Dinosaur DNA Found!
Deep-timers had a big enough problem with collagen and melanosomes. But DNA should be long gone. 75 million years? No way!
Could this be the last straw? For two decades now, especially since 2005, creationists have been challenging deep-timers (those who believe life is hundreds of millions of years old, and earth is 4.5 billion years old) with dinosaur soft tissue. Secular reports have been coming in regularly about soft tissue in fossils: feathers, melanosomes, collagen, various proteins, and materials in dinosaur bones that look like stretchy blood vessels and red blood cells. Evolutionists have been scrambling to find chemical mechanisms that might stabilize the molecules over deep time (see 18 Feb 2020 for latest attempt). They trot out their theories as ‘proof’ that soft tissues can survive tens of millions of years, never taking seriously the creationist critiques, which include the fact that evolutionists themselves had already predicted that soft tissues could not survive anywhere near that long.
But DNA? That’s impossible. Sorry, Jurassic Park fans; DNA degrades way too fast. Evolutionists know that.
Well, the gig is up. A team including Jack Horner and Mary Schweitzer just reported DNA found in a young hadrosaur (duck-billed dinosaur) from Montana. The paper was published January 20, 2020, in National Science Review. Bailleul et al., “Evidence of proteins, chromosomes and chemical markers of DNA in exceptionally preserved dinosaur cartilage.” Look at the reaction reported by Phys.org, in their article, “Cartilage cells, chromosomes and DNA preserved in 75 million-year-old baby duck-billed dinosaur.”
Microscopic analyses of skull fragments from these nestling dinosaurs were conducted by Alida Bailleul at the Museum of the Rockies. In one fragment she noticed some exquisitely preserved cells within preserved calcified cartilage tissues on the edges of a bone. Two cartilage cells were still linked together by an intercellular bridge, morphologically consistent with the end of cell division (see left image below). Internally, dark material resembling a cell nucleus was also visible. One cartilage cell preserved dark elongated structures morphologically consistent with chromosomes (center image below). “I couldn’t believe it, my heart almost stopped beating,” Bailleul says.
Dividing cells with chromosomes and DNA in hadrosaur bone. Bailleul et al, “Evidence of proteins, chromosomes and chemical markers of DNA in exceptionally preserved dinosaur cartilage,” NSR 20 Jan 2020. Figure from Phys.org 28 Feb 2020, “Cartilage cells, chromosomes and DNA preserved in 75 million-year-old baby duck-billed dinosaur.”
But was it really DNA, or did it just look like DNA? Go look at the pictures yourself and read what they say:
The researchers also isolated individual Hypacrosaurus cartilage cells and applied two DNA-stains, DAPI (4′,6-diamidino-2-phenylindole) and PI (propidium iodide). These bind specifically to DNA fragments in extant material, and some of the isolated dinosaur cells showed internal, positive binding in the same pattern as seen in modern cells, suggesting some original dinosaur DNA is preserved (see below, right image).
Yes, see the image. The paper is open-access for all to see for themselves. To rub it in, let’s see how these secular deep-time believers respond to this evidence. Could DNA really last 75 million years?
The possibility that DNA can survive for tens of millions of years is not currently recognized by the scientific community. Rather, based upon kinetic experiments and modelling, it is generally accepted that DNA persists less than 1 million years.
Well, that “generally accepted” belief has just been falsified. Something has to give. Either DNA can last that long, or the dinosaur bones are not that old. Which option do you think they will take?
“These new exciting results add to growing evidence that cells and some of their biomolecules can persist in deep-time. They suggest DNA can preserve for tens of millions of years, and we hope that this study will encourage scientists working on ancient DNA to push current limits and to use new methodology in order to reveal all the unknown molecular secrets that ancient tissues have,” Bailleul says….
These new data support other results that suggest DNA in some form can persist in Mesozoic tissues, and lay the foundation for future efforts to recover and sequence DNA from other very ancient fossils in laboratories worldwide.
And yet creation research has shown that there are strict upper limits on the survival of DNA. It cannot be tens of millions of years old. See Sarfati’s article at Creation.com, and Brian Thomas’s article at ICR.org (Thomas has since completed his PhD).
Update 5 March 2020: Michael J. Benton, professor of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Bristol, doesn’t believe it. He writes today in The Conversation, “Has dinosaur DNA been found? An expert explains what we really know.” It would be a “hugely significant find” he says, “If accurate….” Benton relies on the Saitta paper (see 18 June 2019), choosing to believe that what the scientists found is contamination or microbes. Most interesting is his agreement that DNA cannot survive for long.
Those studying what they believe to be ancient DNA are now careful to decontaminate their samples and work in antiseptic conditions. But we now also know that DNA molecules break down very easily and will typically survive only a few years. Hundred-year-old samples of DNA from museum specimens are massively fragmented and the breakdown of their molecular structure continues rapidly.
By using massive computing resources, DNA from fossils maybe 50,000 years old can be reconstructed from millions of short fragments. The oldest such samples are 700,000 years old – a long way from the 66 million years of the last dinosaurs.
Given this admission, it will be very hard for paleontologists like Benton to deny that the dinosaurs died within a few thousand years, if the evidence continues to prove convincing beyond reasonable doubt.
Sidestepping Tactic
Artist conception of the habitat of Hypacrosaurus.
In the face of falsification, some scientists cannot give up. Instead, they distract attention. This reaction is just like the joke we have told before about the man who thought he was dead. His doctor asks, “Do dead men bleed?” “No, dead men do not bleed,” replied the delusional man, upon which the doctor pricked the man’s finger and blood oozed out. “Well, I’ll be darned!” the man said. “Dead men do bleed!”
Now suppose the delusional ‘dead’ man immediately changes the subject, and engages in sidestepping. He tells his doctor excitedly, “This is terrific! Think of the new research possibilities this opens up. We can now go into graveyards and recover the blood from the dead in order to determine their blood types and learn more about the evolution of bleeding in dead people!”
Whoever swallows that line would be delusional as well.
OK, creationists, it’s time to take charge of this situation and go on offense, because the deep-time moyboys are acting very offensively. They are backtracking on their own upper limits on lifetime for biomolecules that they previously believed. Young ages for DNA are logical conclusions from the evidence in front of their eyes. DNA degrades very quickly. Under the best conditions for preservation, encased in ice inside a sterilized chamber, DNA would still degrade in a tiny fraction of the assumed age. The claim it can last for tens of millions of years is now a complete myth. It’s a mere assertion stated by faith to support a prior belief in deep time.
This discovery pounds the deep time myth into the ground. Another hammer is the finding of carbon-14 in dinosaur bones, which should be completely absent in 100,000 years. This new paper should clinch the case. To me, it’s almost as solid as finding Noah’s Ark on Mt Ararat with rooms for animals and all the dimensions and characteristics described in the Bible. Couldn’t you hear the evolutionists try to say that it evolved up there over millions of years!
What will the evolutionists do? Oh, we know exactly what they will do. They will do what they always do. They will continue like the delusional dead man, claiming that it proves DNA can last for tens of millions of years. They will say it ‘sheds light on evolution.’ Don’t let them get away with it. They must be shamed in public!
Print pictures from the paper. Show them to people, and say, “what does this look like?” Tell them it’s DNA, chromosomes and proteins found in a fossil. Show them the stretchy blood vessels. Then drop the bomb: “These are actual pictures from dinosaur bones.” Pause and watch for the effect: wide eyes, disbelief, incredulous looks. Then read the quotes you have prepared beforehand by evolutionists saying that these materials degrade quickly and cannot last even one million years, let alone 75 million. Let the evidence sink in, before saying, “The Bible says all the fossils were formed in a global Flood that buried all the animals just a few thousand years ago. Doesn’t that make better sense? The secular scientists need all those millions of years because they follow Darwin, their idol.” Keep showing the photos, and say, “Imagine a Darwinist here with us asking you, ‘Who are you going to believe, me or your lyin’ eyes?'”
If the friend continues to look interested, explain the implications. “This means that all those stories about animals evolving over millions of years is not true. It’s a myth. The Bible was right. These animals, including dinosaurs, perished in the Flood only a few thousand years ago. The Bible can be trusted after all. Did you know that Jesus believed that Adam and Eve were created from the beginning along with the world and all its life? Have you heard what he did for you and me? He loved us so much he died for us. Then he rose from the dead. He’s alive, and he is waiting for people like us to repent and give our lives to him. Look again at these pictures. Thousands of years old, not tens of millions. Evolution is false. We were created by a loving God who wants to forgive us and give us eternal life.” Quote John 3:16 and other salvation scriptures.