Page 64 - Creationism - Student Textbook w videos short

1. The organism must be buried quickly. For this to happen, the organism normally must die in
abnormal conditions such as in a flood, volcano eruption or an
earthquake. Otherwise it is near impossible for an animal to be
preserved;
2. The organism must be kept from normal decay. If the animal is
exposed to oxygen or bacteria, they will quickly start to decay;
3. The organism must be buried in matter that is leached with
mineral-rich waters where carbonates are precipitating. These
minerals will replace the original tissue, so that a stone remains in the shape of the original
tissue.

The Geological Column – an Evolutionary Time Scale

What is the geologic time scale and how does it work? Well, the earth's
crust consists of many layers of sedimentary rock (called "strata").
Geologists assume that each layer represents a long period of time,
typically millions of years. This is actually a secondary assumption based
upon the primary assumption of Uniformitarianism. These layers of
sedimentary rock contain billions of fossil remains and some of these
fossils are unique to certain layers. The layers are catalogued and
arbitrarily arranged into a specific order (not necessarily the order in
which they are found). This order reflects the assumption of macro-
evolution (the widely held notion that all life is related and has
descended from a common ancestor). The creatures thought to have
evolved first are considered to be the oldest and are thus placed at the
bottom of the column of layers. The creatures thought to have evolved
later are higher up and so on.

A variety of fossils from each layer of strata have been chosen to be what are called "index fossils".
Index fossils are how modern scientists date the sedimentary rock layers. Paleontologists assume the
age of an index fossil by the stage of evolutionary history the fossil is assumed to be in. They guess how
long it would take for one kind of life to evolve into another kind of life and then date the fossils and
rocks accordingly. And this poses something of a problem: If we date the rocks by the fossils, how can
we then turn around and talk about the patterns of evolutionary change through time in the fossil
record?"

The geologic time scale employs yet another circular argument. We determine
the age of the rock by the assumed age of the index fossils it contains, then, to
determine the age of all the other fossils in the same layer of rock, we look at the
age of the layer of rock in which they are found. "…Geologists are here arguing in
a circle. The succession of organisms has been determined by a study of their
remains embedded in the rocks, and the relative ages of the rocks are determined
by the remains of organisms that they contain."

So, since the earth has major layers of sedimentary rock laid down in layers over
millions of years, and IF evolution is true, what should the fossil record look like?

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