Celebrating a Century of Fossil Finds In the La Brea Tar Pits 93
An anonymous reader writes "A century ago on Monday, the predecessor to the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County began a two-year project to uncover the Ice Age creatures that became trapped in the La Brea Tar Pits. 'Digs over the years have unearthed bones of mammoths, mastodons, saber-toothed cats, dire wolves and other unsuspecting Ice Age creatures that became trapped in ponds of sticky asphalt. But it's the smaller discoveries — plants, insects and rodents — in recent years that are shaping scientists' views of life in the region 11,000 to 50,000 years ago.'"
Re:But But... (Score:5, Insightful)
get on with the trolling program, leading edge creationists believe that isotopes and sediment layers have been disproven by science(and incidentally that if you find any fish fossils on high regions that is proof of the great flood).
if you take it further there's also an allstar argument that has retained it status that GOD CREATED TIME so none of it matters. but that card is to be played usually after everything else has been exhausted(since it's a super card that can't be beaten by logic... because... magic!).
Re:But But... (Score:5, Insightful)
I thought a year was supposed to be the time it takes for a celestial body to complete 1 revolution around a sun in a solar system.
That is one definition of the word "year". Of course, without further context, when one talks of years, he refers to years in the referential of Earth. Not Mercury years, nor Jupiter years or even dog years. You must be slightly trolling loosing this from sight.
As it so happens, a year in our solar system alone varies from 88 earth days to 250 earth years. But hey - let's not let facts get in the way of a good strawman.
As this, again, might be correct, it completely disregards the usual context the word years is used in, thus biding it to one of its multiple definitions. A dictionary can be found at your favourite book shop. Context not.
Re:Why bother? (Score:5, Insightful)
They have dug up millions of bones - to what purpose?
The bones is a byproduct. The important thing is the information we got from them. The reason we don't dispose of the bones is because they might still have stories to tell.
Depending on how nihilistic you want to be one can say that there is no point in getting information on when and how different traits evolved. If you want to go all retard-capitalistic on it you can say that it doesn't provide anything of economic value.
Those views can be applied to pretty much all science, be it astrophysics to philosophy. Those views are also incredibly short-sighted and something one would expect from a PHB that can't see beyond the next quarter.