I am also interested in raindrop patterns, leaf priints and tracks. Have
any of those been reported as fossilized recently?
Trust in the LORD with all your heart,
and do not rely on your own insight.. Pr. 3:5
Ron Chitwood
chitw@flash.net
----------
> From: Glenn Morton <grmorton@waymark.net>
> To: evolution@calvin.edu
> Subject: fossilization
> Date: Saturday, January 24, 1998 10:02 PM
>
> One of the powerful young-earth arguments concerns fossilization. The
claim
> is often made that no fossilization is occurring in the modern world and
> that only rapid burial provided by the flood would suffice to explain the
> fossils found in the earth's rocks. Wysong writes:
>
> "After the Pre-Cambrian void we see a vast fossil record in
> the sedimentary rocks (water deposited) showing hugh arrays of
> life. Finally, today, and for the past few thousand years, no
> fossilization to speak of is taking place."~Randy L. Wysong, The
> Creation-Evolution Controversy, (Midland Mich.: Inquiry Press,
> 1976), p. 364
>
> "How does one explain, for example, a dead fish lying on the bed
> of a lake for about two hundred years while the slowly
> accumulating sediments gradually cover it and then fossilize it?
> Where does this happen in modern lakes?"~John C. Whitcomb and
> Henry M. Morris, The Genesis Flood, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book
> House, 1961), p. 427
>
> Also,
>
> "Under ordinary processes of nature as now occurring, fossils (especially
of
> land animals and even marine vertebrates) are very rarely formed. The
only
> way they can be preserved long enough from the usual processes of decay,
> scavenging and disintegration is by means of quick burial in aqueous
> sediments." Henry M. Morris, The Genesis Flood, (Grand Rapids: Baker
Book
> House, 1961), p. 128
>
> We are going to examine these claims that fossilization does not occur in
> the modern era. We will see that it is not true.
>
> Lets look at terrestrial fossils first.
>
> Amboseli Park in Kenya gives an excellent example of modern day
> fossilization occurring in a modern terrestrial environment. Anna K.
> Berhrensmeyer studied the taphonomy (what happens after death) of bones
on
> the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro. They walked transects making observations
of
> all the bones in the ground that they could find. How long could the
bones
> last on the surface of the earth? Is rapid, meaning instantaneous burial
> required? Behrensmeyer states,
>
> "The total sample consisted of over 20,000 bones representing
> more than 1,500 individuals. These represent attritional
> mortality over a period of 8 to 15 years maximum; most bones are
> destroyed by surface processes or buried within this period of
> time."~Anna K. Behrensmeyer, "Vertebrate Paleoecology in a Recent
> East African Ecosystem," in Jane Gray, A. J. Boucot and William
> B. N. Berry, editors, Communities of the Past, (Stroudsburg:
> Hutchinson Ross Publishing Co., 1991), pp 591-615, p. 596
>
>
> Eight years is quite a long time compared to the timeframe normally given
by
> young earth creationists. Why are these bones able to last that long? She
writes
>
> "Bone weathering on the surface varies according to
> microhabitat; critical factors include fluctuations in
> temperature and moisture. Bones in moist or shaded places may
> stay uncracked for years while exposed parts of the same skeleton
> go through progressive weathering stages and usually disintegrate
> entirely in 8 to 15 years. Weathering is inhibited by burial in
> Amboseli, and burial to a large extent is caused by trampling,
> especially during periods when the ground is wet. In most cases
> lower sides of bones are less weathered than upper, but kicking
> and trampling also has the effect of turning bones over
> periodically, so they weather evenly on both sides. Trampled
> bones are often oriented nearly vertically in the surface
> sediment. Compact bones, such as podials, seem to have relatively
> higher rates of burial and lower rates of weathering than skulls,
> pelves, and vertebrae."~Anna K. Behrensmeyer, "Vertebrate
> Paleoecology in a Recent East African Ecosystem," in Jane Gray,
> A. J. Boucot and William B. N. Berry, editors, Communities of the
> Past, (Stroudsburg: Hutchinson Ross Publishing Co., 1991), pp
> 591-615, p. 606
>
>
> But more importantly, the chemistry of the soils is the main factor.
>
> "Soils of the Amboseli Basin are generally alkaline and
> conducive to bone preservation, and bones occur in all stages of
> fossilization, unmineralized to completely mineralized. Fossil
> bones probably vary from Holocene to Pleistocene in age, but none
> have yet been dated."~Anna K. Behrensmeyer, "Vertebrate Paleoecology in a
Recent
> East African Ecosystem," in Jane Gray, A. J. Boucot and William
> B. N. Berry, editors, Communities of the Past, (Stroudsburg:
> Hutchinson Ross Publishing Co., 1991), pp 591-615, p. 596
>
> Rapid burial of bones in not required for fossilization, unless one says
> that 8 years is a rapid time.
>
> Now for subaqueous fossilization. Some glacial lakes preserve an organic
> rich goo on their bottom. (Alan R. Emery, "Sediments of Deep Canadian
Shield
> Lakes: Observations of Gross Structure and Biological Significance,"
> Science, 181, p. 655-657)
>
> But there are fossils that have been formed in the last few thousand
years
> in the ocean. This has been known for over 45 years. L. G. Weeks reports
on
> the occurrence of fossilized fish in concretions formed during the past
few
> thousand years,
>
> "Among the most interesting occurrences of fish-bearing
> concretions are those that are being found in Recent or sub-
> Recent marine clays in various places along the coasts of
> Greenland and northern Canada. Figure 5 shows one of these
> specimens from the American Museum which Dr. Scaeffer kindly
> permitted the writer to have photographed. The concretions occur
> in marine clays which apparently were raised above sea level by
> the isostatic rebound that followed the melting of the
> Pleistocene ice cap. The fact that concretions have already been
> developed in these very young clays seems significant."~L. G.
> Weeks, "Environment and Mode of Origin and Facies Relationships
> of Carbonate Concretions in Shales," Journal of Sedimentary
> Petrology, 23(1953):3:162-173, p. 168
>
> So, for those who want examples of modern fossilization, here they are.
>
> glenn
>
> Adam, Apes, and Anthropology: Finding the Soul of Fossil Man
>
> and
>
> Foundation, Fall and Flood
> http://www.isource.net/~grmorton/dmd.htm
>