Re: I'll bet we'll find plenty of other species too.

>>where are the useful mutations happening in the human race today?

The assumption that there are no "useful mutations" for humans today is faulty, there are mutations happing all the time, from the ability to handle very fatty diets, tetrachromacy, short twitch run muscles, but what is useful in the context of evolution?

How many of these things will be added to the evolutionary pressure survivability? Humans no longer have evolutionary pressure that we used to have, we have welfare states, choice on reproduction etc. a "weak" genetic trait no longer will add towards the ability to pass on the gene any more than a "strong" genetic trait inhibits it. Although it's a sterotype, poor, undereducated families often have more children earlier than better off, better educated families, so our "evolutionary pressue" now favours poverty and lack of education.

It matters nothing to evolution if you are the smartest, fittest ape unless you pass your genes on, conversely, die early, be unhealthy, uninteligent, but if you have had 10 kids you have done well for evolution.

>>How many mutations do we need to get where we are going

This is a common misunderstanding, there is no "get where we are going", there is no "destination", we are where we are because of evolutionary pressures, we will be where we end up because of evolutionary pressures, it's not survival of the "fittest" (a common misquote), it's survival of the best fit - get in a tank with a shark, you won't do well, put a shark in a forest and you'll do better than the shark, it's adaping to the environment, not be "more evolved" cockroaches are an almost perfect animal (for their environment).

>>how many failed mutations do we expect to find?

There's no such thing as a "failed" mutation, if it is useful (helps us pass genes) it's more likely to be kept, if it's not useful it "may" be kept but is likely to fade away, if it interferes with our ability to breed it will be lost.

Re: A foot skeleton?

You think they're jumping the gun, declaring this evolutionary step from a sole example?

Well if they're wrong, they'll get a shoeing from their peers.

Re: Wait for the creationists...

"There still are NO transitional fossils."

um ... ALL fossils are transitional between some two species, and Evolution doesn't actually need fossils at all in order to be seen as a factual explanation of speciation, the fossils are an unneeded bonus.