The Burdick track. Do you stand by that?
Well here are examples that don't fit the evolutionist theory and yet they get labeled misplaced or anomalies. From the following web site Misplaced and anomalies. It appears that anything that doesn't fit the evolutionist expectations gets ignored as an anomalie or a misplaced fossil. The tree fossils are the ones that I've most commonly heard the "misplaced" terminology applied. They couldn't have stood there while millions of years of sediment formed around them. So either the stratas got deposited quickly or the fossil is "misplaced".
Dr. Clifford Burdick, a geologist, discovered the footprints of a barefooted child, one of which contained a compressed trilobite (A. E. Wilder-Smith, The Natural Scientists Know Nothing of Evolution, Master Books, San Diego, CA, 1981, p. 166). Trilobites supposedly became extinct 230 million years before the appearance of man.
William Meister, on June 1, 1968, found fossils of several trilobites in the fossilized, sandaled footprint of a man. (W. A. Criswell, Did Man Just Happen? Zondervan Publishing Co., Grand Rapids, MI, 1973, p. 87). Trilobites supposedly became extinct 230 million years before the appearance of man.
Polystratic Trees, fossilized trees which extend through several layers of strata, have been found in Saint-Etienne, France and other places. For a fossil to form it must be buried quickly, otherwise it would have decomposed while waiting for the strata to slowly accumulate around it. This is an anomaly which can't be explained by the normal process of fossil formation. In some cases polystratic trees bridge a presumed evolutionary time span of millions of years. Polystratic trees are evidence that sedimentary strata were not laid down gradually over millions of years. (R. L. Wysong, The Creation-Evolution Controversy, Inquiry Press, Midland, MI, 1981, p. 300-301.)
In Glacier National Park, Pre-Cambrian limestone (supposedly 1 billion years old) is lying on top of a Cretaceous shale formation (supposedly 100 million years old). Geologists attempt to explain this anomaly as an overthrust, where a fault causes the older strata to be thrust over the younger strata. However, this "misplaced" limestone is 350 miles long and 35 miles wide, and shows no signs of grinding or sliding that a true overthrust would produce. This discrepancy cannot be explained by overthrusting. (Scott M. Huse, The collapse of Evolution, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, MI, p. 15-16).
During mining operations in a quarry in Lompoc, California in 1976, workers discovered a fossilized skeleton of a baleen whale. What is so unusual about this discovery is that the whale fossil wasn't lying horizontally, but vertically--standing on its tail! The entire fossil is about eighty feet long and was gradually exposed as the quarry was being mined. The whale had to have been buried quickly to become fossilized, otherwise the skeleton would have decomposed. This proves that the huge amounts of sediment surrounding the whale were not deposited over eons of time, but very quickly. (Dennis Gordon Lindsay, The Birth of Planet Earth and the Age of the Universe, Dallas: Christ for the Nations, 1993, p. 18-20.)
A 75-foot trail of human footprints have been found in Tanzania in a layer of volcanic ash, which was dated at 3.75 million years old. T. D. White in describing the footprints said, "Make no mistake about it…they are like modern human footprints. If one were left in the sand of a California beach today, and a four-year old were asked what it was, he would instantly say that somebody had walked there. He wouldn't be able to tell it from a hundred other prints on the beach, nor would you." (D. Johanson and M. A. Edey, Lucy the Beginnings of Humankind, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1981, p. 250, as sited in Evolution: The Challenge of the Fossil Record by Duane T. Gish).
Human footprints and been found in the same strata as dinosaur prints in the Paluxy River Bed in Glen Rose, Texas. The prints are within a few yards of each other, and sometimes even cross each other. Dr. Camp from the University of California and Dr. G. Westcott of Ypsilanti, Michigan have pronounced them genuine. The human footprints continue under shale that has been bulldozed away, proving they could not have been carved in the formation. (Winkie Pratney, Creation or Evolution? The Fossil Record, Pretty Good Printing, 1982).
Human skulls, gold chains, and an iron pot have been found in coal. In the coal collection in the Mining Academy in Freiberg, there is a human skull composed of brown coal and manganiferous and phosphatie limonite. This skull was described by Karsten and Dechen in 1842. (Otto Stutzer, Geology of Coal, Chicago: University of Chicago, 1940, p. 271). In 1889 a Mrs S.W. Culp broke open a chunk of coal and found a 10 inch, eight-carat gold chain embedded within. ("A Necklace of a Prehistoric God", Morrisonville Times, Illinois, June 11, 1891).
Two fossilized human skeletons have been found in Cretaceous sandstone at Moab, Utah. The fossils were found in strata supposedly 65-100 million years before humans were said to have evolved. (Burdick, C.L., "Discovery of human skeletons in Cretaceous Formation", Creation Research Society Quarterly, vol. 10, no. 2, September 1973, pp. 109-110.)
Dinosaur fossils have been found 400 miles from the South Pole. The polar plains now scoured by frigid winds and sub-zero temperatures were warm enough 200 million years ago to be the home to large meat-eating dinosaurs, according to researchers. It was the first dinosaur found on the mainland of Antarctica. (Associated Press, May 6, 1994).
The Meister Trilobite, a more conventional view.
In short, the trilobites in the specimen are real enough, but the "print" itself is dubious. After mainstream rebuttals of this find were published in the 1980's (Conrad, 1981; Stokes, 1986; Strahler, 1987), most creationists quietly and wisely ceased promoting this specimen. However, a few individuals continue to advocate it as an out-of-order fossil.
How many of your other examples are covered here?
These (the best examples -- e.g. the trails at the "Taylor Site") all turned out to be dinosaur footprints. Many of the ones mistaken for human tracks were of an "elongate" type, made when three-toed dinosaurs apparently walked with their metatarsuls (heels) contacting the ground. (They more typically walk up on their toes. The unusual gait may have been associated with a feeding pattern, or to provide better traction in mud. It has been observed at other sites.)
The superficial human appearance was caused either by mud collapse when the prints were made, filling in the toes (see figure below) or by the infilling only partially eroding when the fossilized tracks were exposed. In this regard, the slight chemical differences of the infilling of the long exposed trackways at the Taylor Site actually caused the material to oxidize and turn red against the white limestone substrate, so the that "human" tracks showed clear dinosaur toes!
Figure 1. Variations of Bipedal Dinosaur Tracks
A. Bipedal dinosaur in digitigrade stance
B. Typical bipedal dinosaur track
C. Bipedal dinosaur track with partial metatarsal impression
D. Bipedal dinosaur in plantigrade stance
E. Elongated dinosaur track with full metatarsal impression
F. Elongated dinosaur track with digit marks obscurred by mud back-flow
G. Elongated dinosaur track with indistinct digits. May be the result of a firm substrate, erosion, secondary infilling, or a combination of factors. Note resemblance to a human footprint.
The figure is from a report by Glen Kuban, who has studied these tracks extensively. (I've assisted him in exposing and measuring trackways in the past.) Significantly he is an evangelical Christian who, intrigued by John Morris' ICR book Tracking Those Incredible Dinosaurs (And The People Who Knew Them), initially came to Glen Rose hoping and fully expecting to prove the "mantracks" genuine. His own investigations made him a skeptic.
Indeed they were. It's called "continental drift". Antartica used to be located near the equator. This is a problem (for evolution) how?
