Archaeopteryx part 4- Scales to feathers

The idea that feathers have some kind of ability to evolve from

reptilian scales is patently absurd. One source that was mentioned

by one person in support of the theory stated that the

Archaeopteryx had feathers and scales. the author could have been

referring to the bird-type scales on the feet which are found on

all birds. But the problem is, these scales found on the

Archaeopteryx are bird scales and are totally different from the

reptile scales.

The following are treatments on the feather/scale subject.

"Adam and Evolution" Professor Michael Pitman copyright 1984.

page 42 Consider reptilian scales, bird feathers and fur. The

evolutionist holds that feathers and fur have evolved, divergently

from scales. But can such different skin-coverings be called

'homologous'?

For example, a feather and a scale develop from

different layers of skin and follow different development paths;

feather's greater structural complexity must reflect a more complex

genetic background. Yet the first known feather is entirely feather-

like, not scale-like.

The genes coding for each type of skin

covering must contain a sequence (subroutine) for keratin, because

each is made primarily of a form of keratin. Yet this subroutine

could well be integrated into quite a different overall set of genes.

If so, how could we explain their origin in terms of simple

inheritance from a common ancestor?

Page 222 All birds have feathers: no other organisms do.

Archaeopteryx has feathers. There exists absolutely no evidence for

the evolution of feathers. The guess that DNA coding for scales

'must have' changed to produce feathers is entirely unsubastantiated.

No intermediate scale-feather exists.

Feathers are aerodynamic beauties. They are light, the shaft

being hollow, and quite different from the scales which are coded on

to the feet alone of birds. They grow from capsules called 'pin

feathers' and become lifeless when full grown. A feather from wing

or tail is composed of a shaft with branches, called barbs, arranged

diagonally to the left and right. The barbs have branches to the

right and left called barbules. These overlap neighboring barbules

and are interlocked to eachother by little hooks and eyelets.

Some large feathers contain over a million barbules, with hooks

and eyelets to match, in perfect order. The feather is useless

without this interlocking mechanism which acts something like an

automatic zip fastener whose disturbance preening rearranges. When

outstretched in flight, the hooks cause the whole wing-assembly to

form a continuous sheet to catch the wind. The whole feather is a

cohesive, elastic and light structure, well designed to function as

an air-resistant surface. Sensory receptors record its precise

position.

Over both wings they effect the continuous variations and

fine adjustments of more than ten thousand tiny muscles attached to

the base of the feathers. Behold the parts of a precision instrument

of aerospace, unparalleled in design and workmanship by human

technology.

Feathers are in no way frayed or modified scales. They even

arise from a different layer of skin cells. Whence evolved the

pigment mechanism for coloring and patterning both plumage and egg?

In the latter colours are laid down in the oviduct, in whose walls no

pigment has been found. This indicates that the organization of

pigment and pattern is coded into then avian DNA. By a megamutation?