126 - Fossils

Wording of this Handout:

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Fossils
A fossil is something which has been preserved, usually by being buried. A fossil can be a plant, any kind of animal, an insect, a fish, or anything else which used to be alive. Fossils are sometimes made of stone, but usually that are made of whatever they started out as before they were buried. Coal is fossilized wood. Oil is fossilized plant and animal remains which have been turned to liquid.

How long does it take to turn an animal into a fossil? Some people say millions of years, but that can't be true because the world is not 7000 years old since it was created.

Nearly all fossils are found in sedimentary rock. Sedimentary rock is formed by water. Plants or animals are buried by flowing water, mud, silt, shingle and sand. As layers of sediment build up the plant or animal is compressed, some tiny minerals work their way into the body of the creature. Eventually the creature sets hard and becomes part of the rock then along comes a palaeontologist and chips away the rock, revealing the shape of the dead creature (or plant).

Some researchers have made their own fossils using sea water plus bacteria. Using this method dead shrimps turn into fossils in about six weeks. This back ups the Bible, which tells of a world wide flood which buried all live in less than a year leaving the billions of fossils in the rocks today.