A quick Google and Wikipedia definition: an·ces·tor:
“ancestor; plural noun: ancestors:
Google: a person, typically one more remote than a grandparent, from whom one is descended.
an early type of animal or plant from which others have evolved.
synonyms: forerunner, precursor, predecessor”.Wikipedia: “An ancestor or forebear is a parent or (recursively) the parent of an ancestor (i.e., a grandparent, great-grandparent, great-great-grandparent, and so forth)”.
It is very disheartening that people, who erroneously believe . . . erroneously claim to be self-declared, “Darwinist” fail to comprehend the fundamentals of what “Common Ancestry” entails.
“‘But the question itself reveals a couple of fundamental misunderstandings about evolution and how it operates’, he says. Firstly, humans did not evolve from monkeys. Instead, monkeys and humans share a common ancestor from which both evolved around 25 million years ago.”
Leave it to the pseudo-Scientific ‘Dinosaur-to-Bird Myth Crowd’:
“...monkeys and humans share a common ancestor from which both evolved around 25 million years ago.
This evolutionary relationship is supported both by the fossil record and DNA analysis. A 2007 study showed that humans and rhesus monkeys share about 93% of their DNA. Based on the similarities and differences between the two types of DNA, scientists have estimated that humans and rhesus monkeys diverged from their common ancestor 25 million years ago. Similarly, the fossil record has identified ancestors common to both humans and monkeys, such as an as yet unnamed primate fossil from Myanmar found in 2009 and dated as living around 37 million years ago.”
From: “If evolution is real why are there still monkeys?”. . . to deny the fossil record +PLUS+ make the outrageous claim that merely 57% DNA is “evidence” to establish a line of direct ancestry from theropod dinosaurs to chickens! We don't even do that with 98.8% DNA between Chimps and Human! Legitimate scientists know better.
As bad or worse than the fossil-denying and pseudo-science of creationists!
Common Ancestry = involving an ‘an Ancestor’ mutually shared by two or more species, uniting a group in a close or distant relationship. [Birds are only ‘distantly related’ to dinosaurs, through a common ancestor in the early past which emerged before the dinosaurs and birds. . . reaching back into time beyond 150 million years ago, most likely as far back as the Triassic.]
The following diagram, actually appears to be closer to an accurate representation of the fossil record. How very refreshing!
A ‘common ancestor’ is not a ‘distant relative,’ that is, the dinosaurs are indeed ‘evolutionary cousins’ to birds and share a so-said ‘relationship’ but cretaceous dinosaurs are by no means, “the ancestor” of extinct and extant modern birds!
To say otherwise, and to make such an absurd claim is to deny the fossil record just like Creationists have done to bolster support for mythological pseudo-science.
“The Origin and Evolution of Birds,” by Alan Feduccia
This is fundamental, elementary Darwinism 101!
Common Descent Requires a Common Ancestor
“Common descent describes how, in evolutionary biology, a group of organisms share a most recent common ancestor. There is evidence of common descent that all life on Earth is descended from the last universal ancestor.”
Wikipedia
To a true “Darwinist” there should be no “amazement” that superficial similarities exist between a bone here or a muscle there, similarities between dinosaurs and birds is no great ‘scientific phenomena’, --birds and dinosaurs share a “common ancestor” so naturally there are characteristic features in their anatomy which are shared in common... the same goes for birds and mammals, the same is true for birds and crocodiles. An understanding of Darwinism demands it! However, the question of “Direct Ancestry” from dinosaurs directly to birds, is an entirely different ball of wax.
Dinosaurs and Birds share a ‘Common Ancestor’.
Dinosaurs are NOT the ‘Common Ancestor’ of modern birds!
Human and Chimp share 98.8% DNA. So similar--and yet so different
And yet, who is going to trumpet their ignorance to claim, “Humans evolved from Chimps.”?
“The chimpanzee and another ape, the bonobo, are humans' closest living relatives. These three species look alike in many ways, both in body and behavior. But for a clear understanding of how closely they are related, scientists compare their DNA, an essential molecule that's the instruction manual for building each species. Humans and chimps share a surprising 98.8 percent of their DNA. How can we be so similar--and yet so different?”
(Source: American Museum of Natural History)
And yet... who, but Creationists would make the absurd claim, “Charles Darwin taught, humans evolved from Chimpanzees”?
Human and Chimps share 98.8% DNA and yet, no person with the least fundamental knowledge and understanding of evolutionary biology would be so careless as to use 98.8% shared genetic identity to extrapolate, “Humans evolved from Chimps”.
Hold that thought: Leave the Creationist-Logic to work overtime for the Dinosaur-Bird Mythology crowd. If 98.8% DNA isn't reasonable enough for the legitimate mainstream scientific community to conclude, “Humans evolved from Chimps” then how can it be the Dinosaur-Bird Mythology crowd base their conclusions “Birds evolved from Dinosaurs” on a mere speculative ‘57% shared genetic identity’ between T. Rex and a Chicken? (and as Dr. Feduccia pointed out, it's merely a snip of collagen and not reliable evidence for anything so profound as drawing direct lines between theropod dinosaurs and modern birds.)
Dr. Alan Feduccia:
“Yes, but our ‘T. rex skeptics group’ has seriously questioned that study by Schweitzer; see chapter one in my book Riddle. And even if true (which I seriously doubt) it is just a small snippet of collagen. . . .”
From: Genetic Similarity Between Birds and Crocodiles
Birds are “Non-Avian”? They are ‘dinosaurs’ now?!
The “overzealous eagerness” to put a direct line of descent between theropod dinosaurs and chickens, is self-evident, to the point that it cripples the reasoning facilities.
Aves, Taxonomic Serial No.: 174371 Taxonomy and Nomenclature Kingdom: Animalia Taxonomic Rank: Class Synonym(s): Common Name(s): Birds [English] oiseaux [French] Taxonomic Status: Current Standing: valid Data Quality Indicators: Record Credibility Rating: verified - standards met Global Species Completeness: complete Latest Record Review: 2013Taxonomic Hierarchy Kingdom Animalia – Animal, animaux, animals Subkingdom Bilateria Infrakingdom Deuterostomia Phylum Chordata – cordés, cordado, chordates Subphylum Vertebrata – vertebrado, vertébrés, vertebrates Infraphylum Gnathostomata Superclass Tetrapoda Class Aves – Birds, oiseauxSource: “Integrated Taxonomic Information System” ITIS.gov, the home of authoritative taxonomic information on plants, animals, fungi, and microbes of North America and the world.
“In a comparison with 400 species of modern birds, Dr. Feduccia found that the pronounced arc of curvature of the claws of Archeopteryx was similar to that of known perching birds. Terrestrial birds have very flat claws. The curved claw on the reversed first toe of the fossil, Dr. Feduccia said, ‘is strictly a perching adaptation; it would be a tremendous obstacle to running on the ground.’
Writing in Science, he concluded, ‘Archeopteryx was, in the modern sense, a bird.’
In an interview, Dr. Feduccia was even more emphatic, noting that the claw measurements reinforced other evidence of wing structure, feature configuration, broad tail for lift and hollow bones for lightness that suggested a flight-worthy bird. Still other signs were that Archeopteryx had a wishbone where powerful pectoral muscles needed for flapping wings could be attached.
‘I can't see there's any question that this is a tree-dwelling bird, far removed from dinosaurs, and that paleontologists have simply misinterpreted it,’ said Dr. Feduccia, author of the ‘The Age of Birds’ (Harvard University Press, 1980). ‘This Is Definitive’
“Feathered Dinosaur or a Real Bird?” by John Noble Wilford, February 5, 1993, New York Times.
