Re: four winged Archaeopteryx

["franklin e. bliss" <frank@blissnet.com>]

Right up there with federal income tax. It is a Fraudulent Law  
actually. The originator of ORP was named Ernst Haeckel who developed  
it back in 1866 when peer review was a bit lax.  In time he became a  
well known fraud for his drawings (modified to suit his point)  
showing a group of embryo's in various "stages of development".  Even  
though this "Law" is in disrepute as you point out, it is still  
taught in many public schools as fact.  I forgot to insert an  
emotocon. :-)  This theories "development" was enabled in order to  
support biologic determinism (a whole other topic whos basis in  
thought went back to Plato).

More specifically (excuse the pun) today a similar and somewhat more  
believable concept is often stated that PRO "Phyogeny recapitulates  
Ontogeny". The latter statement of course means that the embryonic  
stages of an organism or species should resemble the embryonic (and  
not adult) stages of its ancestors. In other words, the embryonic  
development of any species is constrained to resemble (closely) the  
embryonic development of its ancestors. Thusly by examining the  
ontogeny of an individual species, we can infer certain aspects of  
their evolutionary history. Nothing cold and hard there except the  
lack of good embryonic fossil record in the rock. Unfortunately for  
the argument, there are  examples that refute the notion that  
phylogeny is reviewed during ontogeny. You got my drift (genetic?)and  
tongue in cheek point that no doubt early Mesozoic avian theropod  
ancestors were featherless even though no modern bird is.

Frank (Rooster) Bliss
MS Biostratigraphy
Weston, Wyoming

On Oct 10, 2006, at 5:24 AM, Roberto Takata wrote:

> A bad law indeed - actually not even a law.
>
> []s,
>
> Roberto Takata
>
> On 10/9/06, franklin e. bliss <frank@blissnet.com> wrote:
> > Some of them are born featherless.  The phrase "Ontogeny
> > recapitulates Phylogeny" is after all a Biogenetic Law.  No doubt
> > early Mesozoic avian theropod ancestors were featherless.
> > Frank (Rooster) Bliss
> > MS Biostratigraphy
> > Weston, Wyoming