fossils and catastrophism.. Funk has a question

From what I know of fossils, it takes very particular circumstances in order for an organism to fossilize.The very fact that there are so many fossils, in the layers suggests that there have been a great many, or a few very tremendous and sudden catastrophies in the history of the earth.Now if all these layers were formed as gradually as mainstream geology would lead us to believe, how are there so many fossilized organisms? I would think at such a gradual rate, that almost all remains of these organisms would have rotted and detoriated long before they had a chance to fossilize.To me the very existance of fossils points to major catostrophy. There are full large mammals frozen in the ice, with food still in their stomachs! This had to happen in a major hurry!If there have been such major catastrophies in the history of the earth, we must be very flawed in thinking that things have changed at the rate we currently observe.Maybe some of the resident geologists would like to explain the flaws in my thinking here. This was a sudden thought as I was reading through some of the other geology threads.Please forgive my spelling, I'm having one of those days when the english language looks and sounds absurd to me. ------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

Let's just take one example: the Mississippi River, back before the Corps of Engineers channelized it. In 1928, my mother-in-law told me, the Mississippi flooded everything west to Selma, Arkansas, a distance of about 40 miles. That was a big flood, yes, but not much bigger than two or three others in the previous century. Each drowned a bunch of cows, and more rabbits and groundhogs, and possibly quite a few of these were buried fast enough, and enough away from oxygen, to start to fossilize.So give me three floods per century, and five million years for the Miss. to stay in roughly the same channel: that's 150,000 floods! That should be plenty to leave a fossil or two lying around. And flooding rivers aren't even terribly good places to make fossils, anyway - lakes along the lines of the Black Sea with productive surface layers and poisonous (hydrogen sulfide - rich) deep layers are much better.

The very fact that there are so many fossils, in the layers suggests that there have been a great many, or a few very tremendous and sudden catastrophies in the history of the earth.
Considering the 100's of millions of years life has existed on Earth, we have relatively few fossils. It's hard enough finding fossils of our own species.There are full large mammals frozen in the ice, with food still in their stomachs! This had to happen in a major hurry!
The freezing conditions would preserve any animal. If you found an entire herd of Mammoths frozen together, that may be a different story.If there have been such major catastrophies in the history of the earth, we must be very flawed in thinking that things have changed at the rate we currently observe.
You mean like the extinction of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago? It doesn't take worldwide catastrophies to give us fossils. Earthquakes, volcanos, local flooding etc. all contribute.
Also the environment in which the creature lives and dies contributes to whether or not fossil records will be easily come by.

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The very fact that there are so many fossils, in the layers suggests that there have been a great many, or a few very tremendous and sudden catastrophies in the history of the earth.

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How exactly do the layers point to both options? Big events lok different than small ones.

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Now if all these layers were formed as gradually as mainstream geology would lead us to believe, how are there so many fossilized organisms? I would think at such a gradual rate, that almost all remains of these organisms would have rotted and detoriated long before they had a chance to fossilize.

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There aren't many fossils considering the time frame, because most rotted and deteriorated before they had a chance to fossilize.

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There are full large mammals frozen in the ice, with food still in their stomachs! This had to happen in a major hurry!

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Why? Current conditions near the poles and at the tops of some mountains are sufficient for this effect.

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If there have been such major catastrophies in the history of the earth, we must be very flawed in thinking that things have changed at the rate we currently observe.

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Major catastrophies leave evidence, funk. No one denies that they happen, but only deny the ones for which there is no evidence.

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Please forgive my spelling, I'm having one of those days when the english language looks and sounds absurd to me.

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Well, when you mix and match about thirty languages that's what you get. ------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Your saying there are a very few fossils because you are assuming your right that the earth is millions of years old.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

Thanks guys for responding, I'm not really trying to refute anything or prove anything here, I'm just curious, that's why I'm questioning some of the things said.I know that catastrophies leave physical evidence, however isn't it possible that future catastrophies could, "damage" evidence of the first event.Something like a crime scene, investigators take too long to get there and prints are smeared or other evidence is damaged.Leaving misleading and inconclusive bits of evidence.------------------
Saved by an incredible Grace.

Good questions, funky, but I'm concerned that you are not absorbing the answers very well... Actually, there are quite a large number of fossils in the earth. There are almost a trillion synapsid fossils in the Karoo Formation in South Africa, for example. A synapsid is a medium sized vertebrate with features of both mammals and reptiles. They range in size from fox to hippo size. A trillion of any large animal is far more than the Earth can support - and that's just one obscure group of animals.If you add up all the fossils found in the geological column... restore all the coal seams into forests... revive all the coral reefs, fish, diatoms, clams, dinosaurs and trilobites... you would have a layer of living biomass about 2 miles thick over the entire Earth.

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I know that catastrophies leave physical evidence, however isn't it possible that future catastrophies could, "damage" evidence of the first event.

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Sure. Its possible, but assuming a catastrophic event of good size it would take quite a lot to erase all of the evidence. The ash from the last eruption of the Yellowstone super-volcano is spread over a huge chunk of North America. Wiping that out would be a trick, though its not impossible. On the other hand, some of the larger impact craters could have erased all the evidence of some smaller catastrophes-- floods, that sort of thing.I suspect you are thinking of Noah's Flood. Winging it a little, wiping out the evidence of a truly global catastrophe would be virtually impossible unless that catastrophe occured billions of years ago.------------------
No webpage found at provided URL: www.hells-handmaiden.com

Admin please delete this topic.. Sorry to waste space.

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Admin please delete this topic.. Sorry to waste space.

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The "Short Term Topics and Messages" guidlines clearly state that a topic can be deleted at the request of the originator. I will leave it up a bit longer, but this topic will be disappearing soon.Adminnemooseus------------------
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