I am back from Russia having had a wonderful time looking at the geology with some fellow geologists. The scenery and geology that one can find along its shore is just amazing. I am in the process of catching up with all of the work that accumulated while I was gone.
Anyway, in Message 1 of 46 it was written:
--- start quote ---
"5. The tropical animals found frozen in
the Arctic ices indicate the poles were
likely warm before the flood. The canopy
seems to be the best explanation of this."
--- end quote ---
Possible sources of the claim that "tropical animals" were found frozen in the Arctic is discussed in the following web pages:
1."Remains of Warm Weather Hippos Have Been Found in the Tundra's Frozen Muck?" at;
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/ce/3/part4.html
2. "A Frozen Ninety Foot Tall Plum Tree with Ripe Fruit and Green Leaves Found North of the Arctic Circle?" at:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/ce/3/part3.html
3. Woolly Mammoths: Suited for Cold?
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mammoths.html#burns
This is one of two articles listed at:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mammoths.html
A possible source of the claim of tropical animals being found in the Arctic is the gross misinterpretation of the environment inhabited by the various mummified mammals found in Siberia and elsewhere in the Arctic circle. This was further compounded by people confusing cold climate plants with tropical plants.
(NOTE: I apologize to those people, who are offended by the citations of articles from the Talk.Origins web Site. A well-argued article is a well-argued article regardless of its source. Just because someone disagrees with you is insufficient ground for either being offended by or disagreeing with them.
In Message 35 of 47,
Percipient mentioned:
--- start quote ---
"About this the same AiG webpage says:
[KENT H]:
Gold chains have been found in coal
AiG: The evidence is strictly anecdotal.
KENT H: I disagree and cover this in The
Hovind Theory. Only one gold chain has been
found in coal to my knowledge [On June 11,
1891, The Morrisonville Times reported; "A
curious find was brought to light by Mrs.
S.W. Culp last Tuesday morning. As she was
breaking a lump of coal apart, embedded in
a circular shape a small gold chain about
10 inches in length of antique and quaint
workmanship ..."]
[AiG]: This is exactly what is meant by
anecdotal evidence. The word is derived
from 'anecdote' meaning 'story'. There is
a story, but no coal sticking to a chain."
--- end of quote ---
There isn't any documentation that this gold chain was actually embedded in the coal. "The Morrisonville Times" report is a favorite of catastrophists and creationists of various ideologies. The details of the gold chain is given by Michael A. Cremo and Richard L. Thompson, Old Earth Vedic creationists, in their book "The Hidden History of the Human Race." This story is reported in the June 11, 1891, "The Morrisonville Times" of Illinois. It reported:
-- start quote --
"A curious find was brought to light by
Mrs. S.W. Culp last Tuesday morning. As
she was breaking a lump of coal preparatory
to putting it in the scuttle, she discovered,
as the lump fell apart, embedded in a
circular shape a small gold chain about ten
inches in length of antique and quaint
workmanship. At first Mrs. Culp thought the
chain had been dropped accidentally in the
coal, but as she undertook to lift the
chain up, the idea of its having been
recently dropped was at once made fallacious,
for as the lump of coal broke it separated
almost in the middle, and the circular
position of the chain placed the two ends
near to each other, and as the lump separated,
the middle of the chain became loosened
while each end remained fastened to the coal."
-- end quote --
Dr. Andrew MacRae another geologist summarized the problems with the alleged evidence a post that he posted to talk.origins in "Re: Drug Dealers of the Paleozoic (Message ID <6jf01e$rm7$1@darwin.ediacara.org>) in answering
how would conventional geologists explain this gold chain. Dr. Andrew MacRae stated:
-- start quote --
"What's to explain? It is pretty poorly-
documented "evidence" in the first place.
It was not collected in situ, it was collected
from a lump of coal that went through goodness
knows how much human processing between the
mine face and when it got dumped in somebody's
basement, and we only have an anecdote as
"evidence" that the chain was embedded in the
coal, rather than, say, embedded in semi-
consolidated coal-dust and grains that got
partially fused together after sitting in a
pile beneath tons of other coal for months or
more before finally getting delivered. The
ability of Mrs. Culp to differentiate between
these two possibilities is unknown, even if
you wanted to go on the anecdote and her
authority. The specimen is gone. It is
scientifically worthless."
-- end quote--
A person can propose alternative explanations about how the gold chain got into the coal. For example, gold chains were very popular on watches in the 1800's. A miner, foreman, worker (in the processing plant removing shale from the coal), some supervisor, or anyone else involved in the either the mining, processing, or transportation of the coal could have lost the chain. Once mixed in with the coal, mineralization or weathering of the coal while it sat in a storage pile or in a railroad car could have easily cemented the coal into something that a layperson would have mistaken for solid coal. There are a variety of minerals in coal that easily weather and when they weather produce minerals that would cement coal dust and powder into solid-looking material.
A very small amount of metal gets mixed into coal when it produced. The coal companies do their best to remove it with extremely strong magnets. However, small and nonferrous material likely will not get removed.
Corliss (1978:652) noted an interesting example that was reported in a magazine article. This article, titled "Coin in Lump of Coal", he found in the 1901, vol. 21, pp. 477, "Strand Magazine." The article reads:
--- start quote ---
"Mr. R. C. Hardman, of Meadhurst, Uppingham, has been
the fortunate finder of a coin dated 1397 embedded in a
lump of coal, which formed part and parcel of a ton that
useful commodity bought at current prices."
--- end quote ---
From this coin, can we also conclude that the global flood deposited this coal bed sometime after 1397 AD just as someone would argue that the gold chain indicates that advanced civilizations were contemporaneous with the deposition of peat that later formed coal? If a person accepts the gold chain as evidence of a advanced civilization contemporaneous with coal deposition, the same arguement can be made for the gold coin is solid evidence that peat, which later became coal, was deposited after 1397 AD. Of course, this date would be too young, even for Young Earth creationists. :-) :-)
Reference Cited:
Corliss, W. R. (1978) Ancient Man: A Handbook of
Puzzling Artifacts. The Sourcebook Project. Glen Arm,
Md. 21057.
Yours,
Bill Birkeland
Houston, Texas
™ Version 4.2
