Posted on 10/31/2009 4:39:54 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Oct 30, 2009 — “Plant fossils give first real picture of earliest Neotropical rainforests,” announced a press release from University of Florida. The fossils from Colombia show that “many of the dominant plant families existing in today’s Neotropical rainforests – including legumes, palms, avocado and banana – have maintained their ecological dominance despite major changes in South America’s climate and geological structure.”
The team found 2,000 megafossil specimens from the Paleocene, said to be 58 million years old. This is only 5 to 8 million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs according to conventional dating. “The new study provides evidence Neotropical rainforests were warmer and wetter in the late Paleocene than today but were composed of the same plant families that now thrive in rainforests.” The press release says that the fossil record from neotropical rain forests has been “almost nonexistent” – but now, it is evident that modern plant families existed then. “We have the fossils to prove this,” one said. “The foundations of the Neotropical rainforests were there 58 million years ago.”
The only difference between modern rainforests and the fossil record is more diversity now. But since identification of species can only be made to the genus level, there may be some subjectivity in that judgment. An earlier team also found the skeleton of a giant snake at the open coal pit mine – Titanoboa. “Like Titanoboa, which is clearly related to living boas and anacondas, the ancient forest of northern Colombia had similar families of plants as we see today in that ecosystem.”
In a related story, Live Science pushed the “oldest known spider web” back another 4 million years (cf. 06/23/2006). The web material, encased in amber, not only proves that spiders had the web-making equipment as far back as the fossil record shows, but that it has continued with little change for 140 million years according to the consensus dating scheme.
All right, Darwinists: you say evolution is a fact, and fossils are the evidence. Where is the evolution? 58 million years have gone by in your scheme, and we have the exact same families of plants today. There isn’t enough difference to concern the most fervent young-earth creationists (notice that ICR celebrated this find as confirming of a young earth and global flood). Surely if natural selection was acting for such a huge amount of time, we should expect to see some evolution. Remember, you believe that a cow turned into a whale in less than half that time. We love fossils and evidence, but give us a reason other than your own bluff to take your storytelling scheme seriously.
Ping!
I am glad that you are finally acknowledging that the earth is at least 58 million years old : )
Wow, I thought even you would pick up on the fact that the author is calling into question evo-religious dating schemes.
No Creationism in 6000 years...
Most biblical creationists allow for 6-10,000 years.
im with you.
The term ‘evolution’ is more flexible than ‘budget cut’ in a political campaign. It can mean change, no change, backward forward, sideways, so anything, everything, and nothing demonstrates evolution.
:o)
Ah yes, the obligatory Saturday night discussion on evolution v creationism … ho hum.
you mean evolutionism and creationism.
Sorry I don’t buy the young earth Feldergarb... People like you who believe in the young earth theory tend to be simple minded dolts.. Use your mind.. God gave us one..
>>ho hum.<<
Always fun to watch the echo chamber in action as they throw pinpricks of little or no value and proceed to misanalyze their own data.
Wow, who knew a single theory could explain everything and nothing at all...LOL!
Yea, that too.
I saw that ‘cow turning into a whale’ thing last year at the county circus. And the girl with three breasts.
And yet never a mind gets changed. LOL!
That must be why our scientists routinely destroy your scientists in debate. Indeed, the evo-atheists have been so utterly humiliated in debate after debate that the high priests of the Temple of Darwin have issued an all points bullitin for their fellow darwin-drones masquarading as scientists to stear clear of debates in public or in print, lest the Creation and ID scientists continue shredding darwood’s evo-religious creation myth, and otherwise continue to make fools out of the darwinist priesthood.
Here is a typical example of what happens when a Temple of Darwin fanatic masquarading as a scientist makes the mistake of accepting a debate challenge from a Creationist or ID scientist:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/10/berlinski_and_the_unnamed_oppo.html
Really?
Explain bacterial resistance to the Sulfonamides which was zero in the 1930's and is about 99% now.
Explain bacterial resistance to the Penicilloic Acid derivatives which was zero in the 1940's and is about 59% now.
You could argue that it is God intervening on a daily basis, but that seems a bit extreme, and He has bigger fish to fry.
Let science be science, let faith be faith.
The more I have studied science (three college degrees now) the more I see God's face.
ALL this did not just happen, or maybe it did, but God's subtle hand is involve either way.
I believe that people that try to use science to justify their faith, don't have faith, and are doubting themselves. Embrace your faith, embrace science, they both pay homage to the Creator.
Yeah, evos are so predictable when they show up.
It is a frontloaded capacity to adapt to changing enviroments. I have to get ready to Trunk or Treat, but when I get back, I would be glad to explore bacterial resistance with you. I am curious, though. If Creation/ID provides a better explanation for bacterial resistance, will you have a more open mind about looking into science from a Creation/ID perspective?
If you want to see some evolution, go look at a potato.
The original potato didn’t grow in the ground, and wasn’t white.
In 58 million years you don’t necessarily get whole families of plants going extinct, but species and genera change. I have collected extinct fossil plants myself. I have also collected recent fossils which are very like the modern forms, just as one would expect.
Now about debates: the audience judges a debate (or any public presentation) to the degree that they have some background in the field. I will never forget hearing a lecture by Velikovsky, a very popular writer and advocate of nutty theories of planetary history. All the geology and space science graduate students were laughing at him. They could see that he was an obvious nut-case and a phony. The humanities majors, however, were very impressed, because they did not know any better.
Whenever he would get a question from a science major, he would change the subject and start rambling on about tribal mythology. The science students could see that he was dodging, but the English majors took his diversions as evidence of the amazing breadth of his knowledge.
So it is with debates on evolution. The audience is also influence by skill of the speakers, and many serious scientists are not really debaters — and they have no reason to have spent much time preparing for creationist arguments.
I used to believe to a degree in micro evolution, like that of bacteria, but I have come to the conclusion that the bacteria did not evolve anything. I think there is simply enough diversity in life that when man stomps on some form, like bacteria, that the bacteria with the genetic code being stomped simply declines allowing the growth of bacteria of a different genetic code to thrive.
There is a crab off the coast of china that is an example along the same lines of thought, where all the crab is eaten except that which appears to have the face of some long dead ruler on its shell so now crab is quite rare except that which has the face. But the crab did not evolve any more than bacteria, it just had a trait that allows it to thrive where others could not.
But since you have to have a mind to change it, evolution and old Earth rolls on among the mindless.
Spoken from the back side of the bell curve.
LOL!
Ummm... Let’s see... a couple thousand years ago people were averaging about 5 to 8 inches shorter (adult height) than they are today. Isn’t that proof of an evolution that has occurred recently? Or will the bar be set ever-higher to ignore that living things do actually change and evolve? Natural selection is normal and will continue, even if there are examples that can be pointed to that might not follow the same pattern as other examples.
The ancestors of giraffes had shorter necks and legs, then they slowly evolved into the animals we have today.
If a woman is given the choice of breeding with a tall muscular healthy man or a shorter, weaker less-than-alpha man, who will she choose? Her offspring will take on some of the genetic traits of the father and the children will be different than if she had borne children with the other man. To deny that species will evolve is asinine and flies in the face of conclusive proof.
You have a dilemma GGG, you have to agree with the timeline to agree with the conclusion that evolution hasn't happened in 58 million years. If you don't agree with the timeline then you can't agree with the conclusion.
So what is it? Do you agree with the timeline and the conclusion or do you disagree with the timeline and the conclusion? I can only assume that you agree with the 58 million year time line since it was important to you to post the article.
Do you know what a bell curve is?
That's an important one to remember. You may be looking at one genus, but hundreds of adapted, evolved species.
Science has only reinforced my belief in God.
However, His plan becomes more complicated with every investigation.
You shouldn’t demean yourself like that.
If you have conclusive proof, then lets see it.
The examples you gave are nothing more than examples of variation within species.
Ha ha! That’s real clever!
Still mentally stuck in the 1650s with GGG and his guru, Bishop Ussher...
nope, permanently affixed in this century, but with the correct interpretation of the evidence as opposed to your man-made religion’s viewpoint.
Ding....ding.....ding.....ding....ding......
We have a winner. This post sets the new record for the most cliches used in a single sentence to say absolutely nothing.
Obviously a flawed hypothesis. If it were true GGG and E-S would still be virgins.
Ha, ha, ha! Thanks for the proof you deny.
You pick a miraculously stable area, where plants and animals have thrived, burgeoned, and bloomed for millenia, where sunlight and steady rain have made an Eden for countless centuries, where tree frogs and flying reptiles abound in multicolor variegations, where ants drown in pitcher plants, except for the ants which have evolved to swim in the dissolving liquid, and consume their hapless cousins.
And you think, because they have erupted, nay, exploded in diversity and mutual dependence, that there is no evidence of evolution.
You do not see the forest for the ecosystem.
Apparently, GGG has been bobbing for apples floating in gin at his cult-approved halloween celebration tonight.
“Obviously a flawed hypothesis. If it were true GGG and E-S would still be virgins.”
Perhaps they found each other...
Once sexual selection enters the picture, normal “survival of the fittest” tends to take a quiet side road.
Is that anything like the old “Gong Show”?
Or so the tale goes.
You do have a point, never mind that the statement, you were referring to, is one whopper!!!
Please do not judge the intelligence, mental capacity, creativity, or common sense of Christians by the content of this post. The vast majority of us are not this stupid.
ROFLOL, good one, very good one.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.