That is nice that a newspaper article can count for empirical evidence but that my links to two scientific studies and published papers are people’s opinions in quotes (evolutionary scientist’s papers BTW). Just so the ground rules are known to all.
From the Post-Gazette. Is that scientifically peer reviewed?
Nevertheless, from the article.....
“could be”, “apparently”, “We were very puzzled about how to interpret”, “suggests that”, “It could be”, “It could be”, “There’s no real way to know”, “This suggests”, “It could be”, “it appears”
And the best comment from the article..... “Paleontologists always used to search for the common ancestor of all mammals, Wyss said, but it has become obvious that there’s no way of proving what animal might be that ancestor. So now the tendency is to identify creatures such as Hadrocodium as close relatives, he said, and not worry about whether it is a direct ancestor.”