Comments on: Blood molecules preserved for millions of years in abdomen of fossil mosquito http://smithsonianscience.org/2013/10/blood-molecules-preserved-for-millions-of-years-in-abdomen-of-fossil-mosquito/ News about the Smithsonian’s research in the fields of anthropology, astrophysics, conservation biology, geology, materials science, paleontology, zoology, and global climate change. Mon, 08 Dec 2014 08:04:00 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1 By: Mark_2674 http://smithsonianscience.org/2013/10/blood-molecules-preserved-for-millions-of-years-in-abdomen-of-fossil-mosquito/#comment-25496 Wed, 12 Feb 2014 02:10:00 +0000 http://smithsonianscience.org/?p=28528#comment-25496 “Didn’t even look for DNA???” Were they afraid they would find some (in which case it would presumably prove ICR claims of being only a few thousand years old). Just saying, if they wanted to shut creationist up, they could just conduct an exhaustive search for DNA in the sample, and say conclusively there wasn’t any.

]]> By: David Bump http://smithsonianscience.org/2013/10/blood-molecules-preserved-for-millions-of-years-in-abdomen-of-fossil-mosquito/#comment-25308 Wed, 16 Oct 2013 21:40:00 +0000 http://smithsonianscience.org/?p=28528#comment-25308 Daniel, C14 is radioactive and decays fairly rapidly. It was not used to provide the date for this fossil. The real question is, How is this possible when complex organic molecules break down in just thousands of years under all known conditions? Is it safe to assume that the conditions that preserved this fossil could do so to this degree for millions of years, or is it finally time we start asking if there is something very wrong with the assumptions or application of the dating methods that have been used?

BTW, here’s another case or two of amazing ancient traces: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/16/a-nervous-system-from-half-a-billion-years-ago/
Not Exactly Rocket Science:
A Nervous System From Half A Billion Years Ago
by Ed Yong

]]> By: Bob Enyart http://smithsonianscience.org/2013/10/blood-molecules-preserved-for-millions-of-years-in-abdomen-of-fossil-mosquito/#comment-25305 Tue, 15 Oct 2013 20:24:00 +0000 http://smithsonianscience.org/?p=28528#comment-25305 “This… represents the first clear evidence that some organic molecules can
be preserved in a fossil of this [46mya] age,” Greenwalt explains. Wow, Greenwalt is a bit behind on his reading :) A good start for him is dinosaursofttissue com, listing a dozen peer-reviewed papers, in Nature, Science, PNAS, PLoS One, etc., on dino soft tissue, and dozens of other papers going back, ALLEGEDLY, all the way to 350 Mya in crinoids :) !

]]> By: Daniel http://smithsonianscience.org/2013/10/blood-molecules-preserved-for-millions-of-years-in-abdomen-of-fossil-mosquito/#comment-25304 Tue, 15 Oct 2013 18:04:00 +0000 http://smithsonianscience.org/?p=28528#comment-25304 How is this possible if the half life of carbon14 is 5703 years?

I assume that the fossil is not a fossil at all. As the term fossilization means that the original biological material is replaced with minerals.

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