Re: angiosperms and oil

Lee Spencer (spencerl@swau.edu)
Thu, 22 May 1997 10:01:03 -0500

At 11:12 PM 5/21/97 -0500, Glenn wrote:
>
>According to the global flood theory, angiosperms lived on earth prior to
>the flood. Some of them should have died early in the flood, and been buried
>in the oldest source rocks. This should have left Oleonane in earlier oils,
>but there is no oleonane in the lowestmost rocks and lowestmost oil fields.
>It would appear from the molecular data that there is NO oleonane--therefore
>no angiosperms-- on earth at the time those source rocks were formed. Since
>the Global flood was supposed to be catastrophic and able to mix things up
>really well, why do we find no oleonane in old oils? Dead flowers and plant
>matter can sink and be buried in the flood.
>
There are two problems with this argument. First, oil will only migrate up
to the first impermeable layer it encounters, usually clay or shale, but
sometimes a fault breccia or other structure. Clay and shale layers are
very abundant throughout the geological column, so oil will not migrate up
through "geological time" very far. Secondly, it assumes that "global
flood theory" processes mixed all habitats; that biota from an
elevationally higher biome could get transported to and mixed with the
biota of a lower biome. If one assumes that the portion of the geological
column referred to by Glenn represents deposits formed during the flood,
the fact that species have observably distinct stratigraphic ranges and are
not found mixed randomly throughout the column says that the flood
processes were orderly and not mixed. The model predicts that angiosperms
will not be destroyed and buried before the rising floodwaters reached
them; therefore, angiosperms should not be represented in the fossil record
before mid-Cretaceous biomes.

The real problem for "global flood theory" has nothing to do with flood
processes, but rather, What pre-flood environmental conditions could
restrict angiosperms to the higher elevations? In our modern world, there
is no biome except marine-below-the-photic-zone that lacks angiosperms.
What were the conditions before the flood where cycads and conifers could
live, but not angiosperms? This again illustrates that more time should be
spent trying to solve problems within the paradigm than trying to prove a
different paradigm wrong.

Yours in Christ,

Lee A. Spencer, Ph.D.
Vertebrate Paleontologist
Earth History Research Center
Southwestern Adventist University
Keene, TX 76059