By TONO
The known fossil record fails to document a single example of phyletic evolution that acomplishes a major morphologic transition and therefore offers no evidence that this gradualist model can be valid.
Datewise, Austlopithecus ramidus is tantalizingly close to the supposed age of the common ancestor(Between Chimps and A. Afarensis). Fragments of seventeen individuals were found lying on fossilized volcanic ash (tuff) that is dated at 4.4 million years. Furthermore, ramidus has precisely the combination of characters that paleontologists were hoping to find and indeed expecting: more apelike than A. afarensis, less apish than a chimp, but with qualities of both.
The teeth reveal an animal that really does seem to be halfway between an ape and the later, more humanlike afarensis. The canines are still prominent, but compared to a chimp's they appear low and blunt.
*From The Time Before History By Colin Tudge(yes, I do own all these books I'm quoting from.)*
Booya. So say again that we have not found a transitional animal in the fossil record. We found seventeen of the suckers at one go.