Krimel accuses Wilber of ignorance about evolution: Krimel: > Least anyone think I exaggerate there is this from a "Brief History of > Everything":
Wilber: > "Take the standard notion that wings simply evolved from forelegs. > It takes perhaps a hundred mutations to produce a functional wing from > a leg--a half-wing will not do. A half-wing is no good as a leg and no > good as a wing--you can't run and you can't fly. It has no adaptive > value whatsoever. > In other words, with a half-wing you are dinner. The wing will work only if > these hundred mutations happen all at once, in one animal--also these same > mutations must occur simultaneously in another animal of the opposite sex, > and they have to somehow find each other, have dinner, a few drinks, mate, > and have offspring with real functional wings." Krimel > This could be Philip Johnson or Michael Behe... pulzee. When I asked what was wrong with Wilber's description, Krimel me referred to the following: http://www.kheper.net/topics/Wilber/Wilber_on_biological_evolution.html. Here are the writer's objections to Wilber's views: " 1. The wing of course developed from the long fore-arms of small predatory dinosaurs (Coelurosaurs)" A picture of a Coelurosaur on Wikipedia shows an animal of very short fore-arms. (Look up Coelurosauria) " 2. Feathers are not modified scales." A red herring. No where does Wilber say anything about scales. " 3. Feathers not only help with endothermy, but long feathers may have been used by dinosaurs to help brood their eggs; this is an excellent example of pre-adaptation. In other words, feathers came before flight. The first appearance of a tiny feather from a mutation would hardly help control body temperature much less help warm eggs. " 4. The downstroke or flight stroke wing seems to have evolved from the maniraptoran prey clutching adaptation. Predatorial maniraptors (e.g. Deinonychus, Velociraptor) snapped their powerful arms forward to grab at prey; the arms moving down from being held at (or even above) the level of the shoulders." Powerful arms? See photo in Wikipedia mentioned above. " 5. When Coelurosaurs originally acquired long feathers there was an immediate advantage as an aid in balance when chasing prey or escaping their enemies. Even many ground-living birds today hold their wings out for balance when running." How is the first appearance of a tiny feather from mutation going to aid in balance? Note that the author doesn't address Wilber's question about a how a mutant sprouting a tiny feather finds and mates with a similar mutant so their children will possibly have a few skimpy feathers, too -- not that the whatever feathers appeared on the children would do them much good anyway. (Incidentally, animal parents of mutant children tend to kill them immediately.) If this is the best the proponents of evolution can do in knocking down those who question their theory, it's little wonder their theory is thought by many to resemble Swiss cheese. Platt moq_discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
