Posted on 10/16/2013 7:50:38 AM PDT by fishtank
Flower Fossils 100,000,000 Years Out of Place?
by Brian Thomas, M.S. *
European scientists have now discovered flowering plant fossils in rock layers supposedly 100,000,000 years older than expected.1 This new finding challenges conventional evolutionary assumptions as scientists struggle to account for what they interpret as an enormous time gap.
Publishing in the journal Frontiers in Plant Science, Peter Hochuli and Susanne Feist-Burkhardt described fossil-pollen grains recovered from a drill core in the north of Switzerland.1
They wrote, "In this paper we focus on fossil evidence, presenting the so far oldest angiosperm-like pollen from the Middle Triassic (ca. 243Ma), a record that predates the generally accepted first occurrence of angiosperm pollen by more than 100Ma [million years]."1
The researchers' distinct color photographs show pollen-grain features diagnostic of flowering plants, not gymnosperms like palms or cycads. "The described pollen grains show all the essential features of angiosperm pollen," according to the Frontiers report.2
And instead of the few primitive-looking pollens that evolutionary scientists were expecting to find in lower rock layers, the researchers discovered many fully-formed pollens of different but well-developed types. The study authors wrote of the "sudden appearance" of angiosperm fossils "on most continents as well as the rapid radiation of numerous clades [which] implies a considerable diversification within approximately 3.5Ma or else it represents a wave of immigration from other areas."1 In other words, they had difficulty explaining how such a wide variety of flowering plants suddenly occur in this Triassic layer.
They encountered an equal challenge in trying to decipher why, after this sudden burst of supposed evolutionary creativity, angiosperms disappeared for 100 million years. The study authors wrote, "If we accepted the monosulcate [e.g., angiosperm] pollen from the Middle and Late Triassic as evidence for a pre-Cretaceous origin of crown group [ancestral] angiosperms the lack of fossil records throughout the Jurassic would remain difficult to explain."1
To account for this difficulty, they invoked speculative "stem relatives," writing, "Considering the hundred million year gap in the record as well as morphological differences to the earliest Cretaceous we suggest that these pollen grains most likely represent stem relatives of the angiosperms."1
Yet, are these conclusions based on scientific observation? It's one thing to assert that these fossils must represent evolutionary ancestors of modern plants because they are millions of years older than the accepted age, but it's entirely circular to then assert that the angiosperm fossils must have formed millions of years before the accepted age simply because conventional evolution tells us plants evolved over long ages.
The Bible's record of all the major phases of world history shows no trace of a Triassic deep-time epoch and offers a better explanation for these fossils.
First, the Bible doesn't rely on circular reasoning or speculations but on "eyewitnesses" who wrote "words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and…the apostles of the Lord and Savior."3,4
Second, Scripture asserts that angiosperms existed alongside all other plants (including gymnosperms) and animals from the very start of creation—reporting instant creation of each plant kind. This exactly fits these fossils' sudden appearance. Third, it describes in detail a worldwide Flood capable of preserving life's traces in fossil forms. And in that context, Triassic flora and fauna do not represent a separate time but distinct ecosystems buried by sediment-laden Flood waters.
Finally, the Bible's timeline shows a creation that is thousands, not billions, of years old, erasing any need to explain why pollen grains buried deep in fossil layers look so similar to living herbs and flowers today.
References
Hochuli, P. A. and S. Feist-Burkhardt. 2013. Angiosperm-like pollen and Afropollis from the Middle Triassic (Anisian) of the Germanic Basin (Northern Switzerland). Frontiers in Plant Science. 4 (344): 1-14.
See Hochuli and Feist-Burkhardt, Frontiers in Plant Science 4 (344): 1-14. The team compared gymnosperm pollen grains found at the same site to show "a distinct contrast to the exine structure of the columellate, angiosperm-like grains." 2 Peter 1:16. 2 Peter 3:2.
* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer at the Institute for Creation Research.
Article posted on October 11, 2013.
In English today, the J gets mispronounced.
In central Europe, where the J was invented, a J sounds like our Y, so for correct understanding a Y simply works better.
Thanks for the explanation!
Wrong on both counts. The biblical genealogies gives us approx 6,000 years - claculated by both Bishop Usher [OT 4,004} and Sir Isaac Newton [OT 3,992].
Furthermore, there is no other book throughout history where archaeology agrees 100% of the time where their geographies and timetables overlap.
But then ymmv if you think millions and billions of years have been scientifically determined - lots of assumptions and conjectures plainly.
I chuckle inside whenever I read something like “appear X million years before they are supposed to”,
because the assumption is obvious - that the layers = lots of time, and that lower layers are “millions of years” older than upper layers.
Mt St Helens “canyon” tells a different story.
Sounds like you're being critical of religion.
The purpose of the Bible is to lead people to salvation through Christ. It is God revealing Himself to mankind. Morals will come with salvation.
What is wrong with ID?
If you believe in God, do you believe He is all-powerful?
If He is all-powerful, doesn’t He had the capability to create the earth in any time period He desires?
Do you believe Christ died on the Cross?
Which is harder to believe? Are either possible? God created everything in six days or Christ died and was resurrected?
I happen to believe in both based on God’s Word.
Yes.
True.
Religion is man’s invention.
Man is God’s invention.
(I just made that up .....)
Religion will lead far more people to damnation than simple unbelief possibly could.
Religion means holding tightly to a position that is against God’s way, while unbelief is mostly ignorance.
Yehova did no experiments.
He did it right the first time, 6013 years ago.
>> “Mt St Helens “canyon” tells a different story.” <<
.
For sure, in every way!
Rapid restoration,
Rapid fossilization,
Radio dating numbers that prove that dating assumptions are GIGO.
A Monty Python skit:
1: Hi, I’d like to get a date on this rock.
2: Ah, well, what fossils did you find near the rock?
1: Why do you need to know that?
2: So I can tell which results to use and which to throw out, of course! Wouldn’t want to wrong date back, now would you?
1: No, of course not. These were the fossils I found near this rock... but... I was really wanting to know how old the fossils are.
2: Oh, that’s easy, those fossils are 3 million years old.
1: But what about the rock?
2: Obviously, it’s 3 million years old, too, because it was near those fossils.
1: OK, thanks!
Yep!
Religion is man made, belief in Jesus Christ as our Lord and savior is not.
I thought the calculation was that creation happened 4004BC?
“Creation was NOT thousands of years ago. The Bible is not a historical document.”
The Bible is a historical document. Creation was thousands of years ago, not millions.
“There was no purpose in giving them a physics course...the purpose of the bible is morals.”
That’s a pretty shallow view of Christianity, then, if you think the Bible is just “about morals.” Certainly the scripture teaches what right and wrong is, but the goal isn’t just to make good men better. It’s to demonstrate that good men aren’t good at all.
As for your other comments, aren’t you just making assumptions about what a human being can and cannot understand? Considering how fanciful many pagan beliefs were, I don’t think there was a cognitive inferiority in mankind in those days in imagining myths. Why, you still believe plenty of myths yourself.
“You suffer two problems here. One, quite simply, is you seem to not know how to Google or read or visit your local natural history museum. There are hundreds of thousands of pieces of fossil evidence, showing a rather beautiful lineage to Homo sapiens. (Incidentally, even if there were none of that, DNA evidence is even stronger.)”
Far less evidence than you would think. There are people living in New Zealand or Australia whom, if Scientists found their skulls in some ditch somewhere, would measure them out to be Neanderthals or Homo Erectus and publish it in a scientific journal somewhere as evidence for evolution. You’d be surprised how much specious reasoning and fraudulent evidence has been put together to aid your evolutionary religion.
“I thought the calculation was that creation happened 4004BC?”
So we’re living in 3AD?
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