Recently, five octopus fossils were discovered in Lebanon. Supposedly 95 million years old, these fossils are remarkably well preserved, including all eight tentacles, and even evidence of suckers and traces of ink!
It’s surprising that the octopuses even became fossils. Since an octopus doesn’t have any hard parts, other than the beak, its body decomposes very quickly into a mushy blob and is gone in a matter of days.
According to evolutionary theory, in order to become fossilized, an octopus would have to sink to the ocean floor, and slowly become buried by sediment, all without decomposing, or being eaten by scavengers or bacteria. That scenario isn’t likely. In fact, even Charles Darwin, in his uniformitarian thinking, wrote, “No organism wholly soft can be preserved” (The Origin of Species, first published 1859, quote taken from p. 422 of the 6th Edition, 1872, reprinted 1902).
In order for this creature to become a fossil, it had to be buried very rapidly. Something catastrophic would have had to happen to make an octopus quickly sink to the ocean floor and be buried before any decomposition could take place, much less be eaten by another animal for dinner!
Noah’s Flood provides the answers to those problems. With such torrential rains, powerful currents, and tectonic movements, these octopuses, and countless other living creatures, were overcome by their surroundings incredibly fast and buried, probably within moments. (Read the entire article at the Creation Ministries International website.)
But this isn’t the only case of soft-bodied animals becoming fossilized. A few years ago, hundreds of fossilized jellyfish were found in a Wisconsin quarry. These jellyfish are supposed to be over 500 million years old. Finding one such fossil is rare. But finding hundreds? The odds against this happening in an evolutionistic manner are staggering. But again, Noah’s flood provides a framework where this could occur. (Read the entire article at the Creation Ministries International website.)
What’s even more astonishing about both of these finds is this: these fossils are almost indistinguishable from today’s variety of the same animal. If they are as old as they are claimed to be, shouldn’t there be differences from modern species? Shouldn’t they look more primitive?
They should, if the evolutionistic date were true. But if these animals were buried by a global flood just 4500 years ago, we would expect them to look exactly like the same animals we see today.
Again, Genesis and Noah’s Flood provide an answer that fits the evidence.
While these finds are interesting, there is something crucial that we can learn from this. These finds don’t fit easily into an evolutionistic framework. Evolution cannot explain satisfactorily how these fossils occurred. That throws a questionable light over the entire evolutionary model. When evidence appears that can’t be explained by any current though, it’s time to reconsider our ideas.
Creation does exactly that. It provides a framework that helps to explain these fossils, in addition to other, normal fossils.
Perhaps it’s time to discard the idea of evolution. If it can’t provide the answers, then it’s not the truth about our origins that we need to hear.
These fossils, along with all the rest, allow us a glimpse of the hand of God, not just in judgment of the earth, but also of his creative and redemptive nature as well.