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From: js2j@mhuxt.UUCP (sonntag)
Newsgroups: net.origins
Subject: Re: EnGardaeopteryx  (part 4 of 6)
Message-ID: <620@mhuxt.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 25-Feb-85 14:24:54 EST
Article-I.D.: mhuxt.620
Posted: Mon Feb 25 14:24:54 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 27-Feb-85 07:47:33 EST
References: <732@uwmacc.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Murray Hill
Lines: 35

Paul Dubois, writing on the (mistaken) idea that when a new specie 
evolves, all members of the parent specie must die out:
> Evolutionists developed the idea.  Some evolutionists realize this, some
> (as, apparantly, Bill) do not.  Some creationists realize this, some do
> not.  Some creationists realize that it is not necessary to evolutionary
> theory, some do not.
> 
> But whether the idea is true or not, it *is* the case that a number of
> proposed intermediates have been rejected as such (by evolutionists) on
> the basis of EXACTLY the above reasoning:  a form is not transitional to
> another form if it exists contemporaneously with it.  Lungfish, for
> example.  My beloved coelecanth, for another.  Archaeopteryx is under
> the same pressure since the discovery of other fossils which are clearly
> birds contemporary to it.
     It really doesn't matter *who* has accepted the idea that a form is not
transitional to another form if they exist contemporaneously.  The idea simply
doesn't stand up to examination.   Archaeopteryx may or may not have been
the link between reptiles and birds, but the fact that Archaeopteryx hadn't
died out before birds developed HELPS TO SUPPORT THE IDEA THAT ARCHAEOPTERYX
was the parent specie.  Birds could hardly have developed from Arch. if Arch.
had died out before birds developed.  It's almost a tautology.  Yet Paul
tries to get us to deny the possibility of Arch.'s intermediate status
(not solely) on the basis of it's contemporaneousness with birds, a fact
which actually *lends support to* it's intermediate status!
     Just what would you require of an intermediate specie between birds
and reptiles, Paul?  You criticized Arch.'s feathers as being almost
identicle with modern bird feathers.  You want maybe some sort of useless
half-feather?  Why would something like that be selected for?  Why would
you expect a specie with useless features to survive long enough to leave
any kind of fossil record?
-- 
Jeff Sonntag
ihnp4!mhuxt!js2j
     "Have SEX with a beautiful, LIVE girl!"  - from a pamphlet from the church
						of the subgenius.