Ancient Oxygen-Rich Rocks Confound Evolutionary Timescale by Brian Thomas, M.S.* Many origin of life researchers have for decades argued that the early earth must have had a “reducing” atmosphere, meaning that it had very little oxygen. This argument has no direct evidence to support it other than the knowledge that oxygen destroys the delicate molecules that comprise cells today. If the first living cells evolved, they would have needed an atmosphere with little or no oxygen. But new research supports the idea that the earth’s surface was always oxygenated...