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Complex, Multicellular Life from Over Two Billion Years Ago Discovered
Sciencedaily.com ^ | 07/01/10

Posted on 07/06/2010 2:59:07 AM PDT by jerry557

The discovery in Gabon of more than 250 fossils in an excellent state of conservation has provided proof, for the first time, of the existence of multicellular organisms 2.1 billion years ago. This finding represents a major breakthrough: until now, the first complex life forms (made up of several cells) dated from around 600 million years ago.

---snip---

By studying the sedimentary structures of this site, the scientists have shown that these organisms lived in a shallow marine environment (20 to 30 meters), often calm but periodically subjected to the combined influence of tides, waves and storms. In order to be able to develop 2.1 billion years ago and become differentiated to a degree never attained previously, the authors suggest that these life forms probably benefited from the significant but temporary increase in oxygen concentration in the atmosphere, which occurred between 2.45 and 2 billion years ago. Then, 1.9 billion years ago, the level of oxygen in the atmosphere fell suddenly.

Until now, it has been assumed that organized multicellular life appeared around 0.6 billion years ago and that before then the Earth was mainly populated by microbes (viruses, bacteria, parasites, etc.). This new discovery moves the cursor of the origin of multicellular life back by 1.5 billion years and reveals that cells had begun to cooperate with each other to form more complex and larger structures than single-celled organisms. Several research avenues now need to be explored: understanding the history of the Gabonese basin and why the necessary conditions were gathered to enable this organized and complex life to exist; further exploring the site to enhance the collection of fossils; but also comparing the history of the Earth's oxygenation with the mineralization of clays. The most urgent task, however, remains the protection of this exceptional site.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...


TOPICS: Science
KEYWORDS: earth; evolution; godsgravesglyphs; helixmakemineadouble; life; paleontology
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To: Redcitizen

;’)


41 posted on 07/07/2010 8:06:11 AM PDT by SunkenCiv ("Fools learn from experience. I prefer to learn from the experience of others." -- Otto von Bismarck)
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To: wendy1946



42 posted on 07/07/2010 10:10:49 AM PDT by goodusername
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To: tlb
if there were dinosaurs in historical times, where are the fossils ? In nearly two centuries of archaeology, somebody should have found something so odd and out of place.

It's also awfully convenient that they survived long enough for American Indians to have seen them and still be scared of them when Lewis and Clark went west, but no European explorer or settler ever ran into one.

43 posted on 07/07/2010 11:33:04 AM PDT by Ha Ha Thats Very Logical
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To: jerry557
Do you suggest that is proof that aliens exist and have been visting us for 5,000 years?

I would suggest they were visiting the Earth about 450,000 years ago.

44 posted on 07/07/2010 11:43:18 AM PDT by numberonepal (Don't Even Think About Treading On Me)
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To: Fred Nerks
And thus, the griffin? Interesting idea. Fossil of a winged mammal?

Or simply an artist's active imagination. What's your basis for drawing the conclusion that it is more likely that the drawing was from direct observation of a living animal, and not from an artist's rendering of an animal from observed fossils or that it was an invention of the artist's imagination?

What evidence leads you to believe that one possibility is reasonable, and the other two not?

45 posted on 07/07/2010 11:53:10 AM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: SunkenCiv
Don't know what you're worried about. It's a fact that dinosaurs and people lived at the same time. The dinos thought girls in bikinis were especially tasty.


46 posted on 07/07/2010 12:29:33 PM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: colorado tanker

The dinos weren’t alone.


47 posted on 07/07/2010 3:57:40 PM PDT by SunkenCiv ("Fools learn from experience. I prefer to learn from the experience of others." -- Otto von Bismarck)
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To: tacticalogic

Extinct Thylacine petroglyph depicted at Murujuga, Dampier, West Australia.

These creatures became extinct on the Australian mainland thousands of years before European settlement of the continent, but survived on the island of Tasmania.

They likely preferred the dry eucalyptus forests, wetlands, and grasslands in continental Australia. Indigenous Australian rock paintings indicate that these animals lived throughout mainland Australia and New Guinea. Proof of their existence in mainland Australia came from a desiccated carcass that was discovered in a cave in the Nullarbor Plain in Western Australia in 1990. Carbon dating revealed its remains to be about 3,300 years old.

Aboriginal cave painting of a Thylacine and its cub in the Pilbara region of West Australia dating back 6,000 years.

Fossils don't have stripes. What is it that you find so threatening in the theory that pre-historic people depicted the creatures THEY SAW!

48 posted on 07/07/2010 5:24:08 PM PDT by Fred Nerks (fair dinkum!)
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To: Fred Nerks

I don’t find it frightening at all. I find tacit asssertion that it was impossible for them to have drawn something they didn’t actually see to be dubious. We do it all the time. Why couldn’t they?


49 posted on 07/07/2010 5:32:48 PM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: T. Buzzard Trueblood
No Helen Thomas pics yet?

Be careful what you ask for.

50 posted on 07/07/2010 7:53:46 PM PDT by rdl6989 (January 20, 2013- The end of an error.)
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To: rdl6989

AAAAAAARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!


51 posted on 07/07/2010 9:24:29 PM PDT by T. Buzzard Trueblood
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To: All
Don Patton and the tricerotops glyph:


52 posted on 07/08/2010 4:21:06 AM PDT by wendy1946
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To: tacticalogic
It isn't a question of drawing something they never saw. It's a question of drawing something they never saw and by pure chance the something turn out to be identical to some known dinosaur type, and their oral traditions describe the creature down to details like a saw-blade back, great spiked tail, and red fur.

The likelihood of that all happening by chance is zero.

53 posted on 07/08/2010 4:23:42 AM PDT by wendy1946
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To: wendy1946

Who’s the dude with the horns standing in front of the triceratops?


54 posted on 07/08/2010 4:26:49 AM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: Fred Nerks
What is it that you find so threatening in the theory that pre-historic people depicted the creatures THEY SAW!

The idea of losing evolution/evoloserism as a viable belief system has implications which impact some peoples' lifestyles...


55 posted on 07/08/2010 4:29:32 AM PDT by wendy1946
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To: wendy1946

Identical? There are some rough similarities, but a lot of the proportions are all wrong. If it was identical, then it would not be a coincidence. Saying that rough cave drawing is identical to a living triceratops is beyond ridiculous. As far as them saying it had red fur makes it accurate, how do you know that? They could have just as easily said it had purple scales, and you’d have the same evidence to show they were right - none.


56 posted on 07/08/2010 4:37:27 AM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: wendy1946
The idea of losing evolution/evoloserism as a viable belief system has implications which impact some peoples' lifestyles...

Then so does the idea that evolution happened.

57 posted on 07/08/2010 4:50:14 AM PDT by tacticalogic ("Oh bother!" said Pooh, as he chambered his last round.)
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To: wendy1946

“It isn’t a question of drawing something they never saw. It’s a question of drawing something they never saw and by pure chance the something turn out to be identical to some known dinosaur type, and their oral traditions describe the creature down to details like a saw-blade back, great spiked tail, and red fur.
The likelihood of that all happening by chance is zero.”

—What “known dinosaur type” has saw-blades and red fur? Also, the only descriptions I can find that say the creature had “saw-blades” are very recent descriptions by people trying to say it was a stegosaurus. IMO the rock drawing looks far closer to the backward-pointing scales of the alligator in #42 than the enormous saw-blades of the stego in #6, and most descriptions I find simply say “scales”. There’s also no spikes in the tail of the drawing, other than the continuation of the same scales seen on the back, as in the alligator. Mishipishu is usually described as a feline with scales, which hardly sounds like a stego. It sounds like the usual practice of many ancient cultures to depict new creatures by combining features of two or more known creatures, such as with the griffin, or chimaera, or Pegasus, or unicorn, or minotaur. In this case it’s a combination of an alligator and panther.


58 posted on 07/08/2010 6:48:39 AM PDT by goodusername
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To: SunkenCiv

The more I think about this the more I’d like to know just what they found. Was it truly multicellular organisms or was it really colonies of unicellular life? This sure changes the traditional timeline.


59 posted on 07/08/2010 12:51:11 PM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: tacticalogic; wendy1946
Who’s the dude with the horns standing in front of the triceratops?

Why, that's "Dr." Don Patton! He runs with such luminaries as Carl Baugh, he of the Paluxy Tracks nonsense and the infamously hilarious fossilized cowboy boot that even the most strident young-earther, save Ted Holden, errr, Wendy1946, has disavowed.

"Dr?" you ask. Good question. Because like far too many creationists to count, Don Patton has lied and lied again about his credentials.

Or at least at one time (from one of many sites that actually cares to check these guys out):

Since early 1989, Don Patton, a close associate of Carl Baugh ... has claimed a Ph.D. (or "Ph.D. candidacy") in geology from Queensland Christian University in Australia. However, QCU is another unaccredited school ... When questioned about this at a recent MIOS meeting, Patton indicated that he was aware of some problems relating to QCU, and was withdrawing his Ph.D. candidacy.

However, the printed abstracts of the 1989 Bible-Science conference in Dayton, Tennessee (where Patton gave two talks) stated that he was a Ph.D. candidacy in geology, and implied that he has at least four degrees from three separate schools. When I asked Patton for clarification on this during the conference, he stated that he had no degrees, but was about to receive a Ph.D. degree in geology, pending accreditation of QCU, which he assured me was "three days away." Many days have since passed, and Patton still has no valid degree in geology. Nor is the accreditation of QCU imminent. Australian researcher Ian Plimer reported, "PCI, QPU, PCT, and PCGS have no formal curriculum, no classes, no research facilities, no calendar, no campus, and no academic staff....Any Ph.D. or Ph.D. candidacy at QPU by Patton is fraudulent."

Four years, Florida College, Temple Terrace, FL (Bible)
Two years, Austin Peay State University, Clarksville, TN (Geology)
Two years, Indiana Univ./Purdue Univ., Indianapolis, IN (Geology)
Two years, Pacific School of Graduate Studies, Melbourne, Australia (Education)
Ph.D. in Education granted 12/10/1993

Hm. Curious. His Ph.D. in Education was granted in 1993. Have you ever in your life seen someone's resume or CV list such a thing and forget to tell us WHERE the degree is from?! And what does it even mean that he went somewhere for "2 years?" This stuff is so ridiculous.

I wish I could check out this claim: "Member of Geological Society of America, and was a speaker at their ‘97 annual convention in Salt Lake City." But my version of Adobe doesn't give me the full pdf. So maybe someone else can check: Here's the full run-down of the 1997 conference.
60 posted on 07/08/2010 2:10:10 PM PDT by whattajoke (Let's keep Conservatism real.)
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