, but I do sincerely believe that about everything evolves thru time, whatever that is.......
I try to make some noise without getting ejected, as I really believe that after all those aeons..... after all that time evolving, only recently have we had the mental agility to comprehend something other than gods and goddesses. Or have not been threatened with non-existence if we didn't believe the dominant local beliefs......

And hello to you too!

I wonder why you say "created"?

The actual number would be far higher than 95%
That figure would be about right for what happened just
at the end of the Permian. (I found one time a little fragment of jaw
with three teeth, from a Phytosaur, a now long extinct
crocodile-like Permian reptile)

 

[Audie]

The reality is that all current life forms that will reproduce are in reality "transitional" forms-- posted by one whom is old enough-- er, I mean mature enough-- to be a fossil.

I dont really buy the "we are all transitional". For one, I do not plan
to "transition"!

While I think the "punctuated equilibrium" thing has gotten far too much play,
it does seem to me to be the case that many organisms are very very stable-
if you are waiting for a ginko tree to try something new, it looks to be a waste
of time.

If tho you were to set rats loose on a continent with no other mammals
I'd think that in, say, 5, 10 million years you would find that there were
still rats, but also wolf-like carnivores, big heavy body herbivores, aaquatic
and tree dwelling mammals, all descended from the original rats.

With, of course, a great many then-extinct species in between.

Meantime the rats in NYC, should it still be here, would not have
changed.

 

[metis]

I dont really buy the "we are all transitional". For one, I do not plan
to "transition"!

I tend to think you may have misunderstood what I was saying or maybe that I just didn't make myself clear. When I said "transitional", I was referring to reproduction.

 

[Audie]

I tend to think you may have misunderstood what I was saying or maybe that I just didn't make myself clear. When I said "transitional", I was referring to reproduction.

No, I understood it fine.

I hear the word "transitional" so much
now, referring to something involving
hormones and surgery is all.

Of course, none of us are an exact
copy of our parents, what with
recombination, gene expression
and a few mutations tossed in.

But it is not necessarily going somewhere,
as the word transition implies.

 

[Audie]

The reality is that all current life forms that will reproduce are in reality "transitional" forms-- posted by one whom is old enough-- er, I mean mature enough-- to be a fossil.

I wonder if there would be a market for burial in a place where one
could count on becoming a fossil.

 

[metis]

But it is not necessarily going somewhere,
as the word transition implies.

As long as a species keeps reproducing, it will go somewhere because evolution never stops-- nothing remains the same.

 

[exchemist]

I wonder if there would be a market for burial in a place where one
could count on becoming a fossil.

A nice thought. Where I live, one can only get a burial plot guaranteed free from disturbance for 40 years after interment.

 

[Audie]

As long as a species keeps reproducing, it will go somewhere because evolution never stops-- nothing remains the same.

Then perhaps we should look at what might
actually be meant by the word "transitional".
The creationists have their own notions, of course.

Such as that there are transitional forms between
the created dog-kind, and, the poodle. They will
accept that. But, a dog-kind will always be a dog-kind,
and never transition to some other kind.

They even speak of transition between phyla, when
saying what evolution is claimed to be, and what
it could not possibly actually do.

Now to what you are saying. Is it your contention that
wolf, say, is busy transitioning into something
that is not a wolf, and there is no stopping it?

How about our common house-fly? I submit that
they are functionally perfect, and any change
would soon disappear as non-adaptive.

Better still, ye horseshoe crab? Oldest fossil
is well over 400 million years old. They
do not seem to have been going anywhere
very fast.

If they are transitioning as you suggest, then
what is the nature of this transition?

 

[Audie]

A nice thought. Where I live, one can only get a burial plot guaranteed free from disturbance for 40 years after interment.

Burial at sea seems to make sense, tho a canvas bag
to keep the crabs out is kind of mean.

 

[exchemist]

Burial at sea seems to make sense, tho a canvas bag
to keep the crabs out is kind of mean.

Sure you don't mean to keep the crabs in?

 

[David1967]

70000000 years ago dinosaurs went 'Roar!' Today, they go Bok, Bok, or tweet tweet.

 

[David1967]

I found one time a little fragment of jaw
with three teeth, from a Phytosaur, a now long extinct
crocodile-like Permian reptile

I am jealous. There was just such a jawbone (partial) from the Permian found about five miles from where I sit right now. It is currently in the Sam Noble museum in Norman Oklahoma. I would be ecstatic if I found that.

 

[metis]

Then perhaps we should look at what might
actually be meant by the word "transitional".
The creationists have their own notions, of course.

Such as that there are transitional forms between
the created dog-kind, and, the poodle. They will
accept that. But, a dog-kind will always be a dog-kind,
and never transition to some other kind.

They even speak of transition between phyla, when
saying what evolution is claimed to be, and what
it could not possibly actually do.

Now to what you are saying. Is it your contention that
wolf, say, is busy transitioning into something
that is not a wolf, and there is no stopping it?

How about our common house-fly? I submit that
they are functionally perfect, and any change
would soon disappear as non-adaptive.

Better still, ye horseshoe crab? Oldest fossil
is well over 400 million years old. They
do not seem to have been going anywhere
very fast.

If they are transitioning as you suggest, then
what is the nature of this transition?

You're nit-picking what I was saying while not looking at its context. IOW, all forms that reproduce are in essence "transitional forms" because evolution never stops.