Fossil of 8-foot Scorpion Found!

[Zankou]

Originally Posted by Te(V)plar

Totally bizarre. I thought the properties of chitin were such that it would be impossible for an organism of that size to be able to move.

On land it couldn't move. But there was a six-foot long ancient millipede on land.

It's kind of a myth that chitin is necessarily the limiting factor. After all, arthropods in the ocean in the present day get enormous (though their shells are not chitin, but rather a calcareous substance). Giant lobsters or crabs, anyone?

During the devonian period, oxygen levels were much higher than they are today, and allowed arthropods to reach gigantic sizes. Like the giant millipede mentioned above, and giant dragonflies and spiders.

[bestbudfam]

awesome find for science.

[Magooglie]

It lived in the water. Which means it probably didn't need to support its own body weight on those tiny legs and just swam around using that big tail. Modern sea insects like king crabs or even land crabs like coconut crabs are still much much smaller than the 8-foot sea scorpion.

[gracie_barra]

just an fyi guys, scorpions are not bugs.

[YellowHare]

Originally Posted by gracie_barra

just an fyi guys, scorpions are not bugs.

That's right. They're not bugs.

They're ninjas!

[HacksawJD]

yo i saw this in a docuentary they other dya, it evolved lazers and rockets and shit

[Zankou]

Originally Posted by HacksawJD

yo i saw this in a docuentary they other dya, it evolved lazers and rockets and shit

Indeed it did.

[NHB7]

Originally Posted by Immolation

Wow, just wow. Being so large means they need to consume a lot of food if the climate shifts slightly then they could end up being in big trouble. Also I doubt they reproduced as much as you htink or moved throughoutt he whole ocean. Evolution does not make species perfect it just allows them to fit into their current environment. If the climate or environment changes they they could be screwed hence the mass extinctions we have had. I remember when I was at the University of South Florida, we had a couple of creationist take Organic Evolution and they both changed their views. It's kind of hard to support creationism after you have learned biochemistry, genetics and actually taken a course on evolution. By the way you want to hear an interesting fact about evolution courses; they do not bash creationism but all creationism does is bash evolutoon. They never have any real points that cannot be knocked down by a knowlegeable scientist.
I also took courses in teh theology department and one of the professors who also was a preacher mentioned that there are more scientist that on campus that believe in God than in any other department. Just because soemone supports evolution doesn't mean they are atheists.

You actually make very good points. Larger does not mean evolunarily better. Indeed, the greater the complexity, the more fragile the species. That is why Dinosaurs are dead, but cockroaches and bacteria from that time are still alive.

Also I think your point about your class is amusing. I had an evolutionary theory class. It had about 150 people in it. At the beginning of the year he asked how many people believed in evolution and how many believed in creationism and a couple of other categories. He charted this. Byt he end of class, the belief in creationism had dropped substantially. The only ones that didn't really change their opinion were the ones who had readily admitted they would never change their opinions even in light of evidence.

[Canned]

Originally Posted by xceptionalguysd

http://icr.org/article/1842/

Weren't you the one talking about common sense earlier in the thread?
Then you post this piece of laughable crap? Institute of creationist research?

The reason it's called faith is because no "common sense" is involved.

[Kiyashin]

I believe in people who are many times smarter than I and who took years of schooling to achieve it because I'm not full of myself. That, and Occam's razor.