Irish farmer, you are wrong about how evolutoin works.

Here is why Blatt is right:

Evolution is a word we use to describe observable phenomenon. Evolution doesnt have any intentions., there is no goald to evolution. Evolution is a passive process. The changes happen because of genetic mutation.

Mutation occurs, in small ways, in every new animal produced, from bacteria to gilla monsters, to poeple. Usually these mutations are useless, or detrimental, like being born with a defective heart. Sometimes however, the change is beneficial, like say a coconut crab having a slightly better ability to breath air than it's parents. It will surveiv and reproduce, where perhaps some it's siblings wont be so lucky (this is just an example). SO it's new trait is passed on to its offspring, and so on.

The changes themselves are accidental, random, and unguided. It is only after thousands of generations do the changes become so great as to render the animals a new species, unable to mate with the older species they arose from. This is why a seemingly "new" form can appear. IN fac tthe form isnt new, it is just the l;atest stage in an evolutionary chain.

However, certain forms are indeed far more succesful than others, and once that form is reached, then evolution can slow down immensely..and the animal appear to have reached its apex state. Consider the crocodilians. Crocodile, aligators, are more or less unchanged for millions of years. This i because no more major adaptation was needed, and mutatiosn didnt favor any particular direction. So the animals have stayed more or less how they are since the time of the dinosaurs(who have long since changed, into birdies).

Speaking of dinosaurs changing into birds, here is another fascinating story. If you look at early birds and late therapod dinosaurs, there is very little skeletal difference, and only exp[erts can tell them apart. In fact there is no clear line between them, and there seems to be a perfect gradation, leading most taxonomists to place them in the same crown clade (i think this is right, correct me if not).

Dinos didn't just one day grow wings and fly off. In fact, many early bird/dinos had feathers but probably didnt fly. In fact flying may have been a secondary adaptation after the winged arms were fairly developed. The feathers may have orginaly served some other purpose; it has been speculated that they developed in response to the animals becoming warm-blooded (endo-thermic), and need for insulation (like fur in mammals).

The wing itself is no more than an elongated arm with minimized fingers(phalanges). This is the beauty of the evolutionary process, organs that have one function need only some small changes to have another completely different function.

Now look at the snakes for a moment. Modern snbakes have no visible limbs at all. Yet we know they evolved fomr lizard-like animals that had four limbs. We know this in part becasue we can find vestigial traces of limbs in the skeleton. Look a sake skeleton. Snake fossils have been found with more devloped limbs ( http://www.smu.edu/newsinfo/releases/99256.html)

Why would snakes have limbs, or vestigial limbs? Becasue they once had 4 legs like lizards, and eventually lost them because their evolving body-type and life-behavior didnt need them. But the traces of thier past can be seen i their anatomy tday.

Just like the Coconut crab i mentioned earlier, which was misunderstood. The vestigial gills in coconut crabs today do indicate that the creature once lived in water, but yet an adult coconut crab will INDEED DROWN if immersed in water. Stragnge, because a human fetus can surved immersed in amniotic fluids. Obviously, animals have different attributres in thier life-cycles.

I can go on and on about evolution, biology and so on. But the fact is you dont want to to hear this, because you emotionally dont the implications of like evolution. You obviously dont understand the science behind it.