Re: paleontology

Zucadragon wrote:
Steven L. schreef:
Zucadragon wrote:
unrestrained_hand@xxxxxxxxxxx schreef:
On Feb 21, 4:04 pm, Zucadragon <Z...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
So I've been discussing with a creationist on a forum.. And he has been
very insistent on a webpage of his which explains why the fossil
evidence is against evolution and how it shows that evolutionists are
wrong. I thought I'd give it a go and figure all this out but my strong
point was never in paleontology and I figure someone else would have a
better refutation of his stuff.

The best I can see is his false reasoning.. Basically going:

evolutionists thought it was this: A

It turned out to be this: B

Correct. And you might note that:
theories and other scientific models always fit the data known at the
time. When they discover that it's "B", it because new data has come
to light. Scientific models - hypotheses and theories - approach the
truth in detail. Look at Newtonian physics being replaced bu
Einstein's Theory of relativity. Newton wasn't wrong so much as he
didn't have enough data to lay it out in greater detail.

Humans are fallible, and we don't have all the answers. *Saying we
have all the answers doesn't cut it. As science provides better and
more detailed models that fit reality, literalist claims about the
nature of reality drift further and further from the known evidence.
This is not eternal truth. it is merely denialism.

Oops, evolutionists had it wrong.

I'm thinking that in all those cases it happened like this:

Evolutionists thought it was this: A

Evolutionists discovered it was this: B

Where were the creation scientists, oh right, they didn't do any
science, so nothing got corrected by them.

Yup.

Though at the same time, I'm sure there's something wrong with the
fossil data that he's showing, I just don't know where to look to get it
though.

http://www.airysdomain.com/writings/ManApeFossils.html

(I'm sorry the follow looks so clustered, but that's really how it's
written down)
Here's the text from the website:

Evolution Oops! A Lack of Ape-Man Transitional Fossils

Looking at the man-ape fossils, which [Evolution defender], calls "solid
science", what do we see?

Piltdown Man:
--------------------------------------http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piltdown_Man


The "Piltdown Man" is a famous hoax consisting of fragments of a skull
and jawbone collected in 1912 from a gravel pit at Piltdown, a village
near Uckfield, East Sussex. The fragments were thought by many experts
of the day to be the fossilised remains of a hitherto unknown form of
early human. The Latin name Eoanthropus dawsoni ("Dawson's dawn-man",
after the collector Charles Dawson) was given to the specimen.

It was thought so by some. But most looked at it somewhat askance - it
didn't fit the picture developing from the accumulated evidence. It
was never essential to the ToE. We don't know who perpetuated it. When
scientists were able to look at it more closely, with better
techniques and more knowledge, it was rejected as fakery.

As you note above, it was scientists who did this - Creationists don't
know enough or do enough science to call our frauds. They can't tell
the difference.

The significance of the specimen remained the subject of controversy
until it was exposed in 1953 as a forgery, consisting of the lower
jawbone of an orangutan combined with the skull of a fully developed,
modern man.

The Piltdown hoax is perhaps the most famous archaeological hoax in
history. It has been prominent for two reasons: the attention paid to
the issue of human evolution, and the length of time (more than 40
years) that elapsed from its discovery to its exposure as a forgery..

Evolutionary theory actually couldn't account for it; it was an
anomaly. In time, we understood why.

---------------------------------------------------

Quotes fromhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/piltdown.html

The hoax [of Piltdown Man] illuminates two pitfalls to be wary of in the
scientific process. The first is the danger of inadequately examining
and challenging results that confirm the currently accepted scientific
interpretation. The second is that a result, once established, tends to
be uncritically accepted and relied upon without further reconsideration.

It is a black mark on science that it took 40 years to expose a hoax
that bore directly on human ancestry. Creationists have not been slow in
pointing to the hoax, the erroneous reconstructions based on the hoax,
and the long time it took to expose the hoax.

So science continues to learn. Creationism never does.

-----------------------
How evolutionists interpreted the fossil: Man-ape ancestor

How the fossil is now viewed: hoax

Ramapithecus:
-------------------------------------------------http://www.onelife..com/evolve/manev.html

"On the Evolution of the Human"

Some controversy exists on the time of this common ancestor to both ape
and human, but it is believed to be about 5.5 million years ago. A key
fossil record near that time is Ramapithecus, which was believed to be
an early hominid for many years, but is now considered an ancient ape
that lived near the fork in our common lineage. Ramapithecus is now
thought to be an ancestor of the modern apes.

It is not a fraud; we simply learned more about it's place in human
history, and relocated it in the family tree.

---------------------------------------------------http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1E1-E-Ramapith.html

"FREE Ramapithecus Information"

Ramapithecus , an extinct group of primates that lived from about 12 to
14 million years ago, for a time regarded as a possible ancestor of
Australopithecus and, therefore, of modern humans. Fossils of
Ramapithecus were discovered in N India and in E Africa, beginning in
1932. Although it was generally an apelike creature, Ramapithecus was
considered a possible human ancestor on the basis of the reconstructed
jaw and dental characteristics of fragmentary fossils. A complete jaw
discovered in 1976 was clearly nonhominid, however, and Ramapithecus is
now regarded by many as a member of Sivapithecus, a genus considered to
be an ancestor of the orangutan.
---------------------------------------------------http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sivapithecus

"Sivapithecus"

The first incomplete specimens of Ramapithecus were found in Nepal on
the bank of Tenau River western part of the country in 1932. The finder
(G. Edward Lewis) claimed that the jaw was more like a human's than any
other fossil ape then known. [1] In the 1960s this claim was revived. At
that time, it was believed that the ancestors of humans had diverged
from other apes 15 million years ago. Biochemical studies upset this
view, suggesting that there was an early split between orangutan
ancestors and the common ancestors of chimps, gorillas and humans.
Humans had separated from African apes about five million years ago, not
15 million or 25 million.[2]

Meanwhile, more complete specimens of Ramapithecus were found in 1975
and 1976, which showed that it was less human-like than had been
thought. It began to look more and more like Sivapithecus - meaning that
the older name must take priority. It could be that Ramapithecus was
just the female form of Sivapithecus. [3] They were definitely members
of the same genus. It is also likely that they were already separate
from the common ancestor of chimps, gorillas and humans, though fossils
of this presumed ancestor have not yet been found.
-----------------------------------
How evolutionists first interpreted the fossil:man-ape ancestor

How the fossil is now viewed: extinct ape


Just what we would expect from evolution, BTW. It can be difficult to
tell where boundaries are, and who is ancestor to whom when the
genepools shift over time into other species, and the fossilization is
poor and sparse.

KNM-ER 1470:
---------------------------------------
Discovered in 1972 by Ngeneo and Leaky

When first publicized, Skull 1470 attracted enormous interest because of
five apparent ‘humanlike’ traits in the initial reconstruction:
1. Its alleged large endocranial volume (ECV) of 810+ cm3.
2. The remarkably flat face of the specimen as compared with the
prognathous (protruding jaw) face of all other known australopithecines,
especially the gracile, and to a lesser extent, robust specimens.
3. The high-domed cranial vault, as compared with the flat forehead of
extinct australopithecines and modern-day apes.
4. The lack of pronounced supraorbital tori (brow ridges).
5. The more rounded braincase, similar to that of some Australopithecus
africanus specimens.

but...
continuing on, Bromage then pointed out that when first reconstructed,
the face of skull 1470 was fitted to the cranium almost vertically.15,16
Yet subsequent studies demonstrated that the face jutted out
considerably, like australopithecines.17,18 Bromage also found that with
this new perspective, ER Skull 1470 bore a resemblance (albeit
superficial) to the hyper-robust and extremely gorilla-like fossil
australopithecine KNM-WT 17000 (the so-called ‘Black Skull’ or A.
ethiopicus).19

From the Smithsonian:http://anthropology.si.edu/humanorigins/ha/habdebate.html

It was once thought that the evolution of the genus Homo was an example
of anagenesis, the continual and gradual change of one parent species
into its daughter species in a linear fashion. As the fossil record
began to expand and more early human fossils were found dating to the
period between 2 million and 1 million years ago, some questions as to
the validity of this hypothesis were raised.
Below are two fossils, shown to scale. KNM ER 1813 is to the left, and
KNM ER 1470 is to the right.

Originally, both were assigned to the species Homo habilis, with ER 1470
thought of as male and the smaller ER 1813 a female in a strongly
dimorphic species. However, the anatomies of the two skulls differ
considerably.

Note that there is a strong supraorbital torus (horizontal bar of bone
above the eye sockets) on 1813, whereas the supraorbital torus of 1470
is slight at best, and does not have the depression behind it that is
seen in 1813. The face of 1470 is longer than 1813's and 1470's upper
jaw is square instead of rounded-off. There is a great discrepancy
between the cranial capacities of the two individuals as well. ER 1470
has a cranial capacity of 775cc, where ER 1813 has a cranial capacity of
only 510cc (which is above the australopith average, but well below the
accepted 600cc cutoff for Homo)

One debate in paleoanthropology today is whether or not ER 1470, and
several other fossils previously identified as H. habilis, should be
grouped into a new species, Homo rudolfensis. This classification would
acknowledge that ER 1470 and the other members of Homo rudolfensis
differ more from Homo habilis, sensu stricto ("in the strict sense,"
meaning: as originally defined), than could possibly be accounted for by
variation within a population or between sexes. This would place two
species of the genus Homo in Africa during the same time period in
addition to two members of the genus Paranthropus, and, possibly, late
surviving members of the species Australopithecus africanus. Far more
complicated than the original neat, linear model.

Most, but not all researchers are convinced that 1470 should be placed
in a separate species. Some, such as Richard Leakey, claim that 1470
should be placed within H. habilis, while excluding 1813 from H.
habilis. As yet, the debate is not satisfactorily settled.

In addition, it is not yet entirely clear which of the two species Homo
habilis and Homo rudolfensis led to the later species in Homo. The
larger cranial capacities of the H. rudolfensis individuals lead some to
think that later humans evolved from this species. Morphology of the
facial bones of H. habilis, such as the shape of the cheekbones and the
browridges, suggests that this species was the ancestor of later humans.

---------------------------------
(And look... even some new information!)

http://www.livescience.com/health/070329_rudolf_reconstruct.html

In March 2007, a team led by Timothy Bromage, an anthropologist at New
York University, reconstructed the skull of KNM-ER 1470. The new
construction looks very ape-like and the cranial capacity based on the
new construction is downsized from 752 cubic centimeters to about 526
cc. Bromage said his team’s reconstruction includes biological
principles not known at the time of the skull’s discovery, which state
that a mammal’s eyes, ears and mouth must be in precise relationships
relative to one another.
-------------------------------

How evolutionists interpreted the fossil: Man-ape ancestor

How the fossil is now more likely to be interpreted: extinct ape.

Lucy:
------------------------------------http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1200/is_/ai_62052382


Anthropologists generally regard an upright gait as essential for
membership in the human evolutionary family. However, some of our
earliest ancestors may have favored knuckle-walking on all fours, much
as chimpanzees and gorillas do, according to a study in the March 23 NATURE.
advertisement

Brian G. Richmond and David S. Strait, both anthropologists at George
Washington University in Washington, D.C., examined previously found
wrist bones from several Australopithecus species. A. anamensis and A.
afarensis--the latter represented by the famous skeleton known as
Lucy--had wrists capable of locking the hands in place during
knuckle-walking, the scientists say. A. anamensis lived just prior to 4
million years ago; A. afarensis existed from 4 million to 3 million
years ago.

-------------------------------------http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/687341.stm


"We saw something that talked about special knuckle walking adaptations
in modern African apes," Dr Richmond said.
SAJS
The hand will give us new insight into Australopithecus behaviour
"I could not remember ever seeing anything about wrists in fossil
hominids. I thought 'Oh my god, I don't think anyone's looked at this.'

"Across the hall was a cast of the famous fossil Lucy. We ran across and
looked at it and bingo, it was clear as night and day. It was a eureka
moment."

Lucy's stiff wrists suggest that her ancestors - and ours - walked on
their knuckles.

"We have found evidence in the wrist joint that sheds new light on
arguably the most fundamental adaptation in humans ... which is why did
humans start walking upright?" Dr Richmond said.

--------------------------------------------http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australopithecus_afarensis


There is considerable debate regarding the locomotor behaviour of A..
afarensis. Some believe that A. afarensis was almost exclusively
bipedal, while others believe that the creatures were partly arboreal.

--------------------------------------------
How evolutionists interpreted the evidence: ape-man ancestor that walked
upright

Another way to interpret the evidence: extinct species of ape

Turkana Boy:
---------------------------------------------http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkana_Boy


Image:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:TurkanaboyV.jpg

(This is a skeleton that is classified as Homo erectus. Does "homo
erectus" then look like a ape-man, or does it look like a man?)

"I think [the Turkana Boy] is remarkable because it's so complete, but
perhaps another aspect that is often overlooked is that many people who
don't like the idea of human evolution have been able to discount much
of the work that we've done on the basis that it's built on fragmentary
evidence. There have just been bits and pieces, and who knows, those
little bits of bone could belong to anything. To confront some of these
people with a complete skeleton that is human and is so obviously
related to us in a context where it's definitely one and a half million
years or even more is fairly convincing evidence, and I think many of
the people who are fence-sitters on this discussion about creationism
vs. evolution are going to have to get off the fence in the light of
this discovery.
Richard Leakey- 1988 video Mysteries of Mankind, produced by National
Geographic
source -http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/15000.html
-------------------------------------
(And I've already discussed many problems with dating fossils.)Note: I
did here.

How evolutionists interpret the evidence: ape-man ancestor

Another way to interpret the evidence: man

NEANDERTHAL:
---------------------------------------http://www.worldmuseumofman.org/neanderthallechapelle1.htm


Typical for the Homo neanderthalensis species , the skull of La
Chapelle-aux-Saints had a pronounced browridge and receding forehead.
Many of the teeth were missing and their respective sockets were in
various states of closure from healing after the loss of the teeth when
the man was alive. These missing teeth comprise all of the right side
cheek teeth of the lower jaw, the molars on the left and at least the
molars of the upper jaw. It is probable that this individual was cared
for by others in his elder years. The evidence of this would suggest
that Neanderthals possessed a communal mindset and cared for their
injured and infirmed.

As previously mentioned, "The Old Man of La Chapelle-aux-Saints" was the
first nearly complete skeleton of a Neanderthal individual ever
discovered. The original incorrect reconstruction done by the noted
paleontologist Marcellin Boule overlooked the fact that the skeleton was
quite elderly when deceased. The bones were in such a degenerative stage
because of the advanced age of the individual that the reconstruction of
the skeleton depicted the Neanderthal in a stooped-over pose and
possessing a frame that would have had an ape-like gait. This wrongly
influenced our perception of Neanderthals in both science and popular
culture for so many years despite other discoveries of skeletons that
disprove this early belief. These misconception of the primitiveness of
Neanderthals has remained with us even today.
------------------------------------

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,980317-2,00.html

In his scientific papers, Boule described the "brutish appearance of
this muscular and clumsy body." This almost simian image persisted
largely unchallenged for decades. Indeed, vestiges of it remain today in
such manifestations as textbook illustrations, the Alley Oop cartoon
strip, and in the pejorative use of "Neanderthal."

But the image was wrong. In 1957 American and British researchers re-
examined the skeleton that Boule had studied and concluded that
Neanderthals stood upright; the stooped posture of Boule's specimen was
attributable to arthritis. Also the feet were not prehensile, nor was
the | spine curved. They further noted that the Neanderthal's brain was
as large as that of early modern humans, a fact that Boule ignored in
his publications.

In the past few decades, the perception of Neanderthals has undergone
still more changes. Evidence from various digs has revealed that they
wielded simple tools, wore body ornaments, had religious rites and
ceremoniously buried their dead.
--------------------------------------http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal

Neanderthal

For some time, professionals debated whether Neanderthals should be
classified as Homo neanderthalensis or as Homo sapiens neanderthalensis,
the latter placing Neanderthals as a subspecies of Homo sapiens. Recent
genetic simulations suggested that 5% of human DNA can only be accounted
for by assuming a substantial contribution of Neanderthaler to the
European gene pool of up to 25%.[10] Some scientists, for example
Milford Wolpoff, claim that fossil evidence suggests that the two
species interbred. This would support the argument that the two were the
same biological species. Others, for example Cambridge Professor Paul
Mellars, say "no evidence has been found of cultural interaction"[11]
and evidence from mitochondrial DNA studies have been interpreted as
evidence that Neanderthals were not a subspecies of H. sapiens.[12]

-----------------------------------------
How Evolutionists interpreted the fossil: ape-man ancestor

How the fossil is now interpreted: man

--------------------------------------

Curious, yet typical, that a Creationist considers the process of
learning and accumulating data to indicate a weakness in scientific
methodology.

How could one brag about the unchanging nature of a model of the world
(Creationism) that cannot ever be demonstrated to be correct?

Several things are clear from looking at this information

1) What scientists claimed about the fossils showing evidence of
evolution from ape to man has been shown wrong again and again and again.

Sometimes.As evidence accumulates, the scientists eventually reach a
consensus. The picture becomes more clear, and less ambiguous. When
theists disagree, there are permanent schisms, because there is no way
to confirm claims that do not predict events in the real world.

2) How the desire of scientists to find ape-man ancestors has affected
their interpretation of the evidence.

It is typical of the anti-scientist (Creationists, hollow Earthists,
astrologers) that they sort thru data and cherry pick them for what
seems to support their claims. Scientists make predictions, and test
their theories against the subsequent findings.

It is not a matter of interpreting the eividence as it is questioning
whether it fits a model or not. The various transitional ape forms,
some of whom are ancestral (or closely related) to us, fit the model
of humans evolving from African Apes.

Do they fit the Creationist model? Not the one I was raised with
(YEC). They fit some OEC creationist models, but then *anything does..
If they can't make predictions, and nothing can falsify them, in what
sense are they true?

3) The "best" fossil evidence in showing evolution from ape to man is
subject to questions and contraversy.

Sure, in details. But not in the overall picture. Some historians have
knock-down drag-out fights over certain issues in Roman history, but
nobody doubts the overall story. Note that further evidence decides
who is right in these disagreements. When does evidence ever settle
any theist disagreement? Never.

4) Showing man decended from apes from fossil evidence is not solid science.

It is as solid as science gets. The fossil record is not even the best
evidence for the ToE, and its explanation for the current diversity of
species, including our place in the world. In Darwin's day that would
have been the nested hierarchy of morphology. Now it would be the
nested hierarchy of the genomes - which just happens to fit the nested
tree of morphology.

Why, for example, would the mutation that broke our gene for making
vitamin C match the chimp's almost perfectly, and the gorilla's less
so, and not at all like the guinea pig's broken vitamin C gene? this
is what the ToE would predict. It's not what Creationism would
predict.

Ans why would the fossil record show successive changes in whole
ecosystems of fossils, starting with ancient (mostly small and simple)
forms, and leading in time to modern forms?

The fossil record also reflects the very long history of climate
change, plate tectonics, rise and fall of ocean levels, etc.
Why do chimps and humans both grin when nervous? ToE explains this;
Creationism does not.

There is no evidence that is problematic for ToE. There is no
evidence that can support Creationism, since it makes no predictions,
and cannot therefore be falsified.

5) There will be "new evidence" in the future that will challenge
scientists views of evolution for years to come.

Yes, and it will be modified as necessary. Even ...discarded if
necessary. It's difficult to imagine how, since it is probably the
best supported theory in science, with multiple classes of data from
varying fields - genetics, mathematics, behavioral sciences,
paleontology, ecology, geology, anthropology, etc.

To claim that the fossil evidence shows strong evidence that man
decended from apes is ignorant at best.

No, it's the simplest explanation for the growing mountain of data.

Changing models and adjusting them to the evidence isn't weakness;
that's an Orwellian redefinition. It's what science *does, and how
science continues to grow. Science learns as data accumulates;
Creationsim just has to deny more stuff.

What this shows clearly is that
scientific evidence is subject to interpretation, and how this causes
error. This is clearly a weakness of the scientific method.

Interpretations always have to fit the data. I'd be interested in
another testable model that fits the data that we have, but there
aren't any.

You might ask this fella why science can reattach severed limbs, send
the Hubble into orbit, design computers and the internet, GPS
satellites, cell phones, antihistamines, etc. if the methodology
doesn't work. Does he think it's all a co-incidence?

Written May 2008

Have fun, Zucadragon.

Kermit

Thank you very much.. See I was preparing to answer every one of the claims, but in general the true-ness of the claims in this case have no bearing on the strength of science or the fossil record.

I also figured that looking at the number of fossils in the human/ancestor category, that these are just a tiny amount over a hill of information on the subject.

Data that doesn't only come from the fossil record, but also from genetics, also from geology. So on, so on.

So the point is, science isn't perfect but so far, every bit of information found, fits in a giant web that supports each new claim, that predicts each new find even.

The battle should be on the creationists side, they're the ones claiming evolution is wrong but at the same time have no theory to suppliment or even replace evolutionary theory.. Its just the same old "if they're wrong, we are right"

Am I getting close with that ?

You are, but there's one more point:

It's remarkable how the world-view, methodologies, and evidence offered by creationists seems *NOT* to change.

You could have heard all these exact same arguments from creationists (especially the glee over Piltdown Man) 30 years ago. And they've been refuted--30 years ago, 25 years ago, 20 years ago, and now (on this NG) once again. It doesn't matter. Creationists don't take "no" for an answer. If you give any of the rebuttals in this discussion to your creationist friend, he will ignore them--and not change a thing on his website.

Try it. Get your creationist friend to admit that he is wrong about *anything* on his web-page. Good luck.

I guarantee you, if creationists are still around 10 or 20 years from now, they will still be waving Piltdown Man around.


Well the point is to show the rest of the forum how totally banana's his reasoning is, he sounds like a really smart fellow, but technically, he's got a few screws loose with the way he debates.

And even if he'll never admit being wrong about "anything".. The rest of the forum will see he's wrong :P

True. But if you depart the forum, he or one of his ilk will be back, trying to bamboozle a new bunch of suckers.

The odd thing is, despite what "Ron O" thinks, creationists are not con artists. They really believe in their main concept--that evolution is wrong and that all life arose in a supernatural creation event. They would pass a lie detector test about that.

But they figure, if to knock down evolution it takes a little bit of bending the truth and a little bit of ignoring contrary evidence, then why not, let's do that.

They mix sincerity about the main goal with lying and obfuscation about the details.

Someone should remind these folks that in the Bible, Romans 3:5-8 says that you can't do evil that good may come of it.


--
Steven L.
Email: sdlitvin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Remove the NOSPAM before replying to me.

.

Quantcast