Evolution 101-part 4: Snakes with Legs and Other Distant Cousins

Remember, normal text is copied from Evolution 101 by the Understanding Evolution team! (worst superhero guild ever) http://evolution.berkeley.edu/

BOLD font is me, Rent A Friend 2000, being Bold.

Understanding phylogenies

Understanding a phylogeny is a lot like reading a family tree. The root of the tree represents the ancestral lineage, and the tips of the branches represent the descendants of that ancestor. As you move from the root to the tips, you are moving forward in time.

 

When a lineage splits (speciation), it is represented as branching on a phylogeny. When a speciation event occurs, a single ancestral lineage gives rise to two or more daughter lineages.Phylogenies trace patterns of shared ancestry between lineages. Each lineage has a part of its history that is unique to it alone and parts that are shared with other lineages. Similarly, each lineage has ancestors that are unique to that lineage and ancestors that are shared.

Once again, NONE of this is based on observable data or events except at the level where all of the points on the chart are dogs, or where all of the points of the chart are turtles. When you back out far enough to find where dogs blend with cats and with turtles and with cabbage, there’s NOTHING which actually exists to fill in the chart. This is the result of beginning with an assumption of the evolutionary theory, then putting different species into a faux animation sequence.

What they fail to show is how many of those lines should be dotted to indicate “No known species exits here, living or in the fossil record.” The human family tree would be almost ENTIRELY dotted lines, and where it isn’t would merely be connecting humans with humans. Of course, if they admit the holes in their theory, they literally have nothing left to say. But I am getting ahead of myself.

Evolution 101-part 3: The Guessing Tree

Remember, normal text is copied from Evolution 101 by the Understanding Evolution team! (And yes, it really says that on their web site) http://evolution.berkeley.edu/

BOLD font is me, Rent A Friend 2000, being Bold.

The family tree

The process of evolution produces a pattern of relationships between species. .

It’s cute how they use the word “process” to mean “religion” and “produces” to mean “inspires us to creatively invent.” But if they spent a lot of time being THAT accurate, they wouldn’t have much of a story anymore.  Maybe I’m being too picky.

As lineages evolve and split and modifications are inherited, their evolutionary paths diverge. This produces a branching pattern of evolutionary relationships.

By studying inherited species’ characteristics and other historical evidence, we can reconstruct evolutionary relationships and represent them on a “family tree,” called a phylogeny.

Let me read between the lines a little: Reconstruct means “Invent.” This is another way of saying, “We don’t OBSERVE this happening (thus making it NOT science) but we can use our imaginations and lead ourselves to BELIEVE that it DID happen, and maybe, just maybe, it’s sort of happening still.” Does this remind anyone else of Scientology?