Resuming Debate with Howard F

Three Meanings of Chronological Labels

In detail:1) How do Fossils Superpose?, 2) Searching for the Cretaceous Fauna (with appendix on Karoo, Beaufort), 3) What I think I have refuted, 4) Glenn Morton caught abusing words other people were taught as very small children

In debate or otherwise on Assorted Retorts: 1) ... on How Fossils Matter , 2) ... on Steno and Lifespan and Fossil Finds, 3) Geological Column NOT Palaeontolical [Censored by CMI-Creation-Station? Or just by the Library I am in?], 4) Same Debate Uncensored, One Step Further, 5) Continuing debate with Howard F on Geology / Palaeontology, 6) Howard F tries twice again ... , 7) Is Howard F getting tired? Because up to now, he has failed., 8) Resuming Debate with Howard F

On Correspondence blog: Contacting Karoo about superposition of layers and fossils

Under other video

Fossil mix ups – When fossils are found where they shouldn’t be (Creation Magazine LIVE! 4-16)
CMIcreationstation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_dIlLwjS7bw

Howard F

Your discussion of the Roraima pollen neglects to mention that there is no pollen anywhere in the Paleozoic even though there are lot of plant fossils and lots of spores. Today pollen is just about everywhere because it is just about indestructible. Even in sediments deposited in km's of water, there is abundant pollen. How were miles thick accumulates of sediment in the swirling mass of the flood deposited with lots of plant fossils but no pollen? This is a case of one problematic occurrence, which may well be due to contamination, against many studies that show a different result. You are cherry-picking the data you like and ignoring vast swaths of data you don't like. You make a big deal about grass and dinosaurs, but you neglect to mention that there is no earlier grass fossils anywhere in the world. There are also no modern mammals found with dinosaurs. No deer, antelope, elk, horses, pigs, goats, beavers, rabbits, whales, dolphins, giraffes, elephants, rhinoceroses, etc. A few very questionable human footprints and that is it. In fact if you look at the history or major groups of land animals, such as pelycosaurs, dinosaurs, ungulates, they always occur in the same order, with no mixing and no fossils out of order anywhere in the world. Same is true of fossil corals, such as tabulates and scleractinian, always tabulates below scleractinians. And the order of species, say within coccolithis, is the same world wide.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

[Comment not accessible in this library - perhaps not on the site at all? Here I am not reconstructing what I answered. Except for the biotopes for "palaeozoic" fossil layers perhaps not being such as carry pollen.]

Reference to Roraima pollen, probably this article:

CMI : The evolutionary paradox of the Roraima pollen of South America is still not solved
by Emil Silvestru
http://creation.com/roraima-pollen

Salient quote from it:

With all the above in mind, since according to observational science contamination is the least probable of all possibilities (a Holmesian ‘impossible’), there seem to be only two solutions:

• 1. The whole evolutionary biostratigraphy which places the first angiosperm pollen in the Early Cretaceous is wrong, angiosperms being in fact present throughout the entire geologic column (does that sound like something you have already read about?). This would of course be the equivalent of Haldane’s rabbit and mortally wound the ‘evolutionary elephant’.
• 2. The CF is Tertiary in age and not Paleoproterozoic, completely rejecting radiometric dating. If so, the very concept of radiometric dating and particularly its reliability needs to be questioned.

Either possibility is simply unacceptable to the evolutionary establishment, hence the escape into the improbable: contamination. A concept that has already served to settle similar problems before: when radiometric dating is clearly at odds with the established biostratigraphy, contamination (‘radioisotope contamination’) is invoked. Or, when accepting contamination would challenge the very concept of radiometric dating, ‘out of place fossils’ (‘fossil contamination’) are invoked. [End quote.]

Own comment:

It seems Emil Silvestru indeed did not mention "as a fact" that no pollen have been found in palaeozoic. In Roraima, it seems that radioactive dating stamp the layers as palaeoproterozoic, which is supposed to be even older. Objection disregards fact that Emil Silvestru offered us a dilemma.

The following

seems to have been moved under our original discussion:

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl Your criteria of only accepting the stratigraphic order of vertebrates where they have been dug in a hole will never be met. By that criterion, you would reject fossils at the base of the Grand Canyon being older than fossil at the top because who in their right mind would ever go through the expense of digging a hole next to a canyon? You might count the canyon as a hole, but then why not the Karoo outcrops? They are at about the same angle. But even in the Karoo outcrops, why would anyone dig down even 20 ft, if they could walk down hill 20 ft and find the same strata?

Regarding using stratigraphy for oil exploration, you said:

"...the long earth concept is a superfluous extra about how those strata came to be there."

No. We use concepts such as reconstructing ancient landscapes to predict petroleum deposits. Identical landscapes today that take thousands of years to develop. There are no known physical processes that can make a large point bar in a few hours, but we see Mississippi River-scale point bars in the subsurface all over the world. These each take hundreds of years to form. And other features such as buried corral reefs that take thousands of years to form. Thus, the ancient earth is an essential component of modern stratigraphy.

Hans Georg Lundahl

"Your criteria of only accepting the stratigraphic order of vertebrates where they have been dug in a hole will never be met."

That is an admission.

Even a pretty radical one.

You did not say "has never been met", but you said "will never be met", as if it was an understanding - not necessarily a conspiracy, but an understanding - between palaeontologists not to test stratigraphy too far, e g by digging down from Katberg formation into underlying Balfour formation in Karoo.

Which was also the info I got from "Karoo" (if the experts I contacted were not inside it while answering, they are at least often inside it while digging).

"By that criterion, you would reject fossils at the base of the Grand Canyon being older than fossil at the top because who in their right mind would ever go through the expense of digging a hole next to a canyon?"

If you said yourself that slope is less steep than 45° most places, who am I to argue with that?

At such an angle, the fossils can have been buried in same layer of mud at same moment.

As to any sorting you find in GC, it is usually marine invertebrates, and like mud sorts itself spontaneously under high water speeds, so would probably marine invertebrates.

Who in their right mind would, etc?

Well, since my main issue is with land vertebrates rather than marine invertebrates, it is not a question of digging down a hole beside the GC (indeed, it could there be done with less expense, like digging holes in the side from botton, if you know such and such a higher level is seen from so many yards further north or south, you dig that horizontal hole so many yards inwards), my proposal would rather be to take a few select places in Karoo, where Katberg formation is on top, and dig down to levels presumed for Balfour formation being under it.

Would one find :

• no fossils at all?
• Balfour typical fossils (confirming stratigraphy)?
• Katberg typical fossils (which like the first would tend to confirm my biotope theory?
• or OTHER fossils (like buried nephelim)?

Probably, for expenses, one would have to rely on volunteers digging and on some crowdfunding.

But it could be done.

"You might count the canyon as a hole, but then why not the Karoo outcrops?"

Is uncovered Balfour really that much lower in terrain than Katberg where it "lies on top of of Balfour"? I'll have to trust you on that one.

And is uncovered Katberg that much lower than Burgersdorp formation "where it lies on top of Katberg and Balfour"? I am trusting you on that one too.

However, no, if angle is 45° or flatter, I am not counting the outcrops as holes. I don't know for certain there was ever any Katberg above the Balfour, where Balfour lies naked. I don't know for certain there was every any Burgersdorp above Katberg, where Katberg lies naked. At least not for longer than some hours, days or months during Flood.

In other words, I don't know for sure there were ever two levels of buried land vertebrates on top of each other.

I did look into Yacoraite, but there we are mostly dealing with snails and such.

I did look at a place in NW or NE Mexico that I lost track of, but there we had one layer of Ceratopsians (considered Cretaceous), and above it one of shrimps and prawns, basically. Usually classified as Palaeocene or Miocene or sth. After what you are saying, I can't be sure these were even two layers - but if they were, they are no trouble for Flood Geology.

Now, I will trust you on one more. Digging down from Katberg to Balfour in Karoo would be digging a hole of 20 feet. VERY much less than what Grand Canyon would challenge us with. Even far less than mining has done to get iron ore. I have been one kilometer (somewhat less than one mile) below Earth surface in Malmberget close to Gellivare, in North Sweden. If industrials can dig down one mile into Earth, amateurs can dig down 20 feet at least. It's about seven yards.

One could even combine the digging with a post-digging hotel project, like digging down into earth for habitation. And the hotel guests or perhaps rent paying residents or so would be paying back expenses for the digging. In that case one had better make sure to get a good architect so they are attractive even if nothing spectacular is proven (or if one wants to actually hide the spectacular proven discovery).

"But even in the Karoo outcrops, why would anyone dig down even 20 ft, if they could walk down hill 20 ft and find the same strata?"

To check if the strata really contain the fauna predicted by oldearthism.

You see, on oldearthist assumptions, it is a matter of chance that such and such fossils from such and such times are at all preserved. Chance would SOMEWHERE lead to that happening on two different levels.

I would rather be the Flood Geologist explaining how certain marine invertebrates got deeper down in Grand Canyon, than the one explaining how a Moschops from the Permian is straight below a creature from the Triassic. Especially if the Triassic creature is also heavy and equally clumsy.

I am not saying it couldn't be countered, I am saying so far it isn't there to be countered (on my criteria).

"Identical landscapes today that take thousands of years to develop. There are no known physical processes that can make a large point bar in a few hours, but we see Mississippi River-scale point bars in the subsurface all over the world. These each take hundreds of years to form."

Point bars are features in rivers, not in strata laid over each other.

They are known to be the product of rivers and can thus be accounted for.

However, the strata are NOT known to be what you claim they are a product of and that does not involve point bars very much.

Therefore the objection amounts to changing the subject.

If point bars can form quicker, I leave that to Tas Walker, but deposits form with different speeds depending on water mass and water speeds and mud thickness involved. Flood geology deal with processes which we are thankful for not being seen today.

So does on some levels uniformitarian geology. Like that period there when such a continent was supposed to be ALL volcanoes, and things like that.

However, this is beside the query I raised.

Here is my correspondence with Karoo, btw:

Correspondence of Hans Georg Lundahl : Contacting Karoo about superposition of layers and fossils
http://correspondentia-ioannis-georgii.blogspot.com/2015/06/contacting-karoo-about-superposition-of.html

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl You said:

You did not say "has never been met", but you said "will never be met", as if it was an understanding - not necessarily a conspiracy, but an understanding - between palaeontologists not to test stratigraphy too far, e g by digging down from Katberg formation into underlying Balfour formation in Karoo.

There is no conspiracy, only practicality.* Who would dig down even 20 ft through rock when you could walk down the hill and make the same observations? Geologists commonly drill cores to test stratigraphy, but you don't except this. You reject small diameter holes, but don't claim we don't test the theories. You need demons to explain the world-wide order of small fossils.

"At such an angle, the fossils can have been buried in same layer of mud at same moment."

Are you making this up, or do you have some evidence to back up this claim?

You said: In other words, I don't know for sure there were ever two levels of buried land vertebrates on top of each other.

But there is evidence of this from all over the world. Seismic and wells confirm the strata seen in outcrops extend hundreds of miles in the subsurface.

You compared digging down 20 ft compared to minds that are hundreds or thousands of feet. True, but excavating is very expensive compared to surface collecting, and most science budgets, especially paleontology, are very modest.

"However, the strata are NOT known to be what you claim they are a product of and that does not involve point bars very muchTherefore the objection amounts to changing the subject."

No. Many vertebrates, such as in the Morrison Fm. are in point bars. They are part of terrestrial deposits. Most land vertebrate deposits are from the deposits of rivers and the adjacent flood plains.

*[which in my book qualifies as "an understanding"]

Hans Georg Lundahl

"There is no conspiracy, only practicality. Who would dig down even 20 ft through rock when you could walk down the hill and make the same observations?"

The problem at hand precisely here is whether the observations made by walking down the hill really are the same.

"Geologists commonly drill cores to test stratigraphy, but you don't except this. You reject small diameter holes, but don't claim we don't test the theories."

Well, you have not done that particular test in 20 ft deep holes through the rock.

If mile deep holes have been dug through rock, why not twenty feet in a few selected places, like some places in Karoo?

"You need demons to explain the world-wide order of small fossils."

I said supposing it were world wide, it could at least be explained by demons getting a lease to try a hand on deception.

It is distinct from the order of land vertebrates.

And my theology accepts the existence of demons anyway, so it is not even ad hoc.

[I had said: I don't know for sure there were ever two levels of buried land vertebrates on top of each other.]

"But there is evidence of this from all over the world. Seismic and wells confirm the strata seen in outcrops extend hundreds of miles in the subsurface."

That is not direct evidence. The strata as rock strata, as well as the order of small invertebrate marine fossils are a separate issue. Nowhere have land vertabrates from Permian been found directly under those from Triassic, I just heard that news from Zuidafrika. And if you read my link, so did you.

No other place is even mentions as lagerstätte for both Palaeozoic and Mesozoic.

PLUS this indirect evidence is challenged by the Roraima pollen. They are arguably small fossils (though not marine invertabrate fauna, rather land based flora) and in Roraima they are where either they shouldn't be on your view, or the radiometric datings should be rejected.

"You compared digging down 20 ft compared to minds that are hundreds or thousands of feet. True, but excavating is very expensive compared to surface collecting, and most science budgets, especially paleontology, are very modest."

If you read all of what I said, I suggested solutions to that:

• use volunteers, not paid workers
• crowdfund for materials

in other words, use no public funding. Maybe if you let creationists in to the team, you could get some funding from CMI or AiG or Eric Hovind, who knows?

PLUS:

• refinance by making it a building project, whether for subterranean shady hotel or for housing.

In other words, it could be done. Not in very many spots, but perhaps five or ten places where Katberg lies over Balfour.

"Many vertebrates, such as in the Morrison Fm. are in point bars."

That I did not know. Two supplemantary questions to that one:

• how do you know for sure they are in point bars? I suppose you don't mean that there is a point bar on the surface now and you conclude from that there was one then. And:
• how do you know, supposing you know they are in point bars, that the point bar of the river didn't form either very rapidly in a calmer spot of the flood or normally slow in the two millennia between creation and flood? I mean two thousand years is plenty of time to make and unmake and remake point bars.

Wait a minute ...

"Many vertebrates, such as in the Morrison Fm. are in point bars. They are part of terrestrial deposits. Most land vertebrate deposits are from the deposits of rivers and the adjacent flood plains."

That is the Non-Flood-Geology explanation of why they got buried, right?

In other words, you are using one part of the Non-Flood scenario rather than an undisputed fact to refute the Flood scenario. Somewhat circular, somewhat disingenious.

And in some places even somewhat impossible.

That Sauropod herd that got drowned in south Argentina or Chile - was it the Flood or were they wading across a river?

The parallel given by uniformitarians were yaks buried in Brahmaputra. BUT:

• the sauropods are LOTS huger than yaks
• Brahmaputra is LOTS more streaming than any river down South of La Plata (or even counting La PLata).

In other words, scenario impossible.

Unless you would want to say it was a gigantic river over landmasses since separated by continental drift, and then the question becomes, where is the rest of that huge river? Indo China? Africa? Haven't exactly heard news of one.

And I forgot in my previous comments:

[I had said: At such an angle, the fossils can have been buried in same layer of mud at same moment.]

"Are you making this up, or do you have some evidence to back up this claim?"

There have been experiments conducted about rapid layering. They do indicate that 45° higher and lower can be simultaneous.

True, they are conducted in much smaller format than what they are presumed to model.

And, sorry, I forgot who the man was who conducted the experiments, if it was Giertych (now on the Catholic Kolbe Center for Study of Creation) or perhaps rather someone else, since Maciej Giertych is geneticist.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl But the beds with the fossils in order are continuous for hundreds of miles along outcrops, always with the fossils in the same order, but you think digging in a few feet behind the outcrop it will all be different?

Hans Georg Lundahl

"In Order" begs the question I am posing.

Whether Moschops and Eucnemesaurus fortis are found at different places BECAUSE Beaufort formation outcrops at one and Elliott at other or BECAUSE Moschops and Eucnemosaurus fortis lived in different places at Flood event and the Beaufort and Elliott beds being an extra complication at the most.

In the first case digging down from Elliott or Katberg into Beaufort will change nothing, you will still find Moschops in Beaufort.

In the second case you won't find Moschops in Beaufort under Elliott, because where Elliott is on top was the biotope of Eucnemosarus fortis. Perhaps a guy that Moschops stayed away from.

Btw, Eucnemosarus fortis is exactly one specimen:

Holotype: TM 119, a partial (fragmentary) skeleton consisting of vertevrae, pelvic remains and limb elements

NO referred specimens are mentioned.

PLUS Eucnemosaurus is such an incomplete skeleton we cannot (in the Flood geology scenario) know if it was some Sauropodomorph or if it was a Nephelim type giant. Head or limbs would tell, but we don't have those.

Palaeocritti - a guide to prehistoric animals : Eucnemesaurus fortis
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/dinosauria/sauropoda/eucnemesaurus

Btw, the locality given both narrow and broader, only give a hit for Eucnemosaurus:

Locality: Farm Zonderhout, Slabberts district, Orange Free State, South Africa.

No Permians found there!

Howard F tries twice again ...

Three Meanings of Chronological Labels

In detail:1) How do Fossils Superpose?, 2) Searching for the Cretaceous Fauna (with appendix on Karoo, Beaufort), 3) What I think I have refuted, 4) Glenn Morton caught abusing words other people were taught as very small children

In debate or otherwise on Assorted Retorts: 1) ... on How Fossils Matter , 2) ... on Steno and Lifespan and Fossil Finds, 3) Geological Column NOT Palaeontolical [Censored by CMI-Creation-Station? Or just by the Library I am in?], 4) Same Debate Uncensored, One Step Further, 5) Continuing debate with Howard F on Geology / Palaeontology, 6) Howard F tries twice again ... , 7) Is Howard F getting tired? Because up to now, he has failed., 8) Resuming Debate with Howard F

On Correspondence blog: Contacting Karoo about superposition of layers and fossils

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl You said " never ever did I find Permian holotypes under Triassic or Lower Jurassic ones.

Now, I did write the South African Geological association to ask them if I got anything wrong, but have so far got no answer."

There are very few holotypes. Each species has one, but there may be many more thousands of fossils of that species, so searching for holotype examples is not very useful. And writing anyone is a waste of their time since all the data you want is in the journals. Just pay the $25 to download the article (or whatever it costs) or pay the subscription, or find a university library with a subscription.

The Karoo is, indeed, a very large area, but the contact between the Perm and Triassic occurs over a small area. I don't know why 45 degrees is important to you. Even the Grand Canyon is less steep (on average) than that. There are very few places on earth where that angle is maintained for any more than about 500 ft vertical. The Karoo is a fine example of where Dinos are stratigraphically and vertically above Pelycosaurs.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Just pay the $25 to download the article (or whatever it costs) or pay the subscription, or find a university library with a subscription."

Sorry, broke and homeless.

"The Karoo is, indeed, a very large area, but the contact between the Perm and Triassic occurs over a small area."

Wonderful.

THEN it should be a piece of cake for you to tell me exactly what if not holotype at least referred specimen of a pelycosaur (ideally as distinctive as Dimetrodon, I think I found only Varanops there, and I haven't yet been able to check whether Varanops could feasably be - with Six Day Creation and Flood Geology as opposed to evolutionary scenario - simply a Varan) directly under if not a holotype at least a referred specimen of a dinosaur.

[Underlined because he will answer the sentence in a truncated form which disfigures its grammatical structure. The both pieces will be underlined below as well.]

So far you have not done so.

"I don't know why 45 degrees is important to you. Even the Grand Canyon is less steep (on average) than that. There are very few places on earth where that angle is maintained for any more than about 500 ft vertical."

Because for me two places below and above near surface of a very steep hill do NOT count.

What counts is same hole dug deeper.

If both finds are near surface and the "verticality" refers to the vertical dimension of the rock's steepness, rather than to a vertical only - or perhaps slightly displaced (hence 45°) - relation, then the relation is topologically speaking horizontal and could go back to a horizontal relation between them at Flood event.

"The Karoo is a fine example of where Dinos are stratigraphically and vertically above Pelycosaurs."

As you describe it, sounds too little vertical for me.

But if this were so, and the area where Permian and Triassic overlap - Beaufort, right? - is small, why not show an example where same assemblage zone and same hole in it yielded a Triassic but not Permian animal on top and a Permian but not Triassic animal further down?

Thing as, these assemblage zones are even smaller areas than Beaufort. Now, I have found NO assemblage zone which was BOTH Permian AND Triassic.

If you mean that there is a local place where one of the Permian assemblage zones goes down under one of the Triassic ones, so that two actual palaeontological assemblage zones of fossils rather than just two rock layers are physically overlapping - where?

And what two critters?

Take a look at the pelycosaur of Karoo:

Palaeocritti : Heleosaurus scholtzi
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/eupelycosauria/heleosaurus

"Synapsida Eupelycosauria Varanopseidae"

Eupelycosaur, should be very clear it's a pelycosaur and nothing else, right?

Well, take another look at how obvious this is:

"Originally thought to be a diapsid reptile."

Oh?

When was reclassification made?

"Reisz, R. R. & Modesto, S. P. 2007. Heleosaurus scholtzi from the Permian of South Africa: a varanopid synapsid, not a diapsid reptile. Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology 27 (3): 734-739."

Oh, as late as 2007? Maybe need to find pelycosaurs under dinos or sth?

But of course the fossil should remain every doubt, shouldn't it?

"Remains Partial skeleton missing tail and most of the limbs."

NOTE, this is NOT about JUST the Heleosaurus of Karoo, it mean this Heleosaurus of Karoo is the ONLY Heleosaurus (at least at present so classified right now) in the world. It's the holotype, if you can have a holotype without referred specimens.

Because, in the case when there are more than one skeleton palaeocritti says so.

Palaeocritti : Antetonitrus ingenipes
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/dinosauria/sauropoda/antetonitrus

Antetonitrus ingenipes has TWO skeletons. One holotype and one referred specimen:

"Holotype (BP/1/4952): partially articulated skeleton (vertebrae, ribs, partial forelimbs and hindlimbs) Referred specimens: BP/1/4952b (some isolated bones)."

And neither of these is from above the Heleosaurus, which, as you will have seen was from Abrahamskraal. Instead they are from:

"Locality: farms Welbedacht-Edelweiss, Ladybrand district, Free State, South Africa."

Now, I go back to Abrahamskraal by doing a search on palaeocritti.

I find five items, five pages listing it, two of which are South Africa (where some critters come from Abrahamskraal) and Capitanian, which is Mid Permian.

The other three are: Heleosaurus scholtzi, Hipposaurus boonstrai, Styracocephalus platyrhynchus.

The first was already mentioned and linked to.

The other two are not exactly pelycosaurs, but have a look:

Palaeocritti : Hipposaurus boonstrai
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/biarmosuchia/hipposaurus

Hipposaurus is a small primitive biarmosuchian therapsid from the Middle Permian of South Africa which was originally thought to be a gorgonopsid.

This one has THREE specimens:

Holotype (SAM 8950): Complete skeleton.
Referred materials: SAM 9081 (distorted skull and postcranial elements, type of H. major); CGP/1/66 (Skull).

And yes, this is Horizon: Tapinocephalus zone, Abrahamskraal Fm, Beaufort Group, Middle Permian (Capitanian). Type locality: Klein-Koedoeskops in the Beaufort West district, South Africa.

How many Triassic fossils have you come across in Klein-Koedoeskops? I'll search palaeocritti: 1 hit, ONLY hipposaurus is mentioned. But OK, to give you some leeway, there might just theoretically be a layer of Triassic fossils in Klein-Koedoeskops above the Permian ones or Permian one, just that all specimens there are referred specimens. Palaeocritti only lists locality of holotype, so called type locality.

Now, there was another little fellow from Abrahamskraal too. Also no pelycosaur, but ...

Palaeocritti : Styracocephalus platyrhynchus
http://www.palaeocritti.com/styracocephalus

"Originally described based on a badly preserved skull, the exact affinities of this South African therapsid was unclear until new materials were found. It is now thought to be an unusual primitive tapinocephalian."

Hence perhaps Tapinocaphalus assemblage zone, right?

Now, the Styracocephalus has a few more specimens. Not all from Abrahamskraal.

But none of them a complete skeleton, by the way.

Holotype (SAM 8936): dorsoventrally compressed skull with greater portion of left ramus of lower jaw.

Referred specimens: SAM K8071 (occiput with portions of skull roof and basicranium); SAM 9346 (Posterior portion of skull roof and separate portion with heeled incisor teeth); SAM K364 (Posterior portion of skull roof); SAM 12201 (Portion of skull roof); SAM 12187 (Posterior portion of skull roof); SAM 12181 (Posterior portion of skull roof with right ‘horn’); SAM 12215 (skull roof with horns preserved, and other skull fragments); BP/1/5433 (Posterior portion of skull roof with left ‘horn’); BP/1/5428 (Fragmentary pieces of skull roof); BP/1/5485 (Portion of skull roof).

11 witnesses to the skull form. Everything below neck reconstructed by comparison with better preserved critters of similar but not identical skull shape. What are the localities?

Horizon: Tapinocephalus assemblage zone, Middle Permian (Capitanian). Type locality: Beaufort West, Fraserburg, Laingsburg, Murraysburg, and Abrahamskraal, Prince Albert, South Africa.

Abrahamskraal was already taken account of.

1 result for Fraserburg, 2 results for Laingsburg ... yes, there is another fossil in Laingsburg:

Palaeocritti : Bullacephalus jacksoni
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/biarmosuchia/bullacephalus

How much will you bet before looking its an overlying Triassic one?

You have lost whatever you were betting!

Holotype (BP/1/5387): Nearly complete skull and lower jaw. (Yes, these very well defined kinds, we can all be so reassured that each species and genus is a welldefined kind, can't we?)

Horizon: Lowermost Tapinocephalus assemblage zone, beaufort Group, Middle Permian (Capitanian). Type locality: Middlevlei farm, Laingsburg, Western Cape Province, South Africa.

Permian again!

Do you start to see my point?

A bonus for me : I found again the creature where the remains are so close to the sculptured woodheads of the drakkar of the Vikings. Or perhaps there was another one which was even closer. Wonder if there were any Bullacephalus jacksoni around after flood and if they were classified as dragons by Beowulf or Sigurd? If so, they seem mercifully extinct by now.

No, seriously, I think the one I saw as similar to dragon heads on drakkar was some other more menacing Biarmosuchian.

So, back to the Rhynchus (Styracorhynchus, wasn't it?):

Murraysburg was also a place where it had been found. There are actually two hits for Murraysburg, AND the other one is not Capitanian. You might be having it.

Palaeocritti : Cyonosaurus
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/gorgonopsia/cyonosaurus

Well, there is just one little problem, if you look at the text.

Locality: Toverwater farm and few miles southeast of Murraysburg, South Africa.

So, the Cyanosaurus which is Upper Permian was not found on top of Styrachorhynchus, but a few miles away. See what I mean by horizontal versus vertical relation?

Holotype (WMUC 1515): skull of an immature individual Referred specimens: RC 75, BPI 254, BPI 254, BPI 294.

How luxurious, by the way! A full FOUR referred specimens. And holotype is a skull.

Now, shall we see if Toverwater farm - other locality mentioned for Cyanosaurus - has other periods than Upper Permian Wuchiapingian?

1 result for Toverwater farm. It spells Cyonosaurus.

So, has Capitanian been overlaid or underlaid by another epoch in Prince Albert?

Yes. Prince Albert ALSO shows hits with Wordian - which is also counted as Middle Permian.

The other four creatures are:

Palaeocritti : Tapinocaninus pamelae
http://www.palaeocritti.com/tapinocaninus

Modderdrift farm, prince Albert, South Africa.

Palaeocritti : Patranomodon nyaphulii
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/anomodontia/patranomodon

Type locality: Combrinkskraal farm, Prince Albert district, South Africa.

Oh, Prince Albert is a whole district? Perhaps that means Abrahamskraal locality, where we started our survey, is one locality on Prince Albert. And distinct from these two Wordian ones!

Palaeocritti : Australosyodon nyaphuli
http://www.palaeocritti.com/australosyodon

Type locality: Tuinkraal farm, Prince Albert Road, South Africa.

Palaeocritti : Glanosuchus macrops
http://www.palaeocritti.com/glanosuchus

Type locality: Knoflok's Fontein, near Van der Byl's Kraal, and farm Modderdrift, near Prince Albert, western Cape Province, South Africa.

"Farm Modderdrift" already mentioned as "Modderdrift Farm." The best place for a South African Dr Dino Adventureland. They even have TWO fossil critters found on their locality!

Let's look at the documentation of each of these Wordian and Capitanian critters:

"Holotype (NMQR 2987): Skull and mandible. Paratypes: NMQR 2985 (skull and mandible); NMQR 2986 (skull and mandible), ROZ K95 (skull and mandible)."

Tapinocaninus pamelae, all four specimens, make a bow with the three meters of body which have never been found.

"Holotype (NMQR 3000): Skull with lower jaw and postcranial elements"

Patranomodon nyaphulii bows as courteously as Ripicheep with the 30 cm body lenth that was only reconstructed from the 5 cm skull length.

"Holotype (NMQR 3152): Skull and mandible, left side well preserved, right side crushed."

Australosyodon nyaphuli takes a bow with the ? [thanks for that!] 1.8 meter body length reconstructed either from the 26 cm skull length or from the Russian (Perm district!) cousins that are called Syodon, without the Australo.

"Holotype (GS M 796): partial skull
Referred specimen: NM QR 2908 (snout)"

Both specimens curtsey in a wolfish manner, like Maugrim, if you know what novel I refer to, with the 1.8 m body length which has also never been found.

If Walt Disney wanted to make another Fantasia, he could choose worse places than Karoo for inspiration. Especially Karoo as seen by palaeontological artists. But to this, he might take other music than Pastoral Symphony. Like Danse Macabre? Camille Saint-Saëns goes spooky enough for some of these shapes and if Satan is considered to have led the dance in that symphony, his demons might have done some dancing of destruction over God's creatures (and perhaps a few transgenics products as well, Permian gives me that impression at times) during Flood.

Oh, the music could ALSO be the other Danse macabre, by Liszt, where the theme is Dies Irae.

Because, the Flood WAS a "day of wrath", precisely as the judgement day.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl You said: "THEN it should be a piece of cake for you to tell me exactly what if not holotype at least referred specimen of a pelycosaur (ideally as distinctive as Dimetrodon,"

There are lots of synapsids from the Karoo area, and I found one basal synapsid (pelycosaur) with the holotype from that area. Not sure why you think this is important, since there is only one holotype per species, but Elliotsmithia longiceps should do for now. If you want there are many papers that detail the stratigraphic zonation of the fossil vertebrates across the Permian/Triassic boundary, ending with dinosaurs.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Why exactly did you cut off the sentence?

It continues: ... I think I found only Varanops there, and I haven't yet been able to check whether Varanops could feasably be - with Six Day Creation and Flood Geology as opposed to evolutionary scenario - simply a Varan) directly under if not a holotype at least a referred specimen of a dinosaur.

I am in the habit of finishing my sentences, even if I take some time, and if you had read it to the end you would have known what I was talking about and why I thought it important.

And no, I was NOT limiting myself to only holotypes, referred specimens would do as well. Not that there are all that many in the fauna mostly concerned with Karoo.

Palaeocritti has no special page for Eliotsmithia, but it is enumerated among eupelycosauria.

The important thing is WHERE was Elliotsmithia found, and was any Jurassic creature found straight above it?

If you do hand me the locality for Elliotsmithia, I can search on palaeocritti if same locality also has something from Jurassic.

By the way, "many papers" is not an answer, especially not so to a homeless guy who cannot afford to buy them.

And "stratigraphic zonation" is still not exactly what I am looking for. Have you still not grasped it?

I mean lower down vs high up in the same hole dug down into the ground.

That would be something which could not possibly be two neighbouring biotopes that had been classified only this lately as being different eras.

That is what you still have not proven.

Besides, since Elliotsmithia is under Varanodontinae, I would like to know the details (apart from Evolutionist ideiology that Varanes developed millions of years later) why it cannot be simply a Varane of some sort.

It's not as if it were a very distinctly well marked creature like the dimetrodon (which perhaps may have been how Medieval dragons really looked like, the one sail mistaken for two batwings).

Palaeocritti - a guide to prehistoric animals
By Group‎ > ‎Eupelycosauria
http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/eupelycosauria

"Not sure why you think this is important, since there is only one holotype per species"

For many species in Karoo there is exactly one holotype and no referred specimens.

For others there are one or two referred specimens. In the above search, which you perhaps did not even read due to your eagerness to answer an unfinished sentence, there was, very luxuriously as per my experience with Karoo, one where there were a full eleven specimens, the holotype and ten more. None of them containing post-cranial material.

As as geologist, you may be thinking of marine invertebrate holotypes where one holotype for such and such an Ammonite is peanuts compared with the millions of ammonites found. For land vertebrate fossils, the story is very different.

In palaeocritti site, the finding place of the holotype is invariably mentioned, whereas with referred specimens, it is more fickle.

And if you are a geologist and have read lots of papers about "that detail the stratigraphic zonation of the fossil vertebrates across the Permian/Triassic boundary, ending with dinosaurs." why do you not tell me which exact place (and remember Karoo is not a place) you find clearly Triassic creatures like dinosaurs straight under clearly Permian ones, like Pelycosaurs.

Schliemann could not have made a relative dating of his Troys, if the different layers with distinctive cultural material had been on different hills instead of straight above and straight below.

Continuing debate with Howard F on Geology / Palaeontology (Updated through 21-V-2015)

Three Meanings of Chronological Labels

In detail:1) How do Fossils Superpose?, 2) Searching for the Cretaceous Fauna (with appendix on Karoo, Beaufort), 3) What I think I have refuted, 4) Glenn Morton caught abusing words other people were taught as very small children

In debate or otherwise on Assorted Retorts: 1) ... on How Fossils Matter , 2) ... on Steno and Lifespan and Fossil Finds, 3) Geological Column NOT Palaeontolical [Censored by CMI-Creation-Station? Or just by the Library I am in?], 4) Same Debate Uncensored, One Step Further, 5) Continuing debate with Howard F on Geology / Palaeontology, 6) Howard F tries twice again ... , 7) Is Howard F getting tired? Because up to now, he has failed., 8) Resuming Debate with Howard F

On Correspondence blog: Contacting Karoo about superposition of layers and fossils

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl "1) You dug that deep or only bored that deep?"

There are thousands of petroleum wells with cuttings and core. I can't teach you all of stratigraphy in a note, but there is no doubt the layers tracked from the surface to the subsurface are the same.

[Maybe for Kansas, have doubts about North Dakota]

"Pelycosaurs have NOT been found locally below Dinos. Which was my point."

I am sure I could find a place where they are directly above and below each other (and I will look), but the same argument works for microfossils, which are small enough they can be found in petroleum well cuttings. Marine conodonts are always found below marine coccoliths. Never mixed, never in reverse order. No chance of an ecological zonation to explain away the data.

"BECAUSE, if one and same sandstone layer had covered both a pelycosaur in one place and a dinosaur in one other place, they would have been diagnosed as different layers.

Tracing rock type is not that easy and unequivocal that you have no wiggling room for that."

No, there are many places around the world where rock strata can be traced hundreds of miles in continuous exposures. The Morrison Formation can be walked out for several hundred miles, and only has dinos. No ungulates and no pelycosaurs.

"somewhere on the globe, you would find trilobites locally under pelycosaurs,..."

[not quoting the OTHER criteria of stratification to find I had said, just two lowest layers ...]

Yes, there are many places where this occurs. Where trilobites are directly below pelycosaurs. Trilobites are small enough they are easily found in petroleum well cores. They have been widely found below and mixed in with pleycosaurs. Trilobites are widely found below, but never mixed in, with dinosaurs, and always below ungulates. It is easier to find the relationship you demand with small fossils that with large ones.

You mentioned the stratigraphy of Kansas:

"Ianthasaurus find Kansas (a pelycosaur, thus "Permian fauna"), Garnett : Garnett is a city in and the county seat of Anderson County, Kansas, United States.

And on map, Garnett in Anderson county is midway NS and very far E. So the two "indications of Permian" do not match as to locality."

I have excavated fossils at Garnett and know it well. The rock strata in Kansas are very continuous, and dip at a low angle to the west. The stratal zones of the Pennsylvanian and Permian are thick, and so cover a wide, north-south stripe in eastern Kansas. The rock units have been tracked physically in painstaking detail. No bait and switch. They can be matched exactly to well logs starting at the surface and extending as far west as Denver. Because the units do not change much, they are very easy to trace using physical evidence, not fossils. But the fossil zonation is consistent.

In the east are pelycosaurs and marine units with trilobites and conodonts (and other fossils). In the west are dinosaurs and marine units with no trilobites and lots of coccoliths. Wells that drill down in the west find trilobites and conodonts directly below. Of course it is very unlikely to find an identifiable pelycosaur bone in core, and never in cuttings because of the size.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Main points:

"I am sure I could find a place where they are directly above and below each other (and I will look)"

Do!

That is the main point of my argument.

"Marine conodonts are always found below marine coccoliths. Never mixed, never in reverse order. No chance of an ecological zonation to explain away the data."

Marine non-vertebrates have another relation to Flood geology than land vertebrates.

The interesting point would be, can you document such land vertebrates are always found with conodonts and never coccoliths? Can you document such other land animals are always found with coccoliths and never conodonts?

That would start looking like an indirect way of getting around my argument.

How different are conodonts and coccoliths to look at even?

Other point was main too:

"In the east are pelycosaurs and marine units with trilobites and conodonts (and other fossils). In the west are dinosaurs and marine units with no trilobites and lots of coccoliths."

OK.

What would this tell a Flood geologist about habitat of pelycosaurs?

I don't have a ready answer for that one yet.

But Pennsylvanian layer being traceable under Permian one where it overlays it (I am sorry I mistook Pelycosaurs for a Permian only creature type) and other layer of creatceous getting on top of the Permian one in the West would be the way deposit layers from different parts of flood overlay, and then the interaction with the different habitats of pre-Flood fauna gives a false impression of time zones rather than ecological ones.

My take on cretaceous (with land fauna) is, it was mainly coastal zones. Often covered with shrimps during flood, sometimes including ducks, plus some of the creatures being built to have part of weight supported by water, as it seems ... but the pelycosaur habitat with conodonts ... do not know.

Nearly missed:

"No, there are many places around the world where rock strata can be traced hundreds of miles in continuous exposures. The Morrison Formation can be walked out for several hundred miles, and only has dinos. No ungulates and no pelycosaurs."

I very definitely believe you, but here we talk about "continuous exposure".

I am sure Morrison Formation is what I could have called a "Cretaceous habitat".

No ungulates? What horses or cows in their five senses would get down to a beach with lots of HUGE dinos on it? If they went miles away from it, so much better were they off!

When I spoke about wiggling room, I meant while tracing multiple layers under surface.

Like the layers in North Dakota:

Creation vs. Evolution : Glenn Morton caught abusing words other people were taught as very small children
http://creavsevolu.blogspot.com/2014/01/glenn-morton-caught-abusing-words-other.html

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl Somehow I though I was using italics and instead got crossed out words. Sorry.

"The interesting point would be, can you document such land vertebrates are always found with conodonts and never coccoliths? Can you document such other land animals are always found with coccoliths and never conodonts?"

Yes, absolutely yes. Pelycosaurs are never found with coccoliths, only between layers with conodonts and other marine fossils such as fusulinids. Dinosaurs are never found in between layers with conodonts and fusulinids, and, if there are marine layers, they always have coccoliths. The order is the same for marine fossils and terrestrial.

"I am sure Morrison Formation is what I could have called a "Cretaceous habitat"."

If there were really Cret habitats and Pennsylvanian habitats, it just happens that the Penn ones are always below the Cret ones? The Cret land animals always associated with coccoliths, and the Penn. ones with conodonts and never coccoliths?

"What horses or cows in their five senses would get down to a beach with lots of HUGE dinos on it? If they went miles away from it, so much better were they off!"

Still, we should somewhere find a layer of rock where the transition can be seen, but it never has. And there would have to be a parallel transition in marine life. But the marine life is stacked vertically exactly the same as we found in outcrops.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

Excuse on strike accepted, I thought you were making a stylish difference, like italicising where you thought I had a point, but striking where you thought I was completely off. I was not offended.

"If there were really Cret habitats and Pennsylvanian habitats, it just happens that the Penn ones are always below the Cret ones?"

As to land animals, you have so far not shown ANY place where land vertebrate Penn fauna has been found below land vertabrate Cret fauna.

Coccoliths are not land fauna, remember.

//What horses or cows in their five senses would get down to a beach with lots of HUGE dinos on it? If they went miles away from it, so much better were they off!//

"Still, we should somewhere find a layer of rock where the transition can be seen, but it never has."

Because where you find dinos fifty feet east of a line and ungulates fifty feet west of it, you will try to say they are different layers, even if that is the only clue for them being so.

You have still not shown a place where (leaving out triolbites this time):

• first you find an ungulate
• then you dig on, not boring but digging and find a dino
• then you dig even deeper, still not boring but digging, and you find pelycosaurs.

Just a wild hunch, what if pelycosaurs could swim and dive and really fancied a diet of conodonts and other marine fossils animals such as fusulinids? Found mixed with their favourite dinners? Or lived on fish who really liked a fusulinid diet?

What if, for instance, pelycosaur sails were good swim belts? What if they lived in an archipelago, whereas Cretaceous was more coastline?

Now, looked up coccoliths (a species known today), and conodonts and fusilinida.

Fusilinida could be some shell fish found today but with less thick shells, and which got their shells vastly misshapen during the Flood when they formed calcium rocks.

The factor which contributed to that may be the same which attracted a habitat of pelycosaurs.

Conodonts, we simply don't know what they were. If they were sth like reconstructed, they may have been a favourite food with pelycosaurs, they just had to make sure not getting hurt on the teeth.

Note well, these hints on a reconstruction of pelycosaur habitat or one version of Pennsylvanian habitat, are much more tentative than my reconstruction of how the Cretaceous one would have been like.

For the Cretaceous we have - as I know thanks to CMI - one modern animal confirming the also otherwise reasonable impression it was a coastline habitat.

As I am not a biologist, either marine or lizard zoologist, I am also appealing to experts: does this make any sense?

The experts in question need not be geologists of course, I am mainly appealing to the scientists who study modern parallels to what I take pelycosaur lifestyle to have been.

Sure conodonts weren't a variety if squid, btw?

"But the marine life is stacked vertically exactly the same as we found in outcrops."

That can be arranged with Flood geology.

Squid or whatever conodonts were drown and get to bottom, and are then covered with lots of water masses including algae, obviously also Coccoliths.

Added later:

Here is a link I was looking for in regards to "wiggle room":

Phenomena: Laelaps
Why I’m Not Tuning in to the Creation vs. Evolution “Debate”
February 4, 2014, by Brian Switek
http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/02/04/why-im-not-tuning-in-to-the-creation-vs-evolution-debate/

"Standing in the Triassic and looking back in time towards the Permian at Dinosaur National Monument, Utah. Photo by Brian Switek."

How do YOU visually tell that where he is looking at and where he is standing are two different laters?

If he were to answer limit is below camera angle, that is cheating (as far as my question is concerned, which he may not be concerned with). If he says it is on the photo, I say the rocks look so alike (except perhaps angle and very slightly in colour) that it's time to say "wiggle room" and suspect he was classifying as two different layers what were simply one layer because of two fossilized habitats. A Triassic and a Permian one.

Update

through morning of 19-V-2015, feast of St Peter of Morono, or Pope Celestine V.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl

You asked if there was any place where dinosaurs can be found directly above pelycosaurs. An excellent example is the Karoo Basin of South Africa where the strata are well exposed in a desert setting and the section can be walked unambiguously upsection along steep outcrops from Permian beds with pelycosaurs to early dinos in the Triassic. Now it is not a vertical cliff, but close enough, and the outcrops are 3 dimensional so no chance of the animals living in different places. And this is the same succession of land animals that is found world wide. Nowhere is the order different. Here is one of good reference:

Smith, R. M. H. (1995). Changing fluvial environments across the Permian-Triassic boundary in the Karoo Basin, South Africa and possible causes of tetrapod extinctions. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 117(1), 81-104.

Regarding dinosaurs and ungulates, basically anyplace where there are fossil dinosuars in the ground and living ungulates works. Or dead ungulates laying on the surface. In the mid-west there are many examples of fossil ungulates, such as sabre tooth cats, camels, etc, preserved on top of beds with dino bones.

Of course, nowhere in the world are fossil ungulates mixed or below dinosaurs, and never are either group below pelycosaurs. As I keep saying the stratigraphic order is never violated.

+Hans-Georg Lundahl

Now you asked about a photo of the Triassic rocks looking “back in time” toward the Permian. Of course the photo does not offer evidence of this, but it is based on geologic mapping. There is a long history of using surface mapping to determine the structure in the subsurface. This is how we know the Permian beds in eastern Kansas are below the Cretaceous in western Kansas. And these results are used around the world and confirmed by millions of petroleum wells (yes millions). For example, the succession of fossils observed in petroleum wells in western Kansas is identical to the succession observed by walking the surface deposits from east to west. Not only are coccoliths above fusulinids, trilobites and conodonts, but the succession of fusulunid species (and trilobites and conodont species) is the same. Not only is the succession of coccolith species the same in the Kansas outcrops as in the wells, but it is the same succession as in Wyoming, or Utah, or England for that matter. And the order of species is the same independent of rock type (shale vs limestone for example).

Now you want to distinguish drilling a well from digging a hole, but the only difference is size. Wells are very deep, narrow holes. And the succession of fossils is identical to what is observed on the surface; the only limitation is that the fossil to be observed in a core must be smaller than the core.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

+Howard F, I went through Karoo myself.*

"Now it is not a vertical cliff, but close enough, and the outcrops are 3 dimensional so no chance of the animals living in different places."

You talk of it, as if it were a place about the size of Regent Park in London.

As far as I have gathered, it is more like Lake District**. Plenty of place for a Triassic biotope to graze beside a Permian one.

I spent at least a month on Karoo, and palaeocritti site is really excellent on Karoo fossils.

I never saw a Permian species found (as far as holotype is concerned at least) in same locality as a Triassic one.

Karoo is divided into assemblage zones and each of them is big enough to include more than one village.

"In the mid-west there are many examples of fossil ungulates, such as sabre tooth cats, camels, etc, preserved on top of beds with dino bones."

Where would you find a sabretoothed cat over a dino?

Are you sure you are not talking about either sabre toothed cats above creatceous rocks without dinos or, reverse, dinos below palaeocene rocks without Uintatherium in them?

By the way, unlike Uintatherium, a sabre toothed cat is not an ungulate. You meant "early extinct mammals, some of which are ungulates" I presume.

Now, show me one or two or three of the places in midwest where you not only get a palaeocene rock layer above a cretaceous or jurassic one, but actually a palaeocene land vertebrate fossil find above a createceous or jurassic or triassic land vertebrate fossil find.

"Fossils of U. anceps have been found in the Bridger and Wakashie rock formations, in the states of Wyoming and Utah near the Uinta Mountains, which are commemorated in the generic name."

Now, rock formations, unlike localities, are in certain ways geological abstractions, I presume.

But is there even a dino found near the Uinta mountains?

If so, how far from the Uintatherium?

"Of course, nowhere in the world are fossil ungulates mixed or below dinosaurs, and never are either group below pelycosaurs. As I keep saying the stratigraphic order is never violated."

So far, neither is it kept in any one place you have shown me.

"Many places in the Midwest" is too unspecific. Karoo is too big to be called a place. It's more like, unless I get it totally wrong, a large landscape like the Scanian Plain (Skåneslätten) in the South tip of Scandinavian Peninsula or by now, since 1660, of Sweden.

"And the succession of fossils is identical to what is observed on the surface; the only limitation is that the fossil to be observed in a core must be smaller than the core."

I have so far made no argument claiming to either explain or explode the succession of marine invertebrates.***

And the big difference between size of a drill core and size of a dug hole is that drill cores work better for entire fossils of marine invertebrates than for entire fossils of land vertebrates.

My point on where Brian Switek stands stands. The layers he is talking of would have been "mapped" rather by fossil content (i e essentially pre-Flood biotopes, unless I am mistaken) than by visual difference of rock type.

But suppose there was a genuine exceptionless layer superposition so that everywhere a layer with dinos superposes genuinely, rather than by wiggling layer definitions, with uintatherium and smilodon layers above and pelycosaur layers below : that could have been arranged by demons directing water currents during flood.

The Catholic Church exorcises water before using it for holy water or for baptismal water. When Christ stilled the storms and waves, He was angry at SOMEONE who was there doing the rocking of the boat. Demons enjoy deception as well as destruction.

* By internet, not in corpore.

** I was going to say Yellowstone, but that is too big.

*** Just starting one half explanation earlier, when it comes to conodonts and what were the other blighters?

Update

through 21-V-2015, St Valentine Bishop, martyred with three boys.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl You said: "The layers he is talking of would have been "mapped" rather by fossil content "

No. the mapping is based on physical relationships. The order of the layers is determined by superposition, not fossils. The order of fossils is determined only after the stratigraphic order is proven. Only then, once the order of fossils is proven in many locations from physical relationships, can the fossils alone be used to determine the ages of rocks.

You said: "...smilodon layers above and pelycosaur layers below : that could have been arranged by demons directing water currents during flood."

Very unlikely since all the associated plants and marine fossils are in the same order. In other words you would need some sorting mechanism in the flood that would sort large and small pelycosaur bones below large and small dino bones. And the pelycosaurs always end up with the same microfossil marine organisms and large plant fossils. With absolutely no mixing. Not even a little bit.

You asked a couple times about finding even one place where the Pelycosaurs are physically below dinosaur fossils. I pointed out such a case earlier. What do you think? If this does not impress you, then why did you ask?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"You asked a couple times about finding even one place where the Pelycosaurs are physically below dinosaur fossils. I pointed out such a case earlier. What do you think? If this does not impress you, then why did you ask?"

Because the case you pointed out was just stratigraphically "below" not physically literally below.

I pointed that out a few times too.

"No. the mapping is based on physical relationships. The order of the layers is determined by superposition, not fossils. The order of fossils is determined only after the stratigraphic order is proven. Only then, once the order of fossils is proven in many locations from physical relationships, can the fossils alone be used to determine the ages of rocks."

To start with, yes.

There was even a time when chalk and slate was all from Cretaceous, I suppose.

But once fossils have been assigned, I think many layers have been considered as different from each other because of fossils with already assigned "ages".

As to your answer about the demons, you missed the point about an artistic deliberate activity. They knew how they could use such a thing and also waited these centuries in order to use it. IF you are correct about stratigraphy in every place being proven independently of fossils, which Switeks photo at least didn't show.

Added later:

If you are in any doubt as to what I mean, I mean that (novelistic reconstruction, not pretending to be prophecy):

• God tells demons they had seduced humanity, except Noah, so far they deserved to get them, He was providing water, they should make sure no one outside Arc survived, and livestock too.
  
  
• Demons respond with a "yeah" and grasp this gives some options for preparing further deceptions. And ask if they can pile animals according to a scale of perfection (there is such a scale, it's just not evolution based) so as to give an illusion of evolution.
  
  
• God denies them (as far as I have seen so far) land vertebrates, pelycosaurs straight under dinos, dinos straight under Uintatheria but grants them (if I got you right on how EVERYWHERE layers are proven physically, if that is what you claim, no layer anywhere "proven" only by fossil content) using marine invertebrates surrounding land vertebrates.

If you wonder if I find this at all realistic, look at St Thomas:

On the contrary, Augustine says (De Trin. iii, 4) that "all bodies are ruled by the rational spirit of life"; and Gregory says (Dial. iv, 6), that "in this visible world nothing takes place without the agency of the invisible creature." I answer that, It is generally found both in human affairs and in natural things that every particular power is governed and ruled by the universal power; as, for example, the bailiff's power is governed by the power of the king. Among the angels also, as explained above (55, 3; 108, 1), the superior angels who preside over the inferior possess a more universal knowledge. Now it is manifest that the power of any individual body is more particular than the power of any spiritual substance; for every corporeal form is a form individualized by matter, and determined to the "here and now"; whereas immaterial forms are absolute and intelligible. Therefore, as the inferior angels who have the less universal forms, are ruled by the superior; so are all corporeal things ruled by the angels. This is not only laid down by the holy doctors, but also by all philosophers who admit the existence of incorporeal substances.

and a bit further on:

On the contrary, Augustine says (De Trin. iii, 8,9) that the angels use corporeal seed to produce certain effects. But they cannot do this without causing local movement. Therefore bodies obey them in local motion. I answer that, As Dionysius says (Div. Nom. vii): "Divine wisdom has joined the ends of the first to the principles of the second." Hence it is clear that the inferior nature at its highest point is in conjunction with superior nature. Now corporeal nature is below the spiritual nature. But among all corporeal movements the most perfect is local motion, as the Philosopher proves (Phys. viii, 7). The reason of this is that what is moved locally is not as such in potentiality to anything intrinsic, but only to something extrinsic--that is, to place. Therefore the corporeal nature has a natural aptitude to be moved immediately by the spiritual nature as regards place. Hence also the philosophers asserted that the supreme bodies are moved locally by the spiritual substances; whence we see that the soul moves the body first and chiefly by a local motion. Reply to Objection 1. There are in bodies other local movements besides those which result from the forms; for instance, the ebb and flow of the sea does not follow from the substantial form of the water, but from the influence of the moon; and much more can local movements result from the power of spiritual substances. Reply to Objection 2. The angels, by causing local motion, as the first motion, can thereby cause other movements; that is, by employing corporeal agents to produce these effects, as a workman employs fire to soften iron. Reply to Objection 3. The power of an angel is not so limited as is the power of the soul. Hence the motive power of the soul is limited to the body united to it, which is vivified by it, and by which it can move other things. But an angel's power is not limited to any body; hence it can move locally bodies not joined to it.

Summa Theologica, Prima Pars, Q 110, A 1 sed contra and corpus, A 3 sed contra, corpus and answers to objections.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl you said: case you pointed out was just stratigraphically "below" not physically literally below."

No. The reference I provided to the Karoo basin in South Africa is an example where they pely's are physically (and stratigraphically) below the dinos. Here is the reference again:

Smith, R. M. H. (1995). Changing fluvial environments across the Permian-Triassic boundary in the Karoo Basin, South Africa and possible causes of tetrapod extinctions. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology, 117(1), 81-104.

You said: "But once fossils have been assigned, I think many layers have been considered as different from each other because of fossils with already assigned "ages"."

Not really. The order of fossils is not circular, but determined by stratigraphic relationships. This always comes first, and the fossils come second. once the order has been firmly established, commonly using cliff exposures, they the fossils can be used as a guide.

You said: As to your answer about the demons,

I never asked about demons

Hans-Georg Lundahl

You asked about mechanism for stratification of marine invertebrate fossils.

You meant the South African example, not the Kansas one.

I have so far NOT been able to check this source on paper, but I DO know very well that as far as I checked Karoo precisely on Palaeocritti, never ever did I find Permian holotypes under Triassic or Lower Jurassic ones.

Now, I did write the South African Geological association to ask them if I got anything wrong, but have so far got no answer.

I am NOT quite sure you are aware of the size of Karoo. I thought you might have misunderstood the case by underestimating the size of "location" (something Karoo is far to big to be). So far, I have neither been able to verify your source on paper, nor heard from the people I checked with.

To make my criteria perfectly clear:

• 1) below means in my book along a line from upper and through lower fossil down to the centre of earth, ideally;
  
  
• 2) I am willing to accept a deviation of 45°;
  
  
• 3) where a horizontal or mainly horizontal relationship has turned into a vertical one by folding, that does not quite fit my criteria either.

Suppose these criteria were met in Karoo, it would make Karoo rather unique on earth as far as I know.

There are not that many places on earth where either Palaeocene / Danian meets Cretaceous / Maastrichtian (three, I looked at each of them as best as I could) OR the line crossed is between Palaeozoic and Mesozoic.

In Yacoraite, to take the Danian / Maastrichtian meeting point, there was a question of snail fossils, as far as I recall, and on top of that I found no real indication (but I would hardly call different snail species a real one anyway, land vertebrate biassed as I am) that the reason fossils are ascribed to two eras is not simply there is a line ascribed to an event thought to have been boundary between Cretaceous and Tertiary.

So, I am awaiting an opportunity to verify a really LOCAL above and below of pelycosaurs and dinos in Karoo.

The reason I was not impressed is I feel I know Karoo - as far as one can know a locality from a distance and from a limited palaeontological perspective at all.

I tried my usual two library resources. And a third one.

If you like, feel free to send me a photo copy of the pages.

Will give you adress in a pm.

Same Debate Uncensored, One Step Further

Three Meanings of Chronological Labels

In detail:1) How do Fossils Superpose?, 2) Searching for the Cretaceous Fauna (with appendix on Karoo, Beaufort), 3) What I think I have refuted, 4) Glenn Morton caught abusing words other people were taught as very small children

In debate or otherwise on Assorted Retorts: 1) ... on How Fossils Matter , 2) ... on Steno and Lifespan and Fossil Finds, 3) Geological Column NOT Palaeontolical [Censored by CMI-Creation-Station? Or just by the Library I am in?], 4) Same Debate Uncensored, One Step Further, 5) Continuing debate with Howard F on Geology / Palaeontology, 6) Howard F tries twice again ... , 7) Is Howard F getting tired? Because up to now, he has failed., 8) Resuming Debate with Howard F

On Correspondence blog: Contacting Karoo about superposition of layers and fossils

Howard F

You make a mistake that you have made many times. Average depositional rates do not apply to thin intervals. In is not valid to divide down as you did: this was shown to be invalid by Sadler in the 1980's. Geologists today (and for the past 50 years at least) do not claim every cm is deposited slowly. Just that average depositional rates are slow. No geologists today thinks a tree was buried over millions of years, so please stop claiming this is a current concept. Modern concepts are that the sedimentary record is a mix of rapidly-deposited layers, and slowly-deposited layers. For example, the vast majority of fossils are poorly-preserved through slow burial.

You also grossly oversimplify the fossil record. Let's just look at reef-forming organisms. In the Cambrian only archaeocyathids (extinct). The rest of the Paleozoic has reefs built by tabulate corals, stromatoporoids, and even algae. None of the Paleozoic reefs contain the modern scleractinian corals. In the Mesozoic, rudists (extinct) were common reef builders, and today reefs are built without any of those organisms. How can a single world-wide flood explain even one fossil reef (and there are thousands) let alone the succession of fossil reef-forming species.

Here is another example: The succession of land animals. In the late Paleozoic are Pelycosaurs, but no dinosaurs and no mammals. In the Mesozoic are dinosaurs, but never any pelycosaurs, and never mixed with ungulate mammals. In younger layers are ungulate mammals. This order is never violated, and none of these groups are ever mixed. No where in the world are elephants mixed with dinosaurs. And even within the Mesozoic, there is a succession of dinosaurs that is about the same all over the world. How can you explain this? Why are there never any horse, antelope, elephant, goat, moose, rhinoceros, deer, cow, sheep, lama, etc. buried with dinosaurs or pelycosaurs? Not even a foot print?

Hans-Georg Lundahl

+Howard F "The succession of land animals. In the late Paleozoic are Pelycosaurs, but no dinosaurs and no mammals. In the Mesozoic are dinosaurs, but never any pelycosaurs, and never mixed with ungulate mammals. In younger layers are ungulate mammals. This order is never violated, and none of these groups are ever mixed. No where in the world are elephants mixed with dinosaurs."

Is there ANYWHERE where they are one on top of other?

http://assortedretorts.blogspot.fr/2015/04/on-how-fossils-matter.html

http://assortedretorts.blogspot.fr/2015/04/on-steno-and-lifespan-and-fossil-finds.html

+Howard F "No geologists today thinks a tree was buried over millions of years, so please stop claiming this is a current concept. Modern concepts are that the sedimentary record is a mix of rapidly-deposited layers, and slowly-deposited layers. For example, the vast majority of fossils are poorly-preserved through slow burial."

THEN :

• a) even slow burial is consistent with Flood Geology (which has some complementary ideas about reasons for poor preservations too);
• b) poorly preserved material means poorly documented species, even genera. Look at three specimens of this one:
  
  http://palaeocritti.blogspot.fr/2013/12/uberabatitan-ribeiroi.html
  
  
• c) above all, if layers CAN be rapidly deposed, how come you "know" the layers add up to millions or even billions of years?

Also, alternatives to Flood with rapid deposition are sometimes very much less realistic:

http://assortedretorts.blogspot.fr/2015/01/on-arguing-biblical-inerrancy-from.html

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl I don't see any reference to pelycosaurs stratigraphically above dinosaurs or ungulates mixed with or below dinosaurs in these sites. Seriously, this is a major problem for YEC's.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

+Howard F, I was not asking on pelycosaurs stratigraphically below (I guess you meant) dinosaurs. I was asking about the LOCALLY below. What exact place on earth?

Give a reference from this site:

http://www.palaeocritti.com

It is evolutionist, so not biassed against you.

I have been through a few countries on it, and nowhere found palaeozoic landfauna under mesozoic, nor mesozoic under cenozoic.

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl That web site does not have all the information, but of course there are many hundreds of places all over the world where rocks with Pelycosaurs are below rocks with dinosaurs.

Here is a reference to a geological map of North America.

http://gallery.usgs.gov/images/06_25_2010/hlc5FRq11Y_06_25_2010/large/gmna_150dpi_standard.jpg

Pelycosaurs are found only in Paleozoic rocks, and dino's in Mesozoic rocks. There is a line that separates them and anywhere there is an outcrop along that line would be an example you are looking for.

The same goes for the KT (Cretaceous, abbreviated as K, Tertiary) boundary which separates dino's from ungulates. Here is a nice example of that boundary.

In this one, the KT boundary is second from last image:

https://landingaday.wordpress.com/2012/01/

I worked in Kansas for a long time where Pelycosaurs are found in the east in the Pennsylvanian, and Dinos are in the west in the Cretaceous. Although there are many miles in between, the layers with the Pelycosaurs dip to the west and are a few thousand feet below the Cretaceous rocks with Dinos. So of course there is no one outcrop that shows them all, but the stratigraphic order is without doubt. Here is a map and cross section to illustrate this.

http://www.kgs.ku.edu/Publications/Bulletins/257/03_hist.html

The stratigraphic order is based on such observations, not on assumptions. In the Kansas example, there are many tens of thousands of petroleum wells that confirm the geologic cross section.

And there are, without exaggeration, hundreds of examples of other outcrops with Pelycosaurs below Dinos, and ungulates above dinos. Of course anywhere you find dino fossils in the ground and a dead deer or horse on the surface is another example. You may think this is a trivial example, but try to find the reverse: a fossil horse in the rock and dead dino on the surface.

Can you find a single example of pelycosarus - dinosaurs - ungulates out of order? If there were any such example it would be big news.

I am using pelycosarus - dinosaurs - ungulates as an example only. There are many other examples of fossils that are only found in order, and never in the reverse. YECs seem to sidestep this data.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"That web site does not have all the information"

More than you show, anyway.

"I worked in Kansas for a long time where Pelycosaurs are found in the east in the Pennsylvanian, and Dinos are in the west in the Cretaceous"

Exactly. Which means that Pennsylvanian and Cretaceous FAUNA may have been biotopes living in different places.

That is just exactly one MORE example of confusing stratographic overlay of rocks with a local overlay of fossils. You just said yourself that Pelycosaurs and Dinos were in DIFFERENT places. Thank you.

Ianthasaurus is a pelycosaur:

http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/eupelycosauria/ianthasaurus

"Upper Pennsylvanian (Missourian) Stanton Formation, near Garnett, Kansas"

http://www.palaeocritti.com/by-group/pterosauria/pteranodon

"Upper part of Niobrara Formation (Late Cretaceous, Santonian) , Smoky Hill Chalk, Western Kansas, US."

I suspect Smoky Hill Chalk is NOT in Garnett or nearby.

You did NOT find a Pteranodon when digging five feet deep into a presumedly very eroded place, and then dig ten feet deeper after removing it, to find the Ianthasaurus just below it.

You found (or whoever else did) a Pteranodon five feet under the ground in a presumedly very eroded place with Cretaceous layers on or near top, and elsewhere you dug four feet into the ground in a presumedly even more eroded place with Pennsylvanian layers on or near top.

I don't believe the erosion story of it, I believe certain layers presumed to have been above Creteaceous in one place and Pennsylvanian in other place never existed at all there. And I also believe the Ianthasaurus lived in a Pennsylvanian biotope during the time when the Flood struck in what is now a place near Garnett, while the Pteranodon lived in a biotope or landed in a Cretaceous biotope during the time when the Flood struck in what is now a place with Smoky Hill Chalk in Western Kansas.

+Howard F I think I got censored here. [Censorship, if such, removed.]

I had however answered your main point. To two subsidiary ones, where you try to defend it:

"And there are, without exaggeration, hundreds of examples of other outcrops with Pelycosaurs below Dinos, and ungulates above dinos."

Where so?

Document one case from:

http://www.palaeocritti.com

OR from any other palaeological publication of your chosing.

I have investigated it for months.

So, the example is somehow NOT on palaeocritti. Remarcable, but not impossible. Where is it documented?

"There are hundreds of" is not a documentation.

"I worked in Kansas for a long time where Pelycosaurs are found in the east in the Pennsylvanian, and Dinos are in the west in the Cretaceous. Although there are many miles in between, the layers with the Pelycosaurs dip to the west and are a few thousand feet below the Cretaceous rocks with Dinos."

That can be arranged by my scenario. Both layers are from flood, they are not strictly coextensive and they covered different biotopes.

If one layer had covered two biotopes of different "age" types, you would simply have analysed it as not same layer but two different ones of same type.

How many layers labelled "shale" are there in North Dakota? Shale is one type, if all of it were from Flood it could be one or two layers. BUT is then reanalysed as many different ones because containing different faunas. Or because above or below such as contain faunas assigned to "specific periods".

+Howard F I seem to have been censored again [censorship removed], thankfully I saved the comment this time.

Your reference to blog and K/T boundary includes:

"Anyway, in this photo by geology professor John Isbell (University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee), the KT boundary is marked by the black coal unit that’s visible across the middle of the outcrop"

Picture, black coal line visible.

"Very cool. Dinosaur fossils below; no dinosaur fossils above."

I believe him. What he does NOT say is that there WERE any ungulate fossils above it.

+Howard F As to third link, here are a few words that should make you pause:

"It was recognized in the mid-1800s that rocks of Permian age occurred in Kansas, based on the fossils they contained; however, they were considered as part of the Carboniferous (Mudge, 1866, p. 5) and consisted mostly of massive magnesian limestones and calcareous and arenaceous shales (Mudge, 1866, p. 10). Permian rocks, as then understood, were included in the Carboniferous of the first geologic map of Kansas (Mudge, 1875) and the 1878 colored version (Mudge, 1878). However, this complete sequence of the Kansas Permian was not treated in publications until the mid-1890s (Haworth, 1895a; Prosser, 1895, 1897). As pointed out by Merriam (1963), the red-bed sequence in Kansas, now considered to be Leonardian and Guadalupian, received considerable attention during this time and into the next century. It was important, and thus necessary, to determine whether the red-bed sequences in Kansas were Permian or part of the Mesozoic. Thus, much discussion focused on the age of these beds and they were, at different times, considered Cretaceous, Jurassic, and Triassic, as well as Permian. Such divergent views were based on lithologic similarities and to some extent on the age significance of fossil plants and vertebrates. Hay (1893), one of those early workers on the red beds of Kansas, suggested that they belong to the Permian, based on lithological similarities to the red beds in Texas from which Cope (1888, 1894) had described Permian vertebrates (Prosser, 1897, p. 80). Cragin (1896), in a detailed description of the Kansas red beds, also considered them to be Permian. "

In other words, Permian red beds in Kansas are Permian, not because of Permian fauna in Kansas, but because of Permian fauna in Texas where similar red beds occurred.

So, what proof is there against scenario: red beds were both deposited in Flood, from same or similar source of material, and in Texas but not Kansas covered a Permian type biotope?

[Eliminated a code which I had not put there, some admin played a prank.]

Howard F

+Hans-Georg Lundahl You said: Which means that Pennsylvanian and Cretaceous FAUNA may have been biotopes living in different places.

No, sorry, The problem with this is that the layers with pelycosaurs are a thousand feet below the layers with dinos. They can be tracked in the subsurface with thousands of petroleum wells. They cannot be the same age. I am using vertebrates as examples, but the same argument works even better with microfossils which can be found in cuttings from oil wells. For example conodonts (Paleozoic) are always below coccoliths (Mesozoic and younger) and these occur directly on top of each other in the same area.

There is no place in the world where a single layer contains dinosaurs in one area and pelycosaurs in another. Pleycosaurs, dinosaurs, and ungulates are found in every continent anywhere there are rocks of that particular age. And the age can be determined independently using microfossils and by tracking beds. If these were ecological zonations, then occasionally you should find the order reversed, but we never do.

Hans-Georg Lundahl

"the layers with pelycosaurs are a thousand feet below the layers with dinos"

• 1) You dug that deep or only bored that deep?
• 2) I suppose if you didn't dig that deep, you really mean sth a bit different, like (reconstructing what I think you mean):
  
  * The layers with pelycosaurs in East Kansas are in West Kansas a thousand feet below the layers with dinos there.

If this reconstruction is correct, this means that Pelycosaurs have NOT been found locally below Dinos. Which was my point.

Different layers during the flood may have been the ones covering different biotopes in different places.

If it is not, tell where exactly a Pelycosaur of any kind has been found locally below a Dino.

Not stratigraphically below, that would be my reconstruction, but locally below.

"There is no place in the world where a single layer contains dinosaurs in one area and pelycosaurs in another."

Oh, I believe you. In a sense.

BECAUSE, if one and same sandstone layer had covered both a pelycosaur in one place and a dinosaur in one other place, they would have been diagnosed as different layers.

Tracing rock type is not that easy and unequivocal that you have no wiggling room for that.

"And the age can be determined independently using microfossils and by tracking beds."

Tracking beds, just answered. Microfossils would probably have some wiggling room by means of different layer positions giving different diagnosis for exact same preserved fossil form in different parts of the world.

"If these were ecological zonations, then occasionally you should find the order reversed, but we never do."

My argument is of same order of probative force if verified, and much better verified than yours seems to be.

If these were time zones, with sediments building up over millions of years, with sediments lowered by millions of years of erosion, somewhere on the globe, you would find trilobites locally under pelycosaurs, these locally under dinos and pterodactyls, these locally under extinct ungulates and smilodons and mammooths, these locally under fauna we can recognise. At least two or three of these locally in same place.

As far as I have seen, we do not. And asking me to take "stratigraphically" instead of strictly locally as a sufficient substitute is bait and switch.

One supplementary observation:

"For example conodonts (Paleozoic) are always below coccoliths (Mesozoic and younger) and these occur directly on top of each other in the same area."

THAT is beyond what I have been doing, but here we might be dealing with shell fish getting layered due to form or size. During Flood.

I meant to be commenting on "succession of land animals" (and slightly perhaps sea vertebrates too) only.

And one more:

Red Hills Kansas (with red beds "from Permian") : The Red Hills is the name of a physiographic region located mostly in Clark, Comanche and Barber counties in southern and central Kansas.

Ianthasaurus find Kansas (a pelycosaur, thus "Permian fauna"), Garnett : Garnett is a city in and the county seat of Anderson County, Kansas, United States.

And on map, Garnett in Anderson county is midway NS and very far E. So the two "indications of Permian" do not match as to locality.

Wikipedia : Red Hills (Kansas) · Garnett, Kansas