Polystrate Fossils: Proof of Noah's Flood

[ksolomon]

We are taught that when we see multiple layers of sediments in the rocks,  this represents millions of years worth of deposition.  

However, polystrate fossils - which traverse multiple layers, shows the deposition was much faster.

How can a dead leaf submerged in water last long enough to be covered by mutiple layers?

This demonstrates that the layers covered the leaf BEFORE it had a chance to deteriorate - maybe a month of two at the most.

See the leaf fossil traversing multiple layer lines ?  

 

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Petrified Tree Traversing multiple Sediment Layers

 

Similar Dino fossil finds also show the same thing - a dino laying on its side through multiple layers - can't find the photo at this time.

 

Illustration of petrified trees in layers of Flood sedimentation going down hundreds of feet into the earth's crust.  These layers have been shown to go completely across our North American continent and continue into neighboring continents like Europe and South America.  This shows the event covered all land masses and drowned everything in hundreds of feet thick mud and water.

 

For more info:  https://www.icr.org/article/what-are-polystrate-fossils/

 

For this they willingly forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water (2 Peter 3:5–6).

 

 

Answers In Genesis:

For this they willingly forget: that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of water and in the water, by which the world that then existed perished, being flooded with water (2 Peter 3:5–6).
 

Evidence of Noah’s Flood can be seen all over the earth, from seabeds to mountaintops. Whether you travel by car, train, or plane, the physical features of the earth’s terrain clearly indicate a catastrophic past, from canyons and craters to coal beds and caverns. Some layers of strata extend across continents, revealing the effects of a huge catastrophe.
The earth’s crust has massive amounts of layered sedimentary rock, sometimes miles (kilometers) deep! These layers of sand, soil, and material—mostly laid down by water—were once soft like mud, but they are now hard stone. Encased in these sedimentary layers are billions of dead things (fossils of plants and animals) buried very quickly. The evidence all over the earth is staring everyone in the face.

 

 

 Geological column

"Thus, a walk though the Grand Canyon then, is not like a walk though evolutionary time; instead it's like a walk from the bottom of the ocean, across the tidal zone, over the shore, across the lowlands and into the upland regions". (Dr Gary Parker, c. 2000 - Creation facts of life). To top

Proof of a Great Flood - Polystrate Fossils

Polystrate fossils are long fossils (trees or other large objects) which are found traversing several layers of strata and demonstrate how the layers did not form slowly over millions of years.

 

1)  Petrified trees and whale fossils (standing on-end) have been found traversing MULTIPLE layers.

2)  They traverse DIFFERENT TYPES of rock, showing the layering effect of turbulent hydrologic action for different types and densities of rock material/sediments.

3)  Petrified trees have been found traversing SEVERAL SEPARATE LAYERS OF COAL, with each coal layer separated by different types of rock, demonstrating the short time for coal to form.

4)  Most polystrate petrified trees have no roots, showing they were uprooted by strong forces, transported from their origin, and quickly buried by layers of water/sediments.

 

Question:  How can trees and whale remains stay intact long enough to be fossilized while traversing different layers of rock and coal?

Answer:  Very quickly by a Violent and Great Flood.

 

Proof of a Global Flood: 
1) Rapid burial of plants/animals by water/sediments under immense pressure due to great water depth, causing fossilization. 
2) Fossils found globally on every continent. 
3) Sea animal fossils high above sea level (even in the Himalayas). 
4) Many sediment layers laid down rapidly in sequence. 
5) Bent layers without cracking (showing layers were still wet). 
6) Tall petrified trees extending perpendicular through multiple layers. 
7) No weathering/erosion between layers (flat boundaries between). 
? Layer components (sand, chalk) deposited huge distances away from their source location. 
9) Jesus said: "For as in the days that were before the FLOOD they were eating drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be."

[one.opinion]

There is a fair amount of material easily available through a browser search that argues against the interpretation of "polystrate" fossils.

https://ncse.com/book/export/html/2842

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/polystrate/trees.html

There is pretty solid evidence against a global flood that include the biogeography we see on the planet today and the obvious layering of fossils. Regarding biogeography, consider the landmass of Australia and the fact that virtually all native mammal species are marsupials or monotremes. There is not a reasonable explanation in existence that answers why these animals somehow raced to this particular part of the world and filled the available environmental niches and prevented placental mammals from finding a foothold. The clear explanation for the layering of different extinct forms of life in the fossil record is that they were on the planet at different times. No other possible explanation has the same level of plausibility.

The flood of Noah as recorded in the Bible refers to a great flood, to be certain, but more likely one of regional impact rather than global. The language used in the Bible does not conclusively indicated that the flood covered the entire globe.

[Tristen]

22 hours ago, one.opinion said:

There is a fair amount of material easily available ....

“Regarding biogeography, consider the landmass of Australia and the fact that virtually all native mammal species are marsupials or monotremes. There is not a reasonable explanation in existence that answers why these animals somehow raced to this particular part of the world and filled the available environmental niches and prevented placental mammals from finding a foothold”

The secular claim is that the reason we find marsupial fossils in Europe when they are no longer found alive there is because they were out-competed by placental mammals. Now I can't account for your subjective standard of what is “reasonable”, but if that secular premise is true, I find it very reasonable to postulate that marsupials were driven by competition to rapid dispersal. That means they may have encountered the land or ice bridge to the Australian continent – whilst the other mammals didn't get their until after that bridge had disappeared.

 

“The clear explanation for the layering of different extinct forms of life in the fossil record is that they were on the planet at different times. No other possible explanation has the same level of plausibility”

Well again, I can't account for your subjective “level of plausibility”, but I would postulate another “possible explanation”. Do you think its possible that different species with different capacities for motility, and occupying different habitats, would succumb to flooding and burial at different times during the flood – such that we would observe a general trend of fossil succession from deep ocean species, to shallow marine species, to sessile terrestrial species, to mobile terrestrial species – with humans and birds only found in the upper layers?

 

“The flood of Noah as recorded in the Bible refers to a great flood, to be certain, but more likely one of regional impact rather than global. The language used in the Bible does not conclusively indicated that the flood covered the entire globe”

God's said He would “wipe from the face of the earth the human race I have created—and with them the animals, the birds and the creatures that move along the ground” (Gen 6:7), “to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth” (Gen 6:13), “to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish” (Gen 6:17). Then, “all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits. Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.” (Gen 7:19-23).

That seems pretty conclusive to me. Then God promised “never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done” (Gen 8:21). Yet we have periodically seen many large “regional” floods.

 

[one.opinion]

10 hours ago, Tristen said:

That means they may have encountered the land or ice bridge to the Australian continent – whilst the other mammals didn't get their until after that bridge had disappeared.

So what reasonable explanation do you have for the lack of placental mammals that migrated over the land or ice bridge that the marsupials traveled over? What evidence is there of a land or ice bridge that has disappeared in the last 4,000 years?

11 hours ago, Tristen said:

I find it very reasonable to postulate that marsupials were driven by competition to rapid dispersal.

Were the marsupials running for their lives from the placentals and managed to win the trans-continental race by thousands of miles? Or was it just a closer race and the bridge was somehow destroyed after they crossed?

11 hours ago, Tristen said:

Do you think its possible that different species with different capacities for motility, and occupying different habitats, would succumb to flooding and burial at different times during the flood – such that we would observe a general trend of fossil succession from deep ocean species, to shallow marine species, to sessile terrestrial species, to mobile terrestrial species – with humans and birds only found in the upper layers?

I think it is possible, but implausible. I would expect expert swimmers to fare best under global flood conditions, and terrestrial organisms to be particularly vulnerable. Since fossils are typically found in sedimentary rock, that indicates that sediments are involved in most fossilization events. The mudslides and other types of events that would result in burial of organisms in sediments would occur much faster in terrestrial environments. I would also expect dinosaurs to have roughly equal to better mobility than humans, yet they were all buried in lower levels of sediment, without any sign of mixing as would be expected in a catastrophic event. Another major problem with this view is the plants. Obviously, angiosperms are no more mobile than other plants, yet there are layers of fossils that contain only gymnosperms (particularly cycads). No, differential mobility is not a model with competitive plausibility.

11 hours ago, Tristen said:

That seems pretty conclusive to me. Then God promised “never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done” (Gen 8:21). Yet we have periodically seen many large “regional” floods.

 

11 hours ago, Tristen said:

Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out

God didn't destroy all living creatures in the flood, despite the language of Genesis 8:21 and 7:23. It certainly seems as though God is using hyperbole to make His point.

11 hours ago, Tristen said:

God's said He would “wipe from the face of the earth...

 

1 hour ago, Abdicate said:

Genesis 7:20
Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.

22.5 feet above the mountains makes it a global event.

That depends on what mountains we are talking about here - Mesopotamia or planet-wide. The word "erets" used as earth in this passage is flexible and could easily refer to a smaller geographical area than the whole earth. If the reference is regional, then the water would cover the mountains in that region, and not necessarily the entire globe.

A global flood would present a number of additional problems that are difficult to explain. Here is a link that goes into some considerable detail why the authors consider the flood to be regional. Some of the arguments are somewhat simplistic, but there are several good points.

https://ecclesia.org/truth/flood.html

[Wade8888]

On 1/12/2019 at 11:44 PM, one.opinion said:

There is a fair amount of material easily available through a browser search that argues against the interpretation of "polystrate" fossils.

https://ncse.com/book/export/html/2842

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/polystrate/trees.html

There is pretty solid evidence against a global flood that include the biogeography we see on the planet today and the obvious layering of fossils. Regarding biogeography, consider the landmass of Australia and the fact that virtually all native mammal species are marsupials or monotremes. There is not a reasonable explanation in existence that answers why these animals somehow raced to this particular part of the world and filled the available environmental niches and prevented placental mammals from finding a foothold. The clear explanation for the layering of different extinct forms of life in the fossil record is that they were on the planet at different times. No other possible explanation has the same level of plausibility.

The flood of Noah as recorded in the Bible refers to a great flood, to be certain, but more likely one of regional impact rather than global. The language used in the Bible does not conclusively indicated that the flood covered the entire globe.

This is especially telling clue from inside the story:

 

An East wind blows to dry up the flood in the story in the Bible. If this were a global flood, an east wind would do nothing to contribute to drying up the waters of the flood. Thus I conclude that the language of the Bible is intended to describe a regional flood, not a global flood.

 

To my mind, the Black Sea flood discovered by Ballard, is probably the best candidate for the origin of the Biblical Flood story.

 

I see no reason to argue for a literal world-wide flood any more, especially since the Apostle Paul said the stories in Genesis were an Allegory, and Allegory need not be literally true. For example, I don't believe the True God commanded Abraham to burn Isaac on an altar, as Human Sacrifice is later forbidden in the Law of Moses. I don't know where that story comes from, but was probably incorporated by a baal worshiper.

Finally, the creation story in Genesis is also not literally, word for word true, as the 3rd and 4th days of creation are in the wrong order: The Sun, the Stars, and the Moon are all much older than Plants. The first day could be correct, because it could be interpreted as "Symmetry Breaking".

[one.opinion]

3 minutes ago, Abdicate said:

Genesis 7:20
Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.

22.5 feet above the mountains makes it a global event.

Again, "erets" could refer to the entire globe, or could refer to a much smaller area. It is not clear if the reference is to ALL mountains or to the mountains in the area that Noah inhabited.

[one.opinion]

9 minutes ago, Abdicate said:

It clearly says:

Genesis 7:20
Fifteen cubits upward did the waters prevail; and the mountains were covered.

22.5 feet above the mountains makes it a global event.

But we don't know which mountains - there is not enough provided in what is written to conclusively state that the mountains in verse 20 include all "the mountains" over the entire planet, or "the mountains" in a smaller geographic erets.

[one.opinion]

Why do you assume that the passage is using erets to refer to the entire planet instead of a regional area?

[Tristen]

On 1/15/2019 at 2:47 AM, one.opinion said:

So what reasonable explanation do you have ...

“What evidence is there of a land or ice bridge that has disappeared in the last 4,000 years?”

Nice loaded question. I'm obviously not obligated to find secular papers that, for some reason, ignore secular presuppositions in favour of creationist presuppositions about time frames.

Nevertheless, the idea that the ocean levels were once low enough to create land bridges between Australia and Asia is not exclusive to YEC. Furthermore, the idea of ice ages creating ice bridges between continents is not exclusive to YEC. The facts are the same. The differences between the two models is, as usual, how the presuppositions influence the interpretations (in this case, specifically about time frames). We all have the same facts.

 

“Were the marsupials running for their lives from the placentals and managed to win the trans-continental race by thousands of miles? Or was it just a closer race and the bridge was somehow destroyed after they crossed?”

The idea that environmental pressures (such as competition and predation) drive dispersal is not exclusive to YEC.

 

“I would expect expert swimmers to fare best under global flood conditions, and terrestrial organisms to be particularly vulnerable”

I would not generally expect land dwellers to be found as low on the strata as marine creatures – because even if they were washed into the water, they'd be more likely to settle nearer to land – i.e. in relatively shallow waters. Those that didn't settle quickly would probably decay – and not be fossilised. Creatures dwelling either in, or nearer to, the bottom of the sea would be inundated with sediment from land run-off – and be buried, and subsequently discovered, generally lower in the strata.

 

“Since fossils are typically found in sedimentary rock, that indicates that sediments are involved in most fossilization events”

Fossilisation indicates rapid burial in fast moving sediments – such as the conditions you'd find in a flood.

 

“The mudslides and other types of events that would result in burial of organisms in sediments would occur much faster in terrestrial environments”

You mean mudslides occurring on terrestrial landscapes – i.e. above sea level? I don't think terrestrial landscapes are inherently more vulnerable to hydraulic forces, but either way, something living at the bottom of the sea would still be buried lower in the strata.

 

“I would also expect dinosaurs to have roughly equal to better mobility than humans, yet they were all buried in lower levels of sediment, without any sign of mixing as would be expected in a catastrophic event”

I don't think you could predict that any two creatures should be found fossilised together – just a general pattern of succession. I expect humans would generally avoid dinosaurs. Would dinosaurs be smart enough to seek higher ground? Even if we did die together, would our bodies be carried by the current at the same rates? Would our bodies sink to the bottom at the same rates? Apparently it is fairly common to find mammals fossilised alongside dinosaurs – but even that surprises me – given the sparsity of the record and the rare conditions required for fossilisation.

 

“Another major problem with this view is the plants. Obviously, angiosperms are no more mobile than other plants, yet there are layers of fossils that contain only gymnosperms (particularly cycads)”

I'd be happy to take a look at your information. But it doesn't surprise me that a gymnosperm forest would be buried largely intact.

 

“No, differential mobility is not a model with competitive plausibility”

Which is an entirely subjective statement. It is abundantly both reasonable and plausible to suggest that mobility and habitat can contribute to fossil succession in a flood scenario.

 

“God didn't destroy all living creatures in the flood, despite the language of Genesis 8:21 and 7:23. It certainly seems as though God is using hyperbole to make His point”

It doesn't say that God destroyed “all living creatures in the flood”. It says “Every living thing that moved on land perished … Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out” (Gen 7:21-22) – with the explicit exception of those that were with Noah (Gen 7:23).

 

Edited January 16, 2019 by Tristen

[one.opinion]

7 hours ago, Tristen said:

“God didn't destroy all living creatures in the flood, despite the language of Genesis 8:21 and 7:23. It certainly seems as though God is using hyperbole to make His point”

It doesn't say that God destroyed “all living creatures in the flood”

Genesis 7:23 -  He blotted out every living thing that was on the face of the ground

Genesis 8:21 - Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.

It could be argued that Genesis 7:23 gives some wiggle room for living things not technically "on the face of the ground", but Genesis 8:21 does say "every living creature". I don't see any way to argue around it.

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

Nevertheless, the idea that the ocean levels were once low enough to create land bridges between Australia and Asia is not exclusive to YEC.

No, what is exclusive to YEC is the idea that massive land bridges were present as recently as 4,000 year ago.

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

Furthermore, the idea of ice ages creating ice bridges between continents is not exclusive to YEC.

The ice bridge model would require a temporary connection to an even colder land mass, mass invasion of this Antarctica-like land mass by marsupials, but virtually no other mammals, rapid warming and successional development of new ecosystems to support the marsupials (like eucalyptus forests) -- all within the last 4,000 years. This is assuming that the migration of the marsupials took place instantaneously. Realistically, the time frame for this all to have occurred would be several hundred years shorter. I'm not a geologist or an ecologist, but I'm close to certain there is no evidence supporting this highly improbable scenario.

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

Creatures dwelling either in, or nearer to, the bottom of the sea would be inundated with sediment from land run-off – and be buried, and subsequently discovered, generally lower in the strata.

I would expect the same for sessile marine organisms, but although the massive amounts of sediment moved by such a cataclysm would certainly trap some swimming organisms, it would be logical to assume that many of these would fare better, even in a massive flood, than terrestrial organisms.

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

I don't think terrestrial landscapes are inherently more vulnerable to hydraulic forces, but either way, something living at the bottom of the sea would still be buried lower in the strata.

Massive sediment flow in a terrestrial environment meets little resistance from air, but would meet substantial resistance in an aquatic environment. Sure, the sediment flow into an ocean would be extreme enough to bury organisms in a coastal habitat, but there would likely be massive areas of open ocean where a large portion of organisms would be undisturbed.

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

I'd be happy to take a look at your information. But it doesn't surprise me that a gymnosperm forest would be buried largely intact.

I'm not an expert in botanical paleontology, either, but I'm going to assume that the experts in the field would rely on more than one single gymnosperm forest, since there are still plenty of conifer forests presently on the planet. This article may have some of the information you are curious about.

https://repository.si.edu/bitstream/handle/10088/7416/paleo_2005_DiMichele_et_al_PCAS_56(Suppl_I)_HR.pdf

8 hours ago, Tristen said:

Even if we did die together, would our bodies be carried by the current at the same rates?

I would expect the sediment flow caused by the flood and the major event needed for fossilization would not be able to physically separate human and dinosaur corpses as neatly as the fossil record indicates.

I understand that YEC scientists have many hypotheses in order to attempt to explain observed facts in a light that aligns more closely with the presupposition of a 6,000-ish year old earth. But in order to maintain this scientific viewpoint, it requires numerous, repeated interpretations that are less plausible than the "secular" model. For example, ice and/or land bridges that only marsupials may cross, dinosaur and hominid fossils in completely separate rock layers because they didn't cohabitate, cataclysmic sediment flow that carefully separates dinosaur and hominid due to differential density, massively fluctuating radioisotope decay rates or massively fluctuating speed of light. All of these assumptions are less plausible than the "secular" model, with little to no evidence, but every single one of these is required to maintain the YEC scientific viewpoint.