Like I said before, this is not true. All the species between what you think of as a reptile and what you think of as a bird have unique, scientific names. Names that mean “something that is part reptile and part bird.”

Your claim that “a scientist would no longer categorize as a reptile, but indeed, as a bird” is wrong. They categorize all these intermediate species as something that is part bird, part reptile.

Scientists don’t look at it and say “it’s a reptile” or “it’s a bird.” That is an incorrect statement. They look at it and say “this thing has some characteristics of reptiles and some of birds.”

I think this is the modern claldogram for birds:

Tetrapoda-Reptilomorpha-Amniota-suropsida-archosauromorpha-archosauria-avemetatarsalia-ornithodira-dinosauria-saurischia-Aves

Here is a simplified graphical:


http://digimorph.org/navclado.phtml

T. Rex Protein "Confirms" Bird-Dinosaur Link

Excerpt:
Bawk, bawk, bawwwwwk.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2008/04/080424-trex-mastodon_2.html

All species are (or were) transitional species. Evolution doesn't stop.

And i'm sorry, but if i showed a biologist a red-tailed hawk, he would immediately agree that i was showing him a bird.

But, you go ahead believing that animals are not categorized as reptiles, mammals, fish, etc, etc if it makes you feel better about the theory evolution, it really doesn't matter to me.

Holy bird droppings batman, look at the title of that article!:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/n...astodon_2.html

But wait, there is no such thing as birds!

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=bird

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=reptile

An animal is either a bird, or it is not a bird. An animal is either a reptile or it is not a reptile.

At some finite point in time there were no birds on earth. Anywhere. Then, suddenly, there appeared the first animal that fit the definition of a bird. We are told it evolved from a reptile. So at some finite point in time, reptile made the transition to bird.


http://www.livescience.com/animals/080208-birds-began.html

Meh, so the fossil record was only off by about 35 million years. I'm sure it's perfectly accurate in all other ways.

The only thing we really know about the fossil record is that we don't know anywhere near enough about the fossil record.

You were so close! Birds are birds and reptiles are indeed reptiles...TODAY. The transitional species may defy modern taxonomic classification. We don't have a proper classification for bird-reptiles because we don't see them around today.

You seem to be hung up on a totally arbitrary convention that man has created to name things. None of this inane discussion about when to call a bird a bird and when to call a reptile a reptile has anything to do with the fact that the fossil record has mountains of evidence that depict all of these species. It doesn't matter what you call them.

And it's not that at some finite point in time what we now call a reptile made the transition to what we now call a bird, it's more like there is this vast stream of species that have evolved from each other and we now choose to apply arbitrary names to them.

Did you ever read the horse evolution article? It really doesn't matter in the end at what point to start to call the animals "horses". It's just a name. The important part is the traceable path of evolution.

Do you now asknowledge the fact that evolution has occurred? Regardless of what we call things?

You are appear to be implying that there is some special meaning to the words bird or reptile. Perhaps we are talking about biblical "kinds"?
You seem to think that there is an absolute definition of "reptile" and "bird". I think if you were to learn a little more about how species are defined you might realize that these terms are artificial. People come to a consensus on what characteristics will be used to define separate clades. These definitions were not handed down to Moses on the back of the 10 commandments.

I think a lot of people don't really understand how long even 1 billion year really is (let alone many billions of years), and what can occur over such an almost unimaginable long amount of time here on earth.

In order for that to be true, the definition of a bird would have to be:

But that is not the definition of a bird. A bird is warm-blooded. Reptiles are cold-blooded. A bird is covered in feathers. A reptile is covered in scales.

What scientists are saying is that birds are living dinosaurs, which many scientists now think were warm blooded. Which would mean that dinosaurs were not reptiles at all. Reptiles are cold blooded.

If that's case, birds did not evolve from reptiles at all, which the theory of evolution had previously predicted. In the case of warm blooded dinosaurs birds could merely be seen to be highly evolved dinosaurs with feathers instead of scales. But for that matter, do we even know if dinosaurs had scales at all?

At this time i would like some evolutionist proponent to go ahead and tell me how unassailable the fossil record is.

The Eggheads don't even know if Dinosaurs were cold blooded, warm blooded, or maybe even both.

There is, i posted them.

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=bird

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=reptile

Or are you telling me Princeton is wrong, and you are right?

BTW, the only scientific absolute i know of, is absolute zero. ;)

Well, i am a man. And yes, science very, very much does seek to characterize and categorize things. That is kind of the whole point.

Would this be the same fossil record that was off by an astonishing 35 million years WRT when the fist birds appeared?

At some finite point in time the first creature that fit the definition of a bird was born. Period.
It was not 65 million years ago as your beloved fossil record led us to erroneously believe, btw...it was apparently 100 million years ago. So your fossil record was only off by, oh....about 33% give or take. That's definitely something to hang your hat on as evidence.

Yep.

The one with 35 million year errors in it?

I have never denied evolution occurs. Are you even reading my posts? But that's not the point. The point is that evolution provides at least as many questions as answers...it is nowhere near set in stone as many of you try to portray. There are massive gaps in knowledge. When we discuss Evolution i am told that these small details don't matter. When we discuss ID, however, the evolutionists all call it a "Religion of gaps". If you ask me, the same can be said of evolution.

Were Dinosaurs warm blooded? No one knows yet.

So much for the infailabillity of the mountain of evidence of the fossil record.

At some point the first bird was born. This is a fact. It is incontrovertable.(sp?) At one time scientists believed that dinosaurs were cold blooded reptiles, and that birds evolved from them, becoming warm blooded at some point along the way. Now scientists say that dinosaurs may actually have been warm blooded themselves, meaning they are not even reptiles- which are by definition cold blooded- which would mean that birds are not evolved from reptiles at all, as evolution has taught us previously, but they are in fact just highly evolved living dinosaurs.

EVOLUTION DOES NOT HAVE IT ALL FIGURED OUT, AND IN FACT IT STUMBLES VERY BADLY ON SOME VERY BASIC THINGS.

If you define ID as "the deliberate modification of life by an intelligent creator", we can say, absolutely 100% for certain, that it exists, and we can prove it in a laboratory.

If you use a much more strict definition of "the creation of life from non life", then we will have to wait for the creation of the first living AI to prove that ID exists, but that day is probably going to happen in our lifetime. At that time, we will have absolute, 100% definitive proof that ID is a very real mechanism, but we will still be centuries from filling in all the gaps in evolution.

IMO, these are not competing theories, but complimentary ones. Much as supergravity and string theorie (once competing theories if i am not mistaken) are now considered to be supporting of one another, and of the larger M theory as a whole.

You can have both ID and Evolution, and the existence of one does not disprove the other in any way, shape, or form.

You really don't get it. These are artificial terms that we humans use for general classification. They are not meant to be absolute biological definitions. You are being far too concrete in your thinking about this.

Well duh.

And if you showed this same biologist a fossil of something that was 50% reptile and 50% bird, what would he call it? He would call it by its scientific name, a name for the species that is 50% bird and 50% reptile.

I would say the same of you.

Artificial terms like, Gravity, for instance?

I would say it is you who are far too wishy-washy in your thinking about this.

I gave you the definition from Princeton university for what a bird is. It is a virtually universally accepted scientifically based definition, plain and simple.

A bird is a well defined, easily categorized animal type, and as such, it can be readily identified as either belonging, or not belonging to that group.

The fact is, no one even knows if birds evolved from reptiles at all...since no one can really say if dinosaurs(or at least all of them) were actually reptiles either. Reptiles -are- cold blooded. If dinosaurs were not, then they were not reptiles, and that means birds did not evolve from them, dinosaurs did....maybe

That depends. If it had all the characteristics to be defined as a bird, he would define it as such. If it was cold-blooded, despite having all other characteristics of a bird, he would say that definitely- it is not a bird by the accepted definition of the word.

Every living thing evolved from single-celled critters.

You seem to be interested in genetics, but don't yet know much about it. Do yourself a favor and sign up for some biology and genetics courses at your local college. After about 500 hours of study and 50 hours in the lab, you'll be ready to have an intelligent conversation on the subject.

I agree that the theory of evolution predicts that to be the case.

Here we go, the backhanded wave of dismissal again.

Blow me, how's that sound professor?

A bird is a real, definable, living, breathing thing. One can point to any living thing on earth, and a biologist can give a go/no go grade as to whether or not it is a bird. The first living bird had all these characteristics as well, or it would not be a bird.

That is a fact.

Fortunately my parents spared me of the 'education' that some of you seem to think you have. I have long stated college is where smart people go to get stupid. This thread is further evidence of that theory.

No, it isn’t a bird by our current accepted definition, as it only has 50% of the characteristics of a bird. That’s why it has a scientific name that applies to something that is 50% bird and 50% reptile.

It’s not an either/or situation, why do you keep trying to turn it into that? It’s not either a reptile or a bird, its part of both, and has a name that is neither reptile nor bird.

Edit: I just had another thought. If it’s alive today, it is either a reptile or bird. That is an either/or situation. Is that why you are applying the either/or rule? Because it applies today? But it doesn't apply to 50 million (or whatever) years ago. Things alive back then were not either a reptile or a bird.

Now it all makes sense.

So why don't you put science right? If you are such an expert that you can so easily poke holes in modern theories, why aren't you on all of the networks being interviewed as the David that brought down the Goliath of science?
Could it be that you are arguing from ignorance? Could it be that you are criticizing something that you have very little knowledge of? You are parading before us the same kinds of "arguments from ignorance", "arguments from incredulity", and "straw-man arguments" that we see endlessly resurrected by the creationists. If you want to understand these things, you have to educate yourself. We can not do this for you on an internet forum, nor are we the appropriate experts to attempt it.
Look in the mirror sometime and ask yourself honestly, why, if evolution is such poor science, does virtually every single research biologist accept it so fully.
Are the all deluded? Was it simply self selection? Is this a "grand conspiracy"?
Now ask yourself how many hours have I personally devoted to the study of biology, paleontology, geology, etc.,? Now how many hours have the scientists devoted?

Yup, this "education" thing is way over-rated.

I am sorry to see that, but it confirms your official troll status.


http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1209152243.jpg

And life by the currently accepted definition is life. So what?

Scientists can't all actually agree on what the actual definition of life really is(for that matter they can't all agree on almost every scientific issue), does that mean they shouldn't try? Or shouldn't write it down and adhere to it when they get a really good compromise that everyone can live with? Or that life isn't really life because there is no absolute definition for it?

Because in order for a bird to have evolved from something, at some finite point in time it must neccesarily become a bird.

Birds exist, you will agree?
They did not always exist, you will agree?
At some point, the first bird was born, you will agree?
At the point that the first bird was born, what gave birth to it was not a bird, you will agree?

Here's another one for you:

Either dinosaurs were warm blooded, or they weren't.

Of course these are either-or scenarios. Why don't you relax and wait for some answers instead of trying to claim evolution is set in stone, because it has been extremely wrong about a few things lately. Like predicting the first birds were born 65 million years ago, according to the fossil record. But wait, WHOOPS, biologists say it was 100 million years ago. Maybe next year someone else will say it was 120 million years ago.

Why is it that scientists even discuss when the first birds appeared if it doesn't matter? Because it matters.

By the way, the silence is deafening wrt my extremely obvious observations regarding ID and it's relation to cloning and artificial intelligence. People here have scoffed at the mere idea of ID. What are they scoffing at anyway....

A definition...and one that is very far from universal, i dare say.

As does your litany of insults and out of hand dismissals.

BTW, there is no absolute definition of a troll, so you cannot rightly categorize me or anyone as one. Hypocritical jackass.

I feel the same way everytime some leftist college professor or student starts telling me about the wonders of communism.
Why is it that so many professors are left wing nuts anyway? Can i even call them that? Is that an actual absolutely definable condition? What is a professor anyway? Is there an absolute definition for a professor?