Evaluating Evidence  —  Carefully Examine the Details

Details are important in all evidence-based science, and are especially important when we're evaluating young-earth theories.

In his lectures and in a song he teaches children to sing, Ken Ham states that the fossil record is made from "billions of dead things, buried in rock layers, laid down by water all over the earth."  But reality is far more complex, and when we observe carefully we see details in real geology that could not be produced by flood geology, which therefore (due to the important details) fails the Reality Checks of evidence-based science.

In the following sections — which are independent so you can read them in any order — you'll see a careful examination of details in a few of the many situations* where young-earth science fails the “reality checks” of scientific method, when we compare predictions of flood geology with observations of real geology:   A. Fossil Patterns (in forams & isotopes) ,   B. Varve Layers ,   C. Dry-Land Activities ,   D. Coral Reefs ,   E. Seafloor Spreading & Magnetic Reversals ;   and Multiple Independent Confirmations in   F. Geology ,   G. Radiometric Dating ,   H. Astronomy .     {* in addition to what you'll see in this page, there are other kinds of old-earth evidence.}

read carefully and think logically:  In each section below, A to H, you can understand the important concepts — the detailed observations that are correctly explained by old-earth theories, but cannot be explained (or are incorrectly predicted) by young-earth theories — if you read carefully and think logically.

A  —  Patterns predicted by Flood Geology, and observed in Reality

In an effort to explain how a global flood could produce the fossil patterns we observe in the geological record, Henry Morris proposed that during The Global Flood there were three mechanisms for sorting:  hydrological sorting (based on size, shape, and density),  ecological zonation (with sorting based on habitats and their locations, if animals living together, on land or in sea, would be buried together), and  differential escape (if animals skilled at fleeing, due to speed and/or intelligence, would escape for a longer time, so they would be buried later & higher).   In the young-earth CreationWiki, Fossil Sorting adds biogeographic zonation (similar to ecological zonation but over a wider area) and tectonic activity (if overthrusts changed the vertical ordering of rock strata).

But when we carefully examine the fossil patterns observed in real rock formations, we find details that are impossible to explain with these sorting mechanisms, acting individually or in combination.  Mark Isaak summarizes a few of the many types of observations that flood geology cannot explain correctly, in Evidence about Age [Fossil Patterns - Part 1].

A1  —  Fossil Patterns that are not consistent with Flood Geology

Foraminifera (often abbreviated to forams) are small sea creatures, 0.1 mm to 10 mm and more.  They have shells with decorations that let us distinguish between species.  Some species are bottom dwellers, but the species that float when alive (but sink after death) are especially interesting due to their widespread distribution in oceans.

In some sedimentary rocks we observe many different foram “floater” species, each in its own vertical layer, in many layers that together span a large vertical thickness.  There is a detailed sequencing, with each species found in only one vertical layer (covering a wide horizontal area), but not in the layers above or below.  The area of a layer can be very wide, so we see a long-range horizontal consistency, producing a vertical pattern with horizontal extension in which many foram species (those that were widely distributed throughout the world's oceans) are arranged in the same vertical sequence all around the world.

Conventional old-earth geology proposes a logical explanation for this pattern:  The different layers were produced slowly by a steady “rain of fossils from the sea above” over a long period of time in which the foraminifers gradually evolved into a variety of time-sequential species with minor differences (*);  the species existing at a particular time produced one layer, then above this another layer was produced by another species that existed at a later time, and so on.  As predicted, the forams are also sorted according to radiometric dating with ages becoming gradually older as we look at lower layers.

But young-earth flood geology does not explain the patterns:  In a catastrophic global flood, why would all members of one species be deposited in sediments at one level, while other species (with similar hydrological sorting because they have similar size, shape, and density) were deposited entirely within their own separate layers, below and above?  In the turbulent waters proposed by flood geology, with extremely thick layers being deposited every day, the tiny forams would all be jumbled together, not with each species its own layer, and not forming the distinctive patterns we observe.   (but what about the other mechanisms? differential escape would not be a factor because the passively floating forams are not actively mobile, and ecological zonation could not produce the precisely detailed long-range patterns we observe.)   For details about foraminifer patterns, see More Evidence about Age [in Part 1 & Part 2] and Microfossil Stratigraphy Presents Problems for the Flood by Glenn Morton.

* Yes, this change is evolution, but evolution is a word with many meanings and this evolution of forams does not prove the Total Macro-Evolution (100% natural evolution of all biological complexity & diversity) that is accepted by old-earth evolutionary creationists, but is challenged by old-earth progressive creationists who propose occasional miraculous-appearing divine action during the history of nature, and is one topic for questions about Intelligent Design. 

A2  —  Isotope Patterns that are not consistent with Flood Geology

In many carefully designed field studies, many scientists have observed...

analogous patterns, with fossils & isotopes:  As implied by the A1/A2 labels and similar titles ("Fossil Patterns..." & "Isotope Patterns..."), the detailed A1-patterns above (with biological forams) are analogous to the following detailed A2-patterns (with atomic isotopes).

Two isotopes of oxygen (O-16 and O-18) are atoms of O that differ in weight (they are 16 and 18), but are almost identical in their chemical reactions.  Both isotopes are used to form organic structures (shells,...) & inorganic minerals;  these structures & minerals can become part of sedimentary rock, where experts in Isotope Geochemistry observe distinctive patterns.

Scientists can measure the istotopic ratio of O (the mathematical ratio of O-18/O-16), and in some situations also the ratios for different isotopes of C (C-13 / C-12), Sr (Sr-87 / Sr-86), and S (with various ratios involving S-32, S-33, S-33, S-36).  When scientists observe isotope-ratios in the organic structures and/or inorganic minerals that were integrated into sedimentary rocks, they observe a sequence pattern that is analogous to the pattern with forams.  Beginning with the rock at an ocean floor and moving upward, they see layers with differing isotope-ratios (for C, O, S, and/or Sr) arranged in a vertical sequence.  And when they look at the layers in ocean-floor rock at widely separated locations all around the world, they see the same vertical sequence, so there is a long-range consistency (as with forams) in a detailed "vertical pattern with horizontal extension."   {details are in Evidence about Age [in Fossil Patterns, Part 1 & Part 2 with Foraminifers}

Conventional old-earth geology proposes a logical explanation for this pattern:  The different layers were produced slowly over a long period of time in which the isotope composition of the atmosphere and global seawater changed because of various biological and geological processes;  the seawater isotopes available at a particular time were used in the structures and minerals of one layer, then above this another layer was produced by seawater with different ratios of isotopes, and so on.

But flood geology cannot explain the patterns:  In the turbulent waters of a catastrophic global flood that quickly deposited sediments, no mechanism (not ecological, hydrological, or escaping; not physical, chemical, or biological) would cause different isotope-atoms to separate into different layers that have the same vertical sequential pattern in all parts of the world.

B  —  Millions of Annual Varve-Layers

On the bottom of some lakes, ancient & modern, the annual cycle of seasons produces alternating layers of sediment, a light layer (with fine sand and soil) deposited in summer, and a dark layer (with even finer soil) deposited in winter.  Each couplet pair, combining a light layer & dark layer, is called a varve, and we can count varves — analogous to counting annual tree rings — to determine the age of sediments.  Many formations have a lot more than 10,000 varves (lakes in the Green River Formation have 6 million) so this is a problem for those who claim the earth is less than 10,000 years old.

As usual, the old-earth explanation — proposing that during each year one annual varve was formed by a slow “raining of sediments” with characteristics that varied in spring, summer, fall, and winter — fits the facts.  But in contrast with two examples above (A1 & A2) that usually are just ignored, young-earth creationists challenge old-earth claims about varves in two main ways, with questions about fish and layers.

Fossil Fish:  Green River sediments contain preserved fossil fish spanning many varve layers;  young-earth creationists claim that these fish would have decayed if the varves were annual, with many years passing before the sediment was deep enough to cover the fish.   But... stagnant cold water at the bottom of a lake can become anaerobic (with an extremely low amount of dissolved oxygen) and this water, which also was saltier than the water above it, would not support bacteria to produce decay, or scavengers to eat the fish.  Wikipedia says, "varve formation requires the absence of bioturbation [mixing of sediments by bottom-dwelling plants or animals];  consequently, varves commonly form under anoxic conditions [in water that is oxygen-depleted, anaerobic]."   {for more, see a claim-and-response by Whitmore and Henke]}

Non-Annual Layers:  At the edge of lakes, some layers are produced by sediment from storm runoffs;  young-earth creationists claim that due to these non-annual layers, we can't know exactly how many of the layers are annual, so conclusions about age are not reliable.  But in the large lakes of Green River, non-annual layers (which don't look the same as annual varves) rarely occur near the center of lakes where almost all layers are annual varves;  this is described in Green River Varves by Glenn Morton, who also explains why many other details (e.g., layers at the edge of lakes were less salty and had a higher isotope ratio of 0-18/0-16, plus astronomical periodicities, volcanic ash events, and more) are expected if most of the lake-center varves form slowly during an entire year.  In another page Morton quotes Flint (1971): "The sediment contains pollen grains, whose number per unit volume of sediment varies cyclically being greatest in the upper parts of the dark layers.  The pollen grains of various genera are stratified systematically according to the season of blooming.  Finally, diatoms [1-celled algae] are twice as abundant in the light-colored layers as in the dark.  From this evidence it is concluded that the light layers represent summer seasons and the dark ones fall, winter and spring."

Could multiple thin layers form quickly in a turbulent global flood?  Young-earth creationists say “yes” and cite the experiments of Guy Berthault.  But the layers in his small-scale “test tube” experiments differ in important details from lake varves, which are uniform over large areas (sometimes thousands of square miles) and contain tiny particles of soil that settle slowly (in a month or more), with some so small that they settle only in winter when surface ice prevents the wind agitation that normally keeps these tiny particles suspended.  These tiny particles would never settle during a turbulent flood.  (and to make 6 million varves, a 1-year flood would have to form a pair of light-and-dark layers every 5 seconds!)

In his young-earth varves page, Kurt Howard says:  "There are many nonseasonal mechanisms for producing laminations such as storms, floods, turbidites, glacial meltwater, and spontaneous segregation of dissimilar materials."  But these mechanisms could not form a two-layer varve every 5 seconds, with the details (cyclic variations of pollens,...) actually observed in varves.  Howard also describes, just before his concluding section, one result of Mount St Helens:  "The volcano eruption produced 25 feet of volcanic ash varve-like deposits from hurricane-velocity surging flows in five hours."  But in most ways these "varve-like deposits" are not like varves — because his layers and varve-layers are made from different materials, with different hydrological properties, chemistry, coloring, layer thickness,... (compare the two pictures in this section, with thin [0.01 cm] varves and thick layers [8 cm] in an ash hill) — so why does he imply that a layering of volcanic ash provides relevant support for a "flood geology" creation of varves?

Creationists seem to imply that if ANY layers can form fast, then ALL layers did form fast, but in doing this they ignore important differences in the characteristics of layers.  And they imply that conventional geology ignores catastrophic events, but...

Uniformitarianism & Catastrophism are both included in Modern Geology:  Even though young-earth science does make some valid claims for the geological results of occasional catastrophic events (like the eruption of Mount St Helens), this does not contradict the old-earth theories of modern geology, which propose a combination of slow-acting uniformitarian processes and fast-acting catastrophic events such as volcanoes, earthquakes, and floods.

C  —  Dry-Land Activities (biological and geological) during The Flood

If a catastrophic global flood produced most of the earth's geology, why do we see evidence (at all levels in miles-thick geological formations) showing “dry land” activities — in the everyday life of land animals, and in dry-land geology that could not occur in an underwater environment — at a time when, according to flood geology, the entire world was under water?

You can read about the evidence for activities of animal life and geology process — the burrows (of several types, both vertical & horizontal), footprints, dinosaur eggs, termite nests, fossil dung, insects in amber, desert varnish on rocks & sand;  the sand dunes, rain drops, mud cracks (in multiple layers), buried river channels & canyons, paleosols (former soils), and evaporative salt beds (containing pollen, plankton, and meteor dust) — in Glenn Morton's description of Details in Layers with brief responses (ignoring important details) in CreationWiki, plus [with links I'll have to fix] Dry-Land Details in a Global Flood.  I encourage you to carefully examine the observed details for each activity, and ask “how could this occur during a global flood?”, and then ask (while thinking about the principle of Multiple Independent Confirmations for A1-A2 above, B here, and C-G below) “how could ALL of these occur during a global flood?”

D  —  Coral Reefs  (growth rates and astronomical cycles)

When scientists measure the height of coral reefs and the average growth rate of corals — and consider the upper limits set by metabolic biochemistry, calcium solubility, and subsidence velocity (this is important because reef-foundations must sink slowly so the growing corals can remain underwater but not too far under the surface) — and then calculate "height/rate (= distance/speed) = time", they conclude that some reefs are very old.  For example, estimates for three reefs (Eniwetok, Great Bahama, and Great Barrier) are 200 thousand, 800 thousand, and 18 million years.

Also, the combination of coral-and-earth has interesting details.  The earth's rate of rotation is slowing down, due to the friction caused by tides that are produced by the moon's gravity, so each day (the time required for one rotation) is getting longer, with fewer days per solar year (the time required for earth to orbit the sun).  In astronomy, physics-based math calculations predict that in the Cambrian period each year had 412 days, in the Devonian it was 400, and now it's 365 days per year.  For similar reasons, our lunar month (time required for moon to orbit earth) has decreased from 30.5 days in the Devonian to 29.5 days now.  /  When corals grow they have cycles (each day, lunar month, and solar year) that produce bands we can observe, like the cyclic annual growth rings of a tree.  When we examine the growth bands in fossil corals, the relative timings of their growth-cycles (the ratios of days per lunar month, and days per solar year) match the change in timings of the earth's rotation;  the lower we look in the geological column, in any part of the world, the more days we see in each lunar month and solar year, with the observed time increases matching those predicted by the physics-and-math of astronomy.

And there is a match between these astronomical ages (found by counting the days in lunar months and solar years at different depths in the geological column) and the ages determined by geological observations and by radiometric dating.  Perry Phillips says, regarding the coral ages determined by radiometric dating, growth rates, and rotational slowdown, "the three processes upon which the dates depend — radioactivity, biological growth, and tidal friction — are independent processes, yet all three combine [with Multiple Independent Confirmations] to form a coherent, natural picture of what is happening."

E  —  Seafloor Spreading and Magnetic Reversals

The continents feel stable but are actually drifting.  When a theory of Continental Drifting was proposed in 1912, it was ridiculed.  Most scientists continued rejecting it until the 1960s when (in modified form as Plate Tectonics) it was accepted due to strong supporting evidence.  One clue is the shoreline shapes (look at eastern South America and western Africa) that "fit together" with a fit that is almost perfect when underwater continental shelves are included.  Other features (rock formations, fossils of plants and animals) also match on these continents, which were together before they began drifting apart 200 million years ago.  Plate tectonics also logically explains earthquake and volcano activities, now and in the past.  But the strongest evidence, which finally persuaded scientists in the 1960s, is the spreading of ocean floors.

At the mid-Atlantic ridge, for example, molten magma (similar to volcanic lava) slowly rises from under the seafloor to its surface, then cools to form solid basalt.  This new ocean-bottom crust pushes the existing crust outward all along the ridge — west toward North & South America, and east toward Europe and Africa — so these continents slowly drift apart.   { You may be wondering, "if the Atlantic is expanding, is the Pacific shrinking?"  In a worldwide process that is too complex to describe here, new crust forms (and causes spreading) at ridges, while some crust is disappearing at other locations. }   The trans-Atlantic continents have been drifting apart for the past 200 million years, and during this time the earth's magnetic field has reversed many times;  it pointed north sometimes, as it does now, and south sometimes.

At the ridge, hot molten magma becomes magnetized, then it cools to form solid new crust that is permanently magnetized.  As the crust moves outward, occasionally the magnetic field reverses direction so the newly forming crust becomes magnetized in the opposite direction.  Thus, we observe a series of long north/south stripes (parallel to the ridge) moving west and east, with magnetism of alternating polarity (normal and reversed) pointing north, south, north, south,...

The zebra-like stripes were formed because new crust was being magnetized while moving outward from the ridge (where magnetizing occurs) in a process similar to a VCR tape being magnetized while moving past the recording heads (where magnetizing occurs).  This animation may help you visualize the process.  The timings of magnetic reversals are irregular and distinctive (as shown in the left diagram) like a fingerprint pattern, and reversal patterns are the same on both sides of a ridge, with approximate west-and-east mirror symmetry.

The age of a magnetized "stripe of crust" can be determined in several ways:

  • We can measure the ridge-to-stripe distance and, using laser technology, the current speed of drifting.  Then, assuming constant speed, we use "distance/speed = time" to calculate the stripe's age.

  • The age of basalt (the mineral in a stripe) can be determined by radiometric dating.

  • Ocean sediment gradually accumulates atop ocean-bottom crust.  At the ridge, newly formed crust has no sediment, but stripes further from the ridge (and thus older) have a thicker layer of sediment because it has accumulated for a longer time.  We can measure the current rate of increase in sediment thickness, and use "thickness/rate = time" to calculate age.

  • We can also use radiometric dating to find the age of various layers in the sediment.

There is a close match between all four determinations of age:  by horizontal distance/speed and radiometric dating for a crust-stripe;  and for the lowest (and thus oldest) layer of sediment on top of this stripe, by vertical thickness/rate and radiometric dating.

Also, some features produced by plate tectonics can be compared with some non-tectonic geological features, and we find a match.

F  —  Multiple Confirmations in Geology

In the Talk Origins FAQ, Mark Isaak outlines the many Problems with a Global Flood that include geological problems in Sections 5-7.

Section 5, The Flood Itself, asks "Where did the Flood water come from, and where did it go?"   Isaak describes young-earth responses proposing flood geology models — Vapor Canopy, Hydroplate, Comet, Runaway Subduction, New Ocean Basins — and briefly explains why, when we "consider all the implications of their models," each model is not satisfactory.

Section 6, Implications of a Flood, asks five questions  —  How do you explain the relative ages of mountains?   Why is there no evidence of a flood in ice core series?   How are the polar ice caps even possible?   Why did the Flood not leave traces on the sea floors?   Why is there no evidence of a flood in tree ring dating?  —  that flood geology cannot answer in a satisfactory way.

Section 7, Producing the Geological Record, is 20 questions asking whether a global flood could produce a wide variety of observed geological features:   geological eras (with "worldwide agreements" when using independent dating methods);    an organized fossil record with a wide variety of detailed patterns (like those in A1 & A2);    varves (as in B) formed by tiny slow-settling sediment particles;    fossil forests (in multiple layers) with soil and roots;    surface features (including the "dry land" features in C) deep in the geological column, far under the surface of flood waters;    angular nonconformities (with details that "seem to require at least two periods of deposition... with long periods of time in between");    mountains (with sedimentary rock) and valleys (formed by erosion, with many carved by slow glacial erosion);    granite batholiths (formed by slow processes);    miles-thick deposits of carbonate mineral, with detailed layering;   heat-producing processes (volcanic magma, limestone formation, meteor impacts, radioactive decay, biological decay, plus additional heat with any of the four flood geology models in Section 5) during a global flood would boil away all ocean water and then it would take millions of years for earth to cool;    limestone deposits (requiring huge numbers of shell-organisms);    chalk deposits (made from tiny organisms that settle slowly, at .5 meter/year);    salt deposits in layers (that would require many periods of evaporation-to-dryness during the flood);    modified sedimentary rocks (recrystallized and deformed by slow metamorphosis);    hematite layers (impossible to form in oxygen-rich atmosphere of Noah's Flood);    fossil mineralization (usually a slow process);    corals (with growth correlated to astronomy, as in D);    huge numbers of fossil animals (how could they all fit on earth when the flood began?);    huge amounts of organic matter (including coal) from pre-flood vegetation (an earth-sized forest would produce less than 2% of this, so how could it all fit on earth?);    the relative numbers of aquatic & terrestrial fossils.

For each of these observed features, when we ask “could it be produced by The Global Flood?” the answer from science is “no”.  And there are MANY other Multiple Independent Confirmations telling us, if we're willing to carefully examine the strong evidence, that “our earth is extremely old.”

We also find Multiple Independent Old-Earth Confirmations that are independent, yet mutually supportive and consistent, in non-geological areas of science, including Radiometric Dating (G) and, for Multiple Independent Old-Universe Confirmations, in Astronomy (H).

G  —  Multiple Confirmations in Radiometric Dating

(plus catastrophic problems due to Radioactive Heating)

Radiometric Dating:

Almost all scientists who understand Radiometric Dating think it's a reliable way to determine dates (to answer “how old is it? when did it exist?”) for a wide range of organic & inorganic structures.  One reason for confidence is the consistency between ages determined in different independent ways.  For example,

in A1 the layer-dates obtained by different methods — by analyzing geology, forams, and diatoms, plus radiometric dating — all give consistent results;  one consistency is that when we test layers lower in the geological column, we find older radiometric dates.

in A2 all istotopes are stable (not radioactive) so radiometric dating is not useful;  instead, scientists use mass spectrometry to analyze the isotope ratios.

in B there is a match between the ages found by simply counting varve layers (like counting tree rings) and by C-14 dating of organic material (pollen,...) in varves.

in C, radiometric dating is not necessary because the problem for flood geology is when we ask “why, in the middle of a flood, do we see biological & geological dry-land activities?”

in D the agreement between independent dating methods — by counting coral growth rings, and calculating rotational slowdown, and observing geology, plus radiometric dating — is described earlier.

in E there is a match between ages (for crust and sediment) found by radiometric dating and by distance/speed & thickness/rate.

in F most geological observations (of rock formations, geological column, ice cores,...) can be cross-checked with radiometric dating, which agrees with the dates from geology.

Radioactive Heating:

Young-earth science cannot explain small details, like the forams, isotopes, features, varves in Sections A–B–C.  It also fails in big ways, as with drifting continents (Section E) and the catastrophic heat — enough to vaporize oceans and melt crust — that would occur during a one-year Flood.  The heating disasters would occur due to huge amounts of heat being produced from several sources, including radioactive decay.

A major young-earth research project, RATE (Radioisotopes and Age of the Earth), concedes the occurrence of "more than 500 million years worth (at today’s rates) of nuclear and radioisotope decay."  This decay occurs throughout the geological formations that, according to flood geology, were produced by The Flood.  Therefore RATE must propose that almost all of this decay occurred during the one-year flood, but this would require having a decay rate for some atoms (but not others) that was extremely high (but only for a year, not before or after), for some unknown reason.  And it would produce a huge amount of heat.  The problems this would cause seem un-solvable, as described by Randy Isaac in his review of RATE's book, Thousands not Billions: "No known thermodynamic process could account for the required rate of heat removal [required to prevent vaporizing of oceans and melting of crust] nor [for another kind of problem] is there any known way to protect organisms from radiation damage. ... The authors admit that a young-earth position cannot be reconciled with the scientific data without assuming that exotic solutions will be discovered in the future.   The heat problem is acknowledged by Larry Vardiman, a member of RATE:  "The amount of heat produced by a decay rate of a million times faster than normal during the year of the Flood could potentially vaporize the earth’s oceans, melt the crust, and obliterate the surface of the earth. (Unresolved Problems in RATE)"