Are there creatures with semi evolved body parts present on the parent creature?

[RobRit]

Are there creatures with semi evolved body parts present on the parent creature?

In reply to this comment of which I find confusing:
"people who accept evolution are the most ignorant, thick-skulled, bigoted morons to ever existthanks for proving that you are a bigot and a moron. you just love to call god a liar by accepting the evolution lie. we should see creatures with semi evolved body parts not present on the parent creature if evo was true. so far zerp evidence for evo have been found in nature."

Edit: From my understanding:
This is what he says we do not have any evidence of: http://genetics.thetech.org/original_news/news124

The guy doesn't understand evolution in that sense semi evolved body parts don't exist generally; every step on the evolutionary ladder is useful. another copy of a gene or a slight alteration in the code can case another leg to appear, but if the mutation is bad, the individual will die (or something similar evolutionary speaking). for example, humans can't evolve half wings with the goal of full wings; as evolution doesn't have a goal. either arms have to change step by step into wings, each step being better than before in reproduction or new appendixes have to form step by step, and each step being useful and adding to better reproduction

Edited July 7, 2016 by RobRit

[John Cuthber]

One could argue that all body parts of all creatures re "semi evolved. They are all changing- slowly.

[Arete]

There's a coupe of major issues with the poster's statement.

 

1) Biological evolution, as defined by biologists, is a change in allele frequencies in a population, over generations, through time. This is directly observable, particularly in populations with short generation times, Ergo, biological evolution is a rather indisputable fact.

 

2) As has already been mentioned, evolution is not a cognizant process. Mutations simply happen, and they are either deleterious, advantageous or (mostly) neutral to the survival of individuals. Accumulation of random mutations, in concert with selection over long periods of time leads to the emergence of complex traits. A real time example is the emergence of citrate metabolism in E. coli in Richard Lenski's long term E. coli experiment.

 

3) Because of how biologists define evolution, the best example of a "partially evolved" trait would be one that is not fixed in a population - i.e. it is present in some individuals in a population, but not others. It may become fixed in the future, but may also be lost through a combination of selection and stochastic processes. An example would be the mutation which allows lactose tolerance which is present in up to 90% in some human populations, and as little as 10% in others.

Edited July 7, 2016 by Arete