Scientists Find Missing Link in Bird Evolution

BlueCup writes "Dozens of fossils of an ancient loon-like creature that some say is the missing link in bird evolution have been discovered in northwest China. The remains of 40 of the nearly modern amphibious birds, so well-preserved that some even have their feathers, were found in Gansu province, researchers report in Friday's issue of the journal Science. Previously only a single leg of the creature, known as Gansus yumenensis, had been found."

Comments

FSM Strikes Again!

[Jerk City Troll]

They were planted there by the Flying Spaghetti Monster to test the convictions of the faithful!

Re:FSM Strikes Again!

[Skreems]

The funny part is that those who oppose the idea of intelligent design will inevitably be more dogmatic, closed minded, faithful, trusting, less willing to do research, less willing to have an intelligent conversation, etc... than 99 percent of people who do accept the idea of creation. (Silly grammer to make the point)

When pro-creation (anti-evolution) individuals make statements like "put a bunch of car parts in your garage and leave it for a year, then see if it's evolved into a Honda", I tend to doubt your assertions. For my own experience, creationists like to THINK they're being logical, but then accuse evolutionists of being "closed minded" when they point out the ridiculous logical flaws and mistaken assumptions in ID or creationism.

Also, the article forgot to mention anything about how they know these birds actually are evolutionary ancestors of modern birds, only that "they just are".

It's a short, summary article in a non-technical journal. If you want a more technical explanation I'm sure you can find one from a source targeted at that level of discussion. But don't assume that the researchers are making it up, just because a five paragraph summary fails to go into detailed technical explanations.

Re:FSM Strikes Again!

[yankpop]

So, they took the evidence and looked at it through the lense of their pre-determined conclusions got the answer they wanted to find? I seem to remember a lecture in a science 101 class that included strong, almost vehement admonition to never ever do exactly what they just did.

I'm just an evolutionary biologist, so you'll have to take this with a grain of salt, but that's bullshit. What they did was note that most species of birds near that occur near the base of the evolutionary tree are aquatic. That's it: they described a pattern. I suppose you could be right, maybe they have some vested interest in early birds being aquatic. I can't imagine what possible motivation you might have for fabricating such an esoteric claim, but you're the one who (anonymously) claims to know so much more than us biologists.

Of course, you could very easily and objectively test this yourself. Look up the latest evolutionary tree for birds, figure out which ones the ecology is known for, and label your tree accordingly. Then look at the tree, and see if the species near the base of the tree are mostly aquatic. If they are, then the guys in the article are ok. I don't think this is pressing enough that I'm going to rush out and do it myself. But you can be sure that there are more than enough fanatical ornithologists in the world to check these things out.

If you really can't find an "evolutionist" who knows more about the subject than you do, you are looking in the wrong places.

yp.

Re:FSM Strikes Again!

[Dimensio]

No - exactly like religion, and they have a book of eye witness accounts to back up their answers.

Eyewitness accounts -- or unsubstantiated claims of eyewitness accounts -- cannot be objectively evaluated. Empirical observations can be objectively evaluated. There is a key difference.

Oh noes!

[Umbral Blot]

No you fools, now there are two missing links (previously we wanted to find C between A and B, now we want to find D between A and C, and E between C and B) Of course this all really goes to show that you can never completely verify evolution no matter how much evidence you collect (just like any scientific theory), which is fine since you can be certain of the truth of something even if there is a remote possibility of later disproof. The public's obsession with "missing links" just goes to show that they don't understand knowledge very well.

In related news...

[reklusband]

KFC's stock soared 100 points with the news that the protoduck would be served boneless and with hot sauce. When asked to comment on the decision to serve 100 million year old extinct bird, a kfc representative was quoted as saying "It has to taste better that the cluck we serve now"

Re:Regardless...

[Gorimek]

Whatever the faults of the Chinese regime may be, being beholden to christian fundamentalist interests is not one of them.

Re:Missing Link, eh?

[nacturation]

Indeed. It's amazing how closely the fundies arguments resemble Zeno's paradox.

Re:Doubious Dating Techniques

[NosTROLLdamus]

Though the method of dating the fossil was not stated in the article, carbon dating can be used up to, like, 60,000 years, which is well beyond the creation of the earth according to biblical timelines, but still, loses some usefullness depending on the age of the specimen. Carbon-14 has a HALF-LIFE of 5730 years. HALF-LIFE. You know how that works don't you?

Often proponents of creationism and intelligent design tend to choose the dating technique that fits the picture they have in their minds. For example, the poster above me stated a single, unrefined example of a dating technique being off in order to set a mindset that this technique is unreliable, and, unjustifiably, useless in all situations. He or she also states the half life of carbon-14, and a continued presence of it in fossils to understate the possible age of the fossil, conviently fitting into creationary mold set by the bible. How old is the world again? 6,000 years?

Another Chinese Fossil?!?

[johnshirley]

Is it just me or does anyone else find that there's an unusually large number of unique fossils coming from China? Maybe it's because, like products manufactured for Walmart, they're mostly cheap crap http://www.paleodirect.com/fakechinesefossils1.htm

Fascinating logic, really.

[Anonymous Coward]

Uncommon Descent, even after their failure in basic statistics this morning, kind of outdid themselves with that post.

The entire complaint there is that the find was called "the missing link". Except... who called it "the missing link"? Well... Fox News.

Fox News manages to disprove evolution sheerly by how they chose to word their headline? Wow. Who would have seen it coming?

This is really the most fascinating thing about the "Intelligent Design" movement. The most extreme and fundamental flaw with "Intelligent Design" creationists is that they simply don't produce anything; year after year while evolutionary biology moves ahead and makes interesting new discoveries, intelligent design creationists keep repeating the exact same mantras over and over, year in and year out, barely stopping even to revise them in the face of refutations. While science goes out and does research, intelligent design creationists sit around and do nothing, because they either already know all the answers or don't care what the answers are.

You'd think intelligent design creationists would be kind of embarrassed of this, and try not to call attention to this. But no. In fact, they take it as a point of pride. Every time evolutionary biologists learn something new, intelligent design creationists-- in particular those at Dembski's uncommon descent blog-- jump on it and claim victory. "Ah ha!" they said. "Evolutionary theory now knows something it didn't before! Why didn't it know that before? This shows how flawed evolution is, that they keep discovering new things!". IDCers see evolution's willingness to learn and constant progress as a sign of weakness, flipfloppery and intellectual bankruptcy. The IDCers themselves, meanwhile, are safe from any such allegations, as each year they remain exactly as ignorant as they were before.