Vorkosigan

That's a hilarious article from TrueOrigins....thanks for a good belly laugh, randman.

The animal’s rear legs are shown not with feet that would help it to walk, but as fins that would assist it to swim. However, Carroll, who examines the animal’s leg bones, says that it possessed the ability to move powerfully on land.

This paragraph says it all. The feet have webs, not fins, and there is nothing about webbed feet that says one can't walk powerfully on land. I can think of several animals with webbed feet that do so -- ever tried to catch a duck?

Here's the actual case, if you are interested, randman...

<a href="http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/mammal/cetacea/cetacean.html" target="_blank">http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/mammal/cetacea/cetacean.html</a>
"Pakicetus is so far known only from its skull, but recent finds in Pakistan have produced other whale species that show very primitive characters in both the skull and the rest of the skeleton. These animals had relatively well developed limbs, but were aquatic. Below right is a drawing of the known skeleton of Rodhocetus, a recently discovered archaeocete from Pakistan, a few million years younger than Packicetus. Rodhocetus had well-developed hind limbs (although only the thighbone, or femur, has been preserved), but unlike land mammals, Rodhocetus did not have its vertebrae in the pelvic region fused together into a sacrum."

read that last sentence again.

<a href="http://www.studyworksonline.com/cda/content/article/0,1034,NAV4-42_SAR1472,00.html" target="_blank">http://www.studyworksonline.com/cda/content/article/0,1034,NAV4-42_SAR1472,00.html</a>
"Pakicetids are thought to be ancestral to cetaceans because of the structure of their ear bones. Although whale ear structure clearly evolved from that of land animals, it is specialized to listen to sounds underwater. Pakicetus had an ear bone structure that is currently found only in cetaceans, leading morphologists to think that it was an early cetacean."

Harun Yahaya complains that it couldn't be an ancestral whale because it walked, but:
<a href="http://www.neoucom.edu/depts/ANAT/Pakicetid.html" target="_blank">http://www.neoucom.edu/depts/ANAT/Pakicetid.html</a>
"Pakicetids were the first cetaceans, and they are more primitive than other whales in most respects.?In fact, they did not look like whales at all, and did not live in the sea.?Instead they lived on land, and may have fed while wading in shallow streams.?Fossils of pakicetids are only found in Pakistan and Northwestern India, and it is likely that cetaceans originated there."

In fact, scientists don't think they were swimmers, but waders.

BTW, more than the skull is known now. Pix of bones are at the site above. You should go with more updated sites, randman. Ones by scientists, for example.

This discusses the ear, with an electron microscope photo of pakicetus' anvil - damned lucky to find that one.
<a href="http://www.neoucom.edu/depts/ANAT/Hearing.htm" target="_blank">http://www.neoucom.edu/depts/ANAT/Hearing.htm</a>

by the way, they are still waiting over in Patrick's thread for you to put up the one best argument from AiG for Flood Geology. If you weren't a troll, you would done so already.

randman

You still didn't answer the basic issue of the conflicting depictions. One small error on webbed feet does not negate the conflicting depictions and the rest of the post.
By the way, I answered your asinine posts, and I will from now on treat you accordingly, not as someone who has any interest in decency, but as what you are. I have no idea what AIG's best argument is, but I did think ya'll were attacking the weakest link as I think is evidenced by most of the evolutionist posts here. There is an attempt to dodge the substance of critics and focus on peripheal issues.
Also, I linked a number of arguments from AIG that I thought were better, and yet was bashed for this.
So take a hike, or answer the substance of other's posts.

[ March 10, 2002: Message edited by: randman ]</p>

Vorkosigan

So take a hike, or answer the substance of other's posts.

[ March 10, 2002: Message edited by: randman ]

Meanwhile, over on the thread with AiG's best argument, Patrick waits.

Michael