Origins Thread

[Tiger]

For the love of fucking God.. If anyone was "trolling", it would be you, but you're not, you're just incredibly fucking dense. Why are we on the, what, twentieth post now and you still haven't moved an inch towards acknowledging your mistakes? Do that, instead of blabbing about "tedium", "pedantry" and now "trolling"

So that’s a no then.

@mods can you threadban this troll from this thread please?

 

[PlunkettsGhost]

Proposed Origins of The Whale - Part One

It's a detailed subject, so you will have to excuse the long posts. These are from notes I composed some time back, in order to get a better sense of the nonsense for myself:



I would like now to expose the very shaky foundations on which the supposed whale Family tree Lies.

1966 was the year it was first tentatively proposed that Archaeocetes, a supposed early precursor to whales, evolved from Mesonychids, an ancient carnivorous Land animal. Both Dissacus and Ankalagon were the only mesonychids known at the time and were thought too well developed evolution wise to be anything other than a sister group the the archaeocetes.

Three more genera of middle Paleocene mesonychids have since been identified but consist only of fragmented cranium pieces. One also has lower jaw fragments(Hukoutherium).

However no one has suggested any of these genera for ancestor of the archaeocetes, and thus mesonychids continue to be classified as a "sister group" to the archaeocetes.

In 1997 one Robert L. Carroll, in his book, Patterns and Processes of Vertebrate Evolution, stated: "It is not possible to identify a sequence of mesonychids leading directly to whales".

In actuality It is not even possible to identify a single ancestral species. Mesonychids are excluded from the actual chain of descent by the evolutionary criteria.

Evolutionists believe that mesonychids evolved into archaeocetes, despite the inability to identify any species in the actual lineage, because mesonychids and archaeocetes have some surface similarities.

These similarities, however, are not enough to make the case for ancestry, especially in light of the even greater differences. The subjective nature of such comparisons is evident from the fact so many groups of mammals and even reptiles have been suggested as ancestral to whales.

Leigh Van Allen,the man who originally proposed the mesonychid relationship, based his ideas on the most general of similarities. Van Allen stated that :"Many features of the skull of Protocetus, an early archaeocete, are not similar to those of either the Hyaenodontidae or the Mesonychidae (or to any other terrestrial mammal known to me) and probably represent to a considerable extent a reorganization of the skull, the chain of effects resulting from adaptation to hearing, feeding, locomotion, and other functions in an aquatic existence"

This point was further noted by Edwin Colbert who said: “In
general this archaeocete skull appears as if it might have been derived from a mesonychid type, but there is little beyond certain general resemblances to support such a relationship."

Evolutionists next port of call on their explanatory tour of the origin of whales is that an amphibious archaeocete evolved into a fully marine archaeocete. It is believed that this
transformation is documented by a sequence of intermediate forms, what one
writer (Stephen J Gould) called the “sweetest series of transitional fossils an evolutionist could ever hope to find." This series includes Pakicetus inachus, Ambulocetus natans,
Rodhocetus kasrani, Indocetus ramani, Protocetus atavus, and Basilosaurus isis.

It is incumbent upon me to point out that, in calling these creatures a series of transitional fossils, the evolutionists dont mean that they form a lineage of ancestors and descendants.

In fact, they admit that these archaeocetes cannot be strung in procession from ancestor to descendant in a natural Ladder. What they mean is that these fossils show a
progressive development within Archaeoceti of some features found in the later, fully formed marine types such as Basilosaurus

The current proposed order of the archaeocetes, in terms of both
morphological and stratigraphical criteria, is:
Pakicetus, Ambulocetus, Rodhocetus, Indocetus,
Protocetus, and Basilosaurus. One problem oversight is that the stratigraphical relationships of most of these fossils are still open to debate.

To give just a brief example , Pakicetus inachus is dated to the late Ypresian, but experts acknowledge that it may date to the early Lutetian. In true evolutionist practice the stratigraphical arrangement in the standard scheme has been influenced by their morphology to create a tidy picture. (circular thinking)

Specialists admit there is a lack of clear ancestor to descendant
relationships from Protcetids to basilosaurids and in fact the immense size difference between the two casts doubt on the hypothesis. It has been calculated that, even in a rapidly evolving line, changes in size are usually on the order of only 1-10 percent per million years and this really precludes the evolution of the afore mentioned species.

Interestingly in the morphological similarity stakes some experts now believe Protocetus was fully marine, (remember if you will the embarrassment of evolutionists when live specimens of Coelacanth, once believed to be amphibious were found and proved to be in fact deep ocean dwellers) it is questionable whether the features of Basilosaurus can be characterized as more advanced.

With regards to the evolutionist claim that modern whales stem from archaeocetes, an area still under hot dispute, despite the conclusive claims some people like to make, the degrees of difference are even harder to bridge.

George Gaylord Simpson has this to say. "Thus the Archaeoceti, middle Eocene to early Miocene, are definitely the most primitive of cetaceans, but they can hardly have given rise to the other suborders. The Odontoceti, late Eocene to Recent, are on ahigher grade than the Archaeoceti and, on the average, lower than the Mysticeti, middle Oligocene to Recent, but apparently were not derived from the former and did not give rise to
the latter".

A. V. Yablokov, wrote, “It is now obvious to most investigators that Archaeoceti cannot be regarded as direct ancestral forms of the modern cetaceans."

Currently leading thinkers in the field believe that archaeocetes are ancestral to whales, but there is no agreement on which family of archaeocetes is involved. In fact, all three families (Protocetidae, Remingtonocetidae, and Basilosauridae) have been proposed.This is particularly revealing when one considers how radically different
Remingtonocetidae is from the other archaeocetes.

In addition, no Ladder of descent from archaeocetes to modern whales has been identified. The phylogenetic relationships among major lineages within the Cetacea continue to be very poorly understood which is why recent phylogenies are dominated by dead ends, broken lines, and question marks. As for Basilosaurus isis, it is generally recognized that Basilosaurinae was an isolated subfamily that had nothing to do with the origin of modern whales.



More recently molecular biologists say whales evolved from a cow-like (or hippo-like) artiodactyl.

Did you follow that logic? Don’t feel bad if you didn’t. It wasn’t very logical. Pakicetus has ankle bones just like artiodactyls, which are land mammals that run very well. This isn’t very surprising to us because Pakicetus was a land animal that could run very well. Pakicetus wasn’t a whale, or even remotely like a whale. But the name “Pakicetus” means “whale found in Pakistan" (wishful thinking).

Therefore, it is by definition, a cetacean (a whale). Since Pakicetus has arbitrarily been called a whale, and since it is related to the artiodactyls, therefore all whales evolved from artiodactyls. Anyway, that’s the logic.

 

[Zipporah's Flint]

Can you comprehend anything that's said to you? Anything at all?

Is that what you're like IRL, walking around with your fingers in your ears ranting and raving at anyone unfortunate enough to be in your vicinity?

Mod warning- Seriously even if you think people are being daft please do not resort to constant abuse. Other posters want to have a real discussion on this thread.

 

[Tiger]

Proposed Origins of The Whale - Part One

It's a detailed subject, so you will have to excuse the long posts. These are from notes I composed some time back, in order to get a better sense of the nonsense for myself:



I would like now to expose the very shaky foundations on which the supposed whale Family tree Lies.

1966 was the year it was first tentatively proposed that Archaeocetes, a supposed early precursor to whales, evolved from Mesonychids, an ancient carnivorous Land animal. Both Dissacus and Ankalagon were the only mesonychids known at the time and were thought too well developed evolution wise to be anything other than a sister group the the archaeocetes.

Three more genera of middle Paleocene mesonychids have since been identified but consist only of fragmented cranium pieces. One also has lower jaw fragments(Hukoutherium).

However no one has suggested any of these genera for ancestor of the archaeocetes, and thus mesonychids continue to be classified as a "sister group" to the archaeocetes.

In 1997 one Robert L. Carroll, in his book, Patterns and Processes of Vertebrate Evolution, stated: "It is not possible to identify a sequence of mesonychids leading directly to whales".

In actuality It is not even possible to identify a single ancestral species. Mesonychids are excluded from the actual chain of descent by the evolutionary criteria.

Evolutionists believe that mesonychids evolved into archaeocetes, despite the inability to identify any species in the actual lineage, because mesonychids and archaeocetes have some surface similarities.

These similarities, however, are not enough to make the case for ancestry, especially in light of the even greater differences. The subjective nature of such comparisons is evident from the fact so many groups of mammals and even reptiles have been suggested as ancestral to whales.

Leigh Van Allen,the man who originally proposed the mesonychid relationship, based his ideas on the most general of similarities. Van Allen stated that :"Many features of the skull of Protocetus, an early archaeocete, are not similar to those of either the Hyaenodontidae or the Mesonychidae (or to any other terrestrial mammal known to me) and probably represent to a considerable extent a reorganization of the skull, the chain of effects resulting from adaptation to hearing, feeding, locomotion, and other functions in an aquatic existence"

This point was further noted by Edwin Colbert who said: “In
general this archaeocete skull appears as if it might have been derived from a mesonychid type, but there is little beyond certain general resemblances to support such a relationship."

Evolutionists next port of call on their explanatory tour of the origin of whales is that an amphibious archaeocete evolved into a fully marine archaeocete. It is believed that this
transformation is documented by a sequence of intermediate forms, what one
writer (Stephen J Gould) called the “sweetest series of transitional fossils an evolutionist could ever hope to find." This series includes Pakicetus inachus, Ambulocetus natans,
Rodhocetus kasrani, Indocetus ramani, Protocetus atavus, and Basilosaurus isis.

It is incumbent upon me to point out that, in calling these creatures a series of transitional fossils, the evolutionists dont mean that they form a lineage of ancestors and descendants.

In fact, they admit that these archaeocetes cannot be strung in procession from ancestor to descendant in a natural Ladder. What they mean is that these fossils show a
progressive development within Archaeoceti of some features found in the later, fully formed marine types such as Basilosaurus

The current proposed order of the archaeocetes, in terms of both
morphological and stratigraphical criteria, is:
Pakicetus, Ambulocetus, Rodhocetus, Indocetus,
Protocetus, and Basilosaurus. One problem oversight is that the stratigraphical relationships of most of these fossils are still open to debate.

To give just a brief example , Pakicetus inachus is dated to the late Ypresian, but experts acknowledge that it may date to the early Lutetian. In true evolutionist practice the stratigraphical arrangement in the standard scheme has been influenced by their morphology to create a tidy picture. (circular thinking)

Specialists admit there is a lack of clear ancestor to descendant
relationships from Protcetids to basilosaurids and in fact the immense size difference between the two casts doubt on the hypothesis. It has been calculated that, even in a rapidly evolving line, changes in size are usually on the order of only 1-10 percent per million years and this really precludes the evolution of the afore mentioned species.

Interestingly in the morphological similarity stakes some experts now believe Protocetus was fully marine, (remember if you will the embarrassment of evolutionists when live specimens of Coelacanth, once believed to be amphibious were found and proved to be in fact deep ocean dwellers) it is questionable whether the features of Basilosaurus can be characterized as more advanced.

With regards to the evolutionist claim that modern whales stem from archaeocetes, an area still under hot dispute, despite the conclusive claims some people like to make, the degrees of difference are even harder to bridge.

George Gaylord Simpson has this to say. "Thus the Archaeoceti, middle Eocene to early Miocene, are definitely the most primitive of cetaceans, but they can hardly have given rise to the other suborders. The Odontoceti, late Eocene to Recent, are on ahigher grade than the Archaeoceti and, on the average, lower than the Mysticeti, middle Oligocene to Recent, but apparently were not derived from the former and did not give rise to
the latter".

A. V. Yablokov, wrote, “It is now obvious to most investigators that Archaeoceti cannot be regarded as direct ancestral forms of the modern cetaceans."

Currently leading thinkers in the field believe that archaeocetes are ancestral to whales, but there is no agreement on which family of archaeocetes is involved. In fact, all three families (Protocetidae, Remingtonocetidae, and Basilosauridae) have been proposed.This is particularly revealing when one considers how radically different
Remingtonocetidae is from the other archaeocetes.

In addition, no Ladder of descent from archaeocetes to modern whales has been identified. The phylogenetic relationships among major lineages within the Cetacea continue to be very poorly understood which is why recent phylogenies are dominated by dead ends, broken lines, and question marks. As for Basilosaurus isis, it is generally recognized that Basilosaurinae was an isolated subfamily that had nothing to do with the origin of modern whales.



More recently molecular biologists say whales evolved from a cow-like (or hippo-like) artiodactyl.

Did you follow that logic? Don’t feel bad if you didn’t. It wasn’t very logical. Pakicetus has ankle bones just like artiodactyls, which are land mammals that run very well. This isn’t very surprising to us because Pakicetus was a land animal that could run very well. Pakicetus wasn’t a whale, or even remotely like a whale. But the name “Pakicetus” means “whale found in Pakistan" (wishful thinking).

Therefore, it is by definition, a cetacean (a whale). Since Pakicetus has arbitrarily been called a whale, and since it is related to the artiodactyls, therefore all whales evolved from artiodactyls. Anyway, that’s the logic.

The Coelacanth is an interesting example of scientists creating a story that turned out to be untrue. It’s never good to try and fit the evidence into your theory.

They believed it to be an extinct transitional species from 65 million years ago that ‘walked’ on the sea floor. however when it was discovered alive in South Africa in 1938, turned out to be nothing of the kind and is just another fish that just swam around. So as it turned out it had been doing the square root of fuck all for 65 million years.

 

[Hermit]

An interesting discussion broke out on another thread regarding the origins of humans and life in general.

I think this deserves its own thread.

The tapestry of human origins is woven with threads of inquiry, speculation and awe. A question as old as time is, where did we come from?

The traditional and deeply rooted beliefs in creationism posit a divine hand sculpting humanity, while the modern scientific discourse of evolution posits that life has arisen from natural processes.

Others believe that our existence is the result of extraterrestrial interventions, with beings from distant galaxies planting the seeds of life on earth.

So, which one is true?

Here is the place to discuss it.

Two options:
1. Matter created itself from nothing (Big Bang evolution)
2. Matter was created by a creator (creationism / intelligent design)

Matter cannot create itself.

As for evolution, it is not scientific because science requires experimentation - there is no scientific experiment that can prove evolution. Evolution is therefore pseudoscience.

 

[Kangal]

There's no real debate about evolution.

Experimental evolution - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

A useful conversation should be centered on abiogenesis.

 

[Tiger]

There's no real debate about evolution.

Experimental evolution - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

A useful conversation should be centered on abiogenesis.

Breeding different dog types doesn’t prove evolution in any way shape or form.

 

[Kangal]

Breeding different dog types doesn’t prove evolution in any way shape or form.

You clearly don't understand the experiments.
Anyway, there's no actual debate to be had with respect to the fact of evolution. Talk to PG or Hermit.

Abiogenesis though...it seems remarkably hard to show non-organiic compounds self organising into the most simple of life forms.

 

[Zipporah's Flint]

Two options:
1. Matter created itself from nothing (Big Bang evolution)
2. Matter was created by a creator (creationism / intelligent design)

Matter cannot create itself.

As for evolution, it is not scientific because science requires experimentation - there is no scientific experiment that can prove evolution. Evolution is therefore pseudoscience.

There is also the idea that matter is eternal which a lot of the ancients believed.

 

[Tiger]

You clearly don't understand the experiments.

It tries to show that variation in a species can lead to a new species, which dog breeding doesn’t do.

From your own link:

“Unwittingly, humans have carried out evolution experiments for as long as they have been domesticating plants and animals. Selection breeding of plants and animals has led to varieties that differ dramatically from their original”

You brought it up, so why not defend it properly.

 

[Tiger]

This is a good place to start.

An Evolutionary Timeline of Homo Sapiens

Scientists share the findings that helped them pinpoint key moments in the rise of our species

www.smithsonianmag.com

Ok, so let’s start with what example at the bottom left of that sample of 5 and we’ll work our way around. Australopithecus Afarensis (aka ‘Lucy).

Do you believe that is a direct ancestor of modern humans?

 

[Kangal]

Ok, so let’s start with what example at the bottom left of that sample of 5 and we’ll work our way around. Australopithecus Afarensis (aka ‘Lucy).

Do you believe that is a direct ancestor of modern humans?

You should read the article and learn a little, Tiger. It'll make you a better person.

Then read this.

How Scientists Discovered the Staggering Complexity of Human Evolution

Darwin would be delighted by the story his successors have revealed

www.scientificamerican.com

 

[Tiger]

You should read the article and learn a little, Tiger. It'll make you a better person.

Then read this.

How Scientists Discovered the Staggering Complexity of Human Evolution

Darwin would be delighted by the story his successors have revealed

www.scientificamerican.com

I’ve read plenty about Lucy. More than you I imagine. Which is why you won’t answer the question I asked and are trying to deflect.

Is Lucy a direct ancestor of modern humans?

Yes or no?

You brought it up as a sample of human evolution so you should know the answer.

 

[Kangal]

I’ve read plenty about Lucy.

Please read the articles rather than spamming the thread with instant replies.
You may learn something. You need at least 10 mins for each one.

 

[Tiger]

Please read the articles rather than spamming the thread with instant replies.
You may learn something. You need at least 10 mins for each one.

The article is a ‘ten a penny’ synopsis of the human evolution story that every 8 year old is told. There’s nothing new in it.

So I’ll answer the question for you, Lucy (Australopithecus) is NOT an ancestor of modern humans.

And yet there she is as the first example in your supposed fossil record of human evolution.

 

[Kangal]

The article is a ‘ten a penny’ synopsis....

You didn't educate yourself. Your loss.

 

[Wolf]

The article is a ‘ten a penny’ synopsis of the human evolution story that every 8 year old is told. There’s nothing new in it.

So I’ll answer the question for you, Lucy (Australopithecus) is NOT an ancestor of modern humans.

And yet there she is as the first example in your supposed fossil record of human evolution.

Seems the dog is an expert on the origin of species now......
Could it be the next current thing? After the US declares war on Mexico that is.......
What a fucking twat.

 

[Kangal]

The thread is complete. Wolf is here to shitpost.

 

[Tiger]

You didn't educate yourself. Your loss.

What a pathetic reply. The same deflection techniques when pushing the Covid Jabs for two years.

You’ve brought up two arguments for evolution and can’t even defend any examination of them.
That’s a poor start.

 

[Kangal]

You’ve brought up two arguments for evolution and can’t even defend any examination of them.

You said they were a ‘ten a penny’ synopsis.

But how would you know? You didn't read them.

Then you say I can't defend any examination of them. But you've made no examination of them. You didn't even read them.

In short, Jesus Fucking Christ

Just read them. You'll find all you need.