The Fossil Record Considered

The fossil record is a fact. To date there have been trillions of fossils found buried in sedimentary layers all over the earth. This fact is uncontested by both the evolutionist and the creationist.

Uniformatarianism and Catastrophism

Until the 1700's, men of science generally agreed that the earth was relatively young by today's standards, in the order of thousands (not millions and billions of years). The earth's geologic features were interpreted as evidence of catastrophe, often attributed to the flood of Noah.

"Scientists of Faith", Dan Graves, 1996, p. 72:

"Niels Steno founded the modern science of geology…Using commonsense reasoning, Steno proposed that water generally laid down sediments quite nearly horizontally, so that the lowest sediments would normally be those that were laid first."

This interpretation of the earth's geologic features was challenged first by James Hutton and then Charles Lyle, who argued that the stratagraphic layers of the earth were formed over vast periods of time by slow uniform processes. "The present is the key to the past."

"His [Lyle's] major contribution was proving that all features of the Earth's surface were produced by natural forces operating for long times. His strong arguments that the Earth's crust was the product of thousands of millions of years of activity did away with the need for unscientific explanations based on the Biblical record."

Excerpted from Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia, 1996, SoftKey Multimedia Inc.

The effect this new interpretation had was profound, paving the way for Darwin:

"Lyell's achievements in geology also laid the foundations for evolutionary biology, a field that was to be more fully developed by a young friend, Charles Darwin." Excerpted from Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia, SoftKey Multimedia Inc.

"Yet it was to Lyell that Darwin owed much of the information that was the basis of his own work." Excerpted from Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia. 1996, SoftKey Multimedia Inc.

With the Bible safely "disproven", and vast amounts of time for matter and random chance to work its "magic," nature could work its own miracles.

"Time is in fact the hero of the plot…given so much time the 'impossible' becomes possible, the possible probable and the probable virtually certain. One has only to wait: time itself performs miracles." George Wald, "Origin of Life", Physics and Chemistry of Life, 1955, p. 12

Relative dating methods (stratigraphy)

The proposed "Geologic Column" doesn't exist in its entirety anywhere:

E P Bottley, "Rocks and Minerals", 1969, p. 10, "There is no one place where this stratigraphical column is completely displayed and the whole can only be pieced together only by collecting information from throughout the world."

Age of fossils determined by the rocks layers:

"Biology", Evolutionary Evidence, 1985, p. 1020: "By measuring the depth at which fossils are buried in a deposit, scientists are able to arrive at a estimate of their age, though perhaps not a very accurate estimate."

The World Book Encyclopedia, 1986, vol 7, p. 364: "Scientists determine when fossils were formed by finding out the age of the rocks in which they lie."

Age of the rock layers determined by the fossils:

E P Bottley, "Rocks and Minerals", 1969, p. 10, "Mapping, collecting and interpreting in ever-increasing detail has lead to the recognition of a sequence of strata which may total hundreds of feet in thickness. These have been allocated to several systems, each representing a period of time in the evolution of the earth, and each readily identified by its fossils."

Circular Reasoning:

"The intelligent layman has long suspected circular reasoning in the use of rocks to date fossils and fossils to date rocks. The geologist has never bothered to think of a good reply, feeling that explanations are not worth the trouble as long as the work brings results." J.E. O'Rourke, "Pragmatism Versus Materialism in Stratigraphy", American Journal of Science, vol. 276, January 1976, p.47

Fossilization Requires Special Circumstances

It must be acknowledged by all, that plants and animals generally don't fossilize unless certain environmental conditions are met. For example, millions of bison were killed on the plains during the 1800's, yet it is true that almost none of them fossilized. Richard Leakey ("Origins Reconsidered", p. 56) explains what is required for fossilization to take place:

"The key process in the entire business is burial: if bones become buried quickly after death, the chances of fossilization are greatly enhanced. And burial depends on there being prevailing accumulation of sediments, such as occurs on the flood plains of rivers and lakes. The water carries fine sediments, which, under the most favorable conditions, and quickly entomb fresh bone."

Interpretation #1: Vast Amounts of Time

The only way to reconcile the fact that fossilization is uncommon, requiring special environmental conditions, with the fact that countless fossils exist, would be to suggest that great periods of time has elapsed. According to the evolution story, over millions of years fossil forms have accumulated, producing the great numbers we see today.

Interpretation #2: The Great Flood of Noah

The biblical flood model certainly would predict the rapid burial and fossilization of countless animal and plant forms. Such a flood would have met the requirements for fossilization as outlined by Leakey.

Consideration:

According to Geologist John D. Morris ("The Young Earth", 1997, pp. 88-90), the annual erosion rates of the continents are 27.5 billion tones annually. The collective mass of the continents currently sits at 383 million billion tones (John D Morris, "The Young Earth", 1997). Pure extrapolation means that the continents should have been eroded flat in no more than 14 million years. In other words, about five times over since the dinosaurs were here (according to the evolutionist timescale). And yet the continents are still rich in fossil bearing sedimentary layers.

Some can and have argued against the idea that the continents should have eroded flat, citing that tectonic forces have countered this effect by thrusting the continents upward. It must be remembered that tectonic theory really is still just a theory. Even if it proves to be an incontrovertible fact, it may answer the question as to why the continents are still here, but the fossil bearing material should still have been eroded away long ago.

Note that it is an incontrovertible fact that the moon's orbit around our planet is decaying. The inverse square law states that when the distance between two objects is cut in half, the attraction between them is quadrupled. Since the moon's pull is directly responsible for the oceans tides, it's perfectly reasonable to suppose that the erosion rates on the continents were even greater in the past. This serves to weaken the notion that an accumulation of fossils could have taken place over vast periods of time. According to Brown, ("In the Beginning", 7^th Ed, pp. 302-306) the maximum age for the earth-moon system is 1.2 billion years.

The effect of an earth-moon system of only 1.2 billion years utterly disrupts the theory of organic evolution in general, since life was said to have evolved in the planet some 3.7 billion years ago. Significant to this discussion is the effect this would have on the fossil record. Brown explains (p.305):

"If the moon somehow began orbiting Earth 1.2 billion years ago, its close proximity to Earth would have created extreme tides many miles high. They would have eroded mountains and smoothed the Earth, especially at low latitudes. Little, if any, geological evidence supports this, and much opposes it. Evolutionists claim that certain fossils are 2.8 to 3.5 billion years old. Had the Moon begun orbiting the Earth 1.2 billion years ago, such fossils would have been pulverized by the havoc of gigantic tides. Tides exceeding a mile high would have swept our planet twice a day for millions of years."

Fossilization Can Happen Very Rapidly

Fossilization of once living material occurs when, molecule by molecule, organic material is removed from the body and replaced with mineral material. The time it takes for complete fossilization to occur is totally dependant upon the immediate environment. There are numerous examples of fossilization taking place in very short periods of time, which ought to utterly destroy any notion that vast periods are an essential requirement.

Some Examples of Rapid Fossilization

The Observed "Ordering" of Fossils

It's true that the fossils do appear within the strata layers of the earth in some sort of discernable order. This order appears to follow the evolutionist's picture of the upward evolution from simple sea life, to fish, to amphibians, to reptiles, and then finally to mammals and birds.

To state that this order exists, however, requires severe qualification. Richard Thompson and Michael Cremo have compiled a massive body to evidence, over 900 pages worth, documenting the exceptions to this "ordering" rule. Even so, there does exist at least a quasi-ordering to the fossils which requires explanation.

Interpretation #1: The Ordering Is Evidence That Evolution Over Millions of Years has Taken Place

This interpretation does not cohere with the Earth-Moon system's maximum age of 1.2 billion years.

Interpretation #2: The Ordering is Evidence of a Global Flood

In the event of a flood, animals would be buried in sediment according to habitat, mobility, intelligence, and bodyweight and density. The ordering of the fossils that would take place would almost mirror what the evolution model would predict, but for very different reasons. Walt Brown ("In the Beginning" 7^th Ed. pp. 139-149) Describes in detail the process of liquefaction, in which sediments are sorted "Hydrologically." Brown describes his liquefaction experiment on p. 142:

"Once liquefaction begins, sedimentary particles fall or rise relative to each other, sorting themselves into layers, each having particles with similar size, shape and density. Buried bodies with the density of plants and dead animals float up through the sediments. The same would happen to happen to plants and animals buried in the flood sediments. Their sorting and later fossilization might give the mistaken impression that organisms buried and fossilized in higher layers evolved millions of years after lower organisms."

Brown further describes an experiment carried out at Loma Linda University, p. 141:

"In an unpublished experiment at Loma Linda University, a dead bird, mammal, reptile, and amphibian were placed in an open water tank. Their buoyancy in the days following death depended on their density while living, the build up of gassed in their decaying bodies, and other factors. The experiment showed that the natural order of settling following death was amphibian, reptile, mammal, and finally bird [Personal communication, Dr. Karen Jensen, 8 January 2001]. This order or relative buoyancy correlates closely with the "evolutionary order", but, of course, evolution did not cause it."

Also note that in the event of a cataclysm such as that of a global flood, numerous exceptions to the "ordering rule" would certainly be expected. Conversely, if the accumulation and ordering of the fossils was the product of evolution over hundreds of millions of years, then the types of glaring exceptions documented by Thompson, Cremo and many others should be nonexistent.

What The Fossils Really Say - The Informational Limits of the Fossil Record

There's only so much information a person can get from a fossilized piece of bone. The only thing we can say for certain is that the animal died and was buried quickly. To infer an evolutionary relationship between it and another fossilized animal is an interpretation of the data, which cannot be proven scientifically.

Leakey makes clear the subjective nature of interpreting fossils. From "Origins Reconsidered":

p. 222 "When you look at fossils you can see the anatomy, you can feel the morphology, and, if you have the right eye for it, you can strive to identify evolutionary relationships."

p. 51 "Fossil anatomy can be extremely difficult to interpret, especially when its fragmentary, as it so often is. People's expectations, their scientific preconceptions, influence their judgments. All scientists work from some kind of theoretical framework and interpret the evidence in its light. Weak evidence can often be made to fit such a framework, whatever its form. I've seen that happen many times in paleoanthropology."

Where's the Missing Links?

Darwin Expected to Find Them

"Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain. This is perhaps the most obvious and gravest objection which can be urged against my theory" Charles Darwin, "On the Origin of Species", p. 287

Gould Admitted We Haven't

"Darwin's argument still persists as the favored escape of most paleontologists from the embarrassment of a record that seems to show so little of evolution directly."

Steven J. Gould, "The Panda's Thumb", 1982, p. 181

"The extreme rarity of transitional forms in the fossil record persists as the trade secret of paleontology. The evolutionary trees that adorn our textbooks have data only at the tips and nodes of their branches; the rest is inference, however reasonable, not the evidence of fossils."

Leakey comments on the problems these "gaps" pose:

"These gaps make it difficult, if not impossible, to establish secure evolutionary links between populations that lived millions of years ago and those living today." Richard Leakey, "Origins Reconsidered", p. 217

"Synthetishe Artbidung" (The Synthetic Origin of Species), by Heribert Nilson, 1953, p. 212:

"It is not even possible to make a caricature of an evolution out of palaeobiological facts. The fossil material is now so complete that…the lack of transitional series cannot be explained as due to the scarcity of material. The deficiencies are real, and they will never be filled."

Natural History, "Darwin and The Fossil Record", by Alfred S. Romer, Oct. 1959, pp 466, 467 "below this[Cambrian period], there are vast thicknesses of sediments in which the progenitors of the Cambrian forms would be expected. But we do not find them; these older beds are almost barren of evidence of life, and the general picture could easily be said to be consistent with the idea of special creation at the beginning of Cambrian times. 'To the question why we do not find rich fossiliferous deposits prior to the Cambrian system,' said Darwin, 'I can give no satisfactory answer.' Nor can we today."

"Biology", by Claude A. Villee, Eldra Pearl Solomon, and P. William Davis, (1985), cites George Gaylord Simpson (p. 1049):

"…nearly all categories above the level of families appear in the record suddenly and are not led up to by known, gradual, completely transitional sequences." This textbook goes on to state:

"Certainly a convenient example is the modern version of Homo Sapiens. We appear suddenly in the fossil record, or so it seems to many palaeontologists. Some dispute this, pointing to apparently transitional forms in the Middle Eastern sites of Skhul and Tabun, but these fossils can also be interpreted as hybrids between modern-type Homo Sapiens (Homo Sapiens Sapiens) and the Neanderthal variety. Thus there is no unambiguous record of the emergence of modern human kind…Aside from humans, where, for example, are the "prototurtles"? the "quasi-bats"? All the old bats are fully adapted flying mammals; they are in no way transitional forms. There is another problem in accounting for major evolutionary changed. One is that major adaptations would be of use to an organism only when more or less fully developed, though not necessarily fully refined. The lensed eye of vertebrates, cephlopod molluscs, and some polychaete annelid worms are examples. Eye lens and retina must coexist to be of any use at all. It is difficult to reconstruct a series of stages in which each is adaptive, whereby such an eye might have come into existence, or, following a proposal of such stages, to show this is indeed the way it actually happened."

Should Evolution be Taught?, by John N. Moore, 1970, pp, 9,14, 24; New Scientist, "Letters", Sept 15, 1983, p. 798:

"Some 120 scientists, all specialists, prepared 30 chapters in a monumental work of over 800 pages to present the fossil record for plants and animals divided into about 2,500 groups…Each major form or kind of plant and animal is shown to have a separate and distinct history from all the other forms or kinds! Groups of both plants and animals appear suddenly in the fossil record…Whales, bats, horses, primates, elephants, hares, squirrels,ect., are all as distinct at their first appearance as they are now. There is not a trace of common ancestor, much less a link with any reptile, the supposed progenitor. No transitional forms exist in fossil stage at all. Very likely, transitions between animal kinds and/or transitions between plant kinds have never occurred." John Moore, Professor of Natural Science, commenting on a study made by the Geological Society of London and the Palaeontologocal Association of England.

Liberty, Sept/Oct, 1975, p. 14 "To secular scientists, the fossils, evidences of the life of the past, constitute the ultimate and final court of appeal, because the fossil record is the only authentic history of life available to science. If this fossil history does not agree with evolutionary theory - and we have seen that it does not - what does it teach? It tells us that plants and animals were created in their basic forms. The basic facts of the fossil record support creation, not evolution." Harold Coffin, Zoologist.

Interpretation #1: Punctuated Equilibrium

There is, of course more than one way to interpret these fossil "gaps". The first would be to suggest that evolution occurs in sudden bursts rather than slow, continual change.

"Biology", by Claude A. Villee, Eldra Pearl Solomon, and P. William Davis, (1985), p. 1051:

"The main difficulty with punctuated equilibrium as a scientific hypothesis is that proposal of an observational test whereby it might by shown false - if indeed it is false - is very difficult. We could have confidence in it only if it survived the application of such a test. Since punctuated equilibrium, if it occurs, is a very singular event not subject to duplication or widespread observation, it is almost as difficult to assimilate into conventional, gradualistic evolutionary theory as is the theory that organisms have arisen through successive, individual acts of creation."

Interpretation #2: Evolution Has Never Taken Place

Darwin said evolution happened slowly over millions of years. Proponents of punctuated equilibrium say it happened in "bursts" which explains the lack of transitional forms in the fossil record. The other, reasonable explanation for what is seen in the fossil record, namely, evidence of sudden appearance of life forms, followed by stasis and then sudden extinction, may also suggest that evolution never happened at all. This interpretation is every bit as valid as the gradualist and punctuated equilibrium models. It is rejected, not on scientific grounds, but because evolution has been selected as the worldview of choice.

Anatomic Similarities

The fossil record's overall failure to provide the "innumerable" transitional forms between major animal types notwithstanding, a few fossil forms have been put forward as legitimate "missing links." The chief reason for this assertion is that certain fossils forms contain obvious anatomic similarities. However, Leakey warns:

"Similar anatomy does not always imply close evolutionary relationship. In evolution, identical anatomy may appear in two unrelated groups when they adapt to identical pressures of natural selection." Richard Leakey, "Origins Reconsidered", p. 79

"There are subtleties in the formation of anatomical structures that we are only just beginning to understand. Unless we have a complete understanding of these subtleties, there is always the possibility of our making mistakes in inferring close evolutionary relations between species that share an anatomical structure." Richard Leakey, "Origins Reconsidered", p. 73

Interpretation #1: Anatomic Similarities Denote a Common Ancestor

This interpretation, as mentioned before, is erroneously (and I would say deceptively) being presented as proof that evolution has occurred. Remember, in order to interpret anatomic similarities as evidence of a common ancestor, one would have to already believed in the evolution story.

Leakey's statement is important. He admits that anatomic similarity does not always imply a close evolutionary relationship. So how can we discern, from fossilized bones, exactly which species evolved from which?

Time Won't Tell

Some may suggest that the age of the specimens in question may shed light on this question. The problem comes in, however, we realize that of all the things that may be measured on a fossil (i.e. composition, size, shape, weight, mass), age is not one of them. The fossils' relative position in the strata (i.e. organism A lies buried beneath organism B ) contains no guarantees that B actually evolved from A, even if, as Leakey states, they share close anatomic similarities.

Remember also, that dating by morphology (i.e. the more "primitive" fossil forms are assigned greater ages) is a very real practice, which must assume that evolution has taken place. Radiometric dates may also be cited, but then again, those dates found in disagreement with the evolution story are rejected. At this point, the dating game becomes quite circular, with the only "constant" being the belief that the evolution story is a true one.

Fossils Considered Transitional Links When Nothing Else is Available

Some cases in point:

a) Piltdown Man

Lubenow (p. 41) states:

"The Piltdown fossils were discovered between 1908 and 1915. It was not until 1953, thirty-eight to forty-five years later, that Kenneth Oakley, Joseph Weiner, and Wilfred Le Gros Clark discovered that Piltdown Man was a fraud."

Lubenow (p. 43):

"However, it is not necessary to know who perpetrated Piltdown to know that if science were really self-correcting, Piltdown should have been uncovered long before it was. Like Boules's reconstruction of the Neandertal skeleton from La Chapelle-aux-Saints, there were elements about it that were quite obvious. The file marks on the orangutan teeth of the lower jaw were clearly visible. The molars were misaligned and filed at two different angles. The canine tooth had been filed so far that the pulp cavity had been exposed and then plugged."

b) Ramapithecus

Recall that Ramapithecus was positioned securely in the human evolutionary continuum on the scantiest fossil evidence. All that was discovered initially were some teeth and jaw fragments. Even Richard Leakey commented:

Richard Leaky, "American Scientist", 64: 174, 1976: "The case for Ramapithecus as a hominid is not substantial, and the fragments of fossil material leave many questions open."

Nevertheless, Ramapithecus was securely positioned on the human family tree in the textbooks, without a fossil skull, pelvis or limbs. Dr. Elwin Simons, as quoted in Time Magazine made this telling confession:

"Time" Magazine, Nov 7,1977: "Ramapithecus is ideally structured to be an ancestor of hominids. If he isn't, we don't have anything else that is." (Emphasis mine).

As noted, Ramapithecus was later "dethroned":

David Pilbeam, "Science", 1982, April 6-7,: "A group of creatures once thought to be our oldest ancestors may have been firmly bumped out of the human family tree…Truthfully, it appears to be nothing more than an orangutan ancestor."

c) The Dolphin Rib

"A five million year old piece of bone that was thought to be the collarbone of a human like creature is actually part of a dolphin rib...The problem with a lot of anthropologists is that they want so much to find a hominid that any scrap of bone becomes a hominid bone." Dr. Tim White (anthropologist, University of California, Berkeley), as quoted by Ian Anderson in New Scientist, April 28, 1983, p. 199

Interpretation #2: Anatomic Similarities Denote a Common Designer

As noted before, the rejection of this interpretation by the evolutionist was not arrived at scientifically, but on philosophical grounds. When we consider that animals share the same planet, under the same sun, under the same atmosphere, all dealing the same gravitational pull of the Earth, breathing the same air, it becomes clear that certain anatomic similarities are to be predicted by any model.

Oftentimes the creation, whether it is a building, or a painting, a sculpture, or a song, offer enough within itself for us to identify whom the creator is. The songs of your favorite artist contain similarities. So do the different models of cars produced by the same manufacturer. The same may be said of the buildings designed by an architect, or the paintings created by a particular artist. It's to be expected that God would do the same in his living creations. Since biblical creation is the issue here, Romans 1:18-20:

"For the wrath if God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what may be known of God is manifest in them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so they are without excuse…"

Conclusion: The fossil record is a fact that can be interpreted different ways. It is a mistake to buy into the claim that the fossil record somehow proves evolution. The fossil record can easily be interpreted as evidence for biblical creation and the flood. This interpretation handles the data in a much more logically consistent way.