Posted on 07/30/2007 2:01:00 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Geologists have found the remains of a huge underground rainforest hidden in a coal mine in Illinois. The fossil forest, buried by an earthquake 300 million years ago, contains giant versions of several plant types alive today.
...
Also surprising is the presence of remains from mangrove-like plants. "It was always assumed that mangrove plants had evolved fairly recently," says Falcon-Lang.
(Excerpt) Read more at bioedonline.org ...
Sorry, not correct.
Look at the definitions on my FR home page.
Saying your personal interpretation of the Bible is wrong isn’t the same as attacking Christianity.
Just off the top of my head, Christian Science, Unitarianism. I'm sure there are others. Isaac Newton is generally put forth on these threads as a Christian, but he did not accept the Trinity.
Reminds me of the fallacious: "if evolution happened why are there still chimpanzees?" argument. But I'm not sure if your alluding to that or trying to make a serious point.
You’re right - I hardly saw these as Christian though.
I’m sure they feel the same way about you.
Both...I was conceding the point that religions do evolve over time - but it seems to be driven less by discovery of new facts as much as the idiosyncrasies of the times.
Theory of Gravity? Ever heard of it?
Sure they do. Africans live with them. They traditionally refrained from killing them, because they figured that it would cause the other lions to eat more people. You've got to understand that human bones aren't found amonst dinasaur bones, because they get crunched up real good when the dinosaur eats 'em. They find African's bones with lion bones, 'cause the lions can choke on a leg, or a head, and bones have no taste anyway. Dinosaurs didn't have that problem.
Theories are not "proven" as much as evidence is collected in favor of a particular theory. It's a question of what exactly does the new evidence question - here if you believed that mangroves had a more ancient origin - the new evidence validates your theory and refutes the mainstream view. If you believed that all life on earth arose spontaneously around 6000 years ago this has no bearing on your belief.
In science, you don't risk hell-fire if you happen to be wrong on something. Scientific theories are meant to be modified if new evidence happens to prove the old theories wrong. What many creationists wrongly believe is that any flaw in any aspect of evolutionary biology invalidates the entire field - just as perphaps among fundamentalists any error or flaw in Scripture invalidates the entire thing.
Conjectures are not considered theories until they are well established. I can't name off the top of my head an established theory that has been proven wrong.
More commonly, a theory is shown to have limited applicability, and is replaced by a theory covering a greater range of observations.
Do you see a geologist for your medical problems?
I'd recommend not getting your geological information from a Medical Doctor.
But hey, there are words, numbers, and pictures and it's long! And it tells me what I want to hear!
The earth would be indeed be quickly planed flat, were it not for tectonic uplift. A wide variety of land areas on the planet are rising (and this can accurately measured year by year.)
Like global warming?
re: your question on young earth vs. old earth creationism -
The best label that I’ve found for myself is “progressive creationist”. Here’s the Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_creationism
I accept microevolution (species changing over time - sometimes very great change) but not macroevolution (one species changing into a totally different species)
I differ from the Wiki description in that I do belive the Bible is the literal word of God and that it is inerrant in the original, but I’m not convinced that there could not be large intervals of time between Genesis chapters. I don’t completely discount the YEC idea that God may have created the world with an appearance of age but I haven’t been convinced and am totally content with not ever knowing for sure.
I hope that helps :)
marinamuffy
“Sure evolution happens, but the main idea that humans came from apes is just not true. There is no link or data to support it. If it were true, why are there still apes?”
Evolution does not state that humans came from apes. It postulates that humans came from earlier forms of bipedal hominids, just as apes came from earlier forms of apes. They are 2 different evolutionary branches. And there is substantial evidence to back this up.
God has absolutely nothing to do with any of this.
Yes. The HGP has been a huge help with this problem. Junk genes are proving to be very valuable! Thanks!
Did you actually read the article?
"The ancient forest bears little resemblance to modern equivalents. "The diversity of the first rainforests was bizarre," says Falcon-Lang.The forest probably had about 50 different plant species, although Falcon-Lang says that this is a conservative estimate. We probably lumped several similar species together as one," he explains. Modern rainforests are more diverse, containing as many as 500 plant species per hectare.
I don't know what he means when he says "the diversity was bizarre" but the last statement there is clear enough.
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