New panda study confirms biblical creation/flood event

Institute for Creation Research - Panda bears are restricted to remote mountains in China and have similar-sized bodies today. But fossils show that in years past some were mini-pandas, while others were giants. Plus, they lived in places far-flung from China. A new find described a mini-panda fossil fragment from Spain, reviving questions about the origin, migration, and demise of panda bears through history.

Researchers from Spain's National Museum of Natural Sciences and the University of Valencia described in the journal Estudios Geologicos two fossil teeth of a panda-like bear that was smaller than today's smallest bears. It was part of a fossil assemblage of "an extraordinary concentration of micro-mammals" that were mixed with fossils of "large mammals [that] were also abundant."¹ By comparing minute features of the teeth to those of similar-looking fossil teeth from France, the authors made a case for naming it as a new species.

The study authors also speculated that a formerly more tropical Spanish climate favored the small pandas during the Ice Age. Today, the area where the fossils were found has a dry climate. Perhaps the change to drier conditions lessened available habitat and food such that the ancient Spanish mini-pandas could no longer survive. And it didn't help their survival that at least some of them were swept away, buried in mud, and fossilized during an Ice Age catastrophe.

read more http://www.icr.org/article/6890/

According to Scripture, bears once lived near the place where Noah's ark landed—near the center of the Eurasian continent. And according to science, pandas live on separate sides of that same continent. Scripture also teaches that animals were created to fill earth's environments, which God foreknew would undergo constant changes. Likewise, science confirms that creatures generate trait variations that enable them to adapt to their environments.

Last, the Scriptures teach that this world and all its animals are cursed and bound to decay. This explains the scientific notion that surviving pandas probably no longer have the robust genetic repertoire to generate giant or miniature pandas. Overall, the panda evidence fits the Bible.

read more http://www.icr.org/article/6890/

In The Magic Man in the Sky, Carl Gallups has given us an exciting insight into the many unanswered questions of evolution theory and, based on biblical truths – both prophecies and promises, the possibilities of other worlds and realities denied by evolutionists. With his open and frank approach, supported by extensive research and information from learned professionals in their respective fields, Carl challenges believers and unbelievers to take a serious look at the subjects discussed in this book. Ultimately, Carl invites every reader to seriously consider the gravity and consequences of accepting or rejecting the truth presented. In this hour of all-but-universal darkness, a bright ray of hope and confidence shines forth from the truths of this book. In a time when lives are marked by a growing hunger for spiritual realities, Carl Gallups reveals the truth that real science and Holy Scripture are inseparably linked to verify that behind all creation there is an intelligent designer who created all that exists.

ICR Debuts YOM (Creationism) Conference in Dallas

ICR Debuts YOM Conference in Dallas

Is the study of origins really important? Important enough to invest in scientific research? The overwhelming answer heard last Saturday at the Dallas Your Origins Matter Conference was, "Absolutely!"

In conjunction with speakers from the science team at the Institute for Creation Research,Your Origins Matter (YOM) launched its public initiative in downtown Dallas where hundreds heard from experts in the field why their origins really do matter.

read more http://www.icr.org/article/6885/

NASA's Ocean Currents Study Confirms Providential Care

Institute for Creation Research

Virtually everybody knows that the world's oceans have currents. But few know who first discovered them, why they are important, or what can be gained by mapping them in greater detail. NASA's Aquarius satellite is collecting related data from the world's oceans, and a recent NASA video highlighted the vital importance of its currents.

Life on earth depends on the continuous movement of ocean water to mix nutrients both horizontally and vertically, otherwise ocean life—and, by extension, life elsewhere on earth—would not survive. The vast majority of the planet's breathable oxygen is generated by marine algae, which are fueled by this mixing.

Ocean currents have complicated causes. The video, while highlighting NASA's Aquarius satellite project, also explained that "at the ocean surface, currents are primarily driven by winds. Deep below the surface, however, currents are controlled by water density, which depends on the temperature and salinity of the water."¹ Aquarius detects sea surface salinity data from the world's oceans—and not just from shipping lanes, from which most data have historically been obtained.²

Water becomes denser and saltier as it cools, and as a result it sinks below less dense waters. The NASA video stated, "This globally interconnected process of overturning circulation occurs in all ocean basins and helps to regulate earth's climate."¹

Thus, ocean currents feed vital organisms and help govern climate, including the distribution of vital rain. But these things were known in the 1800s. Matthew Maury, the father of modern oceanography, was the first to establish the causes and courses of marine currents. He rejected contemporary but lesser theories of what causes currents, including the idea that they are forced by river runoff. In 1855, Maury wrote, "Hence we say we know that the sea has its system of circulation, for it transports materials for the coral rock from one part of the world to another."³

Maury also recognized the importance of ocean circulation to earth's climate. Concerning animals that can build solid shells out of miniscule materials in solution, he wrote: "For to them, probably, has been allotted the important office of assisting in giving circulation to the ocean, of helping to regulate the climates of the earth, and of preserving the purity of the sea."⁴

Unlike NASA's Aquarius project, Maury rightly credited God, not nature, for establishing the ocean's currents. For example, he wrote that "reason assures us that they move in obedience to some law of Nature, be it recorded down in the depths below, never so far beyond the reach of human ken; and being a law of Nature, we know who gave it, and that neither chance nor accident had any thing to do with its enactment."⁵

His life's work was inspired by Psalm 8:8, which refers to "the paths of the seas."⁶ Thus, the ocean currents illustrated in the recent NASA video clearly testify to the paths of the seas with which Matthew Maury and the psalm's writer, King David, were acquainted. God still oversees His earth.

Sere original article with references here.