The Dinosaur Extinction Was More Complicated Than You Think

 

Joel Kontinen

According to evolution, the asteroid impact that killed the dinosaurs some 66 million years ago. According to Genesis it happened during the time of Noah. It did not kill all the dinosaurs, as the account in Job tells us.  

Dinosaurs are the biggest creatures to have ever walked on land, dominating Earth for over 130 million years according to evolution. But how could such extraordinary creatures have simply vanished in the blink of a geological eye? For decades, we’ve assumed these prehistoric megafauna – a staple of our childhoods and Hollywood movies – went extinct for one simple reason: the asteroid that hit Earth was so unimaginably large that it changed everything in one single blow. But now, thanks to new research, an even more intriguing idea has emerged: size alone doesn’t explain what happened.

The real reason the impact was so devastating may have been its angle. Had the asteroid arrived a according Earth at the time, predominantly dinosaurs on land, marine creatures in the sea and pterosaurs in the air, it appears to have struck at almost the worst possible angle imaginable, launching vast quantities of rock, dust and climate-altering gases high into the atmosphere and triggering one of the greatest mass extinctions in Earth’s history.

Source:

David Stock 2026  The Dinosaur Extinction Was More Complicated Than You Think | New Scientist July 16

The ‘doomsday’ glacier’s giant ice shelf is about to break away

 

Image courtesy of Chang W. Lee/New York Times/ Redux/eyevine

Joel Kontinen

The floating ice shelf of world’s widest glacier – Thwaites glacier in Antarctica – is detaching, with worrying implications for global sea-level rise.

Can global warming spell doom for in Antarctica? Some say that the climate was established by God at the end pf the global flood in Noah's time but others are  more sceptical. They say that men can destroy the planet.

Antarctica’s most threatened glacier is about be further destabilised, as the floating ice shelf in front of Thwaites glacier is set to break away.

“Its final demise could happen suddenly, and to avoid being caught on the hop, we have already prepared an ‘obituary’ press release,” says Rob Larter at the British Antarctic Survey.

Dubbed the “doomsday glacier”, Thwaites is about the size of Britain, but it is shrinking rapidly and is already responsible for 4 per cent of all global sea-level rise. Worse still, its collapse is expected to set off a domino effect in the entire West Antarctic ice sheet, ultimately resulting in a calamitous sea-level rise of 3.3 metres and changing the coastline of the entire planet.

Source:

Alison George 2026 The ‘doomsday’ glacier’s giant ice shelf is about to break away | New Scientist 18 May 

Strange mammal ancestor laid huge, leathery eggs — and it was key to surviving the world's worst mass extinction

 

Image courtesy of Professor Julien Benoit.

Joel Kontinen

Evolutionists think that mass extinctions killed most of the animals before the giant universal deluge that took place at the time of Noah.

Using synchrotron X-ray CT scans of a fossilized, intact embryo, researchers found evidence that the plant-eating mammal Lystrosaurus laid eggs, which answers a key question about mammalian evolution. Scientists have cracked a major mystery about mammal evolution after discovering a 250 million-year-old fossilized egg from before the time of the dinosaurs. Researchers say the specimen, which holds a curled-up embryo of the plant-eating animal Lystrosaurus, is the first known egg ever found from a mammal ancestor, proving that mammals' ancestors laid eggs.

The egg could help paleontologists better understand how these animals survived the Permian-Triassic extinction, also known as the Great Dying, which occurred around 252 million years ago. During this event, Earth faced brutal heat, drought, volcanic eruptions and ocean acidification, and 90% of Earth's species died.

"It reveals how reproductive strategies can shape survival in extreme environments: by producing large, yolk-rich eggs and precocial young, Lystrosaurus was able to thrive in the harsh, unpredictable conditions following the end-Permian mass extinction," Julien Benoit, a paleontologist and associate professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa's Evolutionary Studies Institute, said in a statement.

Source:

Kenna Hughes-Castleberry 2026 Strange mammal ancestor laid huge, leathery eggs —‬ and it was key to surviving the world's worst mass extinction | Live Science April 15

 

 

 

World's largest tree is also among the oldest living organisms

 

 Joel Kontinen

DNA analysis suggests Pando, a quaking aspen in Utah with thousands of stems connected by their roots, is between 16,000 and 81,000 years old.

The world’s largest tree has been rigorously dated for the first time, confirming it is at least 16,000 years old.

Named Pando, the tree is a quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides) with around 47,000 stems connected by a root system that sprawls about 43 hectares in Utah’s Fishlake National Forest. It has long been thought to be among the most ancient living things on Earth.

The problem with this dating is that it does not take into the Genesis Flood into consideration. The three can’t be that old. It can’t survive one year under the water.

Source:

James Woodford 2024. World's largest tree is also among the oldest living organisms | New Scientist1 November.

Ice Age made possible by something outside the solar system

 

An illustration shows Earth entering a corridor of interstellar gas and dust 2 million years ago. Image courtesy of Robert Lea. 

 Joel Kontinen

According to evolution, two million years ago, “an encounter with a cold cloud of gas and dust could have caused our planet's "protective giant bubble" to draw back, potentially cooling our planet, new research claims.”

How could it has happen? Some researchers believe that ” Earth may have briefly lost protection from the sun around two million years ago, left to endure the extreme environment of interstellar space as the solar system passed through a dense cloud of gas and dust between stars.

At that time, early human ancestors shared our planet with prehistoric animals like mastodons and sabretooth tigers. It's also when Earth was in the midst of the ice age that ended only around 12,000 years ago. Ice ages are brought about by a range of factors, “

The only decision for the ice age is the flood of Noah’s day, which usher in condition’s that made the ice age possible.

Source:

Robert Lea, 2024,  An encounter with 'something outside of the solar system' may have triggered an ice age on Earth (msn.com) 13 June 

 

Neanderthal woman's face brought to life in stunning reconstruction

 

Image courtesy of the University of Cambridge; BBC Stunandertals dios/Jamie Simonds,

Joel Kontinen

The recreated head of "Shanidar Z'' shows a Neanderthal  woman who lived about 75,000 years ago. 

 “A Neanderthal skull that was crushed to bits 75,000 years ago has been pieced back together and used to recreate the face of a wise-looking archaic woman with dark, flowing hair.” 

“Archaeologists painstakingly pieced together the skull of the individual, who researchers have named Shanidar Z, from hundreds of flattened bone fragments discovered in the Iraqi Kurdistan,”

What do we know Neanderthals? According to Genesis, they were descendants of Noah. 

Source:

Emily Cooke, 2024,  Neanderthal woman's face brought to life in stunning reconstruction | Live Science 2 May.

The Corsican wildcat is a sub species

 Image courtesy of  Martin Boone. 

Joel Kontinen

Genetics research has shown that the cat fox is not half cat and half fox, but Corsican wildcats get their "cat-fox" nickname from their fox-like colour and large tail. but they are real cats.

The cat is a species but it should not be confused with foxes and cats. The Corsican wildcats is an own species called Felis Silvestris  and it can hybridize with other wild cats.

Noah did not thus have to take more than two animals of the cat kind into the ark.

A male and a female of this baramin (created kind) could produce all the varieties of cats that we see around us, from the tiniest domestic cat to Cecil the Lion.

Other hybrids include ligers, zonkeys, wholpins, geeps and grolars, 

 Source:

Pester, Patrick, 2023.  Legendary 'cat-fox' could be a new subspecies, Live Science 22 March

Mount Saint Helens Erupted

Image courtesy of Lyn Topinka, popular image.

Joel Kontinen

 

In May 1980 The Mount St. Helens eruption indicated that thick sediment layers could form in almost no time. A single lava flow in June 1980 formed over 7.5 metres (25 feet) of sediment in just three hours. What is more, the layers look like they are millions of years old.

In addition, mud slides formed a huge canyon very rapidly. The Toutle River Canyon looks as if it is millions of years old, but its real age is 30 years.

The eruption of Mount St. Helens reminds us what the Genesis Flood could do. Mount St. Helens eruption indicated that thick sediment layers could form in almost no time. A single lava flow in June 1980 formed over 7.5 metres (25 feet) of sediment in just three hours. What is more, the layers look like they are millions of years old.

In addition, mud slides formed a huge canyon very rapidly. The Toutle River Canyon looks as if it is millions of years old, but its real age is 30 years.

The eruption of Mount St. Helens reminds us what the Genesis Flood could do. Mount St. Helens erupted, showing that major geological features can be produced in almost an instant instead of needing millions of years.

The Mount St. Helens eruption indicated that thick sediment layers could form in almost no time. A single lava flow in June 1980 formed over 7.5 metres (25 feet) of sediment in just three hours. What is more, the layers look like they are millions of years old.

In addition, mud slides formed a huge canyon very rapidly. The Toutle River Canyon looks as if it is millions of years old but its real age is 30 years.

The eruption of Mount St. Helens reminds us what the Genesis Flood could do.

A new DVD shows what happened. Here’s its promo, courtesy of Creation Ministries International:

Neanderthal found in Iraqi Kurdistan

Image courtesy of Christopher P.E. Zollikofer, Anthropological Institute, University of Zurich.


Joel Kontinen

A Neanderthal skull has been found in the Shanidar Cave in Iraqi Kurdistan is a hotspot for Neanderthal remains.

Pressumed to have lived have lived 70,000 years ago, the middle-aged or older adult are now in the at the University of Cambridge, where his or hers remains are analysed.

We already know that Neanderthals were fully human and they lived mostly in Europe in the same way we do. We belief that they lived in Europe ater the flood of Noah’s day.

Source

Geggel, Laura. 2020. Photos: Squashed skull of 70,000-year-old Neanderthal discovered in cave. Live Science (19 February).

Africans carry surprising amount of Neanderthal DNA

Image courtesy of Christopher P.E. Zollikofer, Anthropological Institute, University of Zurich.




Joel Kontinen

Evolutionists have scratched their heads, Now, it seems that the Neandertals have all the DNA that put them in the human category. This means that Africans can fully declare that their forefather was Adam, just like us. Evolutionists taught that the Neandertals lost their apelike traits.

This was brought home in researched published in Cell, that anthropologist Michael Petraglia of the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History Calls a “novel and elegant finding.”

Evolutionists think that mankind originated in Africa, and then spread towards Europe and Asia and then conquers the world. as they lived in Europe, that is what the inheritance says.

We already know that Neanderthals were fully human they built their culture in the same way we do, we belief that they lived in Europe after the flood of Noah’s days .

Source;
Price, Michael, 2020. Africans carry surprising amount of Neanderthal DNA. Science (30 January)

Noah is Making Headlines Again

Noah has made news recently.




Joel Kontinen


With Darren Aronofsky’s Noah very much in the news, Biblical Archaeology Society joins the conversation by re-publishing an 11-year old article on Noah’s Flood written by Ronald Hendel.

Aronofsky’s Noah, featuring Russell Crowe as Noah and Anthony Hopkins as Methuselah, regards the Flood as a global cataclysm. The film has a number of extra-biblical elements, which tend to distort the Genesis account, putting too little emphasis on the Bible text.

The film’s environmental agenda is obvious. It does not depict Noah as a righteous man, and its description of Methuselah and some other characters borders on the bizarre.

What is more, it appears to add theistic evolution to Genesis.

In contrast, Genesis states unambiguously that God, the Sovereign Creatorof the universe, sent the Flood because of human sin and that exactly eight people and two animals of each kind survived it.

Hendel sticks even less closely to the biblical text than Aronofsky’s Noah. He calls the Genesis account “the legend of Noah’s Flood,” suggesting:

“Biblical scholars will tell you that the Flood Story in Genesis 6–9 derives most directly not from an actual event, but from earlier stories. The earlier stories are from ancient Mesopotamia, best known from the Gilgamesh Epic (Standard Babylonian version, c. 1100 B.C.E.) and the Atrahasis Epic (Old Babylonian, c. 1700 B.C.E.).”

I happen to be a Bible scholar who wrote my master’s thesis on Genesis but I do not subscribe to Hendel’s interpretation. He seems to rely too much on the dubious documentary theory that is mostly based on speculation instead of facts and sees Genesis as a later work.

The details in Genesis support the view that it was the original account and that like other flood legends, the Gilgamesh Epic is a distortion of it.

The ark in Genesis was a huge 150-metre (450 feet) long very seaworthy vessel that could have endured over 30 metre (90 feet) high waves. In contrast, the Gilgamesh ark was cube-formed. It would have capsized on the very first day of the Flood.

Source:

Hendel, Ronald S. 2003. The Search for Noah’s Flood. Scientists are looking in the wrong place. Biblical Archaeology Society.

How Could Noah Fit All the Dinosaurs on the Ark?

Joel Kontinen

Many people assume that Noah’s ark was rather small and that most dinosaurs were huge. Actually, both assumptions are wrong.

The ark was a huge vessel, probably over 150 metres or almost 500 feet long. Many dinosaurs were rather small, only the size of a sheep.

However, some sauropods were enormous. Interestingly, research has suggested that they had a huge growth spurt in their adolescence. Noah had no reason to take the biggest dinosaurs on board, as God probably brought smaller (and younger) ones to him, as this brief video produced by Creation Ministries International suggests:

How DId Kangaroos And Other Marsupials Get to Australia After the Flood?

It is not uncommon to see wallabies near small inland towns in Australia.



Joel Kontinen

Place names often reveal a lot about people and their desire to remember where they have come from. Thus, there is a Newcastle, Tottenham as well as other names we often associate with English soccer teams. It seems that Swedish settlers have also wanted to give a name to a town – Dalby – to remind them of where they have come from.

It seems that one of the most interesting names is Ararat in the state of Victoria – a place also mentions in Genesis chapter 8.

Moreover, there are big mountains near Ararat. It would thus not be very difficult for kangaroos and other marsupials to get from Ararat to other parts of Australia.

Of course, marsupials could also have used the land bridges that probably appeared during the ice age following Noah’s Flood. Marsupials could also have sailed on rafts formed from vegetation (This is a hypothesis evolutionists have also suggested in their own scenarios.).

The Genesis Flood and the Gilgamesh Epic

Genesis describes the ark and the global flood convincingly.



Joel Kontinen

Many skeptics think that the author of Genesis borrowed an ancient Babylonian myth in writing his account of the Flood. But a closer look at ancient documents reveals that this cannot be true.

We know of over 200 flood legends. It seems that almost every culture has its own version. This suggests that there was a destructive historical catastrophe that mankind has not been able to forget.

The ark in Genesis was a huge 150-metre (450 feet) long very seaworthy vessel that could have endured over 30 metre (90 feet) high waves. In contrast, the Gilgamesh ark was cube-formed. It would have capsized on the very first day of the Flood.

Utnapishtim, the hero in the Gilgamesh Epic, was boastful, whereas Noah was a righteous man. In Genesis, the description of the flood's ending is very convincing. In the Mesopotamian story it is not. Utnapishtim first sent out a dove before a raven, which is known as a carrion eater. Noah first sent out a raven and waited a week before sending a dove.

Sources:

Graves, Dan. 2007. Smith Electrified London with New Flood Account. Christianity. com.

Osanai, Nozomi. 2004. A comparative study of the flood accounts in the Gilgamesh Epic and Genesis. MA Thesis. Westley Biblical Seminary.

Migratory Birds Cause Problems for the Genesis ”Local Flood” Hypothesis

The Sooty Shearwater's (Puffinus griseus) long migration suggests that Noah’s Flood could not have been local. Image courtesy of Mike Baird, Flikr/Wikipedia.



Joel Kontinen

Some Christians and especially sceptics think that the Flood of Noah’s days was a local inundation in either Mesopotamia or the Black Sea area.

However, this view that many progressive creationists and theistic evolutionists promote has several serious problems.

The ark would have been unnecessary in a local flood. According to Genesis, Noah also had to take birds on the ark:

”You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive.” (Genesis 6:19-20, NIV).

Even today, many migratory birds fly thousands of kilometres from one continent to another twice a year. For instance, the Sooty Shearwater (Puffinus griseus) migrates from the Falkland Islands, Tierra del Fuego or New Zealand to Norway, a distance of some 14,000 kilometres (9,000 miles). And then the same way back.

The only reason why Noah had to take birds on the ark was that the Flood was global.

In a world entirely covered by water, the only shelter for migratory birds was inside the ark.

Noah, the Flood, the Rainbow and Flooding in Australia

God promised Noah that a global flood would never again destroy all life on earth. Image courtesy of Jerry Magnum Porsbjer, Wikipedia.



Joel Kontinen

The flooding that has continued for weeks in Australia reminds us that unlike Adam and Eve, we no longer live in a perfect world but a world corrupted by sin. However, in spite of tragedies and destruction it is not at all like Noah’s Flood.

Genesis describes a covenant God made with Noah after the Flood:

”I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. I establish my covenant with you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth” (Genesis 9:9-11, NIV).


The rainbow tells us that the Flood of Noah’s day could not have been a global deluge. It also assures us that a destructive global flood will never again destroy all life.

A Flood ”of Biblical Proportions” in Australia

Joel Kontinen

In recent years the media have reported on an assumed flood of ”biblical proportions” on Mars although there is no evidence of liquid water on the red planet.

Recently, the media used the same expression to describe flooding in north east Australia. It is the worst watery disaster there in 90 years. The floods are probably caused by the La Niña phenomenon that has brought warmth and humidity to the Australian coast.

Heavy rains and the flooding of Fitzroy River and other rivers have driven many people from their homes. However, at the moment only one person has been reported dead. Nonetheless, Queensland State Treasurer Andrew Fraser said the flooding was a "disaster of biblical proportions".

The flooding might be a big catastrophe for Queensland, but compared to the flood of Noah’s day, it is a minor deluge. The year-long global flood destroyed all land-based life and radically changed Earth’s topography.

Sources:

Kauranen, Anne. 2011. tulvavedet pysyvät korkealla yli viikon: Australia: ”Raamatullisten mittasuhteiden” tulvat ovat pahimmat 90 vuoteen. Aamulehti 2 January A14.

Munoz, Daniel. 2011. Record floods swamp Australia's northeast. Yahoo News. 2 January.

The Noachian era – but only on Mars?

Was the red planet once blue? Image courtesy of NASA.




Joel Kontinen

Recently, Science published a paper on the assumed watery past of Mars. It even mentioned the Noachian era that obviously caused the red planet to change its colour to blue.

In their paper, Richard Morris and colleagues acknowledge that the evidence for ” outcrops rich in carbonate minerals [on Mars]… has been sparse”.

However,

”Using the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit, we have now identified outcrops rich in magnesium-iron carbonate (16 to 34 weight percent) in the Columbia Hills of Gusev crater. Its composition approximates the average composition of the carbonate globules in martian meteorite ALH 84001. The Gusev carbonate probably precipitated from carbonate-bearing solutions under hydrothermal conditions at near-neutral pH in association with volcanic activity during the Noachian era. ” (italics added)

For them, carbonate-rich outcrops suggest that Mars was once warmer and wetter than it is now.

For reasons that do not sound very scientific, some secular scientists are willing to accept the Noachian era – as long as it occurred on Mars four billion years ago and not on Earth 4,500 years ago.

However, the evidence points to a real global flood - on Earth.

Source:


Morris, Richard V. & al. 2010. Identification of Carbonate-Rich Outcrops on Mars by the Spirit Rover. Science 329: 599023, 421 – 424 (23 July 2010).

An ocean on Mars – but not enough water for Noah on Earth?

A new study claims that over a third of Mars was covered with water in the old days. Image courtesy of NASA.




Joel Kontinen

In the good old days oceans could cover a third of Mars, claims a new study published in Nature Geoscience.

Gaetano Di Achille and Brian Hynek at the University of Colorado in Boulder examined the assumed deltas and river valleys on Mars and suggested that in its youth the red planet was probably not as red as it is now.

There are no direct evidences of liquid water on Mars but since according to the naturalistic view of origins Earth cannot be a special planet, scientists who believe in billions of years are trying to figure out why there is so much water on Earth but none at all on Mars.

Usually, the very same scientists categorically deny the possibility that the flood of Noah’s day was a global catastrophe. They are willing to accept a global flood – but only on Mars.

Such a cataclysm would be too frightening on Earth.

Source:

Cartwright, Jon. 2010. River deltas hint at ancient Martian ocean. Nature News (13 June)
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100613/full/news.2010.293.html

Old speculations re-emerge: The Black Sea Flood as the inspiration behind the description of the Noachian Flood?

Noah’s ark was considerably larger than this model built by Spanish artisans in Gran Canaria. You can see an image of what the ark probably looked like here.



Joel Kontinen

Recently, Ulrike Guérin and Katrin Köller brought up the local Black Sea flood as a potential explanation for the Noachian flood in an article on underwater treasures in UNESCO’s newsletter A World of Science.

According to Guérin and Köller, 7,500 years ago the surface of the Black Sea was a hundred metres lower than that of the Bosphorus. As the climate became warmer, glaciers melted, raising the sea level of the Mediterranean until its waters broke the natural dam at the Bosphorus and water rushed through.

They conclude this from the traces of a submerged coastline lying 17 metres below the surface of the Black Sea.

The hypothesis that Guérin and Köller propose is not new. Roughly ten years ago, National Geographic sponsored research that aimed at establishing the connection between the post-ice age Black Sea flood and the cataclysm of Noah’s day. The expedition was led by Robert Ballard, who discovered the wreck of the Titanic.

Dr. Tas Walker assessed these speculations in 2000. He showed that no details of the local flood scenario corresponded with what we know of the global cataclysm of Noah’s time.

The flood of Noah’s day was an unique global flood that destroyed all people and land animals outside the ark.

The Black Sea flood was a local catastrophe that occurred at the close of the ice age. Scientists who have dated the marks it left behind have failed to take into account the effect of the global flood that would have changed the 14C/12C relationship of the atmosphere as great amounts of vegetation remained submerged. Consequently, the carbon-14 dates for this and other catastrophes are too old.

Sources:

Guérin, Ulrike and Katrin Köller. 2009. Of Shipwrecks, lost worlds and grave robbers. A World of Science 7 (2): 19-23,

Walker, Tas. 2000. The Black Sea flood Definitely not the Flood of Noah. Journal of Creation 14 (1): 40-44. http://creation.com/the-black-sea-flood