As the Washington Post reports, researchers have discovered a fossil that they claim—along with the entirety of the scientific literature of the past 150 years—could be a headache for Biblical Creationists.
The new fossil may, along with multiple lines of converging evidence from fields as diverse as paleontology, biology, astronomy, genetics, physics and geology, finally provide strong evidence against the hypothesis that the world was created in its present form as little as 10,000 years ago.
"Sure, we have plenty of evidence from carbon dating that the earth is billions of years old," said lead researcher, Ryosuke Motani. "The theory of continental drift makes it pretty clear that the earth has changed quite a bit over that time. Once you get into the biology, you've got evidence from molecular genetics, comparative anatomy of homologous traits, not to mention the distribution of various branches of the tree of life around the globe, to name just a few."
Added Motani, "but until today, we didn't really have a smoking gun."
Multiple scientific observers have expressed hope that, along with many cases of observed evolution in nature and in laboratories, and in addition to numerous already-discovered fossils that appear to be the intermediate stages between marine and land-dwelling animals, the newly discovered fossil will be the straw that breaks the camel's back in the Creationists' argument.
"We truly believe that Creationist fundamentalists the world over will finally yield on this," an assistant researcher said. "...especially after they consider that nothing in the last century of scientific investigation has produced any shred support for their hypothesis."
A spokesman at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky said they will take a "very close look" at the group's forthcoming research paper before deciding their next move.
