Information Related to "The Problem of "Living Fossils""
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The geologic column depicted in many science textbooks and museums supposedly shows which life-forms existed at any particular time in the history of our planet. Trilobites, for example, are thought to have lived during the Cambrian Period and later became extinct.
Dinosaurs walked the earth during what are called the Jurassic and Triassic periods and likewise later became extinct.
According to traditional scientific thinking, such creatures should not be found on earth today because the geologic column shows they fell victim to extinction many millions of years ago. However, several discoveries of "living fossils" have cast doubt on this long-accepted interpretation of the fossil record.
An astounding catch
Perhaps the most stunning—and famous—of these living fossils is the coelacanth. Fossils of this unusual fish first appear in strata from the Devonian period, with an estimated age of 350 million years.
For years paleontologists thought the coelacanth became extinct about 70 million years ago, since they found no fossil remains of the fish in deposits formed later than the Cretaceous period. But things changed dramatically in December 1938, when a fishing trawler captured a living coelacanth off the eastern coast of South Africa. Scientists were stunned.
After all, the discovery was akin to finding a living dinosaur in a remote patch of jungle!
Since that first shocking discovery, fishermen and scientists obtained more specimens.
Researchers were dismayed to find that the inhabitants of the Comoro Islands, near the initial find, had used coelacanths as food for years, drying and salting the rare fish's meat.
The discovery of living coelacanths proved to be a profound embarrassment for those trying to use evolution to interpret the geologic record.
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