Fossil discovery
Read the article and make comments by Friday 11/14
Fossil discovery
17 Comments
Alex Tuohy
11/11/2014 01:31:39 am
After reading this article it really proves a point that reptiles and aquatic animals are old. They said that the way the animal had the fin, of a modern day seal. A long period of time had passed until the seal was founded. Very interesting the way evolution and fossils shows the features of animals in the past.
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Cristian Santos
11/11/2014 10:45:23 am
It amazes me how prehistoric animals like this survived and thrived on their own ecosystems
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Mackenzie Barton
11/12/2014 10:30:58 am
It amazes me how after so many years we are still finding new fossils today. It is interesting to see how the animals changed over time for sea creatures to being able to walk and live on land. Hopefully we can find out more about this fossil and other fossils as well.
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Halie Palmer
11/12/2014 10:38:03 am
I find it very interesting that they have found amphibious ichthyosaur fossils in China. I have always been fascinated by marine life and amphibious creatures so this discovery has made it possible to be able to trace back to know what they have evolved from and looked like in the early years of evolution.
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Alexis baker
11/12/2014 08:42:29 pm
It's quite amazing that we keep finding new fossils of different types of creatures that are no longer alive. Filling in the gaps that were once missing are now able to be studied and understood more.
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Amanda Benbow
11/12/2014 09:21:38 pm
It is very fascinating that after many years, we are still finding fossils. It is a major part because it shows how animals have changed over time. Hopefully more fossils are found in the future to help understand the changes animals have gone through.
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Erin Crosby
11/12/2014 09:27:39 pm
I think learning about dinosaurs is so interesting because it was so long ago that nobody knows a lot about that time. It's fascinating how much past species or events have happened that nobody can explain very thoroughly. I wasn't aware that dinosaurs also lived in water. That's incredible.
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Toni Ann
11/16/2014 08:57:15 am
I feel like people underestimate the importance and vitality of the past. Many people often overlook history such as dinosaurs and simply do not care. But it is the past that helps us understand the present. Maybe one day those things Erin mentioned about us not being able to explain will be answered through modern or even historical studies.
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Jordan McKnight
11/13/2014 08:08:24 am
It is an amazing scientific discovery that helps fill in a gap of time that has been a mystery for many years. This also gives us information about evolution of other species. This piece to the evolutionary puzzle that they found is helping in many ways and is a very informative discovery.
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Eric Rafaraci
11/13/2014 08:32:03 am
The discovery on the new fossil is so fascinating and so helpful to modern day society. If we just found one in China, imagine how many other fossils are out there that have yet to be discovered. This is just another piece to the puzzle on the new discoveries.
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Eric N
11/13/2014 09:38:12 am
A couple of concerns that I had after reading the article were how many assumptions were made. All that can be made of the fossil, through empirical science is that it died. It is impossible to determine for certain, or even roughly say that it lived 250 million years ago. The reason they said this was because it was found in a certain layer in the "fossil record" which was invented out of thin air over 200 years ago by Charles Lyle and its layers dates haven't changed since, long before radiometric dating. Also if this fossil was found in the sea or near it, it is EXTREMELY likely that it did not stay in one place. Hydro-logical sorting would have surely changed the fossils place in sediment layers over time, skewing its real date of existence to a much different time. Also it is out of the realm of empirical science to say for sure, and especially publicize, that due to the fossils structure its limbs are in a land-to-sea transitional form. The appendages could have served many functions completely unrelated to their guess, and by just studying its anatomical structure no concrete answer can realistically be made. My final concern is that the article automatically assumes the fossil is a transitional fossil between going on land to sea. Back in the early 1900's evolutionary biologists assumed, the thought to be extinct, "lobe finned fish" was a transitional fossil between going on sea to land. Then forty years later they found a lobe finned fish still alive, and the first thing they thought was "Wow, its amazing this fish survived for 300 million years" instead of questioning their original dissertation, they chose to believe a single "transitional species" still stayed in its form and survived for an unimaginable amount of years. I fear these scientists may have made the same mistake.
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Mr. Silvestri
11/17/2014 09:59:13 pm
You provided some great insight and thoughts about this article. There is always a "grey area" when it comes to analyzing fossils. Many scientists background and past experiences affect their decisions and opinions. It is important to have some type of evidence in order to make an inference about the organism. There is a big difference between inferences and guesses. It's clear that in your opinion they were making guesses most of the time rather than inferences.
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Matt Di Vilio
11/13/2014 10:18:36 am
This is amazing how we found a fossil that is over 250 million years old. It,s a Dolphin like creature that was in the water a long time ago. Another thing that amazes me is that this fossil is a missing stage in evolution for the amphibious ichthyosaur who ruled the earth on both land and water over 250 million years ago. We can learn so much from this fossil and learn a lot more about this and connect how it made water animals the way they are today.
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Emily speranza
11/13/2014 11:38:42 am
I think its cool and interesting that we found a fossil that is more than 250 million years old. It's amazing how much we can learn about the past simply from fossils. Its crazy how we are still finding more and more. This fossil can lead us to learn further information about the creature, which will allow us to learn about different animals as well.
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Ryan Brown
11/16/2014 03:46:54 am
i find it really interesting that we are still finding fossils from over 250 millions years ago, it's awesome how we can use these fossils to compare to animals today and compare how animals changed over time , this helps us learn more about the ecosystem 250 million years GO.
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John Maxted
11/16/2014 07:41:00 am
The fact that we just found a fossil from over 250 million years ago surprises me. It just goes to show how much we still have to learn about evolution in the aquatic world. This apparently filled in our missing evolutionary gap, this shows the transition from land to sea.
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Bobby Hampton
11/16/2014 12:00:51 pm
Fossils have a funny way of coming into our lives because they are so unexpected. This fossil that is said to be with the dinasours 250 million years ago is crazy. It says it is dolphin like because of its find but has features to it that makes it able to adapt to land. It fills a large gap that was missing in history and trying to figure out adaptations from millions and millions of years ago. This fossil was a tremendous find and will benefit scientists tremendously with filling in loose ends.
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