I'd have trouble taking anything you've copied from a religious website seriously. It's hardly unbiased, is it?

http://www.allaboutthejourney.org/problems-with-the-fossil-record.htm
>> ^shinyblurry:

This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.
And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:
Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."
He continues:
The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7... etc, etc..

This video is complete fantasy. Take the evolutionary animation for instance..none of that is supported in the fossil record. All of those transitions are completely inference, especially ape to man. If you believe that, you are thick..do your own investigation. There isn't any conclusive evidence for ape to man evolution what so ever.

And you don't think they're looking for true transitionals? Why do you think evolutionists trotted out piltdown man and nebraska man as proof of evolution for over 50 years, and why today the desperate search is still on to find the missing link. They thought it was neanderthal man but it turned out to be a guy with arthritus and rickets. The fossil record isn't just incomplete, it is ludicrously so..with hundreds of millions of them uncovered yet no true transitionals. I'll let real palentologists explain it to you:

Our museums now contain hundreds of millions of fossil specimens (40 million alone are contained in the Smithsonian Natural History Museum). If Darwin's theory were true, we should see at least tens of millions of unquestionable transitional forms. We see none. Even the late Stephen Jay Gould, Professor of Geology and Paleontology at Harvard University and the leading spokesman for evolutionary theory prior to his recent death, confessed "the extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology."

He continues:

The history of most fossil species includes two features inconsistent with gradualism: 1. Statis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking much the same as when they disappear… 2. Sudden Appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and 'fully formed'. 6 The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils. 7

The British Museum of Natural History boasts the largest collection of fossils in the world. Among the five respected museum officials, Sunderland interviewed Dr. Colin Patterson, Senior Paleontologist at the British Museum and editor of a prestigious scientific journal. Patterson is a well known expert having an intimate knowledge of the fossil record. He was unable to give a single example of Macro-Evolutionary transition. In fact, Patterson wrote a book for the British Museum of Natural History entitled, "Evolution". When asked why he had not included a single photograph of a transitional fossil in his book, Patterson responded:

...I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book. If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would certainly have included them. You suggest that an artist should be used to visualize such transformations, but where would he get the information from? I could not, honestly, provide it, and if I were to leave it to artistic license, would that not mislead the reader? I wrote the text of my book four years ago. If I were to write it now, I think the book would be rather different. Gradualism is a concept I believe in, not just because of Darwin's authority, but because my understanding of genetics seems to demand it. Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils. As a paleontologist myself, I am much occupied with the philosophical problems of identifying ancestral forms in the fossil record. You say that I should at least "show a photo of the fossil from which each type of organism was derived." I will lay it on the line - there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument. 2

David B. Kitts. PhD (Zoology) is Head Curator of the Department of Geology at the Stoval Museum. In an evolutionary trade journal, he wrote:

Despite the bright promise that paleontology provides a means of "seeing" evolution, it has presented some nasty difficulties for evolutionists, the most notorious of which is the presence of "gaps" in the fossil record. Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them… 3

N. Heribert Nilsson, a famous botanist, evolutionist and professor at Lund University in Sweden, continues:

My attempts to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years have completely failed… The fossil material is now so complete that it has been possible to construct new classes, and the lack of transitional series cannot be explained as being due to scarcity of material. The deficiencies are real, they will never be filled. 4

Even the popular press is catching on. This is from an article in Newsweek magazine:

The missing link between man and apes, whose absence has comforted religious fundamentalists since the days of Darwin, is merely the most glamorous of a whole hierarchy of phantom creatures … The more scientists have searched for the transitional forms that lie between species, the more they have been frustrated. 5

Wake up people..your belief in evolution is purely metaphysical and requires faith. I suppose if you don't think about it too hard it makes sense. It's the same thing with abiogenesis..pure metaphysics.

Now, after over 120 years of the most extensive and painstaking geological exploration of every continent and ocean bottom, the picture is infinitely more vivid and complete than it was in 1859. Formations have been discovered containing hundreds of billions of fossils and our museums are filled with over 100 million fossils of 250,000 different species.

The availability of this profusion of hard scientific data should permit objective investigators to determine if Darwin was on the right track. What is the picture which the fossils have given us?… The gaps between major groups of organisms have been growing even wider and more undeniable. They can no longer be ignored or rationalized away with appeals to imperfection of the fossil record. 2

You've been had..be intellectually honest enough to admit it and seek out the truth. Science does not support evolution.

I don't know a damn thing about you. I don't claim that you are anything like any other religious person in existence or in history, except for one thing - a belief in a supernatural higher power that there is no real basis for believing in. And in that very specific aspect of your personality, yes, I generalize you. No matter what kind of monster you yourself try to paint me as being, I just don't feel bad about that. Sorry that I can't catalog the personal details of billions of individual believers for anonymous online discussion purposes. I'm sure you are otherwise a wonderful human being and I certainly bear you no ill will.>> ^smooman:

>> ^Sketch:
You are right, I am not going to get into an argument about semantics with you, because that would make me a complete idiot. If it helps for me to compartmentalize it for you, then yes, where your beliefs in religion, superstition and the supernatural are concerned, I actively think that you are an idiot. Does that clear it up and make you feel better? Now you can go do rocket science, or brain surgery or any number of things that probably make you a great deal smarter than me in a possibly infinite minus 1 number of subjects in peace.>> ^smooman:
>> ^Sketch:
It's not, but if that's how you want to put words in my mouth, then so be it. Smart people can, and do, believe stupid shit sometimes. It happens.>> ^smooman:
>> ^Sketch:
For the record, in my estimation, if you are religious it does not necessarily mean that you are an idiot. But it does mean you believe in idiotic superstition.

"if you are religious it does not necessarily mean that you are an idiot. But it does mean you believe in things only idiots do, thus making you an idiot"
thats basically what you said


well it does actually. the modifier of superstitions, in this case, idiotic, explicitly implies that the believers of such are by association, idiots. This is further enforced by your choice of diction indicating that all persons of religious persuasions believe in what you would describe as "idiotic superstitions". this is merely a debate in semantics but.....whatever. i think i know what you were trying to say. you just said it in the most absolute, presumptuous, generalized way


its amusing to me that you like to think you know my beliefs and my deepest convictions, or superstitions as you call them, based on the mere fact that i am religious. cuz we're all the same right? perhaps to you. by that fact, it is you who are foolish, not me.....or are all atheists the same? (hint: theyre not, and neither are we religious types)
if its more comfortable for you to paint with such broad strokes, then by all means, keep using that sweeping brush, but dont expect me to admire your haste to color all religious peoples as bumbling neanderthals clinging to ancient fairy tales and superstitions that you vehemently insist we are.

but what do i know, im just a superstitious, religious, idiot

>> ^Sketch:

You are right, I am not going to get into an argument about semantics with you, because that would make me a complete idiot. If it helps for me to compartmentalize it for you, then yes, where your beliefs in religion, superstition and the supernatural are concerned, I actively think that you are an idiot. Does that clear it up and make you feel better? Now you can go do rocket science, or brain surgery or any number of things that probably make you a great deal smarter than me in a possibly infinite minus 1 number of subjects in peace.>> ^smooman:
>> ^Sketch:
It's not, but if that's how you want to put words in my mouth, then so be it. Smart people can, and do, believe stupid shit sometimes. It happens.>> ^smooman:
>> ^Sketch:
For the record, in my estimation, if you are religious it does not necessarily mean that you are an idiot. But it does mean you believe in idiotic superstition.

"if you are religious it does not necessarily mean that you are an idiot. But it does mean you believe in things only idiots do, thus making you an idiot"
thats basically what you said


well it does actually. the modifier of superstitions, in this case, idiotic, explicitly implies that the believers of such are by association, idiots. This is further enforced by your choice of diction indicating that all persons of religious persuasions believe in what you would describe as "idiotic superstitions". this is merely a debate in semantics but.....whatever. i think i know what you were trying to say. you just said it in the most absolute, presumptuous, generalized way



its amusing to me that you like to think you know my beliefs and my deepest convictions, or superstitions as you call them, based on the mere fact that i am religious. cuz we're all the same right? perhaps to you. by that fact, it is you who are foolish, not me.....or are all atheists the same? (hint: theyre not, and neither are we religious types)

if its more comfortable for you to paint with such broad strokes, then by all means, keep using that sweeping brush, but dont expect me to admire your haste to color all religious peoples as bumbling neanderthals clinging to ancient fairy tales and superstitions that you vehemently insist we are.


but what do i know, im just a superstitious, religious, idiot

I disagree. I think you are confusing faith with deduction and inference, which is always incredibly annoying when people talk about how atheists require faith. No, all we require is evidence!

We can infer from available evidence, for instance, that the Big Bang happened, or that dark matter is likely to exist because of other observations and EVIDENCE that it does. The math involved in the physical universe doesn't quite work out without it, despite the fact that we cannot see it. This is, of course, a theory (an actual, scientific type theory), but a theory that makes sense based on the best, current, available EVIDENCE. Similarly, we once inferred that God existed because we did not have the knowledge, nor the tools with which to examine our world with anywhere close to the fidelity that we are able to today, and now we are able to throw out the God hypothesis in almost every discipline of study.

Faith, conversely, requires that you not have evidence and just believe in something without proof, or upon someone's word. Perhaps I did not take enough salt with your statement, but faith is certainly not the evidence of anything, let alone "the unseen". Evidence of the unseen, would still be evidence from which we can deduce a conclusion. If you have evidence, you are no longer faithful, you are simply informed. And as of now, there is no actual evidence outside of anecdotes like this video, the Bible itself, and emotional appeals - which are easily dismissed as not credible - for a deity.

The problem with God is that He's just plugged into areas where we don't know things, and people take it upon faith that He's real, even in areas where there is more than enough real, tangible evidence to contradict a need for a deity. That is why secularists get so irritated at young Earth creationists and the like, where a preponderance of repeatable, testable, falsifiable, and verifiable evidence shows how enormously wrong they are, yet they refuse to believe the evidence itself, because it goes against their faith in what they believe to be true. A person might have all of the intellect and powers of critical thinking in the world, but when someone takes something on faith, they abandon those powers to plug in a simple answer for whatever their personal reasons.

I don't know your story, or how you feel you've rationalized yourself into belief, whether it be through some sort of Pascal's Wager thing, or what, and I certainly don't think you are an "ignorant, bumbling Neanderthal" but to accept any of an infinite number of god possibilities, let alone the specific Abrahamic God requires faith, and an absence of logic in the absence of real evidence.

Sorry, I went on a rant there...>> ^smooman:


while that may be true, they are not mutually exclusive.
faith is the evidence of things unseen (i know thats gonna mean zilch to you so take that with a grain of salt) and i very seriously doubt you could convincingly question the critical thinking skills of persons such as CS Lewis
i dont think atheists (or non christians for that matter) are godless sinners, devoid of any morality, any more than i would hope that you not think me an ignorant, bumbling, neanderthal because im religious
we have different religious views, however this does not make either of us smarter, more critical, or better than the other because of that fact

>> ^smooman:

>> ^Ti_Moth:
>> ^shinyblurry:
I mean without faith what do you have?
>> ^smooman:
ps: shinyblurry, science has, quite conclusively, proven that the earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old....but thats neither here nor there. You at least recognize that it doesnt matter (as do i), as it pertains ones personal relationship with god.
The bible wasnt written to tell me how old the earth is =)



Err... Evidence and critical thinking?

while that may be true, they are not mutually exclusive.
faith is the evidence of things unseen (i know thats gonna mean zilch to you so take that with a grain of salt) and i very seriously doubt you could convincingly question the critical thinking skills of persons such as CS Lewis
i dont think atheists (or non christians for that matter) are godless sinners, devoid of any morality, any more than i would hope that you not think me an ignorant, bumbling, neanderthal because im religious
we have different religious views, however this does not make either of us smarter, more critical, or better than the other because of that fact


My apologies if you thought I was refering to you, my flippant comment was directed at shinyblury and his young earth antics. And I understand faith in principle it just seems that people have faith in whatever is the nearest religion at the time of their spiritual awakening, I mean if you were living a few thousand years ago you may well have had faith in Thor or Zeus and thats all well and good but what if Mighty Ra and his family of gods are the correct thing to have faith in? You would be missing out on Vallhalla...

In reply to this comment by smooman:
>> ^Ti_Moth:

>> ^shinyblurry:
I mean without faith what do you have?
>> ^smooman:
ps: shinyblurry, science has, quite conclusively, proven that the earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old....but thats neither here nor there. You at least recognize that it doesnt matter (as do i), as it pertains ones personal relationship with god.
The bible wasnt written to tell me how old the earth is =)



Err... Evidence and critical thinking?


while that may be true, they are not mutually exclusive.
faith is the evidence of things unseen (i know thats gonna mean zilch to you so take that with a grain of salt) and i very seriously doubt you could convincingly question the critical thinking skills of persons such as CS Lewis

i dont think atheists (or non christians for that matter) are godless sinners, devoid of any morality, any more than i would hope that you not think me an ignorant, bumbling, neanderthal because im religious

we have different religious views, however this does not make either of us smarter, more critical, or better than the other because of that fact


ok..now i want to have YOUR babies.
pegg is gonna have to go it alone.
right on man.

>> ^Ti_Moth:

>> ^shinyblurry:
I mean without faith what do you have?
>> ^smooman:
ps: shinyblurry, science has, quite conclusively, proven that the earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old....but thats neither here nor there. You at least recognize that it doesnt matter (as do i), as it pertains ones personal relationship with god.
The bible wasnt written to tell me how old the earth is =)



Err... Evidence and critical thinking?


while that may be true, they are not mutually exclusive.
faith is the evidence of things unseen (i know thats gonna mean zilch to you so take that with a grain of salt) and i very seriously doubt you could convincingly question the critical thinking skills of persons such as CS Lewis

i dont think atheists (or non christians for that matter) are godless sinners, devoid of any morality, any more than i would hope that you not think me an ignorant, bumbling, neanderthal because im religious

we have different religious views, however this does not make either of us smarter, more critical, or better than the other because of that fact

what foolish neanderthals are we to interpret "god does exist" as a definitive statement of proof. i would like to apologize on behalf of me and the rest of the cave dwelling idiots here for insulting your mastery of the language. please dont whip us

http://videosift.com/video/Trump-F-Bombs-on-Gas-Prices-Neanderthals-Cheer

Here's footage of the f bombs referenced in the interview

>> ^Unsung_Hero:

>> ^westy:
curling with helicopters and cows, shud be winter olimpic sport

I commend your courage to ignore the little red squiggly lines under your comment when posting.
Fuk U Spel Sheck!


Spel shecking is practicaly neanderthal. To spend so much time primping and preening your communication feels dishonest imo. Thank the maker for teh internetz!

That is a Neanderthal brow if I ever saw one.

>> ^Tojja:

Reproductively speaking, there can't be to much variance in the chromosomes for successful mating. A rat can't mate with a human for example
Although what you say is 100% accurate, I think that chromosomal variance is not the biggest reason that such a union cannot be consumated...


Yes, she left me...thanks for bringing up the painful memories!

>> ^castles:

I've heard things like 'we share 93% of our DNA with slugs' or something like that - so what does it mean that only '1-4% of our DNA is Neanderthal'? Can someone explain?
EDIT:
Here's the kind of stuff I'm talking about..
Mice, men share 99% of genes
Humans related to humble mud worm
Genome Study Finds Rats, Humans Share Stretches of DNA


The difference is hereditary and pair structure. Genetically speaking, many of the chromosome base pairs are nearly identical from animal to animal. Reproductively speaking, there can't be to much variance in the chromosomes for successful mating. A rat can't mate with a human for example. However, other pre-Homo sapiens's and Neanderthal could, and unlike mules, mate and have non-sterile offspring. The 1-4% is direct ancestry. If you were to compare, like that study did with mice, actual base pair similarity, it would rank higher than chimps most likely (99.9999% or something). However, there is a chance that they are more dissimilar than chimps, and through some reproductive fluke, were still able to have virile offspring. The point is, the difference he was highlighting is the direct mating heritage of early man with Neanderthal, much like someone saying they are 4% Indian, even though they are both 100% human.

>> ^rebuilder:

>> ^raverman:
Do creationists believe in Neanderthals?
If so... how?

A quick googling indicates the Creationist argument regarding neanderthals has traditionally been that they were just regular humans suffering from bone ailments, perphaps caused by malnutrition, lack of vitamin D, etc.


/facepalm