This is another favorite among the so-called “educated” religious folk because they take “evidence” such as fossilized trees protruding through many rock layers and instantly “know” that evolution has been debunked and that scientists are involved in some sort of massive world-wide cover up, and hence that their particular brand of deity was correct all along.

Wrong. In fact they couldn’t be more incorrect if they tried.

Evolution is the change in the inherited characteristics of biological populations over successive generations, and therefore says nothing about how rock layers are laid down. The layers that are studied today were laid down in a wide range of circumstances: with the time taken and the amount and type of debris varying widely.

For the upright trees in rock layers, creationists use the term “polystrate fossils” however real scientists use the term “upright fossils” (Wikipedia link) to describe examples of species that have appeared to grow through rock layers. Here’s an example of an upright fossil located in the Cumberland Basin in Nova Scotia (picture taken from Wikipedia):

The strange thing is that creationists seem to freeze when considering actual explanations and can only come to the conclusion that the Earth is young and therefore evolution is impossible. Instead, they should consider how long a specimen takes to fossilize and how long layers take to be deposited – because both are highly variable and both have been studied exhaustively by scientists.

Animals decay very rapidly and therefore have to be covered quickly to be fossilized, but trees decay much more slowly. In fact the softer trees can take up to 100 years to decay and the harder trees can take upwards of 300 years. That gives a lot of time for layers to be deposited around the trees.

The mistake that creationists make is that they somehow believe that all layers mark off millions of years and they then jump to the conclusion that scientists are saying that a tree stood in place for millions of years while a rock layer formed around it. Wrong. It’s a mistake to believe that the thickness of a layer is necessarily related to how long it took to form. Some layers are laid down relatively quickly, especially those that are the result of localized flooding or volcanic activity.

And the phenomenon of upright fossils can’t have been the result of a world-wide flood or we would see examples of upright fossils in every part of the world. We don’t.

Some famous examples of upright fossils exist in Nova Scotia in Canada, and they were thoroughly studied by scientists a long time ago. In 1868 the scientist John William Dawson published a scientific study that provided an explanation for how such upright fossils formed. Specifically: “The reader will note here that the absolute thickness of any bed or mass of beds is no measure of the time occupied in their formation” (“The Geological Structure, Organic Remains, and Mineral Resources of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island” 1868, page 184).

Yep, over 150 years ago scientists had a good explanation for upright fossils. But you, as a creationist who is propagating such nonsense as “polystrate fossils prove a young Earth” would prefer to believe that you know something that suggests that scientists over the last 150 years have been aware of something that contradicts all other evidence and therefore “disproves evolution”?

You somehow believe that those same scientists have therefore been suppressing evidence and research and dutifully playing their part in a huge conspiracy and cover-up in the scientific community – for one and a half centuries? Really?

Could it just be much more likely that you have misunderstood the situation due to the lies that have been told to you by those keen to “prove” their beliefs at all costs? The greatest cost of which is the truth? Now that you know the truth, you no longer have to be part of the intellectually-dishonest deception.