Missing link found!

Jorn Hurum said:
"This specimen is like finding the Lost Ark for archeologists, It is the scientific equivalent of the Holy Grail. This fossil will probably be the one that will be pictured in all textbooks for the next 100 years."
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I was slightly amused when I considered the analogy.
 
I really hope they have more than a History Channel show with more information about this fossil. If they do I know more than one anthropologist that would like to take a look at it, possibly me included.

I really want to watch that show on it though.
 
The title isn't "Missing link found!". It's "Missing link found?". And since this isn't plastered all over the news everywhere, I'm not too excited about it. Some archeologist is probably just claiming it's the missing link so he can get his 5 minutes of fame.
 
Excalibur said:
The title isn't "Missing link found!". It's "Missing link found?". And since this isn't plastered all over the news everywhere, I'm not too excited about it. Some archeologist is probably just claiming it's the missing link so he can get his 5 minutes of fame.
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Honestly, I've seen it plastered over many news agencies.
 
Biologist and science blogger P.Z. Myers over at Pharyngula points out that media hype about this being a "missing link" is mostly about lazy reporters trying to find a decent hook for the audience:

P.Z. Myers said:
She's beautiful and interesting and important, but I do have to take exception to the surprisingly frantic news coverage I'm seeing. She's being called the "missing link in human evolution", which is annoying. The whole "missing link" category is a bit of journalistic trumpery: almost every fossil could be called a link, and it feeds the simplistic notion that there could be a single definitive bridge between ancient and modern species. There isn't: there is the slow shift of whole populations which can branch and diverge. It's also inappropriate to tag this discovery to human evolution. She's 47 million years old; she's also a missing link in chimp evolution, or rhesus monkey evolution. She's got wider significance than just her relationship to our narrow line.

People have been using remarkable hyperbole when discussing Darwinius. She's going to affect paleontology "like an asteroid falling down to earth"; she's the "Mona Lisa" of fossils; she answers all of Darwin's questions about transitional fossils; she's "something that the world has never seen before"; "a revolutionary scientific find that will change everything". Well, OK. I was impressed enough that I immediately made Ida my desktop wallpaper, so I'm not trying to diminish the importance of the find. But let's not forget that there are lots of transitional forms found all the time. She's unique as a representative of a new species, but she isn't at all unique as a representative of the complex history of life on earth.

... The hype is bad news, not because Ida is unimportant, but because it detracts from the larger body of the fossil record — I doubt that the media will be able to muster as much excitement from whatever new fossil gets published in Nature or Science next week, no matter how significant it may be.

Go ahead and be excited by this find, I know I am. Just remember to be excited tomorrow and the day after and the day after that, because this is perfectly normal science, and it will go on.
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It's a remarkable find. I look forward to hearing the creationists come forward to explain it away and insist yet again that there are no transitional forms in the fossil record.
 
Halifirien said:
Biologist and science blogger P.Z. Myers over at Pharyngula points out that media hype about this being a "missing link" is mostly about lazy reporters trying to find a decent hook for the audience:



It's a remarkable find. I look forward to hearing the creationists come forward to explain it away and insist yet again that there are no transitional forms in the fossil record.
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But it's a moot point since creationists say that the devil planted all fossils older than when the Bible says God created our world to tempt us to evil thinking and straying from the path of the righteous.

Either way, great find.
 
Excalibur said:
The title isn't "Missing link found!". It's "Missing link found?". And since this isn't plastered all over the news everywhere, I'm not too excited about it. Some archeologist is probably just claiming it's the missing link so he can get his 5 minutes of fame.
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Idk about you but I keep seeing this everywhere.
 
Taurothar said:
But it's a moot point since creationists say that the devil planted all fossils older than when the Bible says God created our world to tempt us to evil thinking and straying from the path of the righteous.

Either way, great find.
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Young-Earth Creationists say that; get it right :|

Tyrath said:
Idk about you but I keep seeing this everywhere.
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Same. It looks really neat. I doubt it'll be a lemur with the face of dear old Aunt Harriet, but will still look partially human.
 
Tristam Green said:
Young-Earth Creationists say that; get it right :|
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Creationists that don't pick and choose which part of the bible they want to believe are young earth creationists.

YECs regard the Bible as a historically accurate, factually inerrant record of natural history.

Other creationists don't consider the bible to be historically accurate but choose to live their life based on it's contents anyway.
 
A definition of a Creationist versus a Young-Earth Creationist doesn't negate who says it or for what reason, so I do not really understand where you're going with the statement.
 
"This fossil will probably be the one that will be pictured in all textbooks for the next 100 years."
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That'll be nice for the kids in 2030 using 20 year old out-of-date textbooks.
emot-rimshot.gif
 
..
Looks like a prehistoric Mithra to me.
 
Wait...there are still people who debate evolution? Gimme a break...lol, gunna debate if the earth is round or flat too?

Cool find...not exactly anything new though, just another piece of information pointing out the fucking obvious.
 
Zoolander said:
Wait...there are still people who debate evolution? Gimme a break...lol, gunna debate if the earth is round or flat too?
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They say that at night, when the moon is full and the wind is still, and if you listen closely, you can hear them preparing to argue that evolution violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics.

BOOGA-BOOGA-BOOGA-BOOGA!
 
Seriously, stop making every damn debate into smashing religion. The whole arguement has been done to death. Bones were found. Congrats. Talk about the scientific discovery and stop harping on the "Omg religious people are so stupid, ha ha on them".
 
Mirewen said:
Talk about the scientific discovery and stop harping on the "Omg religious people are so stupid, ha ha on them".
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Some of them are, though. It's nutty fundamentalists getting knocked here, not religious people in general. There are plenty of religious folks who accept evolution as reality. Catholics, for example.
 
I just get sick of hearing smack talk that lumps everyone into the same pot. If you're only knocking the people who are so blind that they can never accept anything other than what they believe no matter what happens in the future, then fine. I'm as disturbed as you are about most of it. You may be understanding enough to know that all religious people aren't the same, but a lot of people aren't and it's obvious by some of the posts that are floating around on here.
 
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