Potential Evidence for a Global Flood

Hello Just Being Real, Can you provide a bit more detail. The only sites that seem to mention polystrate fossils are creationist sites. Can you provide a source so I can have a look at the case that is your favourite. From the reading I have done, there has been a simple explanation for the the existence of "polystrate" fossils for more than 100 years (Dawson, 1868). This makes me believe that I may just be looking in the wrong place. Would you be able to provide a source that is not a creationist website? Also, what makes you believe that polystate fossils are evidence of world wide flooding?I can point out some basic geology errors in you statement though. That is not true. Layers seen in a cliff face can be put down in a very short period of time. There is a new layer over areas in my regioon due to a flood. This layer was put down in less than a fortnight. In some gullies, it is metres thick. I asked my brother (coal industry 15 years), a geologist friend of the family (mining industry 20 years, coal for 10 years) and one of my scientist friends (coal industry 8 years) if they had ever seen one of these fossils. None of them had. I mentioned your claim. The general consensus is that your claim is ridiculous. I dispute your claim that these fossils are common. Coal miners are very rarely exposed to an open face that has not been checked for safety (in Australia anyway). Do coal mines where you are from allow miners to wander around at the cutting face or in unsafe regions that have not been inspected? I googled a number of variations of 'causes of coal mine rock falls' and could not find a single article discussing this issue that you say is common. Basically, can you provide a source for the claim you are making? Where in the world are they actually found. Considering it was a world wide flood, they should be all over the place. Australia has huge coal reserves, in every state, where are the Australian examples? The simplest answer, and the one I suspect is true is that they dont. I will need to see your specific examples before making the call though. We already know that your 'millions of years' issue is not accurate. This is true. But layers can be put down at different rates and depths depending on the conditions and wood can decay at many different rates, depending on the conditions. Who is they? What did they find? Where did they find it? Where is your source? Again, cant find a single source for this apart from Creationist websites. Are there any scientific sources for this? As far as I can tell from the pages I have read that deal with the issue, the whole issue is the creationists interpretation of the word preserved. The way the creationist sites are going on, they are suggesting the soft tissue was preserved as if it had been in the fridge. What the original paper actually discusses is preserved in the fossilised sense. There was no soft tissue actually found, there was just the fosslised imprint of soft tissue. The same way that fossils of jellyfish are found. Their soft tissue has been preserved. Here is a quote from wiki - (Source: Green River Formation - Wikipedia)Notice it discusses soft parts being preserved as well. This does not mean what you suggest in your list. hmmm. Cant find any referense to this on any site that discusses these fossils. Quite the opposite in fact. This is another wiki quote. I dont want to search too much more in case this is not the actual issue you are referring to - (Source: Green River Formation - Wikipedia)The sites I have looked at all mention those two layers being filled with fossils. I can find any mention of any fossils found being seperated by different shale deposits.How would these fossils in one very small part of the world come close to indicating a world wide flooding event?In truth, the only real mention I can find of either of your issues are from the major creationist websites. The polystrate tree issue is not really discussed because it is a non issue in the geological community. The consensus there is that the problem was solved more than a century ago. As for the catfish, it seems that it is a misinterpretation of the word preserved in an early study. This mistake would not have been made by any geologist.After we have discussed your list, seeing as this is a topic you have mentioned you are quite keen to cover, would it be possible for you to explain some issues the non creationist side have with the Global Flood idea?Edited by Butterflytyrant, : No reason given.

Hello JBR,Did your reply actually cover any of the relavent material? This is quote from the Wiki page - So the Wiki page itself is not a Creationist page. It just parrots Creationist statements and advises the readers that the information is typically only found in creationist publications.How does that support your arguement for a global flood? My comment is a reply to the following statement made by you in Message 134

quote:

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These fossils are so common that they are often a real hazard to coal miners who can suddenly be crushed when one dislodges and falls on him in the mines. These fossils are found in coal world wide.

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I refuted that these fossils are "so common that they are often a real hazard to coal miners who can suddenly be crushed when one dislodges and falls on him in the mines." My brother actually rang me today and said that he did ctually recall one fossilised tree. It was horizontal, inside a coal seam. I refute your claim that they are common. I also refute your claim that they are a common danger to miners. If they were common, or a common danger to miners, then the combined 30 years cutting coal experience of the miners I have asked would have come up with more than 1 example wouldnt it? I am not saying that fossilesed trees do not exist. I am saying that the polystrate fossils you claim are common and a common danger to miners are in fact not common at all. Do you actually have any credible sources as this one does not support your claim.Also, be careful using wikipedia as your primary source of information. The quote you have provided is sourced. The title of the source claiming the fossils are found "in the Eastern United States, Eastern Canada, England, France, Germany, and Australia" is "Pennsylvanian fossil forests' in growth position" (http://si-pddr.si.edu/dspace/handle/10088/15971). The word Australia does not appear in the body of the document at all. There is no verification of this claim at all.Again, how does this arguement support your global flood? The map appears to show coal mining activity. How does a map of coal mining activity illustrate polystrate fossils? Does is show any indication of fossils at all? All it seems to show is that you 'little o'l creationists' can locate an image of coal mining activity. Is there a source for this image? Can you illustrate the connection between the image and polystrate fossils? Can you tell me how the image you have provided relates to a global flood?Would you care to discuss any of the important questions and points made in my post?Edited by Butterflytyrant, : No reason given.Edited by Butterflytyrant, : No reason given.

JBR,Ok, lets just forget about my comment regarding where the creationist term polystrate comes from. It makes no difference to the arguement. What you do need to do is provide some sources for your claims. So far, you have provided a wiki article that refutes your arguement by providing the standard scientific explanation for their existence. So you have provided no support for your claim that polystrate fossils are evidence for a global flood. So far, from your posts alone, this is the score -
Global flood - 0
no global flood - 1 I agree, I provided a large response to your claims and you have so far only been able to deal with the trivial. If you want to deal with something relevant, how about dealing with the issues I brought up in Message 186I did refute wiki. And I explained why. Here it is again from Message 195How about you check out the original reply and deal with the issues discussed there.How about you discuss the global flood?

Hello JBR,Would you please include links to your sources in your reply?cheers,BT

We have reached the point where this thread is about to be closed.JustbeReal Made a good A4 page of claims that he believed soundly supported a global flood.he narrowed this down to his two 'favourites'.I have been meaning to weigh in but have found that there is already quite a number of replies contesting his claims.But JBR seems to be mysteriously silent.Maybe we could start a new thread beginning with JBR's original list of support for the global flood.His list seems to cover all of the major supprting arguements for his hypothesis. It would be a handy reference to go back to when the issue comes up again.It would only work if JBR felt that he could actually support his claims. It will only be a worthwhile debate if he means to stand by his statements.It looks like Robert Byers could weigh in as well. He could use a bit of work on his Geology though. I can recommend Dr A's Introduction to Geology thread. here it is Message 1Edited by Butterflytyrant, : No reason given.