The study of the fossilised remains of animals and plants, their relationships to each other and to living animals and plants.
Questions tagged [paleontology]
20 questions
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Did hominids and non-avian dinosaurs ever coexist?
Although the extinction of the non-avian dinosaurs is dated at ~66 million years ago there are a number of purported cave drawings that I've found online that (if verified and interpreted in a certain way!) could suggest that hominids and non-avian…
bondonk
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Is the discovery of tuff amongst dinosaur fossils in Utah incompatible with scientific consensus about dating of the fossils?
A Creation Ministries International article makes the following claim about the multiple-local-flood explanation for the deposits at the Morrison Formation:
The idea of many local floods might at first seem a possibility.
However, a notable…
Shannon T
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Are neanderthal skull fossils just skulls of very elderly humans?
Some people claim that the fossils that have been generally classified as Neanderthal are actually human, and in particular, humans who have lived to a very old age - i.e. two or three hundred years old.
They further claim that the bones in the…
user11643
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1 answer
Did paleontologist Stan Taylor discover human footprints dated from the period of dinosaurs?
From the article Everything We Have Been Taught About Our Origins Is A Lie:
... in 1968 a palaeontologist named Stan Taylor began excavations of fossilised dinosaur footprints, discovered in the bed of the Paluxy river near Glen Rose, Texas. What…
Brian M. Hunt
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Have coelacanth fossils younger than 65 million years been found?
In a Creation Ministries International article, they make the following claim about coelacanths:
Paleontologists believed that coelacanths went extinct about 65 million years ago. However, in 1938, fishermen off the coast of South Africa found them…
Shannon T
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Is the Earth experiencing another mass extinction event?
I have heard that Earth is experiencing another mass extinction event, with many species going extinct at a rate comparable to Earth's many other past extinction events.
This has been reported in the news. The BBC reports the claim like this:
The…
Jeff Attwood
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Is the fossil KNM-ER 1470 evidence that other dating methods other than the fossil record are inaccurate?
The skull was originally dated to be almost 3 million years old. This led Richard Leakey, the son of famed archeologist Louis Leakey to comment, "Either We toss out this skull or we toss out our theories on early man. It simply fits no previous…
user1873
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Were Tyrannosaurus Rex herbivores?
The creationist site, Remnants of God claims that dinosaurs - and in particular Tyrannosaurus Rex - were herbivorous.
Were you aware that Tyrannosaurus Rex was not a meat eater? Yes, I am fully aware that every evolutionist, and Hollywood director…
Ovi
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Is the hominid skull discovered in Petralona 700,000 years old?
Aris Poulianos, a Greek anthropologist, claims that the hominid remains (a skull) discovered in the Petralona Cave are 700,000 years old and belong to a distinct species, which he named Archanthropus europeaus petraloniensis (commonly: Archanthropus…
yannis
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Is it possible to hatch dinosaurs from chicken eggs?
This article is one of many articles talking about re-enabling some dinosaur features in chicken.
I don't know a lot about genetics or paleontology. Most articles I've found about the subject use some form of argument from authority:
People have…
Barnaba
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Have paleontologists systematically ignored dinosaur DNA that does not match the evolutionary model?
A 2009 paper from Institute for Creation Research claims that the reason no DNA has been successfully extracted from dinosaur remains is because any results that don't fit the evolutionary model are suppressed:
Because evolutionary scientists are…
IAS
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Were giant skeletons found in 1936?
There are many examples of this claim on the web
In 1936 Larson Kohl, the German paleontologist and anthropologist, found the bones of gigantic men on the shore of Lake Elyasi in Central Africa. Other giant skeletons were later found in Hava, the…
Remi.b
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Are the footprints found in Great Britain 800,000 years old?
Some footprints were found in Great Britain earlier this year. They are reported to be about 800,000 years old. Here is how they were dated, according to a Yahoo! article:
Scientists dated the footprints by studying their geological position and…
user11643
5
votes
1 answer
Did dragons exist?
Dragons have been common to many cultures and mythologies. Some famous are St. George slaying a dragon and Chinese dragons, such as the symbol used for the Emperor of China.
Creationists and Bible literalists do assert that dragons existed and that…
user6327
5
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Was Mary Schwietzer the first person to suspect the odor of dinosaur fossils might imply that they contain organic material
Discovery magazine interviewed Mary Schwietzer, the woman who discovered soft tissue in dinosaurs. She mentions that when she was working on a T rex skeleton she smelt something like a cadaver. When she mentioned this to Jack Horner he said all…
Shannon T
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