New Fossil Book Won't Showcase Obvious Catastrophe (article)

Institute for Creation Research ^ | June 17, 2013 | Brian Thomas

[fishtank]

New Fossil Book Won't Showcase Obvious Catastrophe by Brian Thomas, M.S. *

Not just horses and fish, but—like a whole ancient zoo buried together—lizards, alligators, stingrays, snakes, squirrel varieties, bats, long-tailed turtles, lemur-like primates, birds, frogs, insects, and sycamore, palm, and fern leaves were all fossilized in Wyoming's Green River Formation. A new book showcasing some of the more spectacular fossils provides secularists another opportunity to reinforce their ideas about how these diverse creatures were encased in what became a giant rock formation. Commonsense observations refute their slow-and-gradual scenario, however, and point to a more violent explanation.

Lance Grande collected the stunning fossil images for the book, The Lost World of Fossil Lake: Snapshots from Deep Time. He works as one of the curators at Chicago's Field Museum of Natural History. One of his images shows a now-extinct variety of horse—one with a tiny stature and long hind legs for its size—surrounded by fossil fish. Horses and fish don't usually hang out together, but apparently they died together. How did they end up in the same fossilized bed?

LiveScience featured some of the book's images on its website, including the "Mini-Horse." There, its image caption reads, "Researchers aren't sure how the horse ended up at the bottom of the middle of Fossil Lake but they suspect it drowned, possibly trying to escape a predator."1 Then, supposedly its carcass sank neatly to the bottom without having been scavenged by any of the many fish represented in the formation's fossils.

The horse body's next trick also defied commonsense. According to LiveScience, "Over thousands of years, dead animals rained down into the muck deep below the surface of long-gone Fossil Lake."2 Not only does the slow-and-gradual story require a magic wand to wave off the persistent problem of scavenging, but it calls upon the ancient deep "muck" to do what experiments have shown it cannot do—keep a carcass from rotting away to nothing.

And what strange process preserved these animal bodies so well as they supposedly rested on the lake bed before the slow-settling sediments covered and buried them over the long years? This story defies horse sense. Clearly, they had to have been buried deeply by fast-building sediment in order to preserve at such high quality.

Supposedly, a lack of oxygen preserved the whole carcasses. But God created microbes to function even without readily available oxygen. The problem is that fish and other animal carcasses rot in just a few weeks, even when buried in mud that has very little oxygen.3 What the scavengers don't eat, anoxic microbes quickly consume. That is why today's anoxic lake and ocean bottom muds form no fossils.

Whatever buried the horse did so rapidly and catastrophically. Fast-flowing water mixed with fresh volcanic ash and washed over the diverse assembly of creatures, burying them alive and trapping them in the Green River's series of basins.

The Genesis Flood provides a context for that catastrophe. Some creation geologists suggest that residual catastrophes immediately after the Flood formed Green River Formation, while others propose that it formed when water ran off the continents in the waning Flood months. Either scenario sets a catastrophic-enough stage to trump slow-and-gradual speculations and to bury alligators, horses, lizards, and fish together quickly and completely.

References

Gannon, M. Images: Stingray Sex, Mini-Horses & Other Curiosities of Fossil Lake. LiveScience. Posted on LiveScience.com June 9, 2013, accessed June 10, 2013.

Gannon, M. Lost World Locked in Stone at Fossil Lake. LiveScience. Posted on LiveScience.com June 9, 2013, accessed June 10, 2013.

Donovan, S.K., (Ed.) 1991. The Process of fossilization. New York: Columbia University Press, 120-129.

Image credit: Lance Grande from The Lost World of Fossil Lake: Snapshots from Deep Time, © 2013, the University of Chicago Press. Adapted for use in accordance with federal copyright (fair use doctrine) law. Usage by ICR does not imply endorsement of copyright holders.

* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer at the Institute for Creation Research.

Article posted on June 17, 2013.

[Fred Nerks]

In northern Wales in the Vale of Clwyd, in numerous caves remains of hippopatmus lay together with those of the mammoth, the rhinoceros , and the cave lion. In the cave of the Cae Gywn in the Vale of Clwyd, "during the excavations it became clear that the bones had been greatly disturbed by water action." The floor of the cavern was "covered afterwards by clays and sand containing foreign pebbles. This seemed to prove that the caverns, now 400 feet above sea level, must have been submerged subsequently to their occuption by the animals and by man...The contents of the cavern must have been dispersed by marine action during the great submergence in mid-glacial times, and afterwards covered by marine sands..." writes H. B. Woodward.

Hippopotomi not only travelled during the summer nights to England and Wales, but also climbed hills to die peacefully among other animals in the caves, and the ice, approaching softly, tenderly spread little pebbles over the travellers resting in peace, and the land with its hills and caverns in a slow lullaby movement sank below the level of the sea and gentle streams caressed the dead bodies and covered them with rosy sand" (Velikovsky:27, 1955)

THE IMMANUEL VELIKOVSKY ARCHIVE

[Natufian]

Sorry, but your theory sucks. If the earth was contracted enough for the sea level to rise above mountains the ensuing volcanic and tectonic activity would be enormous, likely enough to heat and make the oceans acidic enough to kill all life in them. Noah didn’t take any marine life with him so the question would have to be.... where did the vast variety of life in the oceans come from?

[Natufian]

The fourth is the notion that the fish themselves have to survive. Only the eggs need to survive.

What about all the marine life that isn't oviparous?

[kimtom]

Dinosaurs were wiped out by Noah’s flood?..”

The term “dinosaur” was not used until 1840’s

God saw fit to save those animals he deemed.
Any “prehistoric” animals that were taken aboard may not have survive the harsh environmental changes after the flood.

The lush green and warm world became one of changing extreme climates (ice age) and deserts (which by the way, were well watered in times past -few 1000 years ago)

First, contrary to popular belief, the Bible does not teach that Noah took aboard the ark two of every species of animal on Earth. The Hebrew term used in the Flood account (as in the Creation account) to distinguish animals is min (translated “kind” 10 times in Genesis 1 and seven times in Genesis 6-7). The Bible was written long before man invented the Linnaean classification system. The “kinds” of animals that Adam named on the sixth day of Creation and that accompanied Noah on the ark were likely very broad. As Henry Morris observed: “[T]he created kinds undoubtedly represented broader categories than our modern species or genera, quite possibly approximating in most cases the taxonomic family” -1984, p. 129,

[Fuzz]

Astounding.

[going hot]

Astounding.

Also, quite entertaining, no?

[Fuzz]

In a way.

[Natufian]

What ‘kind’ do marsupials belong to and how come they only exist in Australasia?

[kimtom]

What ‘kind’ do marsupials belong to and how come they only exist in Australasia?....”

All animals had a wide range, but it is a known fact that some of the marsupials cannot compete with more aggressive animals.

“Explaining the origin of Australia’s marsupial population, and especially its uniqueness to that one isolated southern continent, is difficult for evolutionists and creationists alike. Marsupials such as kangaroos, opossums, wallabies, and koalas seem unusual, but monotremes (i.e., the echidna and the platypus) are even more puzzling. The main difference between marsupials and most other mammals centers on the reproductive system. Marsupials give birth prematurely and allow the fetus to develop in an external pouch. In other mammals, excluding the monotremes which lay eggs, the fetus develops within the uterus and is attached to, and nourished by, the placenta.

Perhaps the most interesting fact about marsupials is that they nearly all have non-marsupial equivalents in other parts of the world (see Dobzhansky, et al., 1977, Figure 9.3, p. 267). The kangaroo has a similar role to the antelope roaming the African savanna. The wombat resembles a badger, and even has a backward-pointing pouch so that it will not fill with dirt while burrowing! There also are many small marsupials that have rodent counterparts. Evolutionists attribute such similarities to “parallel evolution” in both homology (being alike in form) and analogy (occupying a corresponding niche). That is, they believe that these marsupials and their placental peers developed independently; they share similar characteristics, but took two different paths to get there (see Simpson and Beck, 1965, pp. 499-501). A common ancestry, combined with similar forces of natural selection, evolutionists assert, will result in the same sort of changes through time. This common ancestor is thought to be the opossum because it is a marsupial and is found in other areas of the world apart from Australia.

According to evolutionary theory, the opossum was a primitive mammal living 200 million years ago on a single southern land mass called Gondwanaland. When parts of this supercontinent divided into what are now Australia and South America, the opossums were separated geographically. Over eons of time, so the story goes, the Australian descendants of the opossum developed into the various types of marsupials seen today. However, in South America, they “evolved” placentas and eventually migrated to North America and Eurasia.

These evolutionary ideas suffer from a number of problems, as listed below:
• There are no intermediate fossils (“transitional forms”) showing the development of the various marsupials from an opossum or opossum-like ancestor. Further, to suggest that one type of mammal could arise by supposed evolutionary mechanisms is incredible enough, but the chances of having both placental and non-placental forms evolve in the same way, at the same time, and in different regions, are remote to say the least.

• The humble opossum has been nominated as the ancestor of all mammals because it is supposed to be so “primitive,” having a relatively small brain and no “specialized” characteristics. But the opossum has thrived virtually unchanged in many parts of the world. In general, marsupials often are considered less “advanced” because they lack the complex internal reproductive system of placental mammals. However, they possess many other characteristics that could give them an edge over their placental counterparts. For instance, a female kangaroo can nourish two young ones of different ages at the same time, providing the appropriate formula from each teat. Unlike placental mammals, marsupials can suspend or abort the embryo deliberately if adverse conditions arise. And, of course, the pouch provides a superior place of protection for the young marsupial. Yes, marsupials are different, but they are not inferior.

• The distribution of marsupials is not well-answered by evolutionary theories. According to Michael Pitman, “the most diverse fossil assemblies have been obtained from South America and, later (Pliocene), Australia” (1984, p. 206). That is, according to the fossil record, the marsupials already were well-defined as a distinct group before the separation of Australia from other continents. Thus, geographic separation cannot be as significant to their development as evolutionists like to think. An alternate, biblically based model is as follows: 1. It is reasonable to suggest that God created the various kinds of marsupials. Hence, the many varieties of opossums, kangaroos, wallabies, and so on, most likely have arisen since the time of creation.

2. There could be any number of reasons that God created both placental and non-placental forms. One possibility is that marsupials were created for a specific environment. For example, on the African savannas or North American plains, animals migrate to different areas according to the seasons, and range over huge tracts of land in search of better grazing. However, vegetation patterns in Australia do not allow such flexibility. The unique characteristics of marsupials that allow them to survive in a tough environment are indicative of good design, not blind evolution.

3. Representatives of marsupial kinds went into the ark and were carried through the Flood. Any other varieties not in the ark became extinct with the Flood (and now exist only as fossils).

4. After the Flood, marsupials may have migrated to Australia across land connections or narrow waterways. Perhaps there is a supernatural element involving the second point made above. That is, God, having created specially equipped creatures, may have directed them to settle in Australia in particular. If God can arrange for all the animals to go to Noah (Genesis 6:20), then He very well could assist and direct them in their migration from Ararat once they left the ark (Genesis 8:17).

5. There is no need to postulate long periods of time for whole-scale movement of animal kinds over the Earth. Initial studies by Richard Culp show that there are minimal differences between many North American, European, and Asian varieties of certain plant and animal species (Culp, 1988). The lack of dissimilarities, and the occurrence of unique animal or plant assemblages in various parts of the world (not just Australia), may be evidence for a rapid resettlement in relatively recent times. This would be consistent with the Genesis account.”

REFERENCES

Bartz, Paul A. (1989), “Questions and Answers,” Bible-Science Newsletter, 27[7]:12, July.

Culp, G. Richard (1988), “The Geographical Distribution of Animals and Plants,” Creation Research Society Quarterly, 25[1]:24-27, June.

Dobzhansky, Theodosius, F.J. Ayala, G.L. Stebbins, and J.W. Valentine (1977), Evolution (San Francisco, CA: W.H. Freeman).

Pitman, Michael (1984), Adam and Evolution (London: Rider).

Simpson, G.G. and W.S. Beck (1965), Life: An Introduction to Biology (New York: Harcourt, Brace & World), second edition.

-Trevor Major, M.Sc., M.A.
1989 Apologetics Press, Inc.

[Raycpa]

Amazing God, the world is a fascinating place

What causes fresh-water springs in the ocean?

http://www.4information.com/trivia/causes-freshwatersprings-ocean/

finding fresh water... in the ocean.

http://l.editthispage.com/2000/09/12

[Natufian]

Thanks for the response.

I notice that the article you posted is 25 years old. I imagine that science has moved on significantly in that time.

The article argues that marsupials migrated from the ark’s landing spot to S.America and Australia.

That would mean that, once off the ark, they decided to migrate out of Europe, crossing multiple environments (some of which were suitable for them and some of which definitely weren’t), without leaving any evidence of populations in-place at any point behind them and includes the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean or maybe the Pacific (to get to S. America) and the many, many miles-wide channels between Australia and Asia.

So, why haven’t any of them made the journey back since then?

[Ha Ha Thats Very Logical]

The Great Flood theories are a hodge-podge of contradictions.

This is part of why I find them so unconvincing. Standard evolutionary and geologic theory addresses almost all questions with a single simple theory requiring few assumptions, chiefly that the physical laws that obtain now also worked in the past. Creationist and Flood theories, on the other hand, require a bunch of one-off explanations that don't fit together at all (as your questions demonstrate), unspecified "X factors" and "what if the seas were shallower and the mountains were lower except for where we need them to be higher" speculation, and in general an assumption that physical laws as we know them didn't operate the same way in the past. As an approach to science, it's a mess.

[Ha Ha Thats Very Logical]

The “kinds” of animals that Adam named on the sixth day of Creation and that accompanied Noah on the ark were likely very broad. As Henry Morris observed: “[T]he created kinds undoubtedly represented broader categories than our modern species or genera, quite possibly approximating in most cases the taxonomic family”

So Noah took two members of the Felidae family on the Ark, and from them, in 4,000 years, we got the lions of Africa, the ocelots of South America, the cougar of North America, the flat-headed cat of Malaysia, the Canadian lynx, and the domestic cat of ancient Egypt and your living room? Is that what you think happened? Do you accept the idea that lions and domestic cats are separate species? Doesn't that mean that they crossed the "species barrier" that's supposed to be inviolable?

[USS Johnston]

Creationist and Flood theories, on the other hand, require a bunch of one-off explanations that don't fit together at all (as your questions demonstrate), unspecified "X factors" and "what if the seas were shallower and the mountains were lower except for where we need them to be higher" speculation, and in general an assumption that physical laws as we know them didn't operate the same way in the past. As an approach to science, it's a mess.

Guess what? A planet which was once covered in ferns at the poles then suddenly and repidly completely flooded to the point where evidence of sea shells are found at the top of Mount Everest WAS in your understated words, "a mess." Ya think?? Planet Earth is proven to undeniably become an altogether different planet after the Great Flood.

Standard evolutionary and geologic theory addresses almost all questions with a single simple theory requiring few assumptions, chiefly that the physical laws that obtain now also worked in the past.

Gee, I'm sorry. That's pure balderdash.

"Evolution" is JUNK SCIENCE.

CHALLENGE: Please provide a single provable instance of "standard evolution."

As to the rest of your post, it's the usual mumbo-jumbo word-salad of having explained absolutely NOTHING regarding "physical laws." Moreover, your word-salad answered not a single question with respect to defining your "simple single theory" that a pre-Flood world was no different than a post-Flood world. You couldn't be more wrong.

[USS Johnston]

So Noah took two members of the Felidae family on the Ark, and from them, in 4,000 years, we got the lions of Africa, the ocelots of South America, the cougar of North America, the flat-headed cat of Malaysia, the Canadian lynx, and the domestic cat of ancient Egypt and your living room? Is that what you think happened?

This is absolutely what we KNOW happened. Are you able to prove otherwise? This entire event of building the Ark and assembling its creatures was guided by hand of the Creator Himself and took several years.

Do you accept the idea that lions and domestic cats are separate species? Doesn't that mean that they crossed the "species barrier" that's supposed to be inviolable?

How absurd an Epic Fail. Do you believe you're being clever?? LOL. Run out of asking relevant, sane questions already?

[USS Johnston]

The article argues that marsupials migrated from the ark’s landing spot to S.America and Australia.

That would mean that, once off the ark, they decided to migrate out of Europe, crossing multiple environments (some of which were suitable for them and some of which definitely weren’t), without leaving any evidence of populations in-place at any point behind them and includes the crossing of the Atlantic Ocean or maybe the Pacific (to get to S. America) and the many, many miles-wide channels between Australia and Asia. So, why haven’t any of them made the journey back since then?

Good thoughtful questions.

Is it possible the post-Flood geography was still forming and Continents not yet fully separated when the marsupials made their way to South America and Australia? And did not fall prey to predators there? Might the Continents then thereafter finally become separated by the great oceans? Is it also possible that those who happened to remain in more local continents of Asia, Europe, and North America became prey, eaten by predators?

Fissil records reveal MANY pre-Flood creatures did not survive the Great Flood and post-Flood

[Natufian]

Whether that scenario is possible or not depends on our understanding of how tectonic plates operate.

The Atlantic is currently widening at a rate of about 1cm per year. For it to have widened at a speed suitable for your scenario, the rate would have to be literally millions of times faster than currently observed. It would also have crushed it’s adjoining plates at a similar speed. At that speed the entire planet would be rendered uninhabitable for pretty much all life.

Any predators on the planet would be in exactly the same spot as the marsupials when they left the ark. We know predators follow prey. Why did the predators kill them off in europe but not follow them elsewhere?

[Fuzz]

Why would it take god ‘several years’ to assemble the creatures for the ark? He can destroy every living thing on the planet by flood, after creating all of it a few thousand years earlier, but can’t get the animals he likes to move faster?

[USS Johnston]

Any predators on the planet would be in exactly the same spot as the marsupials when they left the ark. We know predators follow prey. Why did the predators kill them off in europe but not follow them elsewhere?

If God allowed these same animals to assemble peacefully and board the Ark and live in peace for several months, surely He was not going to have all the carnivores consume each other in the moments His creatures left the Ark.

One must ask: Did the Great Flood occur or did it not? Was the hand of God involved in all facets? (I can't answer that for you or anyone else.)

As to the Tectonic Plate theory; In the past I'd seriously considered it as well as the "Pangaea," BUT it still required a catalyst of cataclysmic proportions and not a gradualism of inches-per-year of movement of 'Uniformism'. If that were so, there would be miles of sediment on the ocean floors accumulated over billions of years.

Instead The Planet did undergo a rapid and dramatic change. It convulsed, "the great founts burst open" (according to Genesis in the Bible), earths was awash in turbulence, continents and mountains were thrust upward, world-wide volcanoes erupted (see the entire Mid-Atlantic Ridge), magnetic, gravitation, atmospheric, and climactic changes took place...forever. And so forth.

Consider the tectonic theory, hydroplate theory mapping and other theories posited here which you may find interesting (other maps and theories included):

SOURCE: http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/HydroplateOverview3.html

Plate tectonics, currently the most popular theory in earth science, offers unsatisfactory answers to these and other questions. According to this theory, earth’s crust is composed of many plates,2 each 30–60 miles thick. They move relative to each other, about an inch per year—at the rate a fingernail grows. Continents and oceans ride on top of these plates. Sometimes a continent, such as North America, is on more than one plate. For example, different parts of North America, separated by the San Andreas Fault running up through western California, are sliding past each other. (A fault is a large fracture in the earth along which slippage has occurred.) Supposedly, material deep inside the earth is rising toward the crest of the entire Mid-Oceanic Ridge. Once it reaches the crest, it moves laterally away from the ridge. This claimed motion is similar to that of a conveyor belt rising from under a floor and then moving horizontally along the floor. However, many little-known problems, discussed below, accompany plate tectonics.

Cutting across the Mid-Oceanic Ridge, at almost right angles, are hundreds of long cracks, called fracture zones. Whenever the axis of the Mid-Oceanic Ridge is offset, it is always along a fracture zone. [See Figure 44 on page 111.] Why? According to plate tectonics, plates move parallel to fracture zones. But fracture zones are not always parallel. Sometimes they are many degrees “out of parallel.”3 How then can solid plates be bounded by and move in the direction of these fracture zones? (Can a train move on tracks that aren’t parallel?) Notice the white arrows in Figure 44 showing nearly intersecting fracture zones.

In at least eight places on the Atlantic and Pacific floors, segments of the Mid-Oceanic Ridge overlap for about 10 miles. These are called overlapping spreading centers.4 [See Figure 45.] If plates are moving away from the Mid-Oceanic Ridge, then the distance between overlapping segments must be increasing. However, overlapping regions are always near each other—contradicting plate tectonics.

Two of the most perplexing questions in the earth sciences today are barely verbalized in classrooms and textbooks: “What force moves plates over the globe? What is the mechanism and energy source?”5 The hydroplate theory gives a surprisingly simple answer. It involves gravity, the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, and water—lots of it.

[USS Johnston]

Why would it take god ‘several years’ to assemble the creatures for the ark? He can destroy every living thing on the planet by flood, after creating all of it a few thousand years earlier, but can’t get the animals he likes to move faster?

Mostly because you've failed to capitalize, "God" as in "The Creator."