Snakes and hips

[Ravi Ramdial]

Google news previewed this article....The most primitive snake fossil found features hips and fully functional hind legs.

Now i am a university graduate and this is just my opinion isn't the loss of the hips and the fully functional hind legs a step BACK on the evolutionary chain

[AzurePhoenix]

I don't imagine hidlegs would be all that important as a snake would still have to use at least a bit of the modes of locomotion legless snakes use to get around. If anything they might get in the way more often than not, sort of like a random and not terribly useful attachment sticking out from a streamlined vehicle. They can climb, "crawl", swim, hunt and mate just as well without them.

[RoyLennigan]

there are no steps forward or back in evolution. changes occur due to the environment an organism lives in. obviously, in the environment the snake was in, hips and hind legs were of less use than no legs at all. maybe the sleek body made it easier to evade predators, or dig underground, or swallow their prey whole, etc. whatever the cause, it the change allowed the snake to survive better than others without the change, and so its genes were passed on to more offspring.

[Halucigenia]

....isn't the loss of the hips and the fully functional hind legs a step BACK on the evolutionary chain

You mean a step back on the discredited "evolutionary chain of being", the thinking that there is a direction or purpose to evolution. Is that how you understand it?

There can be no step back if there is no direction.