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To: xcamel

A fossil is simply evidence of a former living thing. Even a footprint is a form of fossil: a “trace fossil.” Fossils do not have to be bones or other skeletal matter. They can be molds (cavities left when the actual organic remains decayed). They can be minerals deposited by chemical changes in the sediment as the organism decayed. And cephalopods (the group which includes octopi) have been around for about 500 million years, so a 95 million-year-old fossil which resembles living species is not shocking. The horseshoe crab has been around for about 200 million years with hardly any visible change.


7 posted on 03/27/2009 4:39:19 PM PDT by hellbender
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To: hellbender
After 35 years of paleontology, thanks much for your illuminating comment.

Sheesh.

15 posted on 03/27/2009 5:00:16 PM PDT by xcamel (The urge to save humanity is always a false front for the urge to rule it. - H. L. Mencken)
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