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REPLY #68 TO
"EVOLUTION VS. CREATIONISM" And, of course, since he's "an evolutionist", his report is automatically suspect, right? If not, why include that comment? If so, why is the report flawed? (R) I'm not saying the report is flawed. You amaze me. The reason I emphasize the fact that he is an evolutionist is because in your earlier replies, you basically through out all nonevolutionist literature as flawed (your words were actually considerably stronger). You set up the rules of the game at the start of this dialogue. I am simply emphasizing to you that I am following your guidelines. There's nothing more to it than that. Chill! (MB) Nice try, but you're missing a rather important point. "Nonevolutionist" (i.e., Creationist) literature is flawed because it is the promotion of religion disguised as or claiming to be science and cares little for the facts and evidence of science. When the ICR's Steve Austin, for example, writes his articles and produces his videos on Mt. St. Helens, Yellowstone, the Grand Canyon, etc., he does not call himself a Creationist or identify his affiliation with the ICR in any way. Instead, he trumpets his PhD and purports to be offering up serious geology when he is, instead, supporting Creationist Flood dynamics hypotheses. It is proper to expose such charlatans and their agendas for who and what they really are. Creationists have adopted the tactic of using the word "evolutionist" (a word of their own invention, by the way), to refer to the author of any published material which they feel lends support to Creationism or challenges some tenet of evolution. Compare this with their total lack of reference to the credentials or fields of expertise for any scientist whose writings do *not* support the Creationist cause. Since you support Creationism and make the same use of the word "evolutionist", it is reasonable to assume that you use it for the same reason as the standard Creationist literature uses it. Creationists do not use the term haphazardly and scientists do not use the term at all to apply to themselves. Scientists refer to each other by their proper degrees and academic affiliations. The line of descent goes from Homo erectus (1,800,000 - 300,000 years ago) to Homo sapiens (first appearing about 500,000 years ago) which then separately diverged into Neanderthals (about 230,000 years ago) and modern humans (about 120,000 years ago) (R) You never answered my questions, so I copied over my main one. Your 230,000 year dating on Neanderthal is based on the oldest find from that species. The indicated split in Goodwin's article is actually about 500,000 years ago, about the time Homo Sapiens is supposed to have first appeared. So this would indicate that the modern human lineage and the neanderthal lineage was already splitting at the when the first Homo Sapiens fossils are dated. this means there should be a nonneanderthal fossil lineage from this split 500,000 years ago, to the appearance of moderns sometime before 125,000 years ago. I asked you to name two such finds. Nonneanderthal, non erectus, and dated between 500,000 years ago and 125,000 years ago. That was what I asked. I ask again. (MB) If Goodwin's study proposes a split that would have happened over twice as many years ago as the dating of the oldest known specimen, doesn't that sound an alarm that the dating of his find might be anomalous and require some corroboration via additional specimens? Another possibility is that his data are correct and the first arrival of Homo sapiens actually happened somewhat earlier than 500K years ago. Finding a specimen that dated somewhat older would not force any major reevaluation of the lineage of modern humans. Further study is indicated. In any case, since Neanderthals and modern humans are not members of the same line of descent, the dating of Neanderthal specimens would have no effect on the evolutionary descent of modern man. This should also point out that your question is meaningless since it asks for two examples of transitional fossils between the common human/Neanderthal ancestor (Homo sapiens) and modern humans (Homo sapiens sapiens), when it should be rather obvious there are *no* such species at all! So, what's the point of your question and why does the Goodwin study present a problem? Furthermore, how does it dispute evolution or support Creationism in any way?
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