Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.

Dismiss

Alert: PBS Evolution Series

1 view

Skip to first unread message

Keith Littleton

unread,

Dec 30, 2002, 11:39:54 AM12/30/02

In Message-ID: <J_zr7.15836$L47.3...@news0.telusplanet.net>
"Derek" <ban...@telus.net> wrote
>"Adam Marczyk" wrote..
>+ You did not respond to my argument. "I don't think
>+ so, my figures were accurate" doesn't cut it. Are
>+ my calculations flawed? If so, show where. If
>+ not, you're just blindly denying. Your prediction of
>+ a constant 1.7% population growth rate for 4000 years
>+ of human history predicts we should have a
>+ ludicrously huge population, considerably more
>+ human biomass than there is material in the earth.
>+ (The earth weighs around 5.97 * 10^24 kilograms.
>+ Your numbers predict that there should be more
>+ humans alive than kilograms of matter in the planet,
>+ by several orders of magnitude.) If I'm wrong, show
>+ me where I'm wrong.
>
>Okay...the study I posted was "one" possible explanation,
>but it was taken out of context, and this was my fault.
>I was using a 1.7% comparison for todays population
>growth, compared to the early years when Noah, and his
>extended family were having children. The 1.7% was not
>meant to carry on through the years. I have to clarify
>that, as you are correct if we use that percentage.
>We would have too many people. This is the study I took
>that from, that points out clearly what I failed to do.
>http://members.ozemail.com.au/~sjdando/worldpop.htm
>
>You seem to be quite handy with numbers. Take a quick
>glance at the studies below, and maybe this will clear
>things up for you in greater detail.
>
> http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-021.htm
> http://www.ldolphin.org/popul.html
-
The main flaw in these arguments is that Young Earth
creationists, who are avid catastrophists, become
"Born Again Uniformitarianists" when the extrapolations
that they use require an absolute uniformity of rate,
which would embarrass the most ardent supporter of
Uniformitarism. Essentially, rate of population
growth has varied so greatly that any number, which a
person chooses, is only representative of the rate, at
which human populations grew for only a relatively small
percentage of the time, humans have existed on Earth as
a separate species. It is impossible to characterize such
growth with any single value.

For example, due to war, pestilence, and many other
factors, human populations in prehistoric past have
crashed with catastrophic reductions in global
populations. A person needs only look at Europe during
the "Black Death", the collapse of the Classic
Maya about 800 BC, the depopulation of mainland Greece
around 1200-700 BC to see that not only the growth rates
of human populations can be quite variable. In fact, they
can be expressed as negative numbers when events cause
catastrophic population declines. The rates at which
human, or any animal populations grows and declines are
so variable that it is virtually impossible to use any
sort of linear extrapolation to reconstruct the past
history of past population growth.

Also, it seems like the values that are being used in
this discussion are nothing more than pure guesswork
without any hard evidence to back them up.
-
>+ "It doesn't prove anything" is pure blind denial and
>+ handwaving. The global flood simply cannot explain the
>+ features I described above. If the burrowing animals
>+ moved in before the flood, their tunnels should run
>+ through the turbidites as well as the shale. They
>+ don't.
-
This is true. In case of the turbidites and shale, the
sandy turbidites are created by the rapid deposition by
a turbidity current. The shale forms after the current
passes by and mud thrown up into suspension within the
water column either by or from the turbidite settles
slowly onto the new sea floor bottom. For the shale
layer to develop in a turbidite, a significant period
of time, in terms of weeks, months, and even years,
must lapse between individual turbidites in order to
allow enough time for clay to slowly settle to the
bottom of the ocean, sea, or lake. This contradicts the
fantastic rates of sedimentation, tens of meters per hour
that would be needed for some sedimentary section to be
deposited within the span of a Noachian Flood.

A turbidite is not completely burrowed because it rapidly
deposited. As a result, it accumulates under conditions
too fast and too hostile for burrowing animals to churn
it. The mud, which later becomes "shale" accumulates very
slowly, which allows animals to live in the bottom while
the mud accumulates and burrow around and often totally
churn it. Initially, the sand comprising the upper
part of a turbidite might also be burrowed.

The churning, called "bioturbation", is largely
restricted to the shale because its contains organic
matter, on which the various animals are feeding. As the
animals move through the mud, many are ingesting it and
feeding on organic matter within it. They are essentially
mining the mud for food. As a result, they restrict their
burrowing to the mud, which later becomes "shale", as the
sand comprising the turbidite typically lacks sufficient
organic matter in it to be worth their effort to mine.

Of course other animals burrow into the bottom, to make
holes in which they can hide. They are just going to dig
a hole deep enough in which to hide below the sea bottom.
As a result, their burrows will largely be restricted to
the "mud" layer on top of the turbidite and the uppermost
part of the turbidite itself before a thick layer of mud
accumulates on top of it. These burrows will cause the
mud overlying a turbidite to be churned as it accumulates.

Finally, the type of borrows produced by animal reflects
the reason for it was made. Escape burrows have very
different morphology than burrows produced for feeding.
The burrows found in the shale layers are clearly feeding
not escape burrows.

For some basic information about turbidites, a person
can look at:

1. turbidity current
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=turbidity%20current

2. turbidite
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=turbidite
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Display.cfm?Term=Bouma%20sequence
http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/DisplayImage.cfm?ID=201

"Sedimentary deposits formed by turbidity currents in
deep water at the base of the continental slope and on
the abyssal plain. Turbidites commonly show predictable
changes in bedding from coarse layers at the bottom to
finer laminations at the top, known as Bouma
sequences...."

3. Sediment Gravity Flows
http://www.cs.umt.edu/GEOLOGY/classes/Geol_432_Arch/
G432_lec10_sedgravflows2.html

(Above URL needs to be reassembled to work)

4. turbidity current movies
http://faculty.gg.uwyo.edu/heller/SedMovs/turbidrg.htm
http://faculty.gg.uwyo.edu/heller/SedMovs/turb1tx.htm

5. "typical turbidite sediment outcrop"
http://www.oceandrilling.org/Documents/Oceanus/Sediments/Sed5.html
http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-
1&q=turbidite&btnG=Google+Search

(Second URL needs to be reassembled)

6. Finally, "Turbidites of the Peira Cava region of
France (March, 2000)" at:
http://citt.marin.cc.ca.us/photos/france/peiracava.html

Turbidites and turbidity currents are discussed by:

Bouma, A. H. (1962) Sedimentology of some flysch
deposits. Elsevier, New York.

Boggs, S. (2001) Principles of Sedimentology and
Stratigraphy. Prentice Hall, New York.

Lowe D. R. (1982) Sediment gravity flows: II.
Depositional models with special reference to the
deposits of high-density turbidity currents. Journal of
Sedimentary Petrology. vol. 52, pp. 279-297.
-
>+ And nothing you cited comes close to explaining how a
>+ catastrophic flood could produce delicate depositional
>+ patterns of fast-forming layers interspersed with
>+ slow-forming layers. The only possible explanation for
>+ this is a series of continual, slow depositions over
>+ geologic time.
>
>Geological columns are often missing, and misplaced, so
>how can you hold firm to fossils proving evidence of
>time?
-
Given that there are logical explanations, e.g. thrust
faulting, overturned strata, reworking, and so forth,
that supported by hard physical evidence for the
"misplaced" geologic column and the missing parts are
readily explained by either erosion, nondeposition,
tectonic disruption of strata, or some combination of
these factors. There are no reasons either to question or
not "hold firm" to using fossils as indicators of
**relative** geologic time.

Kurt Wise, a Young Earth creationist paleontologist
disagrees greatly with Derek's interpretation. Kurt Wise
concluded after studying the data:

"Years before Darwin published the "Origin of Species",
geologists had constructed a geologic column very
similar to that used today. As early as the late
eighteenth century it began to be recognized that
fossils found below others in one area would be found
beneath the same ones in another area. By the late
1820's Georges Cuvier had convinced most of the
scientific world that there was a certain inviolable
order to the fossils of the world. Although the types
of rock did not always occur in the same order, the
fossils contained within them always would. It became
common to give names to suites of fossils which were
always found together. Thus arose the names Cambrian,
Ordovician, Silurian, etc., that are found on the
current geologic column. When the theory of evolution
was introduced, the order of the geologic column was
not affected appreciably. Since it is not possible to
predict the path of evolution, no change in the column
SHOULD have occurred with the acceptance of evolution
and no change did occur. The column also preceded
by at least a century any means of affixing absolute
ages. The only methods of "dating" available in the
nineteenth century were those of superpositional
stratigraphy and biostratigraphy. Each of these methods
yielded only relative ages-- that is, younger, older,
or the same age as some reference rock or fossil.
When radiometry was introduced a method of assigning
absolute ages had finally arrived. With it, any defects
in the column should have been quickly recognized.
No significant contradictions occurred between the
column and radiometry. Although this may be due to
wholesale dishonesty in the interpretation of
radiometric dates, no systematic study has been done
to establish this. As a result, the radiometric dates
must be taken as strong evidence in support of the
correctness of the geologic column."

This quote is from:

Wise, Kurt P. (1986) The Way Geologists Date! in
Proceedings of the First International Conference on
Creationism, Section 1, Vol. 2, Walsh, R.E.; C.L.
Brooks; and R.S. Crowell (eds.), Creation Science
Fellowship, Pittsburgh, PA., p. 135-136f.

It should be noted that Dr. Georges Cuvier was a
Christian creationist and certainly would have been an
anti-evolutionist.

Web pages discuss this matter at:

1. Radiometric Dating and the Geological Time Scale
Circular Reasoning or Reliable Tools? by Andrew MacRae
at:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dating.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/faqs-youngearth.html

2. The Geologic Column and Its Implications to the Flood
by Glenn R. Morton at:

http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/geo.htm
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/geocolumn/
-
>+ And the fact that shale is formed in water proves
>+ there was a global flood? Uh-huh.
>
>shale noun [U] a type of soft grey rock, usually formed
>from hardened clay, which breaks easily into thin layers
>
>shale [shayl ] noun - rock of dark sediment and clay:
>a dark fine-grained sedimentary rock composed of layers
>of compressed clay, silt, or mud
-
There is nothing in either the above definition or below
discussion about a "world-wide unconformity" that provide
any evidence that ***only** global floods produce shale.
If the interested lurker would conduct further research,
he would find that "hardened clay" and the "clay, silt,
or mud" described in the above definitions can be found
currently accumulating in a wide variety of modern
underwater environments such as lakes, lagoons, marshes,
abyssal plains of oceans, and so forth. In fact, such
sediments also accumulate in environments that are only
periodically under water such river backswamps and flood
plains, tidal flats, and so forth. Given the innumerable
places where "hardened clay" and "clay, silt, and mud"
can be found accumulating underwater and in areas that
are often above water for long periods of times, there is
nothing about "shale" which requires either a Noachian
Flood or similar global catastrophe to create it.

The interested lurker can find additional information
about the non-catastrophic formation of shale in books
such as:

1. Potter, P. E., J. B. Maynard, and W. A. Pryor (1980)
Sedimentology of Shale. Springer, New York.

2. Schieber, J., W. Zimmerle, and P.S. Sethi. (2000)
Shales and Mudstones. Balogh Scientific Books,
Champaign, IL.

3. Muller, A. (2002) Carboniferous Geology - Shale
Sedimentology (Zentralblatt fur Geologie und
Palaontologie, Teil I, Jg. 1992 Heft 5) Science
Publishers, Stuttgart.
http://www.schweizerbart.de/pubs/books/es/zentralbla-160199205-desc.html
http://www.uta.edu/paleomap/homepage/Schieberweb/shalenews98.html

4. Boggs, S. (2001) Principles of Sedimentology and
Stratigraphy. Prentice Hall, New York.

Some web pages about the non-catastrophic origin of
shales can be found at:

1. The Black Shale Net at:

http://www.blackshale.com/

2. Is the Devonian Chattanooga Shale Really a Volcanic
Ash-Fall Deposit? (A Review of a Creation Research
Society Quarterly Paper) by James L. Moore

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/ashfall.html
-
>The increasing recognition of catastrophic deposits
>has been accompanied by recognition of other geological
>phenomena that may or may not be catastrophic, but show
>fascinating "worldwide uniformity".
-
Mr. Derek, doesn't seem to understand at all that, as
falsely implied above, the "worldwide uniformity" was
**not** recently recognized. The unconformity at the
Precambrian-Cambrian boundary has been recognized for at
least a century. Other unconformities, of similar world-
wide extent have been recognized for at least for the
last forty years. For example, Sloss (1963) recognized
five unconformities of similar magnitude that separate
the Sauk (Cambrian - early Ordovician), Tippecanoe
(middle Ordovician - Silurian), Kaskaskia (Devonian -
Mississippian), Absaroka (Pennsylvanian - Jurassic),
Zuni (Jurassic-Cretaceous), and Tejas (Tertiary)
stratigraphic sequences. Detailed studies have shown the
presence of even more world-wide unconformities within
the geologic column, e.g. Haq et al. (1987), related
to global fluctuations in sea level.

In arguing the basal Cambrian world-wide unconformity in
terms of a Noachian Flood, a person would also have to
explain why other identical world-wide unconformities
don't represent additional "Noachian Floods", which are
unrecorded by the author of Genesis. As discussed by Haq
et al. (1987), Van Wagoner et al. (1990), Wilgus et al.
(1988) and numerous other published books and papers,
the basal Cambrian and other world-wide unconformities
are readily explained by global changes in sea level
caused by non-catastrophic processes.

References Cited:

Haq, B. U., J. Hardenbol, and P. R. Vail (1987)
Chronology of fluctuating sea levels since the
Triassic. Science. vol. 235, pp. 1156-1187.

Sloss, L. L. (1963) Sequences in the cratonic interior
of North America. Geological Society of America Bulletin.
vol. 74, pp. 93-114.

Van Wagoner, J. C., Mitchum, R. M., Campion, K. M., and
V. D. Rahmanian (1990) Siliciclastic Sequence
Stratigraphy in well logs, cores, and outcrops: Concepts
for high-resolution correlation of time and facies. AAPG
Methods in Exploration Series no. 7, American Association
of Petroleum Geologists, Tulas, Oklahoma.

Wilgus, C. K., B. J. Hastings, H. Posamentier, J. C. van
Wagoner, C. A. Ross, and C. G. Kendall (eds) (1988) Sea-
Level Change: an Integrated Approach. SEPM Special
Publication no. 42. Society for Sedimentary Geology,
Tulsa, Oklahoma
-
>Ager (1981) in his book The Nature of the
>Stratigraphical Record describes features of specific
>parts of the geologic column that are found over very
>large geographic areas or even worldwide. For example,
>at the base of the Cambrian there is a basal quartzite
>that is found "virtually everywhere", typically
>followed by orthoquartzite, then glauconitic sandstones,
>and then marine "shales" and thin limestones.
>http://www.grisda.org/georpts/gr17_01.htm
-
First, both Derek and Brand grossly misunderstand what
Ager (1981) argued in his book "Nature of the
Stratigraphic Record". For example, the "catastrophic
processes, which Ager (1981) discussed, are not global
catastrophies on the scale of the Noachian Flood. Also,
neither person noted that the similarities discussed by
Ager (1981) reflect not only global changes in sea level
but also global changes in climate, such as the change
between hothouse (greenhouse) to icehouse climates, that
have occurred through geologic time as discussed in "ICE
HOUSE or HOT HOUSE at:

http://www.scotese.com/climate.htm
http://www.scotese.com/paleocli.htm

Second, the Cambrian "basal quartzite" that is found
"virtually everywhere", typically followed by
orthoquartzite, then glauconitic sandstones, and then
marine "shales" and thin limestones" is the ***lower
half** of what conventional geologists call the "Lawrence
L. Sloss Cratonic Sequence". This **lower** part of the
Sloss Cratonic Sequence was first described about 94
years ago by Chamberlain and Salisbury who proposed that
they could easily be explained by gradual global sea
level changes (Sloss 1963, 1984). In the 1940,s Sloss
(1963) showed that the sequence of a continent-wide
unconformity overlain by coastal and nearshore
sandstones, which in term are overlain by marine shales
and limestones as described by Dereck, are repeated at
least six times within the sedimentary strata covering
the North American continent. Thus, the formation of a
continent-wide unconformity covered a basal sandstone
overlain by marine shales and limestones, occurred not
once as Dereck falsely implied, but at least six times
since the end of the Precambrian. Thus, there are at
least five more global / world-wide unconfomities than
can be explained by Derek's simplistic one only Noachian
Flood model. Since Sloss (1963, 1984) was published, many
more less conspicuous global unconoformities have been
demonstrated by careful geologic research as discussed
in Van Wagoner et al. (1990), Wilgus et al. (1988), and
other studies. A listing of the most significant papers
can be found at:

http://www.uga.edu/~strata/sequence/readings.html

Thus, if a global unconformity was only caused by global
flooding on the scale of the Biblical Noachian Flood as
claimed by Derek, by his logic, dozens of global and
catastrophic Noachian-scale floods, all unrecorded
in Genesis, must have occurred in the prehistoric past
to account for all of the now documented world-wide
unconformities.

Finally, Derek seems unaware of the fact that the
sedimentary sequence, which he describes is only half of
a complete Sloss Cratonic Sequence. Overlying the marine
shales and limestones in a complete Sloss Cratonic
Sequence are additional terrestrial deposits, indicating
a complete retreat of the marine conditions from the
continent and a return to deposition under terrestrial
environments as in coastalplain (Sloss 1963, 1984).
Above these terrestrial deposits and separating them
from the basal sandstone and overlying marine shale and
limestone of the next Sloss Cratonic Sequence is a major
continent-wide (global) unconformity (Sloss 1963, 1984).

The retreat and advance of shallow seas over the
continents resulted from long term changes in global
sea level at various time scales. The sea level
changes on global scale reflects the interplay of
factors such as the melting and growth of continental
ice sheets, change in the capacity of ocean basin
caused by changes in spreading ridge length and
rate of spreading, changes in continental thickness,
and so forth. Regional variations in the character and
distribution of unconformities and local deposits are
caused by regional tectonics, slope of continental
shelf and platform, rates of sedimentation and other
factors (Van Wagoner et al. 1990; Wilgus et al. 1988).

Reference Cited:

Sloss, L. L. (1963) Sequences in the cratonic interior
of North America. Geological Society of America Bulletin.
vol. 74, pp. 93-114.

Sloss, L. L. (1984) Comparative anatomy of cratonic
unconformities. In J. S., Schlee, ed, pp. 1-6,
Interregional Unconformities and Hydrocarbon
Accumulation. AAPG Memoir no. 36. American Association
of Petroleum Geologists, Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Wilgus, C. K., B. J. Hastings, H. Posamentier, J. C. van
Wagoner, C. A. Ross, and C. G. Kendall (eds) (1988) Sea-
Level Change: an Integrated Approach. SEPM Special
Publication no. 42. Society for Sedimentary Geology,
Tulsa, Oklahoma
-
>Shale is caused by water, and found all over the
>earth. Flood
-
However, the shale is neither all of the same age nor of
the origin. Given that there are innumerable non-
catastrophic processes that can cause "hardened clay" /
"clay, silt, and mud" to accumulate underwater and, even,
within freshwater lakes and the floodplains of modern
rivers, Mr. Derek has no scientific basis for equating
the formation of shale with the Noachian Flood. To find
out how scientifically bankrupt the above statement is,
a person need only read:

Potter, P. E., J. B. Maynard, and W. A. Pryor (1980)
Sedimentology of Shale. Springer, New York.

Also, the presence of fossil soils, called "paleosols",
in shales deposited in the terrestrial floodplains of
rivers soundly refutes them having been created by any
sort of global flood / catastrophe. One example of such
a fossil soil found in "shale" that Young Earth
creationists regard as being deposited and buried under
younger deposits during the Noachian Flood can be found
by reading:

Franc, O. T., and D. E. Fastovsky (2000)
Paleoenvironments of Early Theropods, Chinle Formation
(Late Triassic), Petrified Forest National Park,
Arizona. Palaios. vol. 15, pp. 194-211.

http://www.aapg.org/datasystems/test_pal/data/015/015003/15030194.pdf

Another example of fossil soils, indicative of nonmarine
deposition, within "shale can found on-line at:

1. Abstract of Article at:

http://home.t-online.de/home/f.bailly/paleo/abstract.htm

2. Pictures of soil Structures in this fossil soil at:

http://home.t-online.de/home/f.bailly/paleo/paleosol.htm

The original reference is:

Bailly, F., P. Felix-Hennigsen, H. Klassen, and S.
Stephan (2000) Synsedimentary Paleo-Vertisols in Upper
Jurassic sequences of Northwestern Germany
(Wiehengebirge). Osnabrucker Naturwissenschaftliche
Mitteilungen. Vol. 26, pp. 15-46.

Other pages about paleosols and "Flood Geology" are:

1. "Weathering mantles and the Age of the Earth" at:

http://www.geocities.com/earthhistory/sap.htm

2. "Radiometric Dating, Paleosols and the Geologic
Column: Three strikes against Young Earth Creationism"
by Joe Meert at:

http://gondwanaresearch.com/hp/paleosol.htm

3. "Paleosols and Noah's Flood" at:

http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/paleosol.htm

4. "Not So Amusing Geological Misinterpretations" at

http://home.austarnet.com.au/stear/plaisted_not_amusing_henke.htm
-
>++ In "An Anthology of Matters Significant to
>++ Creationism and Diluviology: Report 2" (Creation
>++ Research Society Quarterly, 18(4) 201-23, 239; March
>++ 1982), I also provide 200 examples of fossils
>++ occurring in "wrong" rock strata, according to
>++ evolution, and show that there usually is no
>++ evidence to support the usual evolutionary
>++ rationalization that these are situations where
>++ fossils from older rock were washed out and
>++ redeposited in younger strata.
-
Having looked at this article, it is apparent to me that
it is nothing more than a laundry list of fossils that
the author believes to be "occurring in "wrong" rock
strata" according to evolution. However, it does nothing
to "show" that there is a lack of any evidence for these
fossils having been reworked. In fact, this paper
actually cites numerous scientific papers, which provide
detailed evidence of why the authors concluded that the
fossils were reworked or "misplaced" by other processes.

The person who wrote this article, John Woodmorappe (a
pen name used by an Illinois high school science teacher,
Jan Peczkis), needs to go out into the field and observe
what is happening in the real world. There, anybody can
easily observe that fossils, contrary to what the article
falsely presumes, can be and are quite readily recycled
as sedimentary rocks enclosing them are eroded by rivers,
slumping, and erdoing shorefaces. For example, sieving
of the foam from the surface of the Mississippi and
Missouri rivers would produce numerous Cretaceous
foraminifer eroded from Cretaceous sediments exposed
within the Missouri river basin. In addition, the
analysis of mud from rivers draining basins underlain by
sedimentary rocks for palynomorphs almost always will
reveal pollen, dinoflagellates, and other organic
microfossils eroded from these sedimentary rocks. In case
of the Mississippi, Ohio, Missouri, and many other rivers
in the central United States, the sediment that they
transport contain microfossils, as old as Cambrian and
Ordovician in age. These microfossils are transported and
deposited in the Mississippi Delta and out in the Gulf of
Mexico. Finally, there are other processes that mixed
sediments and fossils even after deposition. For example,
mud volcanoes "erupt" sediments brought by escaping
natural gas from hundreds of meters below the surface.
Along with sediment, fossils of various types are brought
(displaced) to the surface where they are millions of
years out-of-place. What happens in the Mississippi rive
basin, its delta, and Gulf of Mexico is not any different
than happens in many other parts of the world.

If Young Earth creationists would stop being deaf, dumb,
and blind to the evidence that contradicts their pet
theories, they would find any number of "situations where
fossils from older rock were washed out and redeposited
in younger strata." The statement "there usually is no
evidence" for this happening in both the past and present
demonstrates only the incredible ignorance of geology
that make some Young Earth creationists the laughing
stock and objects of derision of conventional geologists
and paleontologists.
-
>+ Let's see some examples then..
-
For one really fun example of "out-of-place" fossils
being currently created in the modern Gulf of Mexico is
described in great detail in:

Kohl, B., and H. H. Roberts (1995) Mud Volcanoes in the
Gulf of Mexico: A Mechanism for Mixing Sediments of
Different Ages in Slope Environment: Gulf Coast
Association of Geological Societies Transactions,
vol. 45, pp. 351-359.
-
>Out-of-Place Fossils
-
From the exact similarity of wording, it is apparent
that the below examples of out-of-place fossils came from
the book, " In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for
Creation and the Flood" by Walter Brown. Because this
book provided specific references to the published papers
about each example, it is possible to comment
specifically on these examples by examining the papers
and articles cited in "In the Beginning: Compelling
Evidence for Creation and the Flood".
-
>Frequently, fossils are not vertically sequenced in the
>assumed evolutionary order. A For example, in
>Uzbekistan, 86 consecutive hoofprints of horses were
>found in rocks dating back to the dinosaurs.
-
This example apparently come from:

Brown, W. (2001) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. Agards, Catheys Valley
California

In this book, Brown (2001) stated:

"In Uzbekistan, 86 consecutive horse hoofprints were
found beside supposedly 90 -100-million-year-old
dinosaur tracks. Evolutionists have almost as much
difficulty believing that horses and dinosaurs lived
together as they do man and dinosaurs. Horses
allegedly did not evolve until many millions of years
after the dinosaurs became extinct. [See Y. Kruzhilin
and V. Ovcharov, "A Horse from the Dinosaur Epoch?"
Moskovskaya Pravda (Moscow Truth), 5 February 1984.]"

This is a rather remarkable case of an Evangelical
Christian citing a Communist (Soviet) newspaper as if it
was the "gospel truth" instead being "Soviet truth". :-)
In case of what this newspaper has often printed about
Christianity and the United States of America, I am quite
sure that Dr. Brown's opinion of the veracity of
Moskovskaya Pravda (Moscow Truth) would be 180 degrees
the opposite of his evaluation of credibility that he
gives the report about horse hoof prints in the above
quote from "In the Beginning". :-) :-) :-)

Even if a person disregards the credibility problems
inherent with public newspapers published in the Soviet
Union under the strict control of the Communist Party,
there are significant problems with using any newspaper
as a primary source of information. Unfortunately, many
newspaper editors and reporters lack the experience to
evaluate the validity of scientific claims that are made
in the stories that they write. As a result, they all too
often either angle the facts or accept unquestionably
as fact erroneous conclusions made by the people that
they have interviewed.

It would be very easy for the person being interviewed to
have mistaken either current crescents, the tracks of
other animals, e.g. ancient crocodiles, or invertebrate
traces which can easily be mistaken by people as the
hoof prints of horses to have been misidentified and
falsely reported as hoof prints. In this case, because of
their lack of experience as either paleontologists or
geologists, it would have been impossible for either
editors or reporters involved to have caught this
mistake. As a result, it is impossible without additional
information, e.g. detailed descriptions and pictures
published in papers about these alleged hoof prints
published in an accessible journal, to know with any
certainty that these features are actually the tracks
of horses. An example of current crescents, inorganic
sedimentary structure, having been misidentified is
discussed below in terms of the pseudo-hoof prints
described by Young Earth creationists from the Grand
Canyon.

References Cited:

Brown, W. (2001) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. Agards, Catheys Valley
California
-
>b Dinosaur and humanlike footprints have been found
>together in Turkmeniac and in Arizona.
-
Again, we have the strange spectacle of an Evangelical
Christian, Anonymous (1985), citing a Communist (Soviet)
publication, the 1983 "Moscow News" as if it is believed
it to be as infallible as the Bible. As in case of the
above claim about fossil horse hoof prints, Mr. Derek and
Brown (1995) fails to provide any documented evidence
of "humanlike footprints" being found along side dinosaur
prints. They only provided a short interview from in a
newspaper article lacking pictures and any other evidence
that supports the identification of given in the
newspaper interview. Given that all sorts of odd
features, e.g. Monroe (1987), and dinosaur tracks, e.g.
Kuban (1997a, 1997b), have been misidentified as human
footprints, a single newspaper interview is useless as
evidence of the occurrence of human footprints with
dinosaur tracks.

The Tuba City (Arizona) tracks have been examined by
Glen Kuban and the results of his examination were
published in:

Kuban, G. J. (1992) Do Human Footprints Occur in the
Kayenta of Arizona? Origins Research. vol.14, no.2,
pp.7,12,16.

This article is on-line at:

http://members.aol.com/Paluxy2/arizon.htm

In Kuban (1992), Mr. Kuban states:

"When Ron Hastings and I visited Site 1 in 1988 we
saw many definite bipedal dinosaur tracks nearby (as
had during a previous trip), but nothing that strongly
resembled a genuine human footprint. The so-called
"humanoid" markings looked no more convincing in
person than they later did in the CRSQ photographs.

The CRSQ report did not begin explain how multiple
dinosaur track layers fit their young-earth, Flood
geology model. A crucial question is how these and
many other vertebrate track layers (like those in the
Glen Rose Formation) were formed during the midst
of a violent worldwide Flood--if indeed such layers
are interpreted as Flood deposits. Particularly in
need of explanation is how the track-makers survived
while thousands of feet of sedimentary material were
being deposited under the track layers or while
extensive sediments between the track layers were
being deposited. .... "

References Cited:

Anonymous (1985) Russian Paluxy Source. Creation Ex
Nihilo. vol. 7, no. 3, p 4.

Brown, W. (2001) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. Agards, Catheys Valley
California

Kuban, G. J. (1989a) Elongate dinosaur tracks. In D. D.
Gillette and M. G. Lockley, eds., pp. 57-72, Dinosaur
Tracks and Traces: Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

http://members.aol.com/paluxy2/color.htm

Kuban, G. J. (1989b) Color distinctions and other curious
features of dinosaur tracks near Glen Rose, Texas. In
D. D. Gillette and M. G. Lockley, eds., pp. 428-440,
Dinosaur Tracks and Traces: Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press.

Kuban, G. J. (1992) Do Human Footprints Occur in the
Kayenta of Arizona? Origins Research. vol. 14, no.2,
pp. 7,12,16.

Monroe, J. S. (1987) Creation, human footprints, and
flood geology. Journal of Geological Education. vol. 35,
no. 2, pp. 93-102.

For an example of the weird stuff that people misidentify
as human tracks, a person need only go read "The "Meister
Print": An Alleged Human Sandal Print from Utah" at:

http://members.aol.com/paluxy2/meister.htm

And the "The Paluxy Dinosaur/"Man Track" Controversy" at:

http://members.aol.com/Paluxy2/paluxy.htm
-
>d Sometimes, land animals, flying animals, and marine
>animals are fossilized side-by-side in the same rock.
-
According to Brown (2001) this claim is documented by
three widely divergent references, Snelling (1985),
Armstrong (1985), and Shipman (1987). All of these
references are popular articles written for the lay
public.

First, based only on articles from local newspapers, and
a national newsmagazine, Armstrong (1985) discussed the
occurrence of fossil bones found in either an unnamed
shell pit or unnamed shell pits near Tampa, Florida
consisting of a mixture of 80 percent the fossil bones of
land animals mixed with the bones of birds, sea turtles,
salt water fish, fresh water fish, and turtles. The
article was only five paragraphs long. Because of its
shortness, the articles failed to discuss any of the
details about the site and was far too vague for anyone
to make any decision about whether this bone bed (or bone
beds ?) was in anyway anomalous in terms of conventional
geology. Armstrong (1985) failed to provide enough to
give either Brown (2001) or Derek any support for their
conclusions.

Second, Snelling (1985) discusses the catastrophic
implications of fossiliferous sandstone beds that
outcrop at Fossil Bluff near Wynyard, Tasmania in
Australia (Vickers-Rich and Rich 1993). Not only is
Snelling (1985) unable to tell the difference between a
"breccia" and gravelly, fossiliferous sandstone, he
concludes without any real evidence that the beds of
marine shells that the are the result of a "watery
catastrophe" that "overwhelmed, washed, sorted, and
buried all of these animals and plants together."
Snelling (1985) doesn't seem to understand that there is
nothing anomalous about shark's teeth and whales bones
being found in marine sediments.

At Fossil Bluff, the only nonmarine vertebrate fossil
consists of only a single partial (upper) eroded skull
of the possum-like marsupial Wynyardia bassiana (Vickers-
Rich and Rich 1993). Such fragmentary and rare remains of
nonmarine animals is readily explained by the fact that
nonmarine animals occasionally drown in rivers and
lagoons and are swept out to sea where their bones are
scattered and buried in marine sediments. Similarly,
nonmarine plant material, is frequently swept out to sea
and incorporated into marines sediments as found by
Snelling (1985) Fossil Bluff.

The shell beds found at Fossil Bluff near Wynyard,
Tasmania fail to be any evidence of any "watery
catastrophe as argued by Snelling (1985). The shelly
sandstones observed by Snelling can be created by a
variety of noncatastrophic processes, e.g. bottom
winnowing by storms, as discussed by Kidwell (1986, 1991)
and Kidwell et al. (1986). The fossiliferous sandstones
are no different from the shelly sands accumulating on
modern continental shelves, e.g. Anderson and McBride
(1996) and McBride et al. (1996), except for genera and
species of shells found within them.

Finally, Brown (1995, 2001) cites a discussion by Shipman
(1987) of the world famous fossil site at Mesel, Germany
as an example of a fossil deposit created by the Noachian
Flood. However, there is simply no evidence of the fossil
deposits at Messell being created, as implied by Brown
(1995, 2001) by a global catastrophic Noachian Flood. The
fossil deposits are extremely local in nature in that they
are restricted entirely to a fault bounded depression just
over 1000 long and 700 meters wide. Thus, they lack the
regional extent that a person would expect from a global
catastrophe and their distribution is perfectly
compatible with many modern lakes found in tectonic
depressions. The sediment containing the exceptionally
well preserved fossils are found in a bituminous shale,
locally called "oil shale" / "Olschiefer". This is type
of sediment that accumulates only within stagnant waters,
such as found in many lakes, but not within a global
flood claimed moved and deposited masses of sediments
several kilometers thick all over the world. In addition,
the high organic content of the shale is the result of
massive blooms of a green, freshwater alga, Tretraedon.
which grew in large numbers, died off, and accumulated
along with mud at the bottom of a stagnant water body.
The lack of ccocoliths, formanifera, radiolarians, and
other marine microfossils, although perfectly consistent
with accumulation in a stagnant lake, is quick remarkable
for sediments deposited during the late stages of a
global flood that mixed all of the oceans of the world/
Finally, none of the vertebrate fossils, as Brown (1995,
2001) incorrectly implies, in the Messel fossil deposits
are fossils of marine vertebrates. In fact, the fossils
found in the Messel deposits reflect the animals found in
a specific terrestrial ecosystem and limited period of
geologic time. Nobody has found any fossil, that is
obviously out-of-place, e.g. dinosaurs, humans,
trilobites, that would be indicative of the mixing of
animal remains which is implied by Brown (1995, 2001).

References Cited:

Anderson, L. C., and R. A. McBride (1996) Taphonomic and
paleoenvironmental evidence of Holocene shell-bed genesis
and history in the northeastern Gulf of Mexico shelf.
Palaios, vol. 11, pp. 532-549.

Armstrong, C. (1985) Florida fossils puzzle the experts.
Creation Research Society Quarterly. vol. 21, no. 4,
pp. 198-199.

Brown, W. (2001) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. Agards, Catheys Valley
California.

Kidwell, S. M. (1986) Models for fossil concentrations:
paleobiologic implications. Paleobiology. vol. 12,
pp. 6-24.

Kidwell, S. M. (1991) The stratigraphy of shell
concentrations. In P. A. Allison and D. E. G. Briggs,
eds., pp. 211-290, Taphonomy, Releasing the Data Locked
in the Fossil Record (, eds.). New York: Plenum Press.

Kidwell, S. M., F. T. Fursich, and T. Aigner (1986)
Conceptual framework for the analysis and classification
of fossil concentrations. Palaios. vol. 1, pp. 228-238.

McBride, R. A., M. R. Byrnes, L. C. Anderson, and B. K.
Sen Gupta (1996) Holocene and Late Pleistocene
sedimentary facies of a sand-rich continental shelf: A
standard section for the northeastern Gulf of Mexico.
Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies
Transactions. vol. 46, pp. 287-299.

Schaal, S. and W. Ziegler, eds. (1992) Messel, An
Insight into the History of Life and of the Earth.
Oxford University Press.

Shipman, P. (1987) Dumping on Science. Discover. vol. 8,
no. 12, pp. 60-66.

Snelling, A. (1985) Tasmania's Fossil Bluff. Creation
Ex Nihilo. vol. 7, no. 3, pp. 6-10.

Vickers-Rich, P. and T. H. Rich (1993) Wildlife of
Gondwana. Reed, Chatswood, NSW, Australia.

Web Pages about the Messel Fossil Bed in Germany

1. Messel OilShale Lagerstatt

http://www.fossilmuseum.net/Fossil_Sites/Messel/Messel%20Lagerstatt.htm

2. Messel open-pit mine

http://welterbestaetten.de/de2/messel.htm

3. The Origin of the Fossil-rich Messel Structure
http://www.gga-hannover.de/gga_engl/produkte/messel/home.htm

4. Investigations of Ultrastructures from the Eocene
Messel Formation (Messel Oilshale Pit near Darmstadt,
Germany), with Emphasis on Fossil Microorganisms by
Karin Liebig at:

http://www.darmstadt.gmd.de/Museum/HLMD/research/mikroeng.html

5. Ultrastructures from the Eocene Messel Formation with
Emphasis on Fossil Microorganisms by Karin Liebig

http://www.rzuser.uni-heidelberg.de/~dc8/pal/messel-e.html
-
>e Dinosaur, whale, elephant, horse, and many other
>fossils, plus crude human tools, have reportedly
>been found in phosphate beds in South Carolina.
-
In case of the South Carolina claims, they are based on
papers that date to the early 1800s and a person of
unknown expertise. The older citations can be
questionable because in the 1800s, paleontologists were
often often lax about noting exactly where the fossils
found and ascertaining the exact stratigraphic unit
from which it came. What then was called "the phosphate
beds" designated a thickness of strata now known to
consist of separate, well-defined stratigraphic units
ranging from Miocene to Pleistocene age. Given the
lack of any accurate mapping and knowledge of the
geology of the area and rather lax collecting policies
of the 1800's, fossils of widely different locations
and strata were mixed together as simply coming from
the "the phosphate beds". The mix of fossils are an
artifact of how these fossils were collected instead of
actually being contemporaneous in time or coming from
the same unit.

In addition, the material was collected from phosphate
mines, including spoil piles, in which fossil bones from
all sorts of strata would be mixed together along with
artifacts left behind on the ground surface in
prehistoric times. Thus, the material collected from
these mines would be a mixture of fossils from a wide
range of time and include even human artifacts.

Finally, none of the published citations provide by
Brown (1995) fail to provide any convincing evidence that
any dinosaur fossils have been found in these deposits.
There is simply not any documented evidence that fossil
dinosaurs have been found in these deposits.
-
>f Coal beds contain round, black lumps called coal
>balls, some of which contain flowering plants that
>allegedly evolved 100 million years after the coal
>bed was formed.
-
An angiosperm, described and named "Angiospermophyton
americanum" from a single coal ball from the O'Gara Mine
No. 9, Coal Seam No. 5 near Harrisburg, Illinois by
Hoskins (1923) and noted by Noe (1923). Brown (1995)
cites Noe (1923) as a source of the claim for coal balls
"which contain flowering plants which allegedly evolved
100 million years after the coal bed was formed." There
exists an exaggeration of the facts as only one coal ball
containing one specimen of "Angiospermophyton americanum"
was reported. The impression that numerous coal balls
containing specimens of "Angiospermophyton americanum"
exist is certainly false. Also, Brown (1995) overlooks
an article, Seward (1923), in which it is argued that
the single fossil described by Hoskins (1923) is not an
angiosperm and is just an example of "Myeloxylon," a non-
angiosperm, Medullosan pteridosperms (seed fern). It
appears that "Angiospermophyton americanum" was just one
of many plants fossils ranging in age Carboniferous
to Jurassic in age that were argued to be either an
angiosperm or displayed angiospermid characters. In this
case, both Mr. Derek and Dr. Brown have overlooked the
fact that later research has refuted the identification
of this alleged out-of-place fossil as the "flowering
plant", which they claimed it to be.

References Cited:

Brown, Walt (1995) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. 6th ed, Center for Scientific
Creation, Phoenix, Arizona.

Noe, A. C. (1923) A Paleozoic Angiosperm. Journal of
Geology. vol. 31, no. 4, pp. 344-347. (May-June 1923)

Seward, A. C. (1923) A supposed Paleozoic angiosperm
[from the coal measures of Illinois]. Botanical Gazette
vol. 76, no. 2, p. 215.
-
>g In the Grand Canyon, in Venezuela, and in Guyana,
>spores of ferns and pollen from flowering plants are
>found in Cambrianh and Precambriani rocks-rocks
>deposited before life supposedly evolved.
-
The claims by Howe et al. (1983) that they found pollen
in exposures of Precambrian age Hakatai Formation within
the Grand Canyon have been discussed at great length on
talk.origins newsgroups and various listservers. The
general consensus is that Howe et al. (1983) used very
sloppy techniques to collect and prepare the samples and,
thus, got modern pollen mixed into the prepared material,
e.g. Chadwick (1981).

For example in the thread: "Re: Fish and the Flood,"
Message-ID: <352E76...@waymark.net>, Glenn R.
Morton an expert geologist and evangelical Christian
wrote:

"may...@andrews.edu wrote:

>Now, *that* is a respectable argument. Touche'. It
>would seem that you are the better swordsman than I...
>however, as that guy in "The Princess Bride"
>said, "There is one small difficulty...I am not left
>handed." Now it will be you who is pinned against the
>wall. Enter a brilliant young creationist scientist
>by the name of Clifford Burdick; after intensive study
>of the stratigraphic distribution of pollen grains in
>the Grand Canyon, he discovered precisely the sort of
>effect you're looking for. Modern pollen grains in
>Precambrian sediments! It seems that palynologists are
>arranging the pollen stratigraphy to fit their theories.
>It took the courage and observational powers of an
>*outsider* to note that the palynological emperor has
>no clothes!

You need to consider what Art Chadwick (a believer in
a global flood) found when he tried to redo Burdick's
work. I know Art, he is a professor of Geology at SW
Adventist College and is a member of the same
denomination as Burdick.

Art wrote:

"A total of fifty samples from the same strata which
Burdick had studied were processed. All slides were
completely scanned.
No single example of an authentic pollen grain was
obtained from any of these samples. In fact, the slides
produced from the Hakatai Formation were in most cases
completely free from any material of biologic origin,
modern or fossil."~Arthur V. Chadwick, "Precambrian
Pollen in the Grand Canyon - A Reexamination," Origins,
8:1, 1981, pp 8 (pp.7-12)
**
1) No rigorous attempt was apparently made by Burdick
to evaluate personally the modern pollen rain in the
Grand Canyon. A single sample of soil from near one of
the modern collecting sites could have completely
satisfied Burdick as to the source of most of the
grains he has reported. A typical analysis of a site
near where Burdick collected his Hakatai samples
yielded the following profile: bisaccate pollen
(conifers) 30%; juniper 12%; ephedra 16%; various
species of angiosperms (42%) (Siegels,1971). Although
the poor quality of the photographs in the plates of
Burdick's first paper makes definite assignments
impossible, one can approximate the composition of the
flora he reports. Of the grains identifiable as pollen
or spores in the two papers by Burdick (n=18), 7 or 37%
are bisaccates, 2 or 11% are possibly juniper. Ephedra
pollen constitute 11% and angiosperms and unassignable
grains 34%. Thus even with this small sample size,
Burdick's grains approximate the modern pollen rain
found in surface sample in the area of the Grand Canyon
where he collected his samples. "~Arthur V. Chadwick,
"Precambrian Pollen in the Grand Canyon - A
Reexamination," Origins, 8:1, 1981, pp 9-118 (pp.7-12)
**
"More difficulties are created than are solved by
Burdick's report since it would require the explanation
of the accumulation of all the Upper Precambrian
sediments (10,000 ft.), their lithification and
subsequent erosion before the first additional fossil
forms were buried. Add to this the picture the many
thousands of macerations of lower Paleozoic and
Precambrian rocks which have been carried out in scores
of laboratories around the world which have not
supported Burdick's claims. There is a general absence
of evidence for flowering plants below the middle
Cretaceous. It is a responsibility and challenge to
the creationists to develop a model of earth history
which explains the absence.
"Unfortunately it is not an easy task to correct
a positive report such as Burdick's with negative data.
In our hands, application of the cardinal principle of
the scientific method - reproducibility - has failed to
authenticate his record. thus the hypothesis that the
grains are authentic examples of Precambrian pollen can
only be treated with incredulity at present, even among
creationists."~Arthur V. Chadwick, "Precambrian Pollen
in the Grand Canyon - A Reexamination," Origins, 8:1,
1981, pp 11 (pp.7-12)

So you might not want to used Burdick's stuff. It was
sloppy."

... Glen Morton's signature omitted ...

A person can go see more of Glen Morton's articles at:
http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/
http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/pollen.htm

In the thread "How many creationist geologists,"
Message-ID: <7ed46r$t3k$1...@darwin.ediacara.org>,
Andrew MacRae, about the pollen from the Hakatai
Formation, wrote:

"In practice, it is very difficult to eliminate the
possibility of a small amount of contamination either
in the field or in the lab when collecting and
preparing palynological samples, because pollen grains
are so durable, so it wouldn't have surprised me if
some rare pollen did turn up despite Chadwick's careful
work. Then what?

The positive clue that it was contamination comes from
the low thermal maturity of the pollen (these rocks
have been heated to high enough temperature that an
effect on the pollen grains should be seen -- their
color should be darker yellow or brown like the rest
of the palynomorphs found in these rocks), the fully 3-
dimensional morphology with preservation of all the
most delicate details of the structure of the pollen
grains (many of which degrade quite easily, and would
have for certain in these rocks, plus the pollen grains
should have been flattened in the shale), and the
occurrence of modern species found in the area today
(it would be likely for at least some extinct pollen
grain species to be present too -- if all plants were
around prior to the flood, where are the striate
bisaccate pollen grains typical only of the Late
Carboniferous and Permian, for example?)."

References Cited:

Chadwick, Arthur V. (1981) Precambrian Pollen in the
Grand Canyon - A Reexamination. Origins vol. 8, no. 1,
pp. 7-12.

Howe, G. F., E. L. Williams, G. T. Matzko, and W. E.
Lammerts (1988) Creation Research Society Studies on
Precambrian pollen - Part III: A pollen analysis of
Hakatai Shale and other Grand Canyon rocks. Creation
Research Society Quarterly vol. 24, no. 4, pp. 173-182.
(March 1988)

The report of pollen being found the Precambrian Roraima
Formation of Venezuela, and British Guiana come from
Stainforth (1966). The rock from which Stainforth (1966)
claims to have extracted well-preserved pollen are what
is described by him as "highly metamorphosed" quartz and
muscovite and quartz, muscovite, and biotite hornfels
that were severely "cooked" by thick dolerite sills.

Stainforth (1966) stated that one of the geologists, who
processed the pollen sample, noted it to be characterized
by "an uncompressed preservation highly unusual except
in young sediments." At the time of publication, the
pollen assemblage had been matched against many known
suite although ages from Cretaceous, Miocene, and
younger have been proposed by various palynologists.

In the thread "Re: Pollen," Message-ID:
<4tcia9$p...@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>, Dr. Andrew Macrea,
about the Roraima pollen, wrote:

"Another classic example is pollen, including
angiosperms, from the Precambrian Roraima Formation
(spelling?) from the Tablelands of Venezuela. Like
the Grand Canyon example, they are also likely to be
introduced, in particular because the rocks are
moderate metamorphic grade, and yet the pollen grains
were nearly unaltered and colorless. They should have
been baked crispy brown or black if they were in place
in a rock of that grade."

The preservation of pollen is completely inconsistent
with the degree that the rock from which they were
allegedly has been altered by metamorphism. It is
impossible for highly metamorphosed strata to contain the
three-dimensional, well-preserved pollen that Stainforth
(1966) allegedly recovered from the Roraima Formation as
discusses as Dr. Macrea noted above.

References Cited:

Stainforth, R. M. (1966) Occurrence of Pollen and Spores
in the Roraima Formation of Venezuela and British Guinea.
Nature, Vol. 210, no. 16, pp. 292-294. (April 1966)
-
>A leading authority on the Grand Canyon even published
>photographs of horselike hoofprints visible in rocks
>that, according to the theory of evolution, predate
>hoofed animals by more than a hundred million years.
-
McKee (1982) did call these features "hoof-like". This
is only descriptive terminology that only described their
semi-oval form. This is a case where the Young Earth
creationists have mistaken taken a metaphor for reality.
These alleged hoof-prints, are not even animals tracks,
but rather inorganic structures called "current
creasants".

If a person is to assume, for sake of argument, that
these faetures are even animal tracks of some kind, the
penknife in Figure E23 of Mckee (1982) shows they are
far too small to have made by a hoofed horse. In the
figure, they are strikingly oriented all in the same
direction and quite clearly inorganic current crescents.
Discussing these pseudo-tracks, Lockley and Hunt (1995)
stated:

"... But careful studies show that most are
invertebrate traces or features produced by currents.
A review of all known reports of this type suggests
that a surprising number of invertebrate traces have
been misinterpreted as vertebrate tracks. We conclude
that, in most cases, the vertebrate track
interpretations are dubious at best and that each
example should be examined carefully and judged on its
own merits. In the case of the Supai Formation, of
course, we agree with Gilmore that the markings are not
vertebrate tracks-and they were definitely not made by
horses!"

Later, talking about similar alleged horse tracks,
Lockley and Hunt (1995) stated:

"Another example of controversy over tracks was
introduced in chapter 2 in our discussion of
horseshoe-like markings, of uncertain origin, found in
Paleozoic rocks of the Grand Canyon region. Similar
horseshoe-shaped markings have been observed in the
Mesozoic Moenkopi Formation (figure 3.7). These
particular tracks were studied by Frank Peabody, who
identified them as "current crescents" caused by the
scour of currents around a small pebble or other
obstruction on the sediment surface. Peabody was aware
of claims that such features, also found in Triassic
rocks in Germany and in Jurassic rocks in the
northeastern United States, were of vertebrate origin,
and he was anxious to make a correct interpretation for
the Moenkopi occurrences. We ourselves have seen such
features in Moenkopi sediments and agree with Peabody
that they are current crescents, not tracks. There are,
however, other horseshoe-shaped markings found in other
sedimentary rocks elsewhere that are not current
crescents."

References Cited:

Lockley, M., and A. P. Hunt (1995) Dinosaur Tracks:
and Other Fossil Footprints of the Western United States.
Columbia University Press, New York, New York.

McKee, Edwin D. (1982) The Supai Group of Grand Canyon.
United States Geological Survey Professional Paper no.
1173, United States Geological Survey, Reston, Virginia.
-
>j Other hoofprints are alongside 1,000 dinosaur
>footprints in Virginia.
-
According to Brown (1995), these other alleged "hoof
prints" were reported by Monastersky (1989) to have been
found by Dr. Weems in Triassic strata exposed by
quarrying near Culpepper, Virginia. Although described
as "hoof-shaped," Brown (1995) overlooked observations
by Monastersky (1989) that stated:

"With left and right legs spread about 4 feet apart in
an extremely wide stance, this lumbering quadraped left
hoof-shaped prints in mud."

Such stance precludes this animal from being a horse. Dr.
Robert E. Weems, who studied these fossil prints infers
that they actually belong to a large reptile that looked
like a flattened crocodile with horns. Again, hoof-like
prints are automatically regarded as belonging to a horse
regardless of contrary facts. Also, for further
discussion and pictures that refutes the "hoof-prints"
claim by Brown (1995), a person can go read Weems (1987).

References Cited:

Brown, Walt (1995) In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence
for Creation and the Flood. 6th ed, Center for Scientific
Creation, Phoenix, Arizona.

Monastersky, R. (1989) A Walk along the Lakeshore,
Dinosaur-Style. Science News. vol. 136, no. 8, pp. 21
(July 1989)

Weems, R. E. (1987) A Late Triassic footprint fauna from
the Culpeper Basin, Northern Virginia (U.S.A.). Transactions
of the American Philosophical Society, vol. 77, no. 1,
pp. 1-79.
-
>k Petrified trees in Arizona's petrified forest contain
>fossilized nests of bees and cocoons of wasps. The
>petrified forests are supposedly 220 million years old,
>while bees (and flowering plants which bees require)
>supposedly evolved almost a hundred million years later.
-
These are real scientific discoveries although the source
citation used by Young Earth creationists is a popular
newspaper article, Hasiotis (1995), instead of any of
the original published research. The main problem with
this argument is that there is nothing that would
preclude bees from having collected pollen, resin, and
sap from plants and coniferous trees prior to the
development of flowering plants. As noted by Hasiotis
in Anonymous (1995): "Many gymnosperms, a plant group
that includes conifers and ferns, also produce pollen.
The ancient bees could have found sugars and nutrients
- which they find today in the nectar of flowers - in
coniferous plants or even in animal carcasses."

Given that fossils of the actual bees (hymenopteran
insects) who made the fossil nests found and described
by Hasiotis et al. (1995), both Mr. Hick and other Young
earth creationists completely lack any sort of evidence
or proof that the "bees" which made the fossil nests
within the Triassic strata of Petrified Forest National
Park were same exact type of bees that are found
associated with flowering plants. The type of "bees",
which made the Triassic nests, quite likely were a
different and earlier type of bee adapted to either
gathering pollen from gymnosperms, such as conifers and
ferns or sugars and nutrients from either coniferous
plants or other sources.

About these fossil nests, Hasiotis et al. (1995) stated:

"Late Triassic ichnofossil insect nests record very
early, yet advanced behavioral and morphological
characteristics of the Hymenoptera. These trace
fossils shed new light on hypotheses regarding the
timing of insect diversification and its co-evolution
with plants in terrestrial ecosystems. Insect
ichnofossils better constrain the age of origination of
numerous groups because they have a greater
preservation potential than do body fossils, which are
typically much rarer. Triassic ichnofossils of derived
hymenopteran insects extend the ages of these insects
by more than 100 million years (Hasiotis et al., 1995,
1996). Hymenopteran ichnofossils reveal more
information about behavior than do body fossils, which
can be used to interpret behavior solely through
functional morphology. The highly organized nest
configurations of Triassic hymenopteran ichnofossils
imply that complex behavior reflecting primitive
socialization and pollenization, was established long
before the advent of angiosperms; these organisms were
acting as pollinators in the Triassic terrestrial
ecosystems. The pre-established plant foraging and
feeding strategies of early Mesozoic hymenopterans
constitute a pre-adaptation for a later origin of
pollination mechanisms in early angiosperms, thus
favoring rapid angiosperm radiation and
diversification. Through time, these and other insects
probably switched plant resources (from gymnosperm-
cycadeiod to angiosperm) as they co-evolved with the
rapidly diversifying angiosperms to form the intricate
ecological relationships exhibited by insects and
angiosperms today."

One major headache that these fossils provide Young Earth
creationists concerning their ideas about the Noachian
Flood is that the bee cocoons and wasp nests, along with
innumerable fossil soils, called "paleosols", and the
lack of any marine fossils clearly show that the strata
exposed within the Arizona Petrified Forest accumulated
on dry land and was not deposited underwater during
Noah's Flood.

References:

Anonymous (1996) Busy Bee. Campus Press. vol. ?,
pp. ??-??, (January 25, 1996) at:

http://bcn.boulder.co.us/campuspress/1996/jan251996/bees12596.html

Hasiotis, Stephen T. (1995) Fossilized Combs Have
Scientists Abuzz. The Arizona Republic, 26 May 1995,
p. B7.

Hasiotis, S. T. R. F. Dubielz, P. T. Kay, T. M. Demko,
K. Kowalskal , and D. McDaniel (1995) Research Update on
Hymenopteran Nests and Cocoons, Upper Triassic Chinle
Formation, Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona.
NPS Paleontological Research vol. 3, pp. 116-121.

http://www.aqd.nps.gov/grd/geology/paleo/pub/grd3_3/
http://www.aqd.nps.gov/grd/geology/paleo/pub/grd3_3/pefo1.htm