Portal:Paleontology

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The Paleontology Portal

Paleontology is the study of the forms of life existing in prehistoric times, chiefly by studying the fossils of plants, animals, and other organisms. Secular paleontology is based on uniformitarian geology, which holds that there has been no Biblical flood, but instead it is believed the layers of stata represent vast geologic ages. Based on this assumption, paleontologists examine and characterized fossils. Within paleontology, there are branches are areas of specializations based on the particular type of organism. The study of prehistoric humans is known as Paleoanthropology, animal paleontology is Paleozoology, and the branch which studies ancient plants is called Paleobotany.

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Feathered dinosaur

This is a feathered Deinonychus at the ROM exhibit.

Feathered dinosaurs are theoretical transitional forms required by the evolutionist worldview, which holds that birds have evolved from reptiles in the distant past. Throughout the years, there have been many excavations that claim to have discovered dinosaurs with feathers. While there is no evidence rejecting the idea that there could have been feathered dinosaurs, there is also no evidence proving, without doubt, that there were. There is evidence that in at least some cases these so-called feathered dinosaurs are really misidentified birds. Also, most of these fossils are from China, of which they are known to have a fake fossil industry. This places a question mark on all such finds. While some evolutionists believe that dinosaurs are ancestors to our modern-day birds, there is no evidence to prove it, but all the evidence against it.

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Trilobite from Ordovician-age strata near St. Petersburg, Russia.

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Stephen J. Gould (September 10, 1941 – May 20, 2002) is considered one of the best known and most popularly read scientists of the 20th century. Gould believed in evolution and was a paleontologist and professor at Harvard University. Among his contributions to science were his monthly articles with Natural History magazine for 25 years.

Gould graduated from Antioch University with a geology degree and earned his Ph.D. in paleontology from Columbia University four years later. His job descriptions include being Alexander Agassiz Professor of Zoology, Professor of Geology at Harvard University, Curator of Invertebrate Paleontology at Harvard Museum of Comparative Zoology, a member of the Department of the History of Science, and Vincent Astor Visiting Research Professor of Biology at New York University.

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"No wonder paleontologists shied away from evolution for so long. It seems never to happen. Assiduous collecting up cliff faces yields zigzags, minor oscillations, and the very occasional slight accumulation of change over millions of years, at a rate too slow to really account for all the prodigious change that has occurred in evolutionary history. When we do see the introduction of evolutionary novelty, it usually shows up with a bang, and often with no firm evidence that the organisms did not evolve elsewhere! Evolution cannot forever be going on someplace else. Yet that's how the fossil record has struck many a forlorn paleontologist looking to learn something about evolution." - Niles Eldredge , "Reinventing Darwin: The Great Evolutionary Debate," 1996, p.95.

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