Is the fossil evidence modified?

beaglelady · June 25, 2021, 12:24am

Have you guys ever heard of the Atlas of Creation? It’s a book series by Muslim creationist Adnan Oktar under the pen name Harun Yahya. He sent copies to everybody, all over the world. He claims evolution has never occurred and that critters are exactly as God originally created them.

Biologist PZ_Myers wrote: “The general pattern of the book is repetitious and predictable: the book shows a picture of a fossil and a photo of a living animal, and declares that they haven’t changed a bit, therefore evolution is false. Over and over. It gets old fast, and it’s usually wrong (they have changed!) and the photography, while lovely, is entirely stolen.”

Oktar might have been more careful–he actually used a picture of a fishing lure, with hook and all, instead of a real animal.

Dale · June 25, 2021, 12:40am

In other words, he mistook a reel one for a real one?

beaglelady · June 25, 2021, 12:49am

but the photography was really good, so Darwinism was defeated!

T_aquaticus · June 25, 2021, 2:24pm

Exactly. Catastrophic flood waters don’t stop and go in the opposite direction several times in a short distance, and they certainly don’t stay in a single channel.

You only get these features from a river moving slowly across a relatively flat plane. These meanders incised into the Colorado plateau as it was slowly uplifted over millions of years.

Dale · June 25, 2021, 3:57pm

I’m reminded of this… it refutes the YEC argument about the Kaibab uplift and the Grand Canyon in 11 seconds:

beaglelady · June 25, 2021, 5:32pm

Discovery of ‘Dragon Man’ Skull in China May Add Species to Human Family Tree

A laborer discovered the fossil and hid it in a well for 85 years. Scientists say it could help sort out the human family tree and how our species emerged.

T_aquaticus · June 25, 2021, 6:02pm

Here is an amazing photo of the Colorado plateau from the International Space Station:

There is a single main channel with side channels perpendicular to the main channel. This is what you get from a relatively slow moving river across a flat plane. This is not what a catastrophic flow would look like.

What does a catastrophic flow look like? The Channeled Scablands.

Catastrophic flooding produces really wide, braided channels that run parallel to one another.

When there is catastrophic flooding the water spreads out and goes around objects. The water doesn’t stack up in one spot and cut a single meandering channel. With so much energy in the system it all moves in one direction, not at right angles to each other as seen in the Grand Canyon.

Dale · June 25, 2021, 8:02pm

(Comparable view in Google Earth, with labels. ):

rsewell · June 26, 2021, 1:12am

The ability of creationists to tolerate cognitive dissonance is so impressive. Where there exists generous sample availability, appropriate date range, and easily controlled contamination concerns, such as tree ring confirmation, cross check of varves, and early dynasty Egyptian artifacts, carbon dating is met with ridiculous YEC skepticism. Then, where there exists far too insufficient sample, completely inappropriate date range, and contamination to be expected, all of a sudden creationists turn into insistent fans.

But it makes sense when you consider it was never about science, but rather concerned with rhetoric. Upon obtaining some bogus result, parishioners who have no idea what a mass spectrometer even is will accept the assurance of YEC organizations that carbon dating confirms their Flintstones theology.

paleomalacologist · June 29, 2021, 10:43pm

Although Werner’s teachers very likely accepted evolution, it is also rather likely that they were not experts in evolution. Evolutionary biology is one of many specializations within biology, and on his pre-med track he would have been rather unlikely to get very much evolutionary biology unless he made a point of also taking those classes (if he had the time to take them and if they were offered at the institution). The premise of Wells’ Icons of Evolution is wrong - general biology textbook examples of evolution are more likely to be the ones the textbook writers happen to remember than the best examples.

The unreliability of Werner’s approach can be illustrated by checking whether he gives the information needed to tell if two things really are the same or not. Pick a vertebrate, as being more familiar to the average person. Now, to check if the two vertebrates are really the same thing, as he claims, make a detailed comparison of the skeletons. Start with the dentition (both being in front and very important in differentiating types of vertebrates). How many teeth are there? Where are they located in the mouth? What bones do they attach to? Do they have sockets? What shapes are they? How many roots, if any? If they are triangular, do they point forward or backward? What is the structure of the teeth - do they have enamel? is the enamel folded? if so, in what pattern? What is the tooth replacement pattern - continuous growth like rodent incisors or elephant tusks, one set of baby teeth and then adult teeth, or continually growing new teeth and replacing old ones? Move on to the rest of the skull - what bones make up the eye sockets? how many bones are in the jaws? what bones are involved in any arches (like the temporal arch of mammals)? how does the jaw articulate? how does the skull articulate with the backbone? is there a pineal opening? What bones are in the limbs or fins? What are the shapes and arrangements of the wrist and ankle bones? How do they ossify? If Werner does not give the detail necessary to answer those sorts of questions, then he is not providing the information that is needed for the readers to decide for themselves.

[Edit: I should note that publishing descriptions and pictures of fossils to allow readers to decide for themselves has been a major component of paleontology since the 1500’s. The Biodiversity Heritage Library is a good site to look for older and some more current references giving detailed information about both modern and fossil organisms. ]

cewoldt · July 1, 2021, 12:25am

A few responses:

Small catastrophes do not prove that there are not any larger ones, just as regular meals do not prove there is nothing like a Thanksgiving dinner.
Intensity can be substituted for time. In other words, a lot of geological change can take place during high intensity events that might otherwise be attributed to millions of years.
If there really was a worldwide flood, what would we expect to see? Billions of dead things (fossils) buried in rock layers laid down by water all over the earth. And what do we observe? Just that.
There are many massive geological features that cannot be explained by local events, and for which uniformitarian geology has no good explanations. Here are a few:

Quartzite rocks transported by water from their source, the Rocky Mountains both to the east and the west, across several mountain ranges. To the west, they range from lower British Columbia to southern Oregon–up to 800 miles of travel. They were not pulverized into sand because of their hardness–7 on the scale of hardness. They are often deposited with sand, the remnants of softer rocks.
How do we know they were transported by water? Well, they are rounded. And the larger, boulder sized rocks (which didn’t travel as far) have percussion marks all over them, showing that they were knocked around intensely during the transport. Some are found on the top of mountains.

What does it take to move these rocks by water? The speed of the water must be at least 80 miles per hour, faster than ordinary floods. From research and calculations, the water must be at least (from memory–it could be deeper) 50 feet deep. The larger rocks are moved along the bottom, crashing into each other creating the percussion marks. The smaller ones may bounce up and travel a bit higher and farther.

So how were they transported over mountain ranges by water? Obviously, they weren’t. That means that there must have been rapid vertical tectonics that lifted these ranges after the transport of the quartzite. The mountains rose and the valleys sank—in the Grand Tetons and Jackson Hole, more than 30,000 feet! And on the top of the Tetons, there are remnants of the thousands of feet of sedimentary rocks that were once there. How were they removed, and where did this rock go?

Inselbergs and karst rising above planation surfaces, many of them, found on all continents (except probably Antarctica). All the sediment around them, sometimes a thousand feet, have been eroded away. Yet by uniformitarian reasoning, they have stood for 100,000 or even millions of years without eroding, and generally with very little talus or rock debris at their bases. But after long periods of time, surely they would erode away and/or have a lot of talus at the base.

Planation surfaces of the size we see all over the world are not being formed today. They are often dated using fossils and radiometric dating at tens of millions of years old, often 50 million years old and sometimes over 100 million years old. Yet in all this time, they have remained flat, with very little erosion.

What about the continental shelves extending into the oceans, and the underwater canyons extending from the seaward side? How does uniformitarian geology account for these? A worldwide catastrophic flood can.

All of these can be explained by intense geological activity over a short period of time, a year long catastrophic flood, combined with rapid vertical tectonics, but not by uniformitarian geology–presently observed processes acting over millions of years and modest catastrophes.

How do uniformitarian earth scientists explain one ice age, let alone many? There are many hypotheses given, but none really work. Michael Oard has done significant and extensive research and calculations and has come up with an excellent explanation for a post Flood ice age, briefly explained, warmer oceans due to extreme volcanic activity and the heat from vertical tectonics. As we all know, there is very little moisture in the air at lower temperatures, and yet massive amounts of snowfall over many years are needed for enough snow for an ice age. 500 years or so are required for the estimated depth of glaciation cover. And year round cooler land masses are also needed for an ice age so that the snowfall does not melt each summer.

Lower land mass temperatures were due to particulate matter and gases from extensive volcanic activity over several years following the Flood—remember the “mini ice age” in the 1800s due to lower temperatures due to volcanic activity.

This also explains why the higher latitudes around the Arctic Ocean in Alaska and northern Europe and Asia were not covered by ice; the Arctic Ocean was much warmer than it is today.

And btw, if there were many ice ages, why are their geographical islands in the middle of the ice sheets where there is no evidence of ice coverage? These “islands” missed being covered not just once, but many times over millions of years?

Two related observations: First, it is untrue to say that creationists just pick out anomalies. These are huge issues. It is also untrue to say that flood geologists have not done significant field work and research to come up with better explanations; they have done this work and research.

Second, no one has all the answers–not flood geologists or uniformitarian geologists. So having all the answers is not something we can expect from either research project, either uniformitarian or Flood geology. Having said that, however, with all the research done by uniformitarian geologists over the past one hundred years, it is telling that there is still so much that can’t be explained by uniformitarian geology, but which can be fairly easily explained (after much hard work and research) by flood geology.

Bill_II · July 1, 2021, 12:43am

Not when the high intensity event would destroy evidence that is clearly visible, fossil tracks, dino nests, etc, etc.

What we actually see are Quadrillions, Quintillions and Beyond: The Vast Fossil Record Refutes the Flood Geology Hypothesis – Naturalis Historia

Are you aware of the ice age that was detected by measuring the isostatic rebound after the ice melted? A non-technical write up is here.

cewoldt · July 1, 2021, 12:44am

I am well aware of the Missoula Flood and the history of its geological conversation. J. Harlan Bretz spent a lifetime defending his hypothesis against uniformitarian naysayers who feared that he was giving too much comfort to young earth geologists (he was not a creationist or young earther). It was only with younger geologists and being able to fly over the region that he was vindicated late in life.

Your photo from the International Space Station is amazing.

Nothing about the Missoula Flood contradicts valid research from Flood Geology. There are two great books on this event by YEC folks–one is GigaFlood (eminently readable) by Rick Thompson, the other–The Missoula Flood Controversy and the Genesis Flood by Michael Oard.

cewoldt · July 1, 2021, 12:51am

To your last question, “yes.” And although I have not read all the literature, I think this is one way we know the depth of the ice coverage. But of course, this isostatic rebound, at least according to the article supplied, applies only to the “last” ice age, and almost certainly the only one.

cewoldt · July 1, 2021, 12:55am

Tree ring confirmation–are you aware that in severe climate areas, such as where we find the bristlecone pines, there can be several rings in one year, or none? Tree rings are generally annual, but not necessarily when in severe climate areas.

Bill_II · July 1, 2021, 12:56am

No it doesn’t fit the YEC time line.

jammycakes · July 1, 2021, 7:18am

There are many, many young Earth arguments which, if you were to apply them to any other area of science, or even just life in general, you would kill people. This is one of them.

Take driving for example. Thousands of people get killed on the roads every year because of people who believe that intensity can be substituted for time. That’s why we have laws against speeding.

Or what about baking a cake? Ever tried cooking it at 250°C to cut the cooking time in half? I can guarantee you that you’ll end up with something that’s burnt to a cinder on the outside and still completely mushy on the inside.

No, intensity cannot be substituted for time for the simple reason that the evidence left behind by rapid, high intensity events looks completely different from the evidence left behind by slow, gradual processes. Especially when the difference in time you’re talking about is a factor of up to a million.

Here are just two or three examples:

Rapid high-intensity floods carve out relatively straight channels. They do not carve out twisting and meandering ones.
Sedimentary rock layers formed from fine particulate matter (e.g. shale) cannot be deposited quickly because the particles can only settle slowly in still or slow-moving water. If you tried to accelerate the process, you would introduce turbulence which would disrupt the sedimentation process rather than accelerating it.
Zircon crystals cannot get lead into them by any route other than nuclear decay from uranium. If the nuclear decay rates had been accelerated, this would have released enough heat to melt the zircons and, in the process, expel the lead.

They are only huge anomalies for the straw man “uniformitarianism” that young Earthers try to debunk but that no real scientist believes or teaches in reality.

Yes, some processes can and do happen quickly. This is no surprise to anyone. But to demonstrate that the Earth is six thousand years old and that the Flood could have created the fossil record and carved out the continents, you have to demonstrate that everything happened quickly and all at once. I simply don’t see that.

And yes, YECs do exaggerate the extent and significance of anomalies. When you present levels of radiocarbon that are so low as to be all but indistinguishable from contamination, and dismiss contamination as a “rescuing device,” that is exaggerating the extent and significance of anomalies. When you present a minority of radiometric results that differ from each other by 10-20% as evidence that all other results are consistently out by factors of a million, that is exaggerating the extent and significance of anomalies. And when you present tiny scraps of badly degraded, partly mineralised soft tissue remnants in dinosaur bones with no sequenceable DNA in them whatsoever, and portray them as if they were anywhere near being comparable in quality to the woolly mammoths and 2,000 year old bodies in peat bogs, that is exaggerating the extent and significance of anomalies.

rsewell · July 1, 2021, 8:31am

Counting tree rings is easy, isn’t it. Children grasp the concept right away; they know this is something they can do. No degree from MIT required. You do not need algebra, let alone calculus, let alone differential equations. One, two, three…off you go. But somehow, this is not easy enough for young earth creationists, who get all confused when the count goes over 6,000. Being as the concept is so simple and accessible, defenders of a young earth must say something…but what?

But indeed there is also much more to it, and scientists are far from just interested in the counting. By analyzing the isotopes incorporated into the wood as the tree grew, both radiometric and stable, by measuring the springwood and summerwood, looking for signatures of drought, rain, early frost, insect and fungal infestations, much can be determined of the climate and seasonal variation, as well as volcanic and solar activity. So dendrochronologists not only know how long the tree ring record extends, but much of what was going on at the time. Notably absent was a global flood.

Yes, I am well aware of the nonsense put out by your favorite YEC evidence deflectors concerning dendrochronology. Bristlecones are a challenge for the YEC timetable, being as ages to over 5,000 years have been recorded. But that is not the extent of problem, not by a long shot. There are dozens of ring chronologies all over the world which reach past 4500 years, thus pulling the plug on the flood date.

But even that is not the extent of the problem for YEC. As I stated in my post, and you skated past in your reply, is that the tree ring chronology has been subject to massive C14 cross checking. In 1980 the first of these systematic operations was completed, then there was Intcal98, Intcal04, Intcal09, Intcal13, and Intcal20. Have you read these, or do you keep it pretty tight with your YEC sources?

So here it is. The most recent tree ring - carbon 14 cross date goes back 13,900 years. Let there be no category error here; this is not an interpretation. This is fact. This is data.

But, just for yucks, let us consider the German Oak chronology against the YEC timeline. Noah’s flood, say 2500 BC, putting aside actual Egyptian history for the moment. Water and dead stuff everywhere. But we cannot start growing forests in northern Europe right away, can we? There is the matter of all the ice ages wrapped up in one to contend with. It starts to snow, because the seas, which are warm from all that tectonic zipping about, are sending moisture to the cool air, which for some strange reason stays cool even though it blankets a warm ocean; but assuming this all makes sense in somebody’s head, the snow does not let up and after a few centuries all of Europe is under kilometers of solid ice. The sky eventually clears up. Then we wait for a brief few centuries more for the glaciers to melt to the ground, so lets say 4000 years ago we get our first German Oak saplings. Given that we have 4000 years for about 14,000 rings, that works out to an more than three rings per year. However, because rings are identifiable in historical artifacts, we know that the single ring per year works well for the past millennium, so that actually leaves 3000 years for about 13,000 rings, which that means there would have to had been four rings per year to accommodate Noah’s flood. If that works for you, then I’m happy for you.

You cannot discuss tree rings without dealing with carbon dating, because tree rings are made of carbon. Even if you concoct some storyline of why physics does not apply to carbon dating, or why the two by fours which frame your house are full of bogus annual rings, there then remains the additional problem, why does carbon dating yield the same results of dendrochonology, whether that is 200 years, 2,000 years, or 12,000 years?

Paraleptopecten · July 1, 2021, 12:33pm

In an utterly different pattern from what a global flood would produce: how can a single flood possibly produce 20 layers of marine deposits in just the Carolinas, every one with animals that live for decades, and every one with distinctly different animals. If all of the layers were being formed at the same time, then finding Chesapecten in the Castle Hayne limestone should happen, as well as finding original aragonite Santeevoluta is the Waccamaw. Neither has.

Continental shelves are the parts of the continental crust that happens to be below sea level (covered in a thick layer of terrigenic and biogenic sediment.

I will quote a previous post of mine:

Milankovic cycles do a very good job of explaining the dozens of short glacial periods in the late Cenozoic, which a giant flood deposition scheme is completely incompatible with. For larger-scale glacial periods dramatic increases in oxygen level, and/or the presence of landmasses near the poles seem to correlate well, if we have any data.

No, the ice would melt in summer, just not quite as much as it did the previous winter, or the previous year: sustain that for a few millennia, and you can get ice cover extending down to Chicago.

They had thinner Ice than much further inland, yes, but they were not being blasted by excessively hot oceans.

The only ones I know of are “the land is too steep to have ice on it long-term”.

The area that gets lots of snow is the area that frequently stays at ~0- -20 C through the winter, which, coincidently is going to be near the edge of the ice sheet.

Vinnie · July 1, 2021, 1:06pm

There are a lot things that need to line up over extended periods of time for advanced life to form, based solely on our sample size of one. I don’t put any stock in things like the Drake equation. Too many unknowns and chaotic effects to adequately account for. Its all guesswork at this point and the jury is not out on ET. You are correct that a failure to detect a signal is meaningless. The universe is too big and light too slow for our mode of communication. This has been obvious to many astronomers for a while. That tells us nothing about ET.

A quote I read on reddit was the best response to rare-earth:

<<<<Douglas Adams exemplifies such flawed logic in this famous quote: “Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, ‘This is an interesting world I find myself in, an interesting hole I find myself in, fits me rather neatly, doesn’t it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!‘.“ , consequently it causes the authors to assume that every idiosyncrasy of earth is somehow linked to how complex life emerged on earth and that complex life can only emerge if exactly the same idiosyncrasies are repeated in the exact order without giving any thought to alternative scenarios.>>>>

Yet assuming advanced, intelligent life could have evolved in ways we don’t understand or that this is likely in the universe is equally speculation and not remotely scientific. Dickie Dawkins is not an expert on ET. No one is. There is no data. To use Rutherford’s words, its all stamp-collecting.

Vinnie