Biblical Creation vs. Evolution

[Soldier4Christ]

 Evolution Hopes You Don't Know Chemistry: The Problem with Chirality
by Charles McCombs, Ph.D.

Abstract
Evolutionists know that amino acids do not live, but they call this proof anyway because they claim that amino acids are the building blocks of life.

When the newspaper headline, "Life in a Test-tube," appeared in 1953, the evolutionary community became very excited because they viewed the work of Stanley Miller and Harold Urey as scientific proof that life could have been formed from chemicals by random chance natural processes. In that classic experiment, Miller and Urey combined a mixture of methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and water vapor and passed the mixture through an electric discharge to simulate lightning. At the end of the experiment, the products were found to contain a few amino acids. Since amino acids are the individual links of long chain polymers called proteins, and proteins are important in our bodies, newspapers quickly reported there was laboratory evidence that now proved life came from chemicals.

As a Ph.D. Organic Chemist, I have to admit that the formation of amino acids under these conditions is fascinating, but there is a major problem. Life was never formed in that experiment. The product was amino acids, which are normal everyday chemicals that do not "live." Even unto this day, there is no known process that has ever converted amino acids into a life form, but this fact does not stop evolutionists from claiming that this experiment is proof that life came from chemicals. Evolutionists know that amino acids do not live, but they call this proof anyway because they claim that amino acids are the building blocks of life. This claim suggests that if enough building blocks are present, life would result, but this conclusion is only an assumption and has never been demonstrated. Amino acids may be the building blocks of proteins, and proteins are necessary for life, but that does not mean that amino acids are the building blocks of life. I could go to an auto parts store and buy every single part to construct a car, but that does not provide me with a functioning motor vehicle. Just as there had to be an assembler to make a moving vehicle from those auto parts, there had to be an assembler of those amino acids to make the proteins so that life could exist in our bodies.

Ever since 1953, scientists have been asking if the formation of amino acids in those experiments proves the claim that life came from chemicals? Many have debated if this experiment validates evolution or does the evidence point to an Omnipotent Creator? For 50 years, scientists have been asking questions; for 50 years, the discussion ends in debate. Call it professional curiosity, but as a scientist, I always wondered why there are more debates on this issue than discussion of the facts. Then I realized that a discussion of the facts would inevitably lead to a discussion of the subject of chirality. Chirality is probably one of the best scientific evidences we have against random chance evolution and chirality totally destroys the claim that life came from chemicals. Obviously, this is one fact they do not even want to discuss.

Chirality is a chemical term that means handedness. Although two chemical molecules may appear to have the same elements and similar properties, they can still have different structures. When two molecules appear identical and their structures differ only by being mirror images of each other, those molecules are said to have chirality. Your left and right hands illustrate chirality. Your hands may appear to be identical, but in reality, they are only mirror images of each other, hence the term handedness. For this reason, chirality can exist as a right-handed or a left-handed molecule, and each individual molecule is called an optical isomer.

What is the problem of chirality? In our bodies, proteins and DNA possess a unique 3-dimensional shape, and it is because of this 3D shape that the biochemical processes within our bodies work as they do. It is chirality that provides the unique shape for proteins and DNA, and without chirality, the biochemical processes in our bodies would not do their job. In our body, every single amino acid of every protein is found with the same left-handed chirality. Although Miller and Urey formed amino acids in their experiments, all the amino acids that formed lacked chirality. It is a universally accepted fact of chemistry that chirality cannot be created in chemical molecules by a random process. When a random chemical reaction is used to prepare molecules having chirality, there is an equal opportunity to prepare the left-handed isomer as well as the right-handed isomer. It is a scientifically verifiable fact that a random chance process, which forms a chiral product, can only be a 50/50 mixture of the two optical isomers. There are no exceptions. Chirality is a property that only a few scientists would even recognize as a problem. The fact that chirality was missing in those amino acids is not just a problem to be debated, it points to a catastrophic failure that "life" cannot come from chemicals by natural processes.

Let's look at chirality in proteins and DNA. Proteins are polymers of amino acids and each one of the component amino acids exists as the "L" or left-handed optical isomer. Even though the "R" or right-handed optical isomers can be synthesized in the lab, this isomer does not exist in natural proteins. The DNA molecule is made up of billions of complicated chemical molecules called nucleotides, and these nucleotide molecules exist as the "R" or right-handed optical isomer. The "L" isomer of nucleotides can be prepared in the lab, but they do not exist in natural DNA. There is no way that a random chance process could have formed these proteins and DNA with their unique chirality.

If proteins and DNA were formed by chance, each and every one of the components would be a 50/50 mixture of the two optical isomers. This is not what we see in natural proteins or in natural DNA. How can a random chance natural process create proteins with thousands of "L" molecules, and then also create DNA with billions of "R" molecules? Does this sound like random chance or a product of design? Even if there were a magic process to introduce chirality, it would only create one isomer. If such a process existed, we do not know anything about it or how it would work. If it did exist, how were compounds with the other chirality ever formed? Even if there were two magical processes, one for each isomer, what determined which process was used and when it was used, if this was a random chance natural process? The idea of two processes requires a controlling mechanism, and this kind of control is not possible in a random chance natural process.

However, the problem with chirality goes even deeper. As nucleotide molecules come together to form the structure of DNA, they develop a twist that forms the double helix structure of DNA. DNA develops a twist in the chain because each component contains chirality or handedness. It is this handedness that gives DNA the spiral shaped helical structure. If one molecule in the DNA structure had the wrong chirality, DNA would not exist in the double helix form, and DNA would not function properly. The entire replication process would be derailed like a train on bad railroad tracks. In order for DNA evolution to work, billions of molecules within our body would have to be generated with the "R" configuration all at the same time, without error. If it is impossible for one nucleotide to be formed with chirality, how much less likely would it be for billions of nucleotides to come together exactly at the same time, and all of them be formed with the same chirality? If evolution cannot provide a mechanism that forms one product with chirality, how can it explain the formation of two products of opposite chirality?

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

Chirality is not just a major problem for evolution; it is a dilemma. According to evolution, natural processes must explain everything over long periods of time. However, the process that forms chirality cannot be explained by natural science in any amount of time. That is the dilemma, either natural processes cannot explain everything, or chirality doesn't exist.

If you're in doubt as to which is correct, you are a living example of the reality of chirality. Without chirality, proteins and enzymes could not do their job; DNA could not function at all. Without properly functioning proteins and DNA, there would be no life on this earth. The reality of chirality, more than any other evidence, did more to convince me of the reality of an all-powerful Creator. I hope it will do the same for you.

I find it interesting that when creationists start talking about God's supernatural creation, evolutionists usually counter by saying that everything must be explained by natural science and divine intervention is not science. I find this remark extremely amusing. When we show them that the laws of natural science cannot explain the existence of chirality, evolutionists say that the process happened a long time ago by some unknown method that they cannot explain. Now who's relying on a supernatural explanation? Although they would never call it divine intervention, they certainly are relying on faith and not on scientific facts. Evolution just hopes you don't know chemistry.

There is another problem with DNA and how it works in the human body. As part of the normal replication process for DNA, an enzyme travels down the DNA strand so that a copy strand of DNA can be produced. As the enzyme reads the sequence of molecules along the strand, and if an incorrect nucleotide is detected in the strand, there is a mechanism that uses other enzymes to cut out the bad nucleotide and insert the correct one, thus repairing the DNA.

Let's look at DNA and this repair mechanism, if indeed they were formed from random chance natural processes. If the repair mechanism evolved first, what use is a repair mechanism if DNA has not evolved yet? If DNA evolved first, how would the DNA even know it would be better off with a repair mechanism? Can molecules think? DNA is not a stable chemical molecule, and without a repair mechanism, it would easily deteriorate by chemical oxidation and other processes. There is no mechanism to explain how DNA could exist for millions of years while the repair mechanism evolved. DNA would just decompose back into pond scum before the alleged billions of random chance mutations could ever form the repair mechanism.

Once we realize that design does not happen by chance, then we realize that the entire universe is not the product of a random, chance process; it is the result of an omnipotent Creator who created everything by just His Word. I hope you are beginning to see the problem. Evolution can give you a theory that might on the surface seem possible, but when true science gets involved and scientists start asking questions, the problems and false logic of the theory become apparent. This is why evolution just hopes you don't know chemistry.

* Dr. Charles McCombs is a Ph.D. Organic Chemist trained in the methods of scientific investigation, and a scientist who has 20 chemical patents.

[Soldier4Christ]

 Dinosaur National Monument: Jurassic Park Or Jurassic Jumble?
by Various Authors

Abstract
On the heels of the American "dinosaur rush," Earl Douglass in 1909 discovered eight articulated brontosaur tail vertebrae, standing out in relief from a sandstone ridge in eastern Utah.

The Quarry Visitor Center perched upon steeply dipping Morrison Formation strata. Photo by Bill Hoesch.

By William A. Hoesch and Steven A. Austin*

More than one thousand large fossil bones stand out in bold relief upon the rock wall at the Quarry Visitor Center in Utah's Dinosaur National Monument. The first-time visitor is stunned by the magnitude of the exhibit. The quarry face (known best as "The Wall") is surely the finest on-location dinosaur display in the world. This tangled knot of dinosaur bones represents a classic "mass burial" deposit, a trademark of what geologists call the Morrison Formation. Extending from New Mexico to Canada, the Morrison Formation covers about 700 thousand square miles and has been assigned to the Jurassic System. How did such a burial take place? We seek to find the real significance of the deposit at Dinosaur National Monument (DNM) and to dispel myths that our culture has delivered to us.
History of "The Wall"

On the heels of the American "dinosaur rush," Earl Douglass in 1909 discovered eight articulated brontosaur tail vertebrae, standing out in relief from a sandstone ridge in eastern Utah. As digging began, he was shocked at how the skeletons turned up, literally one on top of another, and how the smaller stegosaurs "got in the way" of the prized sauropods.1 The sedimentary rock package containing the bones can be called the "Quarry sandstone," a lens-shaped pebbly sandstone up to 50 feet in thickness that is exposed for 3,000 feet along the ridge outcrop. The Quarry sandstone is composed chiefly of chert and tuff grains.2 Volcanoes certainly supplied the tuff grains, and perhaps the chert pebbles as well. It is part of the overall 470-foot-thick Brushy Basin Member of the Morrison Formation that is dominantly mudstone. No less than a dozen well-articulated sauropods were excavated over a 15-year period ending in 1924. Probably none was more famous than the original "Brontosaurus" excavated by Douglass, that remains the most complete ever found, and that has stood in Pittsburgh's Carnegie Museum since 1915. The Quarry Visitor Center was opened officially to the public in 1958. Popular caricatures about dinosaurs can now be compared with the stark reality of the deposit itself, in an exhibit that is without parallel in the world.

The classic dinosaur
The Jurassic Park caricature

Of all the popular images of dinosaurs, perhaps none has been so compelling as the one featured on the front cover of Life Magazine over 50 years ago.3 The magazine displayed Brontosaurus, the snub-nosed sauropod, half-floating in the waters of a swamp and lazily munching on its lush vegetation. The artwork was derived from the Yale Peabody Museum's mural painted by artist Rudolf Zallinger after six-months of consultation with the world's top geologists.4 It had been considered fact, not speculation, that the mural and magazine cover accurately represented the world in which Brontosaurus lived 150 million years ago. Because the purpose was to depict "The Age of Reptiles," mammals do not appear. The image became an icon so compelling that even a U.S. postage stamp bore its likeness. The image was derived, in a major way, from the deposit visible at the Quarry Visitor Center.

The artwork on this 1970 U.S. postage stamp was an icon for over three decades.Today, this "Jurassic Park" caricature can be regarded as twentieth-century folklore. Brontosaurus, the icon that stood for at least two generations, underwent an extreme makeover in the 1970s, to correct two mistakes made much earlier. The result was a new name, Apatosaurus, and a radically different head with a long-snouted and delicate look.5 Almost all geologists familiar with the Morrison Formation question the swamp image, and some call it "heresy."6 The contention that waters were somehow needed to buoy the giant herbivores is also discounted. The image that these were slothful, stupid, and lumbering beasts was revised with new evidence leading some to suggest warm-bloodedness. Sedimentary evidence indicating bone transport means that we see the dinosaur burial site today, not the "park" in which they lived. Mammals are not depicted in "The Age of Reptiles" icon, but mammal fossils are well represented in the Morrison Formation at DNM.7 Finally, the age for the deposit has been "adjusted" so many times over the last 80 years that there is little reason for confidence that the currently accepted age is the correct one.8

Thus, the image that had been so widely embraced by the public involved a largely fictional animal in the fictional waters of a fictional swamp during a fictional age. This was the original Jurassic Park, concocted not by Hollywood, nor by creationists, but by the very scientific leaders, museum curators, and government administrators who were most familiar with the DNM deposit.
Six facts regarding the Dinosaur National Monument deposit

We need to get the real story for the Quarry Visitor Center deposit. Recognizing the facts is important because they help us get beyond the cultural baggage and icons to develop a deeper understanding.

Fact #1: The most common fossil in the Quarry sandstone is not the dinosaur, but a group of clams, of the genus Unio.9 Nearly identical forms of this clam thrive today in nonturbid and perennial fresh waters. This clam, known for a weak hinge joining its two shells, normally comes undone within days of the creature's death.10 Fossil clams at DNM are mostly disarticulated, and obviously were transported along with the big sauropod bones and other debris. Some of the loose shells are stacked, or imbricated, in a preferred west-to-east direction. Others, less commonly, are found in articulated form, that is, with the two matching shells closed and intact. These articulated clams are not in natural growth position, but represent a "transported death assemblage." In other words burial was the cause of death.11 The equivalent sedimentary layers near Grand Junction, Colorado, display a multitude of unionids, all articulated, that are recognized as having been "buried alive during an episode of rapid sedimentation."12 That something similar happened at DNM is almost inescapable. The numbers of these clams, and their manner of burial, remind us that the real story at DNM is first and foremost, one of death, transport, and rapid burial.

Fact #2: The original Brushy Basin deposit was dominated by silica-rich volcanic ash representing explosive volcanism on a colossal scale. Three products of explosive volcanoes dominate the Brushy Basin Member: (1) discrete tuff beds up to 20 inches thick containing up to half-inch-diameter volcanic fragments accumulated from air-fall ash,13 (2) reddish or greenish, fine-grained, altered volcanic ash redeposited by water in massive beds,14 and (3) pebbles of volcanic tuff and chert some over one inch diameter dispersed through the water-worked sandstone. Montmorillonite, the kind of clay formed by alteration of volcanic ash, alone accounts for over 50% of the 470-foot-thick Brushy Basin Member at DNM.15 A staggering quantity of volcanic materials, estimated at more than 4,000 cubic miles,16 occurs within the thin but widespread Brushy Basin Member in Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona. No volcano is known within the boundary of the Morrison deposit, no local lava flows are known within the Morrison boundary, and geologists place the nearest explosive volcanic source vents in southern California or Nevada.17 How these coarse volcanic materials in such colossal quantities were distributed on so wide a scale remains a mystery. Imagine an exploding volcano in southern California that rained half-inch-diameter pumice and lapilli fragments on Utah and Colorado. That would be a most extraordinary eruption.

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

Map showing the extraordinary areal extent of the Morrison Formation.Fact #3: Fossils from the DNM quarry represent a water-transported and processed assemblage, not an in situ ecosystem. We need to dispel the image of a calm and serene park for the Quarry sandstone. The remains of whole dinosaurs, unionid clams, snails, logs, and wood fragments from the Quarry sandstone all testify to some degree of transport. The more easily transported bones like ribs and phalanges are under-represented compared to less-easily transported items like femurs, which suggests the winnowing action of water. The majority of dinosaur skeletal items were buried while articulated or closely associated with a parent carcass, including some nearly complete carcasses that came to rest in stiff rigor mortis positions.18 The dismembered carcasses certainly contained tissue adhering to bone at the time of burial. Quarry invertebrates include not only the unionid clams, but also two genera of gill-breathing snails from the prosobranch family.19 Modern snails from this family, that are nearly identical to these fossil forms, require in their life-cycle waters that are (1) perennial, (2) well-oxygenated, and (3) low in turbidity. Such conditions could hardly have been met during deposition of the Quarry sandstone bed, much less the overall Brushy Basin Member. This enigma has been called "the Morrison gastropod problem."20 The snails must also be regarded as part of the death assemblage. The fact that all of these fossil types were selectively sorted during transport from an unknown distance before burial makes very difficult the job of reconstructing an ancient "ecosystem."

A simplified north-south cross-section of the DNM Quarry.Fact #4: The agent that transported the clams, carcasses, clay, snails, sand, and pebbles was itself a most extraordinary sedimentary process. At the DNM quarry, the bones are found in three distinct intervals within the 50-foot-thick, channel-shaped Quarry sandstone. The three sandstone "channels" scour into the surfaces beneath, and experts have struggled to imagine the kind of "rivers" that each of the channels represent. The notion taught for decades at the Quarry Visitor Center by DNM rangers, that dinosaurs were washed up on a point bar along the bank of a meandering river, is now discredited.21 Bones are especially concentrated in the bottoms, not the sides, of the scour channels. The sand grains and pebbles in the sandstone are dominantly composed not of quartz, the typical river sediment, but of altered tuff and chert fragments of probable volcanic origin. The lowest of the three levels, where dinosaur bones are most abundant, contains isolated larger pebbles dispersed in a sandy matrix, a texture unlike that of normal rivers. The texture and composition of the lower interval suggests deposition from a muddy suspension, not normal bedload transport in a river. Mudflows associated with catastrophic floods during the recent eruptions at Mount St. Helens volcano produced fluidized sediment slurries in wide river valleys and deposited similar textures.22 The upper two intervals of the Quarry sandstone, where dinosaur bones are less abundant, have noteworthy scour surfaces with cross beds of sand and pebbles indicating eastward transport of muddy and sandy sediment over large dune structures by very fast water currents. We can imagine dinosaur carcasses suspended buoyantly in a denser-than-water flow. How far they floated is unknown, but the process of suspension may have not been very abrasive. Clams, snails and logs were also moved with the volcanic pebbles and carcasses within the slurry. As deposition of sediment and carcasses occurred, the remaining flow became enriched in water going from a muddy, slurry suspension current to a less-muddy traction current. The deposit itself gives us an impression of a very catastrophic water-burial event.

The pebbly sandstone matrix that entombs the dinosaur fossils. Photo by Bill Hoesch.Fact #5: Food requirements for the giant herbivores imply abundant vegetation, yet fossil evidence for localized swamps, or for in situ flourishing of plants, is scant to nonexistent. A large herbivore like Apatosaurus would need to eat more than a ton of green fodder each day in order to survive. Large numbers of dinosaurs imply enormous food reserves in the form of plants. However, paleontologists are baffled by the rarity of fossil plants: "Although the Morrison plain was an area of reasonably rapid accumulation of sediment, identifiable plant fossils are practically nonexistent."23 Transported logs occasionally occur in sandstone channels within the Morrison, but rooted soil zones with upright in situ stumps have not been reported, even though they are potentially the most fossilizable features in a volcanic terrain. Even fossil spores and pollen, the most durable traces of plants, are in very short supply.24 The enigma of the missing plant fossils might be answered by supposing that dinosaurs migrated routinely into a very arid plain where alkaline flats prevented plant growth. The bizarre notion of an "incomplete ecosystem" within a "Jurassic Desert" is a radical departure from the lush and balanced habitat of the elusive "Jurassic Park." Another explanation for the noteworthy deficiency of plant fossils, especially in the face of the sedimentary evidence at the Quarry Visitor Center, is that the flood transportation and deposition process selectively separated the dinosaurs from plants (i.e., sorting of "highly displaced" organisms).

Fact #6: The "mass accumulation" of dinosaur bones at DNM, a sort of trademark feature for the Morrison Formation in the American West, represents a mystery that lacks satisfactory explanation. About 20 such extraordinary bone quarries exist, separated by vast reaches that are relatively devoid of bones. The lowest of the three bone-bearing intervals within "The Wall" at the visitor center represents the highest bone concentration, a packing of 2.9 bones per square meter.25 As visually stunning as this is, other large dinosaur quarries in the Morrison have bone packing that is over ten times this value. The rock types in these various quarries are quite variable, but the entombed dinosaur taxa are incredibly similar, even though the Morrison Formation covers a 700-thousand-square-mile area. So uniform are the taxa that frustrated evolutionists agree, "We failed to find any convincing evidence of evolution at the generic level within the Morrison Formation."26 These massed accumulations, of which DNM is the most famous example, remain a geologic mystery.
The massed accumulations of the Morrison Formation remain a geologic mystery. Photo courtesy National Park Service.Conclusion

It is difficult to escape the conclusion that something extraordinary took place at Dinosaur National Monument. The deposit indicates enormous volcanoes, a suspension means of transport, multiple kinds of death assemblages, and a host of paleoenvironmental problems. Yet, DNM is only one of many dinosaur-massed assemblages. The above six points are hardly debatable, but are very much understated. Why does the public not receive frequent reminders of the facts so obvious within "The Wall" at DNM? Why does a coherent dinosaur "environment" seem so elusive? "Jurassic Park" is too peaceful a picture here. Clams, snails, and dismembered dinosaurs within the same deposit demonstrate a watery catastrophe. "Jurassic Jumble" is more appropriate.
Endnotes

1. Chure, D., and West, L., 1994, Dinosaur: the Dinosaur National Monument Quarry: Vernal, Utah, Dinosaur Nature Association, 40 pp.

2. Turner, C., and Peterson, F., 1992, Sedimentology and Stratigraphy of the Morrison Formation in Dinosaur National Monument, Utah and Colorado: Annual Report of the National Park Service (unpublished), contract #CA-1463-5-0001, in cooperation with the U.S. Geological Survey, 80 pp.

3. Life Magazine, September 1953.

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

4. Zallinger's famous mural was painted under the supervision of Yale geologist and museum director Carl O. Dunbar with Harvard and Yale scientists tutoring him for six months prior to commencing the mural. The mural is known to have inspired a new generation of paleontologists.

5. Douglass identified the correct diplodocus-like skull for his sauropod, but was overruled by his supervisors at Carnegie Museum who deferred to an earlier, incorrect, precedent. Thus, "the size, shape, and features of the Apatosaurus head were disputed for over a century" (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1986).

6. Bakker, R., 1986, The Dinosaur Heresies: New Theories Unlocking the Mystery of the Dinosaurs and their Extinction: New York, William Morrow, 482 pp.

7. Engelmann, G., and Callison, G., 1998, Mammalian faunas of the Morrison Formation: Modern Geology, vol. 23, pp. 343-380.

8. A claystone very near the top of the Quarry sandstone at DNM that yielded a 135.2 ± 5.5 Ma K-Ar date in 1986, gave a 152.9 ± 1.2 Ma Ar-Ar date in 1991 (Kowallis, B., et al., 1991, Age of the Brushy Basin Member of the Morrison Formation, Colorado Plateau, Western USA, Cretaceous Research, vol. 12, pp. 483-493). The age of the Morrison Formation has been "the chief point of dispute" for over 70 years as of 1944 (Stokes, W., 1944, Morrison Formation and related deposits in and adjacent to the Colorado Plateau: Geological Society of America Bulletin, vol. 55, pp. 951-992). As of 1998, "one of the significant unresolved problems related to the Morrison Formation is its age, both chronostratigraphically and biostratigraphi-cally" (Kowallis, B., et. al., 1998, The isotopic age of the Morrison Formation in the western interior; final report: in, C. Turner and F. Peterson, eds., Final Report: The Morrison Formation Extinct Ecosystems Project: unpublished report, in cooperation of the National Park Service and the U.S. Geological Survey, pp. 167-200).

9. Chure and West, op. cit.

10. Cummins, R., 1994, Taphonomic processes in modern freshwater molluscan death assemblages: implications for the freshwater fossil record: Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, vol. 108, pp. 55-73.

11. Good, S., 1998, Bivalves as tools for paleoenvironmental analysis--Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation of the Western Interior: final report: in, C. Turner and F. Peterson, eds., Final Report: The Morrison Formation Extinct Ecosystems Project, op. cit., pp. 121-158.

12. Evanoff, E., Good, S., and Hanley, J., 1998, An overview of the freshwater mollusks from the Morrison Formation (Upper Jurassic, Western Interior, USA): Modern Geology, vol. 22,
pp. 423-450.

13. Turner, C. and Fishman, N., 1991, Jurassic Lake T'oo'dichi': a large alkaline, saline lake, Morrison Formation, eastern Colorado Plateau: Geological Society of America Bulletin,
vol. 103, pp. 538-558.

14. Wahlstrom, E., 1966, Geochemistry and petrology of the Morrison Formation, Dillon, Colorado: Geological Society of America Bulletin, vol. 77, pp. 727-740.

15. Bilbey, S., 1992, Stratigraphy and sedimentary petrology of the Upper Jurassic-Lower Cretaceous rocks at Cleveland-Lloyd Dinosaur Quarry with a comparison to the Dinosaur National Monument Quarry, Utah: Ph.D. dissertation, University of Utah, 280 pp.

16. Area of Brushy Basin volcanics exceeds 120,000 square miles in eastern Utah, northeastern Arizona, northern New Mexico, western Colorado, and southern Wyoming. Thickness of volcanics averages about 200 feet through this area. Therefore, volume of volcanics is at least 4,300 cubic miles.

17. Christiansen, E., Kowallis, B., and Barton, M., 1994, Temporal and spatial distribution of volcanic ash in Mesozoic sedimentary rocks of the western interior: an alternative record of Mesozoic magmatism, in, M. Caputo, F. Peterson, and K. Franczyk, eds., Mesozoic Systems of the Rocky Mountain Region, USA: Denver, Rocky Mountain Section SEPM (Society for Sedimentary Geology), pp. 73-94.

18. Lawton, R., 1977, Taphonomy of the Dinosaur Quarry, Dinosaur National Monument: Contributions to Geology, University of Wyoming, vol. 15, no. 2, pp. 119-126.

19. Evanoff, E., et. al., 1998, op. cit., and Yen, T., 1952, Molluscan fauna of the Morrison Formation, United States Geological Survey Professional Paper 233-B, pp. 21-55.

20. Evanoff, E., 1998, Paleoenvironmental implications of freshwater gastropod faunas in the Upper Jurassic Morrison Formation of the Western Interior--an enigma between geologic and biologic evidence; final report: in, C. Turner, and F. Peterson, eds., Final Report: The Morrison Formation Extinct Ecosystem Project, op. cit., pp. 103-104.

21. Turner and Peterson, 1992, op. cit.

22. Pierson, T., and Scott, K., 1985, Downstream dilution of a lahar: transition from debris flow to hyperconcentrated streamflow: Water Resources Research, vol. 21, pp. 1511-1524.

23. White, T. E., 1964, The dinosaur quarry, in, E. Sabatka, ed., Guidebook to the Geology and Mineral Resources of the Uinta Basin: Salt Lake City, Intermountain Association of Geologists, pp. 25-26.

24. Dodson, P., Behrensmeyer, A., Bakker, R., and McIntosh, J., 1980, Taphonomy and paleoecology of the dinosaur beds of the Jurassic Morrison Formation: Paleobiology, vol. 6, no. 2,
pp. 208-232.

25. Dodson et. al., op. cit.

26. Dodson et. al., op. cit.

*William Hoesch, M.S. geology, is Research Assistant in Geology, and Steven Austin, Ph.D. geology, is Chairman of the Geology Department, both at ICR.

[Soldier4Christ]

 American Genesis the Cosmological Genesis of the Indians
by Bill Johnson

Abstract
Despite the widespread acceptance of this philosophy, anthropology has yielded strong evidence in favor of the miraculous events recorded in Genesis. Nearly all people of the world, including the American Indians, have cosmological beliefs that are similar to the Genesis account.

With the rise of uniformitarian geology and Darwinian evolution in the nineteenth century, the stage was set for a naturalistic interpretation of life. Naturalism would soon pervade every facet of life (biology, sociology, theology, etc.). The "higher" critics applied this philosophy to the Bible in their quest to strip it of the supernatural. Events in the book of Genesis such as the creation of man, original sin, the worldwide flood, and the Tower of Babel, were written off as mythological. One anti-creationist boldly stated, "Nearly all peoples have developed their own creation myth, and the Genesis story is just the one that happened to have been adopted by one particular tribe of Middle Eastern herders."1 It is commonplace today to view the book of Genesis, as well as the whole Bible, through the spectacles of naturalism.

Despite the widespread acceptance of this philosophy, anthropology has yielded strong evidence in favor of the miraculous events recorded in Genesis. Nearly all people of the world, including the American Indians, have cosmological beliefs that are similar to the Genesis account. Although gross exaggerations have worked their way into their stories through thousands of years of retelling the tales, it is evident that the main points in the Genesis account (chapters 1-11) have been preserved.
Creation of Mankind

". . . the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life. . . . the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and He took one of his ribs . . . made . . . a woman, and brought her unto the man" (2:7,21-22).

The question of man's origin has been debated for thousands of years. All men, regardless of race or religion (even atheists) have a creation story that accounts for man's existence. Most Indian tribes attribute this creation to a Creator, and their stories show great similarities to the creation story outlined in the book of Genesis

The Salinan Indians of southern California say: "When the world was finished, there were as yet no people, but the Bald Eagle was the chief of the animals. He saw that the world was incomplete and decided to make some human beings. So he took some clay and modelled the figure of a man and laid him on the ground. At first he was very small but grew rapidly until he reached normal size. But as yet he had no life; he was still asleep. Then the Bald Eagle stood and admired his work. `It is impossible,' said he, `that he should be left alone; he must have a mate.' So he pulled out a feather and laid it beside the sleeping man. Then he left them and went off a short distance, for he knew that a woman was being formed from the feather. But the man was still asleep and did not know what was happening. When the Bald Eagle decided that the woman was about completed, he returned, awoke the man by flapping his wings over him and flew away."2

The Pima Indians of southern Arizona believe, "Earth Maker took some clay in his hands, mixed it with his own sweat, and formed it into two figures—a man and a woman. He breathed life into them and they began to walk around. They lived. They had children. They peopled the land. They built villages."3
Original Sin

". . . the Lord God commanded . . . of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shall not eat . . . in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die. . . . the woman . . . took of the fruit thereof, and did eat . . . her husband [also] did eat.
. . . [the Lord said] . . . cursed is the ground for thy sake . . . for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return" (2:16-17; 3:6,17,19).

While the idea of original sin is not common among all Indian tribes, some, like the Incas of Peru, record the story in great detail:

"The natives of this land affirm that in the beginning, and before this world was created, there was a being called Viracocha. . . . when he had created the world he formed a race of giants of disproportioned greatness painted and sculptured, to see whether it would be well to make real men of that size. He then created men in his likeness as they are now; and they lived in darkness.

Viracocha ordered these people that they should live without quarrelling, and that they should know and serve him. He gave them a certain precept which they were to observe on pain of being confounded if they should break it. They kept this precept for some time, but it is not mentioned what it was. But as there arose among them the vices of pride and covetousness, they transgressed the precept of Viracocha Pachayachachi and falling, through this sin, under his indignation, he confounded and cursed them."4
Flood

". . . the wickedness of man was great in the earth. . . . the Lord said, I will destroy . . . both man, and beast . . . and [He said to Noah] Make thee an ark. . . . I will cause it to rain upon the earth. . . . the waters prevail[ed]. . . . and the mountains were covered. . . . every living substance was destroyed . . . and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him . . ." (6:5,7,14; 7:4,20,23).

There is no other story among the Indians as prolific as the worldwide flood. Nearly every tribe has a flood story that is similar to the Genesis flood.5 The Tehuelche of Patagonia attribute the flood to the wickedness of man:

"At a remote time in the past, the earth was inhabited also by people other than those created by the sun-god. They were very bad and fought among themselves all the time. When the sun-god saw this he decided to annihilate these people and to create another population in their stead. To destroy the bad people, the sun-god sent torrential and continuous rain, the springs opened, and the ocean overflowed. In the deluge all mankind and all animals were swept away. . . . the sun-god sent [out] the dove, which returned with blades of grass in its beak, proving thereby that it had found dry land. Then the sun-god decided to create new people. First he made a man, then a woman, and finally a dog to keep them company."6

The Lillooet of British Columbia believe that one day a great and continuous rain flooded the world. The Lillooet Noah, Ntci'nemkin, took refuge with his family in a large canoe. The others ascended to the mountaintops but the flood soon covered them. Only the peak of Split Mountain remained uncovered. As the waters receded, the canoe rested on Smimelc Mountain. When the ground was dry the people descended and repopulated the earth.7
Tower of Babel

". . . the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. . . . And they said, Go . . . let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven. . . . the Lord said. . . . let us go down, and there confound their language. . . . So the Lord scattered them abroad . . . and they [ceased] to build the city" (11:1,4,6-8).

Unlike the proliferation of flood legends, those concerning the confusion of tongues are mostly confined to the tribes of the southern states and Mexico. Most stories are only brief allusions, usually tacked on to the end of a flood legend, but some tribes, like the Choctaw of Louisiana, have preserved a detailed account:

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

"Many generations ago Aba, the good spirit above, created many men, all Choctaw, who spoke the language of the Choctaw, and understood one another. These came from the bosom of the earth, being formed of yellow clay, and no men had ever lived before them. One day all came together and, looking upward, wondered what the clouds and the blue expanse above might be. They continued to wonder and talk among themselves and at last determined to endeavor to reach the sky. So they brought many rocks and began building a mound that was to have touched the heavens. That night, however, the wind blew strong from above and the rocks fell from the mound. . . . The men were not killed, but when daylight came and they made their way from beneath the rocks and began to speak to one another, all were astounded as well as alarmed—they spoke various languages and could not understand one another. Some continued thenceforward to speak the original tongue, the language of the Choctaw, and from these sprung the Choctaw tribe. The others, who could not understand this language, began to fight among themselves. Finally they separated. The Choctaw remained the original people; the others scattered, some going north, some east, and others west, and formed various tribes. This explains why there are so many tribes throughout the country at the present time."8

The Anahuac Indians of Mexico believe that after the flood, the survivors began building a vast pyramid of bricks to reach the heavens. This angered the gods, who destroyed the pyramid by sending down fire from heaven.9

Conclusion

What are we to make of all these similarities? Does the evidence point to a common source? Is there a reasonable alternative?

Those persuaded by naturalism believe these stories are widespread because the Indians learned them from missionaries. There are several reasons why this explanation fails. (1) The first missionaries recorded some of these stories. (2) The Indians often distinguish between the traditions of their ancestors and those of the white man. (3) The heart of the Christian message is Christ, who is non-existent in Indian mythology, and (4) great exaggerations speak of long ages, which would predate missions to the American continents.

The most reasonable explanation for the similarities between the stories contained in American Indian folklore, and those recorded in the book of Genesis, is that all people are descendents of Noah's family. After the flood, mankind multiplied once more; and these stories were fresh in the minds of men who would soon be dispersed throughout the whole world.

Despite the failures of naturalism, this worldview continues to hold the minds of countless individuals. One might wonder why there is such a strong propensity towards a naturalistic interpretation of life. The main reason lies with the religious and ethical implications supernaturalism has on man. (cf. John 3:19-20.)

Naturalists would claim to reject supernaturalism on scientific grounds alone. The truth is that naturalism cannot account for the known facts. It isn't driven scientifically, but is a philosophical position that has excluded the supernatural. An honest evaluation of all the data, especially the anthropological evidence, should lead one to the conclusion that supernaturalism is the position that fits the facts better than its rivals.
Endnotes

   1. Dawkins, Richard, Blind Watchmaker, New York, Norton, 1986, p. 316.
   2. Mason, J. Alden, "The Ethnology of the Salinan Indians" in University of California Publications in American Archaeology and Ethnology, vol. 10,
      no. 4, 14 Dec. 1912, pp. 191-192.
   3. Erdoes, Richard, American Indian Myths and Legends, New York, Pantheon Books, 1984, pg. 473.
   4. Markham, Sir Clements, History of the Incas, 1967, pp. 28-29.
   5. The author has amassed over 200 flood legends from North and South America.
   6. Wilbert, Johannes and Karin Simoneau, Folk Literature of the Tehuelche Indians, UCLA, 1984, p. 104.
   7. Teit, James, "Traditions of the Lillooet Indians of British Columbia" in The Journal of American Folklore, vol. XXV, No. XCVIII, 1912, p. 342.
   8.  Bushnell, David L., "The Choctaw of Bayou Lacomb St. Tammany Parish Louisiana" in Bulletin of the Bureau of American Ethnology, vol. 48, 1909,
      p. 30.
   9. Tylor, Edward B., Anahuac: Or Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern, London, Longman & Roberts, 1861, pp. 276- 277.

*Bill Johnson is a creationist from Spokane, Washington.

[Soldier4Christ]

 Biology Confronts Evolution
by Joseph Mastropaolo, Ph.D.

Abstract
As we have seen, biology is the best explanation of life. It is the most complete, the most observable, and the most verifiable with experiments. There is no need to employ any of the unnecessary, misleading, multi-inverted, and unobservable complexities of evolution superstition. Biology completely eliminates evolution.

Evolution pretends to be biology but it plays us for fools because it provides no successful experimental documentation. Let's see if there is one scintilla of scientific evidence to support evolution.

Most biology textbooks show a glass apparatus in which the precursors for amino acids were boiled and electrically sparked for a week, and sure enough, there were trace amounts of a few amino acids. The implication is that if similar, unthinking processes were continued, then a living cell would evolve. Such logic is like stating that automobiles evolved long ago by means of rubber sap, sand, iron ore, and coal falling into a volcano. The iron ore and the carbon in the coal made steel, the sand melted and made glass, and the sap vulcanized and made rubber. Then after billions and billions of trials and errors, the text may say, there evolved spontaneously better and better pistons, cylinders, whole engines with spark plugs and transmissions, axles on four wheels with rubber tires under bodies of steel with glass windows, windshield wipers, headlights, and tanks full of gasoline. The text might state that the first cell and all life evolved in a similar way.

Scientists note that such a tall tale is a fantasy of a peculiar type. If someone said he had bought a brand-new car the night before and in the morning found it rusted and rotted to a pile of powder, then we would note that his story described correctly the direction of the laws of physics, but rust and rot do not occur that fast. Contrarily, if he says that a pile of sand and iron ore evolved into a brand-new car, then we recognize this as an inverted fantasy because it is the exact opposite of the way reality works. So, the amino acid and volcano car examples are not merely fantasies, they are inverted fantasies. They are not the cow-jumped-over-the-moon kind of tall tales, because cows can jump a low fence. They are the grass-ate-the-cow kind of tall tales, the inverted, upside-down kind of fantasy.

One way that scientists reject tall tales is with observation. Scientists are persuaded by observing cars coming off the assembly lines in Detroit and note that no one has ever seen a car spontaneously, nor purposefully, evolved in or out of a volcano. Scientists therefore unequivocally conclude that all cars were created by intelligent design. But what about life? Is biology sufficient to explain life or must it be supplemented by inverted evolutionary concepts to fully describe the biological world? Let us pursue this answer by examining the life cycle of a representative life form.
Survival by Means of Genetic Reserves

The monarch butterfly is a good example of biology because all observations can be verified. Its whole life cycle is sequenced from one allotment of deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and can be observed in 60 days. The monarch butterfly's egg is oval and about one millimeter long. It hatches in three days to a caterpillar which spins a chrysalis around itself then hatches as the butterfly. Then it has the ability to fly, migrate, eat, mate, and procreate. Shortly after completion of their reproductive functions, both male and female become dehydrated and die.
Unique Sequential Genetic Reserves

The life cycle of the monarch butterfly teaches that within the seemingly inert egg are all of the genetic instructions to form a sixteen-legged caterpillar and a six-legged butterfly. There was no physical manifestation of the caterpillar when it was an egg just as there was no physical manifestation of the butterfly when it was a caterpillar. There was a manifested morphology while there were unmanifested in the organism's genetic reserves meticulously planned transitional structures and different morphologies. To observe such remarkable transformations in 60 days teaches an important lesson on genetic reserves. These incredibly complex transformations, which no human engineer can blueprint, may be called sequential genetic reserves. They occur once in a rigorous order to attain adulthood and do not occur again. Every complex organism has them. Some do not transform from sixteen legs to six legs, some do not transform from pedestrians to flyers, but the transformations to adulthood are no less remarkable. Every multicelled life form must grow and develop from an egg or seed to an adult configuration and that requires continuous structural and functional alterations that are molecularly planned, organized, coordinated, controlled, and commanded beyond human comprehension. We do not know how the DNA did it, but we do know that such mega-engineering could not have been done brainlessly the way evolution pretends. There are other kinds of genetic reserves.
Punctual and Precise Cyclical Genetic Reserves

When the arctic fox has a gray coat of fur in summer, which blends with the tundra, it has in its genetic reserve the white fur it will wear in winter. The fox's white fur in winter blends with the snow but its genetic reserve still contains the gray fur for the following summer. Similarly, the rock ptarmigan draws from its genetic reserves to display feathers of mottled reddish-brown in spring, then brownish-gray in fall, then white in winter. Trees leaf and bloom in spring, fruit in summer, then drop their leaves in the fall. Birds nest and rear young in spring and summer, then migrate in the fall. These periodicities are from the organism's cyclical DNA genetic reserves and go on repetitively for its lifetime with punctuality and precision. The fox has white fur for the first snowfall, not the last, and gray fur for the first thaw, not a week or a month later. And it never grows red or green or orange or blue fur by trial and error like random processes might propose. If its cyclical genetic reserves were not engineered for precision and punctuality, it could not survive one season.
Punctual and Precise Arousal Genetic Reserves

Exercise in the heat arouses the genetic reserve to synthesize heat-shock proteins that enable activity in the hot environment. Activity patterns arouse new proteins for muscle actin and myosin contractile filaments. Skeletal muscle hypertrophy and bradycardia are aroused from training, and skeletal muscle atrophy and tachycardia from bed rest. An increased concentration of red blood cells and 2,3-diphospho-glycerate are aroused by sojourns at high altitude, then lost by a return to sea level. New collateral coronary arteries are synthesized in two months to get around blocked arteries. New bone cells are aroused by fractures, and new scar tissue from abrasions, cuts, or tears. These are but a few of the innumerable DNA genetic reserves manifested by arousal that are built into each life form. They may be aroused in a matter of hours, not millions of years. They cannot be incorporated by evolution because the organism cannot experience what is needed until the event, and it will not survive unless the need is immediately satisfied. Vacant-minded evolution cannot plan or organize or coordinate or command or control change because it is brainless. What is brainless is simple (to the extreme) and cannot comprehend or act in what is complex to the extreme: life and survival.
All Genetic Reserves Function At Once

From conception to death, the DNA of the life form makes available, as needed, all genetic reserves and there is no interference amongst them. For example, the life form may arouse simultaneously the separate proteins for heat shock and altitude as it climbs a mountain in the heat of the day as well as the proteins to withstand the bitter cold at night. Always at the ready, the abundant genetic reserves may manifest themselves in any appropriate pattern at any time. They provide each life form with remarkable arrays of morphological, functional, and behavioral mechanisms to meet punctually and precisely the variabilities of any environment and to survive the extremes. And they do it right the first time. They do not do it by magic or blind iteration over alleged millions of years, as the inverted evolutionist superstition would have us believe. If the arctic fox had to evolve its white coat for the first snowfall by chance, it would not have survived one day. Like every life form, it needed the versatility, precision, and punctuality of all its genetic reserves from conception or it would never have survived even to being born.
Are Response, Adaptation, Acclimation, and Acclimatization, Evolution or Design?

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

If a person exercises, the heart rate will increase and this is called a response. If a person trains for weeks with that exact exercise, then the heart rate will be lower than the initial response. That lowered heart rate for the same exercise might be called, adaptation. If such a modified response is instigated by an environment, then it may be called acclimation. If in response to a change in climate, then it may be called acclimatization. Calling any of these evolution misleads us because the immediate response is an attribute of the current physiological configuration from the DNA. From a store of arousal genetic reserves in the DNA, that configuration dynamically masters new requirements and stays current. Those reserves will synthesize the appropriate new proteins whether the stimulus comes from within, like the exercise, or from outside like the climate, or something else in the environment. By appropriating the four responses, evolutionists not only mislead us but they also complicate what is in reality quite simple. The design takes care of everything. Evolution has nothing to do and that is why biology has eliminated it.
Are There Speciation, Micro- and Macroevolution in Reality Biology?

Anyone can observe remarkable variation in biology. All brothers and sisters are different. Even identical twins have different fingerprints and behaviors. The Chihuahua is not a different species. "Speciation" and "microevolution" are attempts to appropriate the immense variability of biology. All Chihuahuas are different but not one will ever evolve to a cat or a raccoon or anything else. So too "macroevolution" as an extension of microevolution is a fraudulent misrepresentation that has never been seen because it is an inverted fantasy like grass eating a cow.
Life Described Scientifically

As anyone can observe, the Primordial Law of Biology is minor vita ex vita, life arises only from life and always with less vitality. Biology is under the jurisdiction of the laws of the universe, the propaganda of evolution notwithstanding. The Primordial Law of the Universe is natura semper scalas descendet, nature always descends, that is, devolves. Therefore, devolution, never evolution, is the relentless, inescapable law of the universe. The true nature of the universe, and therefore biology, is devolution, the exact opposite of masquerading evolution interloping in public school and university biology textbooks as science.

The history of each individual in each generation is the same as for the population, but on a smaller scale. The individual is conceived with its greatest vitality and progressively devolves that vitality until death. Just as no individual can live forever, so no population can live forever. All life forms individually and collectively are fixed and mortal.

From environmental pollutants that cause genetic disorders, populations lose their vitality until they cannot reproduce viable offspring. That is the advent of extinction. By contrast, the evolution superstition in biology textbooks is a multi-inverted fantasy because it not only teaches that life can spring up like the volcano car, but that life and the car can perfect themselves forever like fictional perpetual motion machines.
Conclusion

As we have seen, biology is the best explanation of life. It is the most complete, the most observable, and the most verifiable with experiments. There is no need to employ any of the unnecessary, misleading, multi-inverted, and unobservable complexities of evolution superstition. Biology completely eliminates evolution.

Reference

Mastropaolo, Joseph. The Rise and Fall of Evolution, A Scientific Examination. 2003, pp. 115-123. Manuscript in revision.

*Dr. Mastropaolo is an adjunct professor of physiology for the ICR Graduate School.
Related Topics

[Soldier4Christ]

 Was Charles Darwin Psychotic? A Study of His Mental Health
by Jerry Bergman, Ph.D

Abstract
Darwin was clearly a very troubled man and suffered from severe emotional problems for most of his adult life, especially when he was in the prime of life. The exact cause of his mental and many physical problems has been much debated and may never be known for certain.
Introduction

Darwin's many lifelong and serious illnesses have been the subject of much speculation and study for over a century. Darwin stated that his health problems began as early as 1825 when he was only sixteen years old, and became incapacitating around age 28 (Barloon and Noyes, 1997, p. 138). Horan (1979, p. ix) concluded that Darwin was "ill and reclusively confined to his home in Kent for forty years." Darwinian scholar Michael Ruse even concluded that "Darwin himself was an invalid from the age of 30" (2003, p. 1523). And medical doctor George Pickering, in an extensive study of Darwin's illness, concluded that in his early thirties, Darwin became an "invalid recluse" (1974, p. 34). UCLA School of Medicine Professor Dr. Robert Pasnau (1990, p. 123) noted that Darwin also "remained ill almost continually" for the entire five years that he was on his HMS Beagle trip.

Dozens of scholarly articles and at least three books have been penned on the question of Darwin's illness. The current conclusion is that Darwin suffered from several serious and incapacitating psychiatric disorders, including agoraphobia. Agoraphobia is characterized by fear of panic attacks (or actual panic attacks) when not in a psychologically safe environment, such as at home. Darwin, as is common among agoraphobiacs, also developed many additional phobias—being in crowds, being alone, or leaving home unless accompanied by his wife (Kaplan and Sadock, 1990, pp. 958-959).

Agoraphobia is also frequently associated with depersonalization (a feeling of being detached from, and outside of, one's own body), a malady that Darwin also suffered (Barloon and Noyes, 1997, p. 138). A study of Darwin's mental condition by Barloon and Noyes concluded that Darwin suffered from anxiety disorders that so severely impaired his functioning that it limited his ability to leave his home, even just to meet with colleagues or other friends. This diagnosis likely explains his very secluded, hermit-like lifestyle (1997, p. 138). It also helps to explain the title of Desmond and Moore's 1991 biography of Darwin: Darwin: The Life of a Tormented Evolutionist.
Other Psychiatric and Medical Problems

Colp (1977, p. 97) concluded that "much of Darwin's daily life was lived on a rack which consisted of fluctuating degrees of pain" that was sometimes so severe that Darwin called it "distressingly great." Darwin's many psychological or psychologically influenced physical health symptoms included severe depression, insomnia, hysterical crying, dying sensations, shaking, fainting spells, muscle twitches, shortness of breath, trembling, nausea, vomiting, severe anxiety, depersonalization, seeing spots, treading on air and vision, and other visual hallucinations (Barloon and Noyes, 1997, p. 139; Picover, 1998, p. 290; Colp, 1977, p. 97; Bean, 1978, p. 573). The physical symptoms included headaches, cardiac palpitations, ringing in ears (possibly tinnitus), painful flatulence, and gastric upsets—all of which commonly have a psychological origin (Pasnau, 1990). Colp noted that "behind these symptoms there was always a core of anxiety and depression" (1977, p. 97). Some speculate that part of Darwin's mental problems were due to his nagging, gnawing fear that he had devoted his "life to a fantasy"—and a "dangerous one" at that (Desmond and Moore, 1991, p. 477). This fear was that his theory was false and there was, in fact, a divine Creator.

Darwin's behavior also indicates that he suffered from a mental disorder. Although devoted to his wife and daughters, he "treated them as children" even after his daughters were fully grown (Picover, 1998, p. 289). Some of Darwin's statements to others also cast doubt on his mental stability. For example, in 1875 he wrote the following words to fellow scientist Robert Hooker:

    You ask about my book, & all that I can say is that I am ready to commit suicide: I thought it was decently written, but find so much wants rewriting. . . . I begin to think that every one who publishes a book is a fool (quoted in Colp, 1977, p. 228).

Colp noted that Darwin's son Leonard claimed that his father's illness even interfered with his feelings for his children. For example, Leonard once noted that

    As a young lad I went up to my father when strolling about the lawn, and he . . . turned away as if quite incapable of carrying on any conversation. Then there suddenly shot through my mind the conviction that he wished he was no longer alive (quoted in Colp, 1977, p. 100).

Darwin's mental problems were considered so severe that Picover (1998, p. 289) included Darwin in his collection of historical persons that he calls "strange brains . . . eccentric scientists, and madmen." That Darwin suffered from several severely disabling maladies is not debated; the only debate is what caused them (Pasnau, 1990, p. 121).
Other Possible Causes of Darwin's Condition

Others, including Darwin's own wife, argued that his mental problem stemmed from guilt over his life's goal to refute the argument for God from design (Bean, 1978,
p. 574; p. 28; Pasnau, 1990, p. 126). Most of the psychoanalytic studies have argued that his problems were a result of his repressed anger toward his tyrannical father and "the slaying of his heavenly father" by his theory (Pasnau, 1990, p. 122).

Diagnosis of the cause of Darwin's mental and physical disorders include parasitic disease (Chaga's disease—caused by an insect common in South America), arsenic poisoning, and possibly even an inner ear disorder (Picover, 1998, p. 290; Pasnau, 1990). All of these causes have largely been refuted. Many persons conclude he had a classic, essential mental disturbance bordering on psychosis (a severe, incapacitating mental disorder). Regardless of the diagnosis, Darwin's condition was clearly incapacitating, often for months at a time, and rendered him an invalid for much of his life, especially in the prime of his life.

Arnold Sorsby concluded that Darwin was also an obsessive-compulsive and gives the following evidence:

    If Chagas's disease did not cause Darwin's symptoms what did? My personal diagnosis would be an anxiety state with obsessive features and psychosomatic manifestations. Anxiety clearly precipitated much of his physical trouble, and regarding the obsessive component there are several important points. . . .

Darwin exhibited the obsessional's trait of having everything "just so"; he kept meticulous records of his health and symptoms like many obsessional hypochondriacs. Everything had to be in its place; he even had a special drawer for the sponge which he used in bathing . . . Then there is the health diary he kept. Days and nights were given a score according to how good they were; the score was added up at the end of each week, and there is evidence of frequent changing of mind in deciding whether a night was very good or just good (1974, p. 228).
Darwin's Own Words about His Condition

In addition to the diary on his health problems and complaints (Colp, 1977, p. 136), he frequently discussed his health problems in his letters and his autobiography. Darwin's own description of his condition included the following: "I am forced to live, . . . very quietly and am able to see scarcely anybody and cannot even talk long with my nearest relations" (quoted in Bowlby, 1990, p. 240). Darwin once complained that speaking for only "a few minutes" to the Linnean Society "brought on 24 hours vomiting" (Darwin, 1994, pp. 98-99). At another time, Darwin had a "house full of guests" and after he visited the parish church for a christening, he was "back to square one" and his good health "had vanished `like a flash of lightning'" and sickness (including the vomiting) returned (Desmond and Moore, 1991, p. 456). The suddenness of his illness, as illustrated by these incidents, indicates that his incapacitating episodes were psychological in origin.

Another side of Darwin revealed his sadistic impulses. His own words taken from his autobiography give a vivid example:

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

    In the latter part of my school life I became passionately fond of shooting, and I do not believe that anyone could have shown more zeal for the most holy cause than I did for shooting birds. How well I remember killing my first snipe, and my excitement was so great that I had much difficulty in reloading my gun from the trembling of my hands. This taste long continued and I became a very good shot (1958, p. 44).

The fact that he loved killing so much that killing his first bird caused him to tremble with excitement could certainly indicate a sadistic streak in Darwin. His passion for killing birds is well known. One wonders if this "passion" for killing may have, in part, motivated his ruthless "survival of the fittest" tooth and claw theory of natural selection.
Conclusions

Darwin was clearly a very troubled man and suffered from severe emotional problems for most of his adult life, especially when he was in the prime of life. The exact cause of his mental and many physical problems has been much debated and may never be known for certain. Since Darwin wrote extensively about his mental and physical problems, we have much material on which to base a reasonable conclusion about this area of his life. The diagnosis of the cause of his mental and physical problems includes a variety of debilitating conditions, but agoraphobia with the addition of psychoneurosis is most probably correct.

Unfortunately, most writers have shied away from this topic, partly because Darwin is now idolized by many scientists and others. Often listed as one of the greatest scientists of the nineteenth century, if not the greatest scientist that ever lived, Darwin is one of the few scientists known to most Americans. To understand Darwin as a person and his motivations, one must consider his mental condition and how it affected his work and conclusions.
References

Barloon, Thomas and Russell Noyes, Jr. 1997. "Charles Darwin and Panic Disorder." JAMA 277(2):138-141.

Barlow, Nora, ed. 1958. The Autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809-1882. NY: Norton.

Bean, W. B. 1978. "The Illness of Charles Darwin." The American Journal of Medicine 65(4):572-574.

Bowlby, John. 1990. Charles Darwin: A New Life. NY: Norton.

Colp, Ralph Jr. 1977. To Be an Invalid: The Illness of Charles Darwin. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago.

Darwin, Charles. 1994. The Correspondence of Charles Darwin. Cambridge, England: Cambridge University. Vol. 9.

Desmond, Adrian and James Moore. 1991. Darwin: The Life of a Tormented Evolutionist. NY: Warner Books.

Grigg, Russell. 1995. "Darwin's Mystery Illness." Creation Ex Nihilo 17(4):28-30.

Horan, Patricia G. 1979. Foreword to The Origin of Species. NY: Gramercy Books.

Kaplan, Harold I. and Benjamin J. Sadock, ed. 1990. Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry/V. Volume 1 Fifth Edition. NY: Williams and Wilkins.

Pasnau, R. O. 1990. "Darwin's Illness: A Biopsychosocial Perspective." Psychosomatics 31(2):121-128.

Pickering, George. 1974. Creative Malady. NY: Oxford University Press.

Picover, Clifford A. 1998. Strange Brains and Genius: The Secret Lives of Eccentric Scientists and Madmen. NY: Quill William Morrow.

Ruse, Michael. 2003. "Is Evolution a Secular Religion?" Science 299:1523-1524.

Sorsby, Arnold, ed. 1974. Tenements of Clay. NY: Charles Scribner's Sons.

*Dr. Bergman is on the Biology faculty at Northwest State College in Ohio.

[Soldier4Christ]

 New Rate Data Support a Young World
by D. Russell Humphreys, Ph.D.

Abstract
Exciting new developments in RATE projects are confirming our basic hypothesis: that God drastically speeded up decay rates of long half-life nuclei during the Genesis Flood and other brief periods in the earth's short history.

New experiments done this year for the RATE project1 strongly support a young earth. This article updates results announced in an ICR Impact article last year2 and documented at a technical conference last summer.3 Our experiments measured how rapidly nuclear-decay-Nuclear decay in zircon graphic.generated Helium escapes from tiny radio-active crystals in granite-like rock. The new data extend into a critical range of temperatures, and they resoundingly confirm a num-erical prediction we published several years before the experiments.4 The Helium loss rate is so high that almost all of it would have escaped during the alleged 1.5 billion year uniformitarian5 age of the rock, and there would be very little Helium in the crystals today. But the crystals in granitic rock presently contain a very large amount of Helium, and the new experiments support an age of only 6000 years. Thus these data are powerful evidence against the long ages of uniformitarianism and for a recent creation consistent with Scripture. Here are some details:
Radioactive crystals make and lose Helium

These radioactive crystals, called zircons, are common in granitic rock. As a zircon crystal grows in cooling magma, it incorporates Uranium and Thorium atoms from the magma into its crystal lattice. After a zircon is fully formed and the magma cools some more, a crystal of black mica called biotite forms around it. Other minerals, such as quartz and feldspar, form adjacent to the biotite.

The Uranium and Thorium atoms inside a zircon decay through a series of intermediate elements to eventually become atoms of Lead. Many of the inter-mediate nuclei emit alpha particles, which are nuclei of Helium atoms. For zircons of the sizes we are considering, most of the fast-moving alpha particles slow to a stop within the zircon. Then they gather two electrons apiece from the surrounding crystal and become Helium atoms. Thus a Uranium 238 atom produces eight Helium atoms as it becomes a Lead 206 atom. (See diagram.)

Helium atoms are lightweight, fast-moving, and do not form chemical bonds with other atoms. They move rapidly between the atoms of a material and spread themselves as far apart as possible. This process of diffusion, theoretically well-understood for over a century, makes Helium leak rapidly out of most materials.
Natural zircons still contain much Helium

In 1974, in the Jemez Mountains of northern New Mexico, geoscientists from Los Alamos National Laboratory drilled a borehole several miles deep into the hot, dry granitic rock to determine how suitable it would be as a geothermal energy source. They ground up samples from the rock cores, extracted the zircons, and measured the amount of Uranium, Thorium, and Lead in the crystals. From those data they calculated that 1.5 billion years worth of nuclear decay had taken place in the zircons,6 making the usual uniformitarian assumption that decay rates have always been constant.7

Then they sent core samples from the same borehole to Oak Ridge National Laboratory for analysis. At Oak Ridge, Robert Gentry (a well-known creationist) and his colleagues extracted the zircons, selected crystals between 50 and 75 µm (0.002 to 0.003 inches) long, and measured the total amount of Helium in them. They used the Los Alamos Uranium-Lead data to calculate the total amount of Helium the decay had produced in the zircons. Comparing the two values gave the percentage of Helium still retained in the zircons, which they published in 1982.8

Their results were remarkable. Up to 58 percent of the nuclear-decay-generated Helium had not diffused out of the zircons. The percentages decreased with increasing depth and temperature in the borehole. That confirms diffusion had been happening, because the rate of diffusion in any material increases strongly with temperature. Also, the smaller the crystal, the less Helium should be retained. These zircons were both tiny and hot, yet they had retained huge amounts of Helium!
Experiments verify RATE prediction

Many creationists believed it would be impossible for that much Helium to remain in the zircons after 1.5 billion years, but we had no measurements of diffusion rates to substantiate that belief. As of 2000 the only reported Helium diffusion data for zircons9 were ambiguous. So in that year, the RATE project commissioned experiments to measure Helium diffusion in zircon (as well as biotite) from the same borehole. The experimenter was one of the world's foremost experts in Helium diffusion measurements in minerals.

At the same time, we estimated the diffusion rates that would be necessary to get Gentry's observed Helium retentions for two different zircon ages: (a) 6000 years, and (b) 1.5 billion years. Then in the year 2000 we published the two sets of rates as "Creation" and "Evolution" models in our book outlining the RATE project goals.10

The next year, 2001, we received a preprint of a paper reporting data on zircons from another site. In 2002 we received zircon data for our Temperature/diffusivity graph.site from our experimenter. Both sets of data cover a temperature range of 300º to 500º C, which is somewhat higher than the temperature range of Gentry's data and our prediction, 100º to 277º C. Both sets agree with each other and, while not overlapping our "Creation" model, both lined up nicely with it. We reported these data in a technical paper that the editors of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism11 accepted for publication in their Proceedings.12

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

In July 2003, just one month before the conference, we received a new set of zircon and biotite data from our experimenter. These data were much more useful to us, in three ways: (1) these zircons were 50 to 75 µm in length, (2) both zircons and biotite came from a 1490 meter depth, (3) the zircon diffusion rate data went down to 175º C. Items (1) and (2) mean that these zircons matched Gentry's exactly, being from the same borehole, rock unit, depth range, and size range. Item (3) means the diffusion rate data now extend well into the temperature range of our models.

These new data13 agree very well with our "Creation" model prediction, as the figure shows. Moreover, the diffusion rates are nearly 100,000 times higher than the maximum rates the "Evolution" model could allow, thus emphatically repudiating it.
New data closes loopholes

The experimenter also accurately measured the total amounts of Helium in both the zircons and in the surrounding flakes of biotite. This ties up some loose ends for our case: (1) The total amount of Helium in the zircons confirms Gentry's retention measurements very well. (2) Our measurements show that the Helium concentration was about 300 times higher in the zircons than in the surrounding biotite. This confirms that Helium was diffusing out of the zircons into the biotite, not the other way around. (3) The total amount of Helium in the biotite flakes (which are much larger than the zircons) is roughly equal to the amount the zircons lost.

Compare this situation to an hourglass whose sand represents the Helium atoms: We have data (from Uranium and Lead) for the original amount in the top (zircon), the present amount in the top, the present amount in the bottom (biotite), and the rate of trickling (diffusion) between them. That makes our case very strong that we are reading the Helium "hourglass" correctly.
The zircons are young

The new data allow us to calculate more exactly how long diffusion has been taking place. The result is 6000 (± 2000) years—about 250,000 times smaller than the alleged 1.5 billion year Uranium-Lead age. This and other exciting new developments in RATE projects are confirming our basic hypothesis: that God drastically speeded up decay rates of long half-life nuclei during the Genesis Flood and other brief periods in the earth's short history. Such accelerated nuclear decay collapses the uniformitarian "ages" down to the Scriptural timescale of thousands of years.
Endnotes and References

   1. RATE stands for "Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth," a research initiative launched in 1997 jointly by the Institute for Creation Research, the Creation Research Society, and Answers in Genesis. See book in ref. 4, and numerous pages about the RATE project at www.icr.org.
   2. D. R. Humphreys, "Nuclear Decay: Evidence for a Young World," ICR Impact No. 352, October 2002. Archived at /articles/imp/imp-352.htm.
   3. D. R. Humphreys, S. A. Austin, J. R. Baumgardner, and A. A. Snelling, "Helium diffusion rates support accelerated nuclear decay," Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, (Pittsburgh, PA: Creation Science Fellowship, 2003) pp. 175-195. Archived at http://www.icr.org/research.
   4. D. R. Humphreys, "Accelerated nuclear decay: A viable hypothesis?" in Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth: A Young-Earth Creationist Research Initiative, L. Vardiman, A. Snelling, and E. Chaffin, editors (San Diego, CA: Institute for Creation Research and the Creation Research Society, 2000)
      p. 348, fig. 7. Book information at: http://www.icr.org.
   5. Uniformitarians assume that "all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation" (II Peter 3:4), without interventions by God which might drastically affect the rates of some physical processes.
   6. R. E. Zartman, "Uranium, thorium, and lead isotopic composition of biotite granodiorite (Sample 9527-2b) from LASL Drill Hole GT-2," Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory Report LA-7923-MS, 1979.
   7. The 1.5 billion year uranium-lead date was consistent with uniformitarian geological expectations for the age of the Precambrian "basement" rock from which the zircons came.
   8. R. V. Gentry, G. J. Glish, and E. H. McBay, "Differential helium retention in zircons: implications for nuclear waste management," Geophysical Research Letters 9(10): 1129-1130, October 1982.
   9. Sh. A. Magomedov, "Migration of radiogenic products in zircon," Geokhimiya, 1970, No. 2, pp. 263-267 (in Russian). English abstract in Geochemistry International 7(1): 203, 1970. English translation available from D. R. Humphreys.
  10. See ref. 4 for the prediction.
  11. Conference website at http://www.icc03.org.
  12. See ref. 3 for technical details.
  13. We plan to report these new data in detail in future technical publications, particularly in a paper to be submitted to the Creation Research Society, and also in the final report of the RATE project two years from now.

*Dr. Humphreys is an Associate Professor of Physics at ICR.

[Soldier4Christ]

 Carbon Dating Undercuts Evolution's Long Ages
by John Baumgardner, Ph.D.

Abstract
The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event is to understand that fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global Flood that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year.

Evolutionists generally feel secure even in the face of compelling creationist arguments today because of their utter confidence in the geological time scale. Even if they cannot provide a naturalistic mechanism, they appeal to the "fact of evolution," by which they mean an interpretation of earth history with a succession of different types of plants and animals in a drama spanning hundreds of millions of years.

The Bible, by contrast, paints a radically different picture of our planet's history. In particular, it describes a time when God catastrophically destroyed the earth and essentially all its life. The only consistent way to interpret the geological record in light of this event is to understand that fossil-bearing rocks are the result of a massive global Flood that occurred only a few thousand years ago and lasted but a year. This Biblical interpretation of the rock record implies that the animals and plants preserved as fossils were all contemporaries. This means trilobites, dinosaurs, and mammals all dwelled on the planet simultaneously, and they perished together in this world-destroying cataclysm.

Although creationists have long pointed out the rock formations themselves testify unmistakably to water catastrophism on a global scale, evolutionists generally have ignored this testimony. This is partly due to the legacy of the doctrine of uniformitarianism passed down from one generation of geologists to the next since the time of Charles Lyell in the early nineteenth century. Uniformitarianism assumes that the vast amount of geological change recorded in the rocks is the product of slow and uniform processes operating over an immense span of time, as opposed to a global cataclysm of the type described in the Bible and other ancient texts.

With the discovery of radioactivity about a hundred years ago, evolutionists deeply committed to the uniformitarian outlook believed they finally had proof of the immense antiquity of the earth. In particular, they discovered the very slow nuclear decay rates of elements like Uranium while observing considerable amounts of the daughter products from such decay. They interpreted these discoveries as vindicating both uniformitarianism and evolution, which led to the domination of these beliefs in academic circles around the world throughout the twentieth century.

However, modern technology has produced a major fly in that uniformitarian ointment. A key technical advance, which occurred about 25 years ago, involved the ability to measure the ratio of 14C atoms to 12C atoms with extreme precision in very small samples of carbon, using an ion beam accelerator and a mass spectrometer. Prior to the advent of this accelerator mass spectrometer (AMS) method, the 14C/12C ratio was measured by counting the number of 14C decays. This earlier method was subject to considerable "noise" from cosmic rays.

The AMS method improved the sensitivity of the raw measurement of the 14C/12C ratio from approximately 1% of the modern value to about 0.001%, extending the theoretical range of sensitivity from about 40,000 years to about 90,000 years. The expectation was that this improvement in precision would make it possible to use this technique to date dramatically older fossil material.1 The big surprise, however, was that no fossil material could be found anywhere that had as little as 0.001% of the modern value!2 Since most of the scientists involved assumed the standard geological time scale was correct, the obvious explanation for the 14C they were detecting in their samples was contamination from some source of modern carbon with its high level of 14C. Therefore they mounted a major campaign to discover and eliminate the sources of such contamination. Although they identified and corrected a few relatively minor sources of 14C contamination, there still remained a significant level of 14C—typically about 100 times the ultimate sensitivity of the instrument—in samples that should have been utterly "14C-dead," including many from the deeper levels of the fossil-bearing part of the geological record.2

Let us consider what the AMS measurements imply from a quantitative standpoint. The ratio of 14C atoms to 12C atoms decreases by a factor of 2 every 5730 years. After 20 half-lives or 114,700 years (assuming hypothetically that earth history goes back that far), the 14C/12C ratio is decreased by a factor of 220, or about 1,000,000. After 1.5 million years, the ratio is diminished by a factor of 21500000/5730, or about 1079. This means that if one started with an amount of pure 14C equal to the mass of the entire observable universe, after 1.5 million years there should not be a single atom of 14C remaining! Routinely finding 14C/12C ratios on the order of 0.1-0.5% of the modern value—a hundred times or more above the AMS detection threshold—in samples supposedly tens to hundreds of millions of years old is therefore a huge anomaly for the uniformitarian framework.

This earnest effort to understand this "contamination problem" therefore generated scores of peer-reviewed papers in the standard radiocarbon literature during the last 20 years.2 Most of these papers acknowledge that most of the 14C in the samples studied appear to be intrinsic to the samples themselves, and they usually offer no explanation for its origin. The reality of significant levels of 14C in a wide variety of fossil sources from throughout the geological record has thus been established in the secular scientific literature by scientists who assume the standard geological time scale is valid and have no special desire for this result!

In view of the profound significance of these AMS 14C measurements, the ICR Radioisotopes and the Age of the Earth (RATE) team has undertaken its own AMS 14C analyses of such fossil material.2 The first set of samples consisted of ten coals obtained from the U. S. Department of Energy Coal Sample Bank maintained at the Pennsylvania State University. The ten samples include three coals from the Eocene part of the geological record, three from the Cretaceous, and four from the Pennsylvanian. These samples were analyzed by one of the foremost AMS laboratories in the world. Figure 1 below shows in histogram form the results of these analyses.

These values fall squarely within the range already established in the peer-reviewed radiocarbon literature. When we average our results over each geological interval, we obtain remarkably similar values of 0.26 percent modern carbon (pmc) for Eocene, 0.21 pmc for Cretaceous, and 0.27 pmc for Pennsylvanian. Although the number of samples is small, we observe little difference in 14C level as a function of position in the geological record. This is consistent with the young-earth view that the entire macrofossil record up to the upper Cenozoic is the product of the Genesis Flood and therefore such fossils should share a common 14C age.

Figure 1. Histogram representation of 14C analysis of RATE coal samples. Coal 14C AMS Results Mean: 0.247 Std dev: 0.109
Percent Modern Carbon

cont'd

[Soldier4Christ]

Applying the uniformitarian approach of extrapolating 14C decay into the indefinite past translates the measured 14C/12C ratios into ages that are on the order of 50,000 years (2-50000/5730 = 0.0024 = 0.24 pmc). However, uniformitarian assumptions are inappropriate when one considers that the Genesis Flood removed vast amounts of living biomass from exchange with the atmosphere—organic material that now forms the earth's vast coal, oil, and oil shale deposits. A conservative estimate for the pre-Flood biomass is 100 times that of today. If one takes as a rough estimate for the total 14C in the biosphere before the cataclysm as 40% of what exists today and assumes a relatively uniform 14C level throughout the pre-Flood atmosphere and biomass, then we might expect a 14C/12C ratio of about 0.4% of today's value in the plants and animals at the onset of the Flood. With this more realistic pre-Flood 14C/12C ratio, we find that a value of 0.24 pmc corresponds to an age of only 4200 years (0.004 x 2-4200/5730 = 0.0024 = 0.24 pmc). Even though these estimates are rough, they illustrate the crucial importance of accounting for effects of the Flood cataclysm when translating a 14C/12C ratio into an actual age.

Percent Modern Carbon

Some readers at this point may be asking, how does one then account for the tens of millions and hundreds of millions of years that other radioisotope methods yield for the fossil record? Most of the other RATE projects address this important issue. Equally as persuasive as the 14C data is evidence from RATE measurements of the diffusion rate of Helium in zircon crystals that demonstrates the rate of nuclear decay of Uranium into Lead and Helium has been dramatically higher in the past and the uniformitarian assumption of a constant rate of decay is wrong.3 Another RATE project documents the existence of abundant Polonium radiohalos in granitic rocks that crystallized during the Flood and further demonstrates that the uniformitarian assumption of constant decay rates is incorrect.4 Another RATE project provides clues for why the 14C decay rate apparently was minimally affected during episodes of rapid decay of isotopes with long half-lives.5

The bottom line of this research is that the case is now extremely compelling that the fossil record was produced just a few thousand years ago by the global Flood cataclysm. The evidence reveals that macroevolution as an explanation for the origin of life on earth can therefore no longer be rationally defended.

Acknowledgement: The RATE team would like to express its heartfelt gratitude to the many generous donors who have made the high precision analyses at some of the best laboratories in the world possible. The credibility of our work in creation science research depends on these costly but crucial laboratory procedures.
Endnotes and References

   1. F. H. Schmidt, D. R. Balsley, and D. D. Leach, "Early expectations of AMS: Greater ages and tiny fractions. One failure?—one success," Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research B, 29:97-99, 1987.
   2. J. R. Baumgardner, D. R. Humphreys, A. A. Snelling, and S. A. Austin, "Measurable 14C in fossilized organic materials: Confirming the young earth creation/Flood model," in Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, R. E. Walsh, Editor, Creation Science Fellowship, Pittsburgh, PA, pp. 127-142, 2003.
   3. D. R. Humphreys, J. R. Baumgardner, S. A. Austin, and A. A., Snelling, "Helium diffusion rates support accelerated nuclear decay," in Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, R. Ivey, Ed., Creation Science Fellowship, Pittsburgh, PA, pp. 175-196, 2003.
   4. A. A. Snelling and M. H. Armitage, "Radiohalos—A tale of three granitic plutons," in Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, R. Ivey, Ed., Creation Science Fellowship, Pittsburgh, PA, pp. 243-268, 2003.
   5. A. A. Snelling, S. A. Austin, and W. A. Hoesch, "Radioisotopes in the diabase sill (upper Precambrian) at Bass Rapids, Grand Canyon, Arizona: An application and test of the isochron dating method," in Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Creationism, R. Ivey, Ed., Creation Science Fellowship, Pittsburgh, PA, pp. 269-284, 2003.

* Dr. Baumgardner is Adjunct Associate Professor of Geophysics for the ICRGS.