Posted on 02/02/2005 6:19:41 PM PST by curiosity
Please don't post long silly rants by ICR. They carry no scientific weight whatsoever and are totally bankrupt theologically.
Ping
You should read the fine scientific analysis by ICR, it is some of the best stuff on the net that explains the errors of evolution.
The ICR is filled with accredited scientists that are brilliant and have proven themselves in industry and the sciences, achieved doctorates in their fields and published many papers and patents.
And, they happen to be right.
aint no crypto involved, just read it and believe it. :)
Then, knowing that we're not interested in your guru's material, you are deliberately being obnoxious by posting that stuff. Way to gain converts.
If you actually would read what is posted, you might learn something.
And, the comments you just wrote are what is making this thread devolve, not my long articles...although I admit they were too long and I'll stop.
A discussion is much more interesting if you stick to the topic and make arugments in your own words, rather than cutting and pasting massive amounts of someone else's writing that is so long, no one can respond to it.
At the very least, provide a link instead of just dumping text.
AS A TRANSITIONAL FORM ARCHAEOPTERYX WON'T FLY
- IMPACT No. 195 September 1989
by Duane T. Gish, Ph.D.*
© Copyright 2004 Institute for Creation Research. All Rights Reserved.
There is a growing consensus that Archaeopteryx, a bird whose fossils have been found in the Solnhofen Plattenkalk of Franconia (West Germany), was indeed capable of flight. The claim, however, that Archaeopteryx was a transitional form between reptiles and birds simply won't fly.
Recent fossil discoveries and recent research on Archaeopteryx argue strongly against the suggestion that it is transitional between reptiles and birds. The rocks in which fossils of Archaeopteryx have been found are designated Upper Jurassic, and thus are dated at about 150 million years on the standard evolutionary geological time scale. Ninety years ago, with reference to Archaeopteryx and to two other ancient birds, Ichthyornis and Hesperornis, Beddard declared, "So emphatically were all these creatures birds that the actual origin of Aves is barely hinted at in the structure of these remarkable remains."1 During the years since publication of Beddard's book, no better candidate as an intermediate between reptiles and birds has appeared, and so, in the eyes of its beholders, Archaeopteryx has become more and more reptile-like until it is now fashionable to declare that Archaeopteryx was hardly more than a feathered reptile. In 90 years, Archaeopteryx has thus evolved from a creature so emphatically bird-like its reptilian ancestry was barely hinted at into a creature some evolutionists declare to be nothing more than a reptile with feathers!
What is the true status of Archaeopteryx? Was it a transitional form between reptiles and birds? First, the general nature of the evidence: The sudden appearance, fully formed, of all the complex invertebrates (snails, clams, jellyfish, sponges, worms, sea urchins, brachiopods, trilobites, etc.) without a trace of ancestors, and the sudden appearance, fully formed, of every major kind of fish (supposedly the first vertebrates) without a trace of ancestors, proves beyond reasonable doubt that evolution has not occurred. Quarrels about disputable cases such as Archaeopteryx are really pointless. Furthermore, there are three other basically different types of flying creatures—flying insects, flying reptiles (now extinct), and flying mammals (bats). It would be strange, indeed, even incomprehensible, that millions of years of evolution of these three basically different types of flying creatures, each involving the remarkable transition of a land animal into a flying animal, would have failed to produce large numbers of transitional forms. If all of that evolution has occurred, our museums should contain scores, if not hundreds or thousands, of fossils of intermediate forms in each case. However, not a trace of an ancestor or transitional form has ever been found for any of these creatures!
Archaeopteryx had an impressive array of features that immediately identify it as a bird, whatever else may be said about it. It had perching feet. Several of its fossils bear the impression of feathers. These feathers were identical to those of modern birds in every respect. The primary feathers of non-flying birds are distinctly different from those of flying birds. Archaeopteryx had the feathers of flying birds,2 had the basic pattern and proportions of the avian wing, and an especially robust furcula (wishbone). Furthermore, there was nothing in the anatomy of Archaeopteryx that would have prevented it being a powered flyer.3 No doubt Archaeopteryx was a feathered creature that flew. It was a bird!
It has been asserted that Archaeopteryx shares 21 specialized characters with coelurosaurian dinosaurs.4 Research on various anatomical features of Archaeopteryx in the last ten years or so, however, has shown, in every case, that the characteristic in question is bird-like, not reptile-like. When the cranium of the London specimen was removed from the limestone and studied, it was shown to be bird-like, not reptile-like.5 Benton has stated that "details of the brain case and associated bones at the back of the skull seem to suggest that Archaeopteryx is not the ancestral bird, but an offshoot from the early avian stem."6 In this same paper, Benton states that the quadrate (the bone in the jaw that articulates with the squamosal of the skull) in Archaeopteryx was singleheaded as in reptiles. Using a newly devised technique, computed tomography, Haubitz, et al, established that the quadrate of the Eichstatt specimen of Archaepoteryx was double-headed and thus similar to the condition of modern birds,7 rather than single-headed, as stated by Benton.
L.D. Martin and co-workers have established that neither the teeth nor the ankle of Archaeopteryx could have been derived from theropod dinosaurs—the teeth being those typical of other (presumably later) toothed birds, and the ankle bones showing no homology with those of dinosaurs.8 John Ostrom, a strong advocate of a dinosaurian ancestry for birds, had claimed that the pubis of Archaeopteryx pointed downward—an intermediate position between that of coelurosaurian dinosaurs, which points forward, and that of birds, which points backward. A.D. Walker, in more recent studies, asserts that Ostrom's interpretation is wrong, and that the pubis of Archaeopteryx was oriented in a bird-like position.9 Further, Tarsitano and Hecht criticize various aspects of Ostrom's hypothesis of a dinosaurian origin of birds, arguing that Ostrom had misinterpreted the homologies of the limbs of Archaeopteryx and theropod dinosaurs.10
A.D. Walker has presented an analysis of the ear region of Archaeopteryx that shows, contrary to previous studies, that this region is very similar to the otic region of modern birds.11 J.R. Hinchliffe, utilizing modern isotopic techniques on chick embryos, claims to have established that the "hand" of birds consists of digits II, III and IV, while the digits of the "hand" of theropod dinosaurs consist of digits I, II, and III.
Scales are flat horny plates; feathers are very complex in structure, consisting of a central shaft from which radiate barbs and barbules. Barbules are equipped with tiny hooks which lock onto the barbs and bind the feather surface into a flat, strong, flexible vane. Feathers and scales arise from different layers of the skin. Furthermore, the development of a feather is extremely complex, and fundamentally different from that of a scale. Feathers, as do hairs, but unlike scales, develop from follicles. A hair,, however, is a much simpler structure than a feather. The developing feather is protected by a horny sheath, and forms around a bloody, conical, inductive dermal core. Not only is the developing feather sandwiched between the sheath and dermal core, it is complex in structure. Development of the cells that will become the mature feather involves complex processes. Cells migrate and split apart in highly specific patterns to form the complex arrangement of barbs and barbules.12
Philip Regal attempts to imagine how feathers may have developed from scales.13 Regal presents a series of hypothetical events whereby the elongation of body scales on reptiles, as an adaptive response to excessive solar heat, eventually produced feathers. What we are left to believe is that a series of genetic mistakes, or mutations, just happened somehow to result in a sequence of incredible events that not only converted a simple horny plate into the tremendously complex and marvelously engineered structure of a feather, but completely reorganized the simple method of development of a scale into the highly complex process necessary to produce a feather. What an incredible faith in the blind forces of evolution! Regal's paper simply adds another "Just-so" story to evolutionary scenarios, completely devoid of empirical support.
Recent events cast even further doubt on Archaeopteryx as a transitional form. If the claims of Sankar Chatterjee prove to be valid, then certainly Archaeopteryx could not be the ancestral bird, and dinosaurs could not be ancestral to birds. Chatterjee and his co-workers at Texas Tech University claim to have found two crow-sized fossils of a bird near Post, Texas, in rocks supposedly 225 million years old—thus allegedly 75 million years older than Archaeopteryx and as old as the first dinosaurs. Totally contrary to what evolutionists would expect for such a fossil bird, however, Chatterjee claims that his bird is even more bird-like than Archaeopteryx! In contrast to Archaeopteryx, this bird had a keel-like breastbone and hollow bones. In most other respects, it was similar to Archaeopteryx.14 If evolutionary assumptions are correct, this bird should have been much more reptile-like than Archaeopteryx. In fact, he shouldn't even exist!
Another threat to the notion that Archaeopteryx was intermediate between reptiles and birds are the claims of Sir Fred Hoyle, the famous British astronomer, fellow astronomer Chandra Wickramasinghe, and Israeli scientist Lee Spetner, based on detailed photographic evidence, that Archaeopteryx is a fraud.15,16 They maintain that an artificial matrix was placed on a reptilian fossil and that modern feathers were used to impress the matrix, to leave a likeness of fossil feathers. Scientists of the British Museum of Natural History have defended the authenticity of the fossil.17 If the allegations of Hoyle, Wickramasinghe, and Spetner turn out to be correct, it would be a devastating blow to evolutionists. If the fossil is a forgery, however, it would have to be a devilishly clever one, because the forger would not only have to fake the feathers, but also somehow emplace the many bird-like features described in this article.
The conclusion which appears to be most reasonable is that Archaeopteryx was a true bird, remarkably isolated from any alleged reptilian progenitor and other birds. A discussion of other features of Archaeopteryx, such as its teeth and clawed wings, may be found in Evolution: The Challenge of the Fossil Record.18
FOOTNOTES at this link: had to keep this short::
http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-195.htm
Creatinoid Hand waving
It's not "and besides". "Bird hipped dinosaurs" and birds developed "bird-hips" (actually a rearward pointing pubis bone) for the same reason: to tuck the digestive system into the pelvis and move the Centre of Gravity aft.
Without that, a vegetarian dino has to be quadripedal. With their smaller gut, carnivorous dinos don't need that, but they do need to get rid of the tail for efficient flying. Not only the weight, but a long reptile tail prevents stall-landings.
Parallel evolution: Form follows function, same as dolphins and ichthyosaurs
People have read it and responded to it on countless other threads. That's why it grows so tiresome.
If people won't follow the link and read it for the 10th time, what makes you think they'll read it for the 10th time if you post it?
It doesn't really matter. No one, arriving now in this thread, is going to wade through all that junk. You posted a very good, thoughtful article, and things were going very nicely. Then ... well, as I said, it doesn't matter.
I make that I'm wrong. Gen 2:19 in King James makes it sound like God made the animals as he was bringing them before Adam. But the Revised Standard Version is clearer on tense and God was bringing the animals before Adam that God had already made.
The animals were made before Adam. However, you still have the problem of Eve. If God put Adam to sleep and removed a rib and then closed his flesh to create Eve. Then clearly Eve did not evolve.
It does grow tiresome that people still believe inthe fairy tale of evolution, yes, I admit that, despite the science that is presented against it.
And, most importantly, how much the Word OF God speaks against it.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/1334745/posts
I have already posted things in my own words, and the people here refuse to address that with any integrity, they just call names or whatever...(sigh)
So, I responded with spam.
sorry.
Tomorrow, if I bother at all. Actually, much has been rebutted already on this thread. Kinda clueless to post a point after it has already been shot to bits.
That's Creation Science: bludgeoning with how clueless you can be.
You can tell, sometimes, just how much an article hurts. If it elicits a whirlwind of fury, you have struck a nerve.
What few real scientists there are at ICR are not biologists and have no clue what evolution is about.
Some of the credentials of ICR "scientists":
Richard Bliss, formerly a member of the ICR staff, claimed to be "a recognized expert in the field of science education" and was co-author of a "two-model" book that creationists have pushed for use in the public school system.
Bliss claimed to earn a D.Ed. from the University of Sarasota in 1978. A previous version of this article described the university as a "diploma mill operating out of a Florida motel" as late as 1984. However, the university's status has since improved. The University of Sarasota was accredited in 1990 by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to grant masters and doctoral degrees. According to the 1997 edition of Bears' Guide to Earning College Degrees Nontraditionally [1], a student's total residency at the University of Sarasota can be as short as six weeks.
Clifford Burdick, a researcher for the Creation Research Society and a member of the Creation-Science Research Center, is a "flood" geologist who has spent forty years trying to prove that giant humans once roamed the earth and even mingled with the dinosaurs.
Burdick has displayed a copy of his Ph.D. from the University of Physical Sciences (Phoenix, Arizona) in Carl Baugh's Glen Rose Creation Evidence Museum. According to Ronald Numbers' The Creationists [2]: "[Creationist Walter Lammerts'] inquiries revealed the University of Physical Science to be nothing more than a registered trademark. As described in its memographed bulletin, 'The University is not an educational institution, but a society of individuals of common interest for the advancement of physical science. There are no campus, professors or tuition fee.'"
Harold S. Slusher, formerly of the Institute for Creation Research, is best known for his critiques of radiometric dating techniques. He is also known for the rather bizarre suggestion that the universe is much smaller than it appears, because its geometry is Riemannian as opposed to Euclidean.
Slusher claims to hold an honorary D.Sc. from Indiana Christian University and a Ph.D. in geophysics from Columbia Pacific University. Robert Schadewald discovered that Indiana Christian University is a Bible College with only a 1/2 man graduate science department. As for Columbia Pacific, it "exhibits several qualities of a degree mill" [3]. Ronald Numbers describes CPU as
an unaccredited correspondence school that recruited students with the lure of a degree "in less than a year." Slusher's dissertation consisted of a manila folder containing copies of five memographed ICR "technical monographs" and a copy of the ICR graduate school catalog, all held together with a rubber band. The supervising professor was his creationist colleague from El Paso and the ICR, [Thomas] Barnes, who himself possessed only an honorary doctorate. [2]
According to Bears' Guide [1], Columbia Pacific was denied its application for state license renewal in early 1996 for undisclosed reasons. The university appealed the decision in late 1996, but the appeal had not been acted upon by the time Bears' Guide went to press.
Additionally, so far as I can tell, not one ICR, AIG or DI "scholar" has a published peer reviewed scientific paper refuting evolution in any reputable scientific journal.
There is no science in creationism.
I believe the fossil record shows that flowering plants are actually a very recent development, perhaps starting in the last 60 million years or so.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.