Fossil Sorting in the Great Flood Part 2

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BUT you can not disqualify us from the race before it starts.

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You disqualified yourselves, by ignoring objective observations and assuming things not evidenced. No matter the reason behind this behavior, it is still against the rules of science. For the same reason, race cars are not allowed in the Olympic 100 meter dash. Is this bias, or just ignoring the rules? I would argue for the latter.

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This is what your doing when you say we must show evidence for the claims in Genesis BEFORE we can contend with opponents. We don't.

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One of the RULES of science is positive evidence for a positive claim. This is why creationists are not allowed in science, because of your very attitude. Fantasies are not part of science.

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And indeed the origins debate is not about the Bible.but rather creationists attacking evolution which is the dominate position in the establishment though not the hearts of the American people especially the founder peoples.

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I am not really sure what our Founding Fathers have to do with science, so we will leave that alone. However, if creationists want to attack evolution then they have to show why evolutionary predictions are so spot on. That is, they have to explain why evolution is able to predict new fossil finds before they happen. One example is the prediction of a land mammal/aquatic mammal transitional fossil. Scientists hypothesized that the fossil should have such and such characteristics and found within a certain age range. They were right. If evolutionary theories are so wrong, how is this possible?What are the creationist predictions with regard to the fossil record? Where should the next transitional fossil for the mammal/reptile transition be found, according to creationist predictions? If creationism is so right, why is it unable to make such predictions, and in fact be so wrong all of the time? If creationism is right, then why doesn't it match up with God's creation? If evolution is so wrong, why does it match up so well with God's creation?So, let's assume that Noah's flood did happen. What would we expect? Let's see, we have:1. Earth completely covered.2. Heavy rain.3. Destruction of everything not on the ark.4. Mountains and valleys being created catastrophically.Let's start with those. Now, what would you expect the fossil record to look like?1. A large layer of sediment world wide that is consistent and not layered.2. If there is layering, the largest particles should be on the bottom and smaller/finer sediments on top.3. Species living at the time of the flood should be randomly distributed in these layers.4. The largest amounts of sediment should be at the lowest elevations; the sea bottoms.5. Rocks should be randomly sorted, not sorted by their isotopic content.What do we find:1. Varying layers of thickness, nothing indicating a world wide flood.2. Particles are not sorted by particle size. Particle organization is best explained by changing environments, not hydraulic forces.3. Fossils are exquisitely sorted, not one fossil is out of place world wide. Fossils found in one layer in Europe are also found in the same layer world wide.4. There is more sediment on the dry land then there is in the sea bottoms. This runs counter to flooding as it is observed today. Flooding of the magnitude found in Genesis would have stripped the land of sediment and deposited most of it on the sea bottom.5. Rocks are not randomly sorted with respect to their isotopic content. Instead, they are organized in a way that reflects billions of years of sedimentation and igneous rock formation.This is why creationism fails. What we expect from a world wide flood is not their. Fossil sorting is a very good example of how science actually takes the flood story of Noah at face value, and through objective evidence, shows a literal interpretation to be wrong. What we expect from the event is not present, and so the event did not happen. However, there is another theory that explains the data in a coherent and consistent manner: evolution.Why should we accept a theory that is derived from faith and is not consistent with the evidence when we have a theory that is derived from objective evidence and is consistent with observations? Just answer that simple question and you will get to the very basis of this debate. Evolution is accepted because it works and it's predictions are borne out. Creationism was dropped because it was inconsistent with the data and it's predictions were not borne out. It really is that simple.

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Its has nothing to do with sedimetary rocks or anything like that, its like I stated before; massive sea level rise after the last ice age.

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How about catastrophic local floods, such as the catastrophic Black Sea fill in. It has been hypothesized that entire civilizations were wiped out by a sea that grew by meters a day. Not only that, but we also have numerous catastrphic floods in the Tigris/Euphrates valley and the Nile Valley as well. This, compared to the "glacial" slowness (sorry for the pun) of rising sea levels after the last ice age. It would seem to me that local catastrophes were extrapolated to being world wide in effect through the mechanism of hyperbole.

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Again Mike Cosmology is science if it obeys the scientific method in its approach.
However when Cosmology deals with the past it is forced out of the science field and into the history field. Two different species.They just to us laymen look similair until we look closer.

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Why can't you apply the scientific method to past events? If something happened in the past it leaves evidence. Using that evidence to construct a theory falls well within the purview of science. The field of History deals with HUMAN events that happened in the past. History deals in literature, art, and other human artifacts to reconstruct a civilization. History, just like science, must be consistent with the evidence. History is a science, it is just limited to human civilizations. It uses the same techniques, uses the scientific method, and relies on scientific findings in the realms of biology, geology, and archaeology to support it's theories. Again, nothing in science says that theories must only apply to observations of mechanisms in action. Instead, science allows the extrapolation of those mechanisms into the past as long as the evidence matches those extrapolations.Therefore, we have modern day measurements of sedimentation, speciation, natural selection, and random mutation. We apply what we observe today and test the evidence to find those markers in the past. And what do we find? They are there. Science is both in the past and in the now. Can you show me where in the evolutionary sciences that the scientific method is not used? Can you show me a creationist theory that sticks to the scientific theory, expecially those theories that explain fossil sorting mechanisms?

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Itis about evidence and then the nature of evidence.
Nobody,even creationists, argue against evidence. We argue about interpretation. (And I think very well).

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Yes, and we are arguing about how to interpret evidence, and how to construct a theory. Science claims that theories should be constructed as follows:1. The theory should be consistent with all known evidence and be consistent with modern day observations.2. There can not be falsifying evidence.3. The theory must be based on objective, repeatable observations.4. The theory must make predictions about future evidence.Evolution meets all four of those requirements. Let's see where creationism fails:1. Creationism is not consistent with all of the evidence. There is no known mechanism that can sort fossils, world wide, in a fashion that resembles the fossil record. Second, there is no observable layer of sediment that is consistent with a world wide flood.2. Radiometric dating, and corroboration between independent non-radiometric dating techniques, places the age of the earth at 4.5 billion years. This falsifies a young earth.3. Creationist theories are not based on evidence, but rather on ad hoc hypotheses. Walt Brown's Hydroplate Theory, for example, is not supported by evidence but rather it is a collection of ad hoc hypotheses that are meant to explain contradictory evidence. The only evidence put forward for creationism is the inerrancy of a literal translation of the Bible. This assumption is not tested, but required for creationism. This assumption is not objective, and it has been wrong on many occasions (see geocentrism).4. Creationism does not make predictions about the age of theorized transitional fossils, DNA similarities, or other unknown yet discoverable objective data. Some creationists have gone as far as claiming a whale transitional fossil would not be found. However, within 5 years that very transitional fossil was found. The few times that creationists have stuck their neck out the blade has fallen.I would say that creationism is a poor interpretation, and that the scientific theory of evolution is much more accurate. Yes, there are different ways to interpret evidence, but there is only one CORRECT way to do so. Creationism, time after time, has either been incorrect or has had to use untestable and unsupported theories to support itself. This type of activity shows weakness in a theory, in that it refuses to be testable or relies on zero to very few observations that are contrary to other numerous observations.

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It seems clear these fossils in the field are just sitting there. And just a product of a fossilization EVENT.
Not the result of millions of years of accumulation.But suddenly.

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And what evidence do you have of this "sudden" event? What would falsify the theory that this was a sudden event?

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And also as an event it is a photograph of the envirorment at the time.

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Can you name one environment that doesn't have grass? Can you name one environment that doesn't have angiosperms? In the fossil record we find extended 'environments' devoid of both. And not just here and there, but predictably world wide. We see aquatic environments devoid of any bony fish, devoid of sharks, devoid of clams, but they are filled with life, life that is not present in the layers above it or present today. We see terrestrial environments that possess species that are completely different than those alive today. We see environments devoid of mammals, of reptiles, and yet we have difficulty finding environment devoid of just one of those organisms, much less both. This explanation is lacking both explanatory power and detailed observations of the fossil record, and it is not consistent with any observations about todays world.

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Well what can anyone say . No one witnessed it.
Yet you insist your view only can be legitamate.
Well prove it .

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If evolution is true, then the fossil record should reflect the DNA relationships between living species. Supported.If evolution is true, emergence of morphological characteristics should match the order of the fossils. That is, the cladograms created from fossils species should be reflected in the order the fossils are found, with daughter species being found in sediments above the parent species. Supported.If evolution is true, then the observed rate of mutation and selection should be reflected in life evolving over billions of years. Supported.If creationism is true, then we should find fossils randomly assorted according to topography, not morphology. Unsupported.If creationism is true, then human artifacts and mammals should be found in the earliest sediments. Unsupported.If creationism is true, then DNA similarities should not reflect the fossil record. Unsupported.If creationism is true, then there rocks should not be sorted by their radionuclide concentrations. Unsupported.Evolution is supported, creationism is not. Is that good enough? In science nothin is every proven, but theories are falsified. Creationism has been falsified and evolution continues to predict and consistently explain what we see in nature.

Actually, I like Bill's statement better: Which gets to the heart of matters. If Mr. Byers is willing to ignore over 200 years of geologic data, then he is also able to ignore important parts of theology as well. Creationists, by their logic and attitude, imply that their understanding of theology is lacking as well. Great post Bill (as usual).

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I though all held that the reason the history department and the science department are separated in a university was for a profound difference in methodolgy! Two very different fields of intellectual endeavor indeed! THIS MUST BE CLEARED UP FIRST.

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They are different endeavors that use the same methodology. Historical accounts that are not part of written accounts are derived from inderict evidence found at archaeological digs. Through this, we can derive the lifestyle of cultures through the way they lived instead of relying on faulty writings of contemporaneous authors. History, as it is taught in high schools and universities, is strictly about human endeavors. I can't remember learning about the migration patterns of water buffalo as part of my Western Civ classes, can you? Also, the biological sciences were called originally called "Natural History", for you information. In fact, most of the fossils across the world are found in "Natural History" museums. Through science, we are able to piece together what happened in the past, and those accounts are called history, whether or not they pertain to human or non-human species. However, to be a reliable history these accounts have to be consistent with the evidence. Within the evolutionary sciences, this means that evolutionary accounts have to be consistent with fossil and DNA evidence, modern day observations about the functioning of biological systems, and observed methods of creating biodiversity. And guess what, it is consistent right down the board unlike creationism which is inconsistent and contrarian in almost every way.

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We are in or close to the algebra of logic here and touching on why millions of people insticntively or creationists intellectually not persuaded that evolution is true.

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People don't want to believe that they are related to things they feel are inferior, plain and simple. They will use any contrivance accessible, including quote mining and outright lies. Creationists are not emotional persuaded, I will agree, but they seem to lack the capacity to prove that they are intellectually not persuaded. Instead, they want everyone to positively support evolutionary theories while not even attempting to support their own. They call evolution a flight of fantasy while believing that man was originally made from mud by a supernatural being who they have no evidence of. They claim that there is no evidence for evolution while writing papers criticizing the evidence. They claim that science can not peer into the past while writing articles on the supposed evidence for the hydroplate theory. They claim creationism is science without even knowing what science is or how it is practiced.I, for one, am a practicing scientist. I test things that happen in the past all of the time, even if they did happen 10 minutes ago. I test things that are not witnessable, such as molecular reactions that take place within human cells. I propose mechanisms for protein interactions even though they can not be seen by the human eye. My results go against certain paradigms within my field, but I try and publish them anyway. I know how the scientific method works because I USE IT. I know the strengths of the scientific method because I USE THEM. I know how science is done, you simply have no clue as to how anything within science is supported, how theories are constructed, or how theories are tested. Until this is cleared up, I will debate no more forever with Mr Byers.So, please, tell me how it is impossible to test past events using the scientific method. Please tell me how it is impossible to test the theory of evolution right now, in today's world. Please be specific and use examples.

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The reason is that past events were not witnessed and not repeatable or falsifiable.

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As Crashfrog said, past events leave evidence, and that evidence is measurable and repeatable. If I claimed that a 5,000 megaton nuclear bomb went off in China 10,000 years ago, could we test this? You bet we could. Why? Find a crater, and if that crater fits the criteria of a nuclear blast, and the crater dates to 10,000 years ago, I have evidence to the positive with no need to witness it. However, since the blast is inferred, I can no claim with absolute certainty but I can claim with little tentativity that I am right. This is the same way past meteor strikes are discovered, by the evidence they leave behind. This is how common ancestory is discovered, but the evidence in living organisms' DNA. Forensics works by the same scientific principles, looking for evidence that can either falsify or support the theory at hand by looking at the evidence left over from a crime. Many criminals are sent to death row without anyone witnessing the crime. Guess what they are convicted on? Evidence left at the crime. Are you saying that we should go back 100 years in forensics and only convict when a crime is witnessed first hand? I guess it would solve prison overpopulation.

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The fast breakup and separation of land would create tremendous water pressure,I repeat tremendous,that would instantly squish life and even the evirorment of that life.

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So why don't we find dinosaurs with grass and grass pollen? If the entire environment was squished then these two things should be found together. Also, why don't we find aquatic mammals and ancient aquatic reptiles in the same layers? How does this "power of water" create such ordered fossil layers consistently world wide?

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The fact that there is no grass with dinosaurs is explained easily by saying that grass was a minor plant in nooks and cranies of the world the and took off only after the flood.

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So where was the grass? Where in the world should we search for these illusive, pre flood grasses? The fact that we have found ZERO below the K/T boundary (below which we find all dinosaurs) no matter where we look in the world makes your proposal difficult to accept.

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It is very common for different plants to change in dominance and even happens today.

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At the species level, yes. However, we are looking at things above the species level. But let's move to your example below.

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For example there is a famous tree,I think redwood, that used to dominate the nothern hemispere but today is resticked to small areas in China.

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We are talking about one species here, not an entire family of plants. What you need use as an example is world wide replacement of pine trees with palm trees. In fact, grasses can be found in more environments than coniferous trees so perhaps this isn't even comparable, but it is a start. If grasses were around they would have shown up in the fossil record due to their ease of fossilization (especially their pollen) and sheer numbers.

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As to aquatic mammals/reptiles not together in the fossil record. Simple mammals did not take to the sea until after the flood. Before the ancesters of whales/seals were on the land. But as on the land there was a dominance shift and so the sea was free for invasion.

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Please tell me how a killer whale survived on land? Or are you saying that wolves and killer whales are in the same created kind?

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The grass family could lose or gain dominance as easily as a specsis.

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Do you have evidence of a whole family of plants as diverse as grasses being forced out of an ecosystem? They can be found in every ecosystem from arctic to tropical, arid to rainforest, etc. Sorry, but evolution and dispersal of grasses millions of years ago makes a lot more sense.

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Or because it didn't rain before the flood grass was unable to cope.

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Ignoring for the moment that grasses can be found in desserts, let's instead look at comparative ecosystems. If we go to the tropics we see grasses and ferns. Ferns are known for needing higher levels of rainfall, therefore if we find ferns we know that there was ample rainfall. So the question is, how is it possible to have ferns but no grasses in areas with ample rainfall?

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Or grass is just a sub-kind of another kind that is very present in the fossil record.

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So a grass evolving from a non-grass? Isn't that macroevolution? And also, you still have not commented on why we find aquatic, air-breathing organsism in different levels (ie whales and aquatic reptiles).

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The changes of aquatic creatures would still be micro and not macro. And yes it would be quick. Not thosands or hundred years but only generations. Probably most speciation now on the planet was finshed within a hundred years of the flood. the fossil evidence insists on this.

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And the changes needed to go from ape to man are far less than the changes needed to go from land mammal to aquatic mammal. Therefore, ape to man would be microevolution, would it not?

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Geography was different back then

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What evidence led you to this conclusion?

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These proto-mammals didn't sort by jaw.

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Yes they did: At the bottom is a reptile, and at the top is an early mammal. Notice the movement of the jaw bones into the middle ear where they are used for sound transmission. Also, the fossils ARE sorted in the fossil record. Why would they stack up in such an obvious pattern?

Ah crap. Original post off topic and nothing but derisive comments. Thought I would take the thunder out of an admin's sails.This message has been edited by Loudmouth, 08-16-2004 05:25 PM

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It is creationists belief that almost all geologic layers were laid down at once.

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It is a belief supported by blind faith and by ignoring falsifying evidence.

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We don't accept the separation that is now made in geology and so the premise behind yours points negates its strength.

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You don't accept current geology because it runs counter to your pre-conceived religious dogma. However, you have yet to show how it is wrong. It is like a small child claiming the world is flat while ignoring all of the evidence falsifying his position. Creationists can't counter the arguments that current geology makes, so what do they do? They ignore them.

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Indeed the old idea introduced by a British dude in geology that the present is the evidence of the past , I forgot his name,called uniformatism is falling to pieces by the accepted ideas of plate teutonics, glacial action, and the new meltwater outbursts sweeping geology today.

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At one time, uniformitarianism was a theory that stated everything proceeded at the same RATE as today. That theory was pretty muched dumped long ago. Today, uniformitarianism says that everything in the past occured by the same MECHANISMS. Therefore, the mechanisms of sedimentation we see today are tested for in the past, and more and more they are finding support for the same active mechanism in the past as the mechanisms we observe now. Therefore, the theory of plate tectonics is extrapolated into the past, and it fits the data. Look at my new thread "YEC Challenge: Hawaiian Islands" for a taste of how well uniformitarianism works.

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And so as I said the great idea of biological change is conditional on geological change and without it finished.

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The theory is that the fossils in a layer of sediment are representative of the species alive at the time the sediment was created. How that sediment, either through uniform or non-uniform rates, does not contradict this fact.

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OK I understand what your saying. Simple answer. The different layers have different kinds for the very reason that they are different.
A different layers means a different sediment flow/pressure. This would be, usually, because of the lay of the land. and so the different land with a different flow frooze the different communities.

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Could you please show us the evidence that led you to this conclusion. Could you please show us examples of geologic strata and fossil sorting occuring by the mechanisms that you propose.

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Perhaps off thread but ice dam collapse has been a gain for geology creationism. Most of us see these damsw as post flood event. They have overturned previous ideas that such things had not happened and also they have taught how water greatly affects the lands also not before understood.

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Ice dams have shown that violent floods result in a large sedimentary layer without sorting. This is a great problem for creationists.