Image from ICR article.
Posted on 05/30/2013 8:12:26 AM PDT by fishtank
Can This Dog Sniff Out Fossils? by Brian Thomas, M.S. *
Gary Jackson and his dog Migaloo, trained to sniff out buried remains, work with locals to uncover archaeological sites and help Australian police locate the bodies of murder victims. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, "Migaloo quickly located the 600-year-old remains of an indigenous Australian,"1 which researchers found a decade ago. But that specialized training resulted in an unforeseen crossover—Migaloo can also smell fossils.
Fossils are supposed to be rocks in the shape of bones, with no original bone material remaining. Over supposed eons, gradually trickling minerals slowly replaced the long-dead creature's bone material. Museums and textbooks widely teach that this process takes millions of years. If that's really how it happened, then the bones should no longer smell different from the surrounding rock.
Remains buried for dozens or maybe even a few thousand years might still retain some of their original organic components. But original organics are out of the question for remains buried for a million years. If the original material wasn't replaced by minerals, then it would have decayed and disappeared long before a million years elapsed—especially in the warm Australian climate.
Apparently, nobody explained these fossilization issues to Migaloo and her sensitive sniffer. The black Labrador-bull mastiff identified megafauna bone remains tagged as being between 2.6 and 5.3 million years old. How did she find fossils so well?
University of Queensland paleontologist Steve Salisbury told the Herald, "It seems very feasible to me that there would still be odour attached to a corpse but fossil bone is another thing. We're talking millions of years old, where the original bone and internal structure has been re-mineralised and essentially become a rock. That's why I question whether she can smell the difference."1 Why does Salisbury stick closer to the remains' undemonstrated age assignment than to Migaloo's demonstrated ability to pick up the bones' scent?
This doubt seems to arise not from the observable evidence—either from analyzing the fossils or from observing Migaloo—but from belief in unobserved millions of years.
But the dog can smell something different in those fossil bones. Maybe underground processes never did re-mineralize the bones. And if they still retain original organics, then maybe they are simply not millions of years old.
After all, paleontologists continue to find "unmineralized" fossils—fossils with original proteins and cells—all over the world. Original tissue fossils, designated as tens of millions of years old, hearken from several U.S. states, as well as Brazil, Argentina, Great Britain, Germany, Chinese provinces, Italy, and Belgum.2 The still-intact organic molecules inside these fossils show that all their rock layers look many times younger than their evolutionary age assignments.
"I'd like to believe it. If she can find fossilised bone, then that would make our searches a lot easier. I'm ready to watch and be surprised - that would be really exciting," Salisbury said.1 It sure would be, not just because dog noses would make fossils searches easier, but because original, unmineralized organic materials in fossils might force clear-thinking people to reassess fossil age assignments.
References
Mann, Effie. "Migaloo the super snout's on the case." The Sydney Morning Herald. Posted on smh.com.au April 28, 2013, accessed May 19, 2013.
Many of these finds are cataloged at www.icr.org.
* Mr. Thomas is Science Writer at the Institute for Creation Research.
Article posted on May 29, 2013.
Image from ICR article.
Isn’t it a Lab, though! High five!
jaw might be too big(?)
Good post , I was postulating that age may be the issue before end of article.........
Good eye.
“The black Labrador-bull mastiff”
I too have a half black Lab. Her other half is pit bull & German Shepherd mixed. She is one formidable gal. Jaws like a freaking bull-gator.
Very interesting article.
“But the dog can smell something different in those fossil bones. Maybe underground processes never did re-mineralize the bones. And if they still retain original organics, then maybe they are simply not millions of years old.”
Or,,,, maybe they just do smell different than ordinary rock.
The dog is supposed to sniff out “buried remains”. I.e.: she’s a cadaver dog. Why wd she detect dinosaur bones unless they smelled like what she’s trained to find: decaying remains.
Perhaps because the fossils just smell differently than ordinary rocks. We don’t know why at this point. The article puts forward one possible reason, but there may be another reason. It’s still only guesswork, and unproven. I certainly don’t know one way or the other.
What I’m asking is, in what way do the fossils ‘smell differently’? The dog is not trained to sniff out items that smell differently; she’s trained to sniff out decaying corpses.
“in what way do the fossils ‘smell differently’?”
We don’t know,,,, yet. This article makes one guess at the answer.
The article’s ‘guess’ is the only one consistent w the dog’s training.
“the only one consistent w the dog’s training.”
True to some extent. But dog’s sense of smell is amazing. He may make a connection that we’re completely in the dark about,,, at this time. This article makes a claim, which might be true, but does not really present the scientific evidence to back it up. All the points are still being argued and discussed, with no clear winner/proof as of yet.
A cadaver dog alerts only on certain smells. Unless dinosaur remains exude these smells, the dog wd not alert.
” Unless dinosaur remains exude these smells, the dog wd not alert.”
They may exude a smell, that is perhaps similar, or the same, but at a level so low that we can’t detect it. Dog’s noses are another of His wonderful creations! Sensitive beyond belief! I’ve been following this topic for a loooong time, and am just not convinced yet.
It would be interesting to see some testing done. We used to be able to only test water for parts per million, now, we can test for fractions of a part per billion. The tech has improved that much. I wonder if any testing of this nature has been done? I would think it could be.
The simplest explanation is generally the right one.
Fact: the dog is trained to sniff out decaying flesh & bones.
Fact: the dog alerts to fossils just as she does to non-fossilized remains.
Conclusion: the scent given off by the fossils triggers the same response from the dog as the scent given off by non-fossilized remains.
Not sure why it needs to go further? Why speculate, when the facts will do?
Good dog ping.
You're probably right, the later picture wasn't there when I first posted. Need to ask an AKC Dog show judge. Or whatever there in Aussieland. But they'd better get that critter procreating. Hope he/she has not been "fixed"!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.