Asteroid extinction theory challenged by rock core, according to Nature Science Update 10 April 2003.
Scientists at Princeton University, New Haven and the University of Karlsruhe, Germany, have examined a core of rock taken from the Chicxulub crater near the Yucatan Peninsula. This is the asteroid impact crater where many scientists claim mass extinction of dinosaurs began.
The theory is the impact sent masses of dust into the atmosphere, which blocked sunlight so plants couldn’t photosynthesise food for big animals such as dinosaurs, who then died leaving small mammals to evolve. Princeton scientists found the crater core contained abundant fossils of microscopic plants (plankton) that need sunlight for photosynthesis as much as large plants do. German scientists also found rock layers in the core were less compacted than expected, indicating the impact was not as great as currently believed.
Editorial Comment: Many mass extinction theories have come and gone as scientists try to explain the difference between Cretaceous rocks, which contain dinosaur fossils, and Tertiary rocks, which don’t. The hidden assumption in all such theories is the belief that rock layers are buried time zones formed one after the other. But geological names for rock layers were originally given to describe either the composition or location of rock layers e.g. Cretaceous means chalky, Jurassic means Jura Mountains. If we train Geology students to start again from first principles, they may discover that differences between Cretaceous and Tertiary rocks are not time based at all.
Furthermore, mass extinction does not help the theory of evolution which requires new kinds of animals to come into existence. This can only occur if new genetic information is produced. Death of existing animals will not produce it. The anomalous microscopic plankton fossils now found also indicate it’s time for evolutionists to go back to the drawing board again.
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