Not sure if I'm going to respond to the rest of your message, since most of it conveys an implicit misunderstanding of evolution and you could pretty easily figure it out, if you wanted.

But I thought I would respond at least to the part about the platypus, since that information is really quite new and the lay reporting has been vague and misleading.

http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2008/...ent=channellink

Platypuses are not "part bird" at least not in the sense you imply. Although birds, reptiles and mammals all shared a common ancestor, we could think of the "duck bill" as being a case of convergent evolution. The bill superficially resembles that of a duck, but it's different material.

For reference, "convergent evolution" refers to a similar feature that evolves independently in different lines. Example: bats, birds, and some insects have wings, but they evolved them separately.