ANOTHER weekend is about to descend upon us. To fulfill our Curmudgeonly duty of providing you with inspirational reading material, we once again visited the highly esteemed creationist website of the Institute for Creation Research (ICR). Our quest was fruitful, and thus we bring you: How Did Marine Organisms End Up in Tree Sap? Excerpts, with bold added by us:
A team of French experts in paleoenvironments has discovered algae and several bits of marine life that are completely encased in amber, a hard substance thought to originate from hardened tree sap. Amber is renowned for preserving exquisitely detailed fossils, often of insects.
Okay, now what?
In their study published in the November 11 issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the authors note that “it has been supposed that amber could not have preserved marine organisms” because amber is produced in forests, not oceans. The researchers only reported what they saw and didn’t attempt to interpret how the amber formed or how the marine fossils were trapped in it.
This seems like quite a mystery! It’s enough to get a creation scientist all worked up and thinking great thoughts.
Although the creationist scholars at ICR dutifully cite the original article in a footnote, they don’t provide a link. Presumably their readers never stray from the hallowed confines of the ICR website. We can remedy that. You’ll need a subscription to read the full article, but here’s the abstract: Evidence for marine microfossils from amber.
Curiously, the abstract appears to contradict the claim made by ICR, that the researchers “didn’t attempt to interpret how the amber formed or how the marine fossils were trapped in it.” This is from the abstract:
The amber forests of southwestern France grew directly along the coast of the Atlantic Ocean and were influenced by the nearby sea: shells and remnants of marine organisms were probably introduced by wind, spray, or high tide from the beach or the sea onto the resin flows.
But let’s not quibble. Here’s more of what ICR says of this stupendous discovery:
Elsewhere, however, those who hold to the model that the earth was primarily shaped by “slow-and-gradual” geological processes have interpreted amber fossils as being the preserved remains of creatures from forests that existed millions of years ago. Creation scientists have presented many reasons to be skeptical about this interpretation, and the fact that algae have been found trapped in what was once tree sap indicates that the amber’s formation and deposition most likely involved an enormous, water-related event.
Yes! It “most likely involved an enormous, water-related event.” Not a local flood, not a hurricane, and not something really simple — like a fallen, sap-dripping tree that tumbled into a river and floated downstream to the tidewater, then maybe drifted out to sea and back. Most definitely it wasn’t due to what the researchers actually suggested, that “marine organisms were probably introduced by wind, spray, or high tide.” No! This amber mystery “most likely involved an enormous, water-related event.”
Let us continue. The creation scientists at ICR mention a news report that suggested: “The most likely scenario is that the forest producing the amber was very close to the coast.” You, dear reader, might think this is a possibility, but that’s only because your brain is riddled with sin. The creation scientists at ICR have a better idea:
The key to understanding amber formation may not be the proximity of the forest to the coast, however, but the events related in the biblical record regarding Noah’s Flood. At that time, the ocean overreached its coastal boundary and inundated the forest!
It all depends on having the proper frame of mind.
Copyright © 2008. The Sensuous Curmudgeon. All rights reserved.
The Sensuous Curmudgeon 
It was Noah’s Flood? Wow.
“It was Noah’s Flood? Wow.”
Yup. Little-known fact: He started running the water for a bath, and was interrupted by a phone call lasting forty days and forty nights. (They didn’t have tubs with overflow prevention drains in those days. In fact, it was this very incident that led to the mandate that all tubs henceforth shall have overflow prevention.)