Evolution of whale hearing unfolds in fossil record

Steve Wrote:

unique, specific predictions, which are subsequently verified over time

That is really dumb Steve. Scientists wasted their time by noticing that whales are mammals, have hip bones, etc. Then they hypothesis that whales evolved from land animals and are now wasting their time looking for fossil and DNA evidence. What they should be doing is debating - debates are the way to find the truth! [/sarcasm]

[serious] John, thanks for the article. Does anyone have more pictures/explanations of the changes in the ear for those of us without journal access. I’m especially interested in ‘hearing’ ;-) how the the cetacean ear got its start - was it from the earlier ear or a separate system that started out with something like sound transmission through jawbones?

[off topic] It would be also be interesting if anyone has a writeup of the implications for this research: Sequencing of organims that were selected because each organism represents an important position on the evolutionary tree and therefore will contribute a sequence that will be particularly important in helping to interpret the human genome That is the sort of project that would even attract a fair amount of popular press attention. It might be good to brief some members of the press on what sort of results would invalidate evolution as well as what sort of benefits we expect from the knowledge. Then, when the sequencing is done, brief the press again on the results and how they validate or invalidate evolution.