I've been paying attention in class, and in both Biology and Ancient Western Civilization, dates don't add up?

Question

They both cite "millions of years" without anything to back it up. It's like reading kids stories of dinosaurs or stories of Noah's ark and expecting them to believe every word in both books.

There are all these sea monsters uncovered now that supposedly lived an infinity ago, but why couldn't they have lived more recently, maybe one even giving the idea for Scylla?

In almost every culture there are dragons in folklore, did that come from dinosaur remnants? And fossils are found so few and far between in dates.

My question is: Are our dates mixed up? Could everything have happened sooner and closer together than hundreds of millions of years ago?

*I have done my research, and this is what I have found. If I have something wrong, tell me specifically what it is, don't merely tell me to get an education or look up the facts. And I'm not forcing my question on you, I'm asking your opinion and ideas on it.

Thanks for taking the time to read this and respond!

Answer 1

Time is the secret weapon of inventiveness.  Things that do not happen today may have happened if given enough time.  But, in all actuality things that do not occur will never occur. Time is not the solution.  Nature is built on laws and consistency.  The known time and the speculated time are far different. History is perhaps 7000 years with man and it is sudden.  Civilisations pop up suddenly in history.  The vast years are speculated based on circular reasoning of strata and fossils and basically because evolution if true requires mucho years.  Cavemen and egyptian pictures of dinosaur looking creatures are found today and this was before the bones were discovered and modern thought was applied to reveal how these creatures look.  The ancients were drawing what they saw and it is widespread as are the "dragon" stories.  Giant lizards would grow bigger in a past environment where the earth was different and giant fossils show this to be true of other animals also in the past. The oxygen level was higher and UV rays were reduced so that man and beast lived much longer lives.

A stamp in Japan commemorated the finding of a sea serpent type beast in the late 1900s.  This can be found by googling.  The change in our atmosphere and the increase UV rays and perhaps the killing of these dinosaurs by man led to their demise.  A recent find of dinosaur bone has soft tissue existing after thousands or millions of years?  Scientists are baffled how it could survive after so many years, but it must have since that is the model. But, maybe your thinking is correct and the millions and billions are indeed fairy tales.

Answer 2

Well, if the books you are reading just say "millions of years" then we have a problem. But if they cite specific numbers of years, like "the last of the known dinosaurs lived 65 million years ago" then we have less of a problem. If you've really done your research, then you should know how the geologists and paleontologists are getting those numbers, like what methods they are using.

And here's the truth about science (well, one of them), and I'll relate it to your specific question. It's possible that all of our dates are mixed up, and dragon myths are actually dinosaur accounts, and all that. It's possible. However, it's not especially probable. The reasons scientists have for thinking the Earth is billions of years old are much better than the reasons they have for believing the Earth is thousands of years old. Much better, within the framework of science. So if we look at what we know about dinosaurs scientifically, things look like this...

These bones are in deep layers, usually. They are embedded in rock. They are mineralized/fossilized. They are in context with other species that no longer exist. Contextually, they appear to be much older than species that lived today, or even species that lived more recently but are now extinct. What we know about geology tells us that these remains are very old, and the methods that we have to quantify that tell us about how old they are. Furthermore, when you look at the fossil record as a whole, they fit within the larger story that is being uncovered. Having dinosaurs running around 800 years ago doesn't really fit, especially when you have the option of placing them 80 million years ago. That fits much better.

So the contention that there isn't anything to back those dates up isn't really true at all. Even if you completely toss out radioactive dating or other absolute dating methods, these dinosaur bones clearly are not in context with human remains. Anywhere. There's no physical evidence linking them together. They don't exist in the same layers. We don't have dinosaur skulls with swords in them, or shields with dinosaur teeth in them. We certainly don't have any dragon remains on display anywhere, and we've never dug up dinosaur remains that may have been on display like that. Given the stories about dragons, we should expect to find something like that.

But even if you toss out all that evidence says humans and dinosaurs did not live together, what evidence do we have to back up the idea that they did live together? Stories of dragons, and not much else. Even then, there are other explanations. There are other mythical beasts in folklore that don't appear to show up in the fossil record. There aren't any researchers trying to show that fairies existed, or unicorns, or imps, or 9-tailed foxes, or hydras. Why can't dragons share a common origin with other folklore creatures? There's more reason to put them there.

But I see your point. We have these giant lizard skeletons, and we have stories of giant lizards. Why can't they be linked in a significant way? The short answer is two fold.

1. They can.

2. They might not be in the way that you suggest.

Fossils do get uncovered from time to time. Is it possible that a partially uncovered T-Rex skeleton, maybe found in a quarry or just uncovered by wind or flood, sparked the stories about dragons? It's possible. It might not actually be what happened, but it's one possibility.

Answer 3

HAVE you done your research? Have you looked at other books besides your text books?

I'm not sure, specifically, where you are finding these discrepancies. Certainly dates DO get a bit more specific than "million of years". Perhaps your books are being vague for the purpose of simplicity.

What grade level are your text books?

Answer 4

As carbon-14 & Potassium/Argon dating becomes more precise, historical dates MUST be adjusted!

"As science improves, history changes"...