Page 553 - Atlas of Creation Volume 3

Harun Yahya

One must explain also why all theropods and other dinosaurs discovered in other deposits where integument
is preserved exhibit no dino-fuzz, but true reptilian skin, devoid of any featherlike material (Feduccia 1999),
and why typically Chinese dromaeosaurs preserving dino-fuzz do not normally preserve feathers, when a

hardened rachis, if present, would be more easily preserved. 155
So, what are these creatures, found in China, and presented as a supposed intermediate form be-
tween reptiles and birds?

Feduccia explains that some of the creatures presented as "feathered dinosaurs" were extinct reptiles
with dino-fuzz, and that others were true birds:

There are clearly two different taphonomic phenomena in the early Cretaceous lacustrine deposits of the
Yixian and Jiufotang formations of China, one preserving dino-fuzz filaments, as in the first discovered, so-

called ''feathered dinosaur'' Sinosauropteryx (a commpsognathid), and one preserving actual avian feathers,
as in the feathered dinosaurs that were featured on the cover of Nature, but which turned out to be secondar-
ily flightless birds. 156

That is, all the fossils presented as "feathered dinosaurs" or "dino-birds" belong either to flightless
birds like chickens, or to reptiles that possess the feature called "dino-fuzz," an organic structure that has
nothing to do with avian feathers. Clearly, no fossil establishes the existence of an intermediate form be-

tween birds and reptiles. (Besides the above-mentioned two basic groups, Feduccia also mentions "the
abundant beaked bird Confusiusornis," some enantiornithines, and a newly identified seed-eating bird
called Jeholornis prima, none of which is a dino-bird.)

Therefore, Prum and Brush's claim in Scientific American that fossils have proved that birds are di-
nosaurs is totally contrary to the facts.

The "Age Problem" that Evolutionists Want to Hide and

the Misconception of "Cladistics"

In all evolutionist articles that fan the flames of the dino-bird myth, including the one by Richard O.
Prum and Alan Brush in Scientific American, there is one forgotten and even hidden but very important

fact.
The fossils of what they falsely call the "dino-bird" or "feathered dinosaur" do not date back any more
than 130 million years. However, there is an extant fossil of a true bird at least 20 million years older than
the fossils they want to present as a "half bird:" Archaeopteryx. Known as the oldest bird, Archaeopteryx is

a true bird with perfectly-formed flying muscles, feathers for flight and a normal bird's skeleton. Since it
could soar through the skies 150 million years ago, how can evolutionists maintain such nonsense as to
present other creatures that lived later in history as the primitive ancestors of birds?
Darwinists have discovered a new method of doing so: cladistics, which has been frequently used in

paleontology over the past few decades to interpret fossils. Those who promote this method are not in-
terested in the fossils' age; they only compare the measurable characteristics of extant fossils and, on the
basis of these comparisons, devise an evolutionist family tree.
This method is defended on an evolutionist Internet site that explains the so-called rationale for

positing Velociraptor, a much younger fossil than Archaeopteryx, as the latter's ancestor:
Now we may ask "How can Velociraptor be ancestral to Archaeopteryx if it came after it?"

Well, because of the many gaps in the fossil record, fossils don't always show up "on time." For example, a re-
cently discovered partial fossil from the Late Cretaceous of Madagascar, Rahonavis, seems to be a cross be-
tween birds and something like Velociraptor, but appears 60 million years too late. No-one however says its

late appearance is evidence against its being a missing link, it may just have lasted a long time. Such examples
are called "ghost lineages"; we assume these animals existed earlier when we have probable ancient ancestors
for them a long way back, and perhaps possible descendants back then too. 157

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