An embarrassment for YECs?

[Christine Janis]

Feathers are no longer thought to be modified scales, but neomorphic structures.

These are some good popular resources on feather evolution

http://www.dinosaur-world.com/feathered ... lution.htm

http://www.science20.com/adaptive_compl ... r_feathers

[a_haworthroberts]

By the SAME AiG author today (the one who pretended that the protofeathers in Yutyrannus were made of collagen and not keratin): "And while the characteristics of eggs and skeletons can help paleontologists classify various kinds of dinosaurs and varieties within those created kinds, there is no evidence that any kind of creatures evolved into other kinds, such as birds".

That's our YEC! Aided and abetted by Mr Ham - who detests people lying and suppressing truth. Start EVERY WEEK with the BIBLE. A 'clean slate' devoid of any troublesome facts dug up from the ground!

DON'T bother to remember ANY of the evidence that you batted away the previous week. It's easier that way.

[a_haworthroberts]

Fraudster Brian Thomas of the ICR, who is embarrassed by evidence but NOT too embarrassed to LIE, has posted a blog: ''One Ton 'Feathered' Dinosaur?''. http://www.icr.org/article/6769/

I have just sent them an email:
"Brian Thomas is LYING about Yutyrannus huali. "Despite these
assertions, the fossils' details show no actual feathers or feather
imprints". The man has NO shame. 'Protofeathers' made almost certainly
of keratin, not collagen, have been found on the fossils - up to 8
inches long.
Why are you SO dishonest? Why are you such a persistent, deliberate,
liar?".

[a_haworthroberts]

Or, if you REALLY mean 'skin' not 'collagen', reptile scales are made of keratin as are protofeathers or advanced feathers. So how does your obfuscation help your 'argument'?

(Second email just sent.)

[a_haworthroberts]

The YEC denial machine could not agree on HOW to spin it. What exactly? The genus Caudipteryx (they are considered to have been dinosaurs).

On 29.9.07 the Answers in Genesis 'News to Note' (in an item on Velociraptor so the comment does not stand out) stated "Furthermore, other fossil finds considered to be dinosaur precursors to birds have turned out to be flightless birds similar to ostriches, such as Protarchaeopteryx robusta and Caudipteryx zoui".

But on 25.8.11 Brian Thomas of the Institute for Creation Research was claiming (LESS plausibly than AiG by the sound of it): "The Museum of Nature & Science in Dallas is currently running an exhibit called "Chinasaurs" that features dinosaur fossils discovered in China. Some of these fossils supposedly represent transitional species from dinosaurs to birds. But these "feathered dinosaurs" appear to be missing a key feature—namely, the feathers... Caudipteryx did not have a bird's keel bone or a bird-like beak. And unlike birds, it had hips that permitted free movement of its thighs. Thus, it was most likely a dinosaur, not a bird or a transitional form".

It would seem that different YECs, who haven't even seen the fossils in question first hand but who like to talk out of their backsides, can fail to agree with each other. One denies DINOSAUR, the other denies FEATHERS. Because a feathered dinosaur might imply evolution - and we can't have that when we are talking to Christian fundamentalists online, can we?

[marcsurtees]

I'm not a track expert, but this is a response from a colleague of mine who is (works on dinosaur tracks) about the paper in Nature (the Palaeo3 paper appears to be an extension of the same data).

"Sure the tracks are bird-like as the title suggests, but the hallux impressions aren't that great, varying a fair bit between tracks in the three shown (fig 1b) - so they could be preservation artefacts from the toe 'scuffing' on the way in (if I'm being cynical). And interdigital angle is a poor indicator of anything because it can vary in an individual depending on substrate/locomotion/mood!

"So yeah, I don't find the hallux that convincing, but it's difficult to come up with a completely convincing argument against it. I'm certain you can get 'hallux-like' impressions from odd motions of the foot or substrate, but whether that's the case here I can't say."

Note that all dinosaurs had a hallux --- the issue is whether or not it was a truly reversed hallux, like post-Archaeopteryx birds. A small dinosaur could have a longish hallux (big toe) that would leave a bird-like impression, but would not have the unique bird-like morphology. Probably impossible to tell from the footprints alone.

I have been meaning to respond to this for a while, but other things took over.
Your colleague has correctly stated that the evidence in the paper from Nature is somewhat equivocal, but the additional evdence in the Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology paper that I specifically wanted to your response to was not addressed. This is much less easy to dismiss.

[cathy]

have been meaning to respond to this for a while, but other things took over.
Your colleague has correctly stated that the evidence in the paper from Nature is somewhat equivocal, but the additional evdence in the Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology paper that I specifically wanted to your response to was not addressed. This is much less easy to dismiss.I have been meaning to respond to this for a while, but other things took over.

Marc, can you explain your obsession with these tracks in creationist terms?

What exactly are you trying to prove, or more precisely, what lies are you planning on presenting at the Edinburgh creation torch rally in relation to these tracks?

At present, in the absence of anything else, they are inconclusive and probably more likely to fit the explanations you've been pointed to by two (a similar response to Christine's friend was given last time you raised this) experts on dinosaur tracks. If they aren't, and are more conclusively found to be birds, the consequences are for dinosaur to bird evolution only. Only that is adapted. They do not have any obvious consequences for evolution as a whole from common ancestor. It would take a hell of a lot more to dismantle every single piece of evidence for that.

If they had consequences for evolution as a whole they would still not effect the age of the Earth or universe! And I'm really not clear at all how you are reconciling acceptance of the dates with your belief in a 6000 year old Earth. One or the other, both is impossiblr even for you. By any stretch of the imagination it does not work!

And if they did affect all of those things - the default position would still not be a 6000 year old Genesis piece of allegorical prose. For that you need evidence! How many times has this point been made to you?

In short you gain nothing!!!!!!! And pretending anything but the above, which is still generous, will be a big fat lie. So will you be lying to your pals in Oct about the significance of these tracks or stating clearly the above?

Now go find some genuine positive evidence for your beliefs!

[Dr_GS_Hurd]

Perhaps Shurtees should grow a beard for his personal safety. Nobody honest could look in the mirror to shave. On-the-other-hand, there is no indication that Shurtees is honest.

[a_haworthroberts]

Email to AiG just now.




I tried to send the following message to AiG from within their website
but received a rather silly error message about 'invalid' characters,
apparently because I included some quotations.

'Evolutionary call to arms' article of 1 June (on the AiG website) - see http://www.answersingenesis.org/article ... ry-call-to arms

The Abstract to the Nature paper on Yutyrannus huali reported "Y.?
huali bears long filamentous feathers, thus providing direct evidence
for the presence of extensively feathered gigantic dinosaurs".

The 14 April article on the AiG website claimed "In this case the ?
feathers? consist of filamentous structures ?too densely packed? to
determine their structural characteristics and filamentous structures
whose ?morphological details are not preserved?" and "On the other
hand, calling dinosaur-associated filamentous structures that lack
ordinary feather anatomy feathers does not make them feathers. (Such is
this situation.) This convenient identification also does not make
those structures ?primitive feathers? or ?proto-feathers? or any kind
of transitional structure" and "Many experts believe filamentous
structures such as those described here are collagen fibrils, a sort of
connective tissue commonly found, among other places, in skin.
(Feathers are made of keratin, not collagen.)".

Thus you MISREPRESENTED and REJECTED the conclusions of the Nature
paper.

According to Darren Naish, blogging in Scientific American on 4 April:
"If you're wondering, claims that the integumentary structures present
in coelurosaurian theropods might actually be decayed collagen fibres
(yes, collagen fibres ? - I'm not kidding!!) are not likely and never
have been".

THUS Russell Garwood is CORRECT to write in Nature recently: "The
novelty of a large dinosaur with feathers was a selling point of the
recent paper. However, in spite of a widespread agreement on birds'
dinosaur origins, a limited number of researchers remain sceptical.
Within days of the paper appearing, the influential creationist
organization Answers in Genesis had exploited this disagreement. It
misrepresented the Nature paper and disagreement about the equivalence
of dinosaur feathers and bird feathers, concluding: ?Dinosaurs did not
evolve into birds ? no evidence of feather evolution has been found in
the fossil record.? It had presented an exciting discovery and a
genuine scientific debate (albeit one that has almost run its course)
as evidence against evolution, rather than as attempts to refine
knowledge in this interesting area".

[a_haworthroberts]

Sorry - my RIDICULOUS email changes apostrophes, quote marks and dashes into question marks for some unfathomable reason.

[a_haworthroberts]

Christine Janis has informed me:


An important point here is that collagen is derived from *mesoderm*,
and thus is formed in the *dermis* (ie., not in the top layer of the
skin, the epidermis, where keratinous structures are found).

The "collagen fibers" notion comes from a critique of Sinosauropteryx
by John Ruben. He proposed that the apparent short "frill" along the
backbone of this animal was actually frayed collagen fibers under the
epidermis, that had become exposed via decay. This is, to the best of my
knowledge, THE ONLY PLACE where anyone has proposed that dinosaurs'
integumentary (ie skin) structures are collagenous.

This interpretation is not impossible (although not particularly well-
supported) for Sinosauropteryx. However, structures that obviously
*protrude* from the surface of the skin, such as in Yutyrannus, cannot
possibly be made of collagen, it would be developmentally impossible.
More proof that the AiG "scientists" don't know their science, and are
just cherry-picking from any scientific papers that they can find that
support their claims.

[Christine Janis]

Marc Surtess said

Your colleague has correctly stated that the evidence in the paper from Nature is somewhat equivocal, but the additional evdence in the Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology paper that I specifically wanted to your response to was not addressed. This is much less easy to dismiss.

As I'm not a footprint expert (nor, I expect, is Marc) I'm not going to follow this up. However, I will make the comment that creationists would have a heyday with an evolutionary biologist making an argument about rock solid presence of a taxon based simply on the presence of footprints. (And rightly so.)

[marcsurtees]

Marc Surtess said

Your colleague has correctly stated that the evidence in the paper from Nature is somewhat equivocal, but the additional evdence in the Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology paper that I specifically wanted to your response to was not addressed. This is much less easy to dismiss.

As I'm not a footprint expert (nor, I expect, is Marc) I'm not going to follow this up. However, I will make the comment that creationists would have a heyday with an evolutionary biologist making an argument about rock solid presence of a taxon based simply on the presence of footprints. (And rightly so.)

Interesting, one might think you are trying to avoid the issues raised by this paper.
As you suggest I am not an expert on footprints. But all of us we have to rely on experts when we look at evidence outside our field. But as scientists I would suggest that we are qualified to examine the published data and come to an informed opinion.
Furthermore the authors of this paper concluded that the prints were made by birds. This conclusion is perfectly consistent with creationist theories (that birds were specially created) and not consistent with the "birds are dinosaurs" hypothesis.

[cathy]

Interesting, one might think you are trying to avoid the issues raised by this paper.
As you suggest I am not an expert on footprints. But all of us we have to rely on experts when we look at evidence outside our field.

No Marc what is interesting is you continue ot labour the same points when everything that can be reasonably said about them has already been said several times to you! You have been given ALL the possible explanations, from the experts, INCLUDING the possibility that the explanation you want might be true, which is they are made by something flying!

Now I'm not shouting I'm just going to say this very clearly in the vain hope you will finally understand - YOU ARE DEALING WITH SCIENTISTS, THEY ARE NOT GOING TO JUST REJECT ALL EXPLANATIONS JUST COS YOU WANT THEM TO. THEY WILL WAIT FOR SOMETHING MORE CONCLUSIVE - AS CHRISTINE SAYS!! AND IF EVIDENCE FOR YOUR DESIRED EXPLANATION EVER APPEARS - IT WILL MEAN NOTHING AT ALL TO YOU. WHETHER BIRDS WERE DINOSAURS OR SHARED A COMMON ANCESTOR WITH THEM IS NOT GOING TO TOPPLE THE MOUNTAINS OF EVIDENCE FOR EVOLUTION AND IT CERTAINLY ISN'T GOING TO SUDDENLY PROVE SOMEONE WAVED A MAGIC WAND 6000 YEARS AGO. YOU HAVE GIVEN US NO PROOF OF YOUR BELIEFS AT ALL!! NOTHING.

These inconclusive trackways, which real scientists have an open mind about, is all you have and THEY DO NOT SUPPORT YOU IN ANY WAY.

Can you either explain to me why you cannot get that fact, or give me some reason why you keep raising exactly the same point again and again when every possible answer has been given to you including the one you want. Our knowledge about the timelines and ways of evolution accumulates daily. It does not alter the overwhelming evidence it happened - do you understand? And if it did - as I've said thousands of times before, the default position is not Genesis it is don't know - do you understand that?

Once everything that can possibly be said has been said there is no point in re saying it - do you understand that? That is NOT avoiding the issue - do you understand that? If you think it is can you please explain what the hell extra you want them to say next - 'oh yes Marc you're right and the trackways experts could not possibly have alternatives'.

If you have a new point to raise, raise it, but stop pretending that not pandering to your inane wish to have these inconclusive trackways presented as proof is what you really mean.

[cathy]

But as scientists I would suggest that we are qualified to examine the published data and come to an informed opinion.

You are not a scientist Marc. You start from a conclusion in a 3000 year old religious text and twist or ignore the evidence to fit that conclusion. You will never change your mind on that conclusion whatever the evidence shows. That makes you incapable of making an informed opinion.

Your opinion was formed by ignoring 99.9999% of the information - scientific or theological. It is not informed by anything but your arrogant belief you are the only one capable of reading the bible - and it would'nt change even if your God popped down with a dvd showing you were wrong.


That is not scientific thinking and it certainly is NOT reaching an INFORMED opinion.