Exploring the Intersection of Science and Faith in the Spirit of John Ray
They say diamonds are forever, but for geologists this saying doesn’t make much sense. They would agree that diamonds are for a long time—hundreds of millions if not billions of years—but not forever. Many lines of evidence reveal that one must go deep (more than 150 km) into the mantle of the Earth to find […]
If a global Flood destroyed all humans except Noah and his family just 4350 years ago, why don’t we find human fossils in the same layers of rock believed to be set down by Noah’s Flood? This is a perfectly natural and appropriate question for a young-earth creationist (YEC) to ask. After all, according to […]
The Ark Encounter theme park in Kentucky is literally built on trillions of dead things. This fact would seem to support Ken Ham’s popular response to what we would expect had the world been subject to a global flood: “Billions of dead things in rock layers…” But the fossils that form the foundation of his Ark park […]
The sedimentary rocks of the Earth hold vast quantities of fossils. Hundreds of years of careful observations have shown that fossils are far from random in their distribution but rather they appear in the geological column in a distinct pattern or order referred to as fossil succession. How can we explain the observed distribution of fossils in the […]
Evidence that some features of earth’s landscape are the product of processes acting over longer periods of time can be found everywhere we look. Some of this evidence, such as that from the Grand Canyon, may be familiar to us but other evidence is far less familiar but tells the same story. For example, high […]
Mastodons, mammoths, camels, horses, giant bison and giant sloths roaming the mountainsides of the Rocky Mountains may seem like something that only Hollywood could dream up but there is abundant evidence that North America was once home to a thriving community of animals that today we might associate with the African Serengeti. Previously (The Snowmastodon […]
Recently I shared evidence of an ancient forest preserved in amazing detail by volcanic ash (An Ancient and Alien Forest Reconstructed: A challenge for young earth creationism). I posed a number of challenging questions that this spectacular fossil discovery raises for those that hold to a young-earth creationist’ (YEC) understanding of earth’s history. Since then, […]
Fossils often provide us with only a fragmentary view of the distant past but sometimes collections of fossils record ancient and seemingly alien worlds in stunning clarity. In the past decade several notable fossil discoveries have permitted the reconstruction of entire forest ecosystems that existed at various points in time and space in earth history. Today, […]
Here is a puzzle: Where can you stand on dry ground and look up to see a river channel above you? Ok, yes, New Orleans is a good answer. But I’m talking about looking up 100 feet from a non man-made location. There are a number of places on Earth and possibly on […]
The NASA rover Curiosity has been making its way across the floor of Gale crater on Mars since 2012. It has closely examined a wide range of rock types which reveal that this location on Mars has experienced a long history of variable climates. From water-infused bedrock, water-deposited conglomerates, wind-formed fossilized dunes to active sand […]
If a global Flood destroyed all humans except Noah and his family just 4350 years ago, where are all the human fossils? This is a question that any young-earth apologist must be prepared to answer. It’s a perfectly natural and appropriate question. After all, according to young-earth creationists (YECs), nearly all fossil remains of dinosaurs, […]
On the Greek Island of Lesvos there is a World Heritage Site which includes hundreds of petrified trees and countless other fossils. Many of these petrified trees are found standing upright with root systems intact. A variety of tree species have been identified including a species similar to the giant sequoia trees found today in California. […]
Please welcome Lars Cade* as a guest blogger on Naturalis Historia. I am a Christian currently studying to become a paleontologist. While I still have much more that I need to learn before I could properly consider myself one, I know enough of the discipline to know when it is being misrepresented. Unfortunately, the young-earth […]
Animal tracks preserved in stone are found in great abundance in many parts of the geological column. You might be asking yourself, aren’t the chances incredibly small that any individual track made in mud would be preserved over long periods of time? You would be right. The vast majority of footprints won’t survive the ravages of […]
Billions of footprints are preserved in the rock record. While bones get all the attention, fossil footprints likely outnumber bones. How can we make sense of this observation? Surely, preserving a bone must be far more likely than preserving a footprint? I have written about how paleontologists use information from footprints and bones to reconstruct […]
