The number of local, stage boundary-straddling species (NLSSS) at each stage-stage boundary is determined from the Paleobiology Database. The pattern of NLSSS values qualitatively defines five biostratigraphic zones: the Precambrian through Cambrian (with zero to low NLSSS values), the Ordovician through Mississippian (with low to moderate NLSSS values), the Pennsylvanian through Permian (with very high NLSSS values), the Mesozoic (with low to high NLSSS values), and the Cenozoic (with moderate to very high NLSSS values). As a criterion for identifying the pre-Flood/Flood boundary, NLSSS values strongly suggest a position below the Ordovician. As a criterion for identifying the Flood/post-Flood boundary, NLSSS values strongly argue against a position very much above the Cretaceous/Paleogene boundary. The Cretaceous/Paleogene boundary is suggested by terrestrial NLSSS values in North America, but a definitive global argument must await re-evaluation of global terrestrial vs. marine NLSSS data. Tentatively then, the bottom and top NLSSS biostratigraphic zones are designated pre-Flood and post-Flood, respectively. The middle three NLSSS biostratigraphic zones—tentatively interpreted as Flood sediments—are provisionally identified as the burial of dominantly marine, coastline, and terrestrial organisms, respectively. The large—and possibly periodic—variations in NLSSS values suggest that further mining of paleontological data may reveal interesting biogeographical and/or depositional processes during pre-Flood, Flood, and post-Flood times. Lack of correlation between NLSSS pattern and stage-through-system-level biostratigraphic zones suggests that index fossils and sub-erathem stratigraphic units provide no more information about earth history than a relative time scale. Lack of NLSSS/megasequence correlations also suggests that surges in Flood energy were largely independent of the depositional pattern of fossils. ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION Fossils—as evidence of organisms living in the past—played an important part in diluvial theory, even before the rise of modern creationism (see, e.g., Nelson 1931). Fossils were also important in many of the publications of early twentieth century creationists like George McCready Price (see, e.g., Wise 2018), and they are referred to throughout the seminal creationist work, The Genesis Flood (Whitcomb and Morris 1961). Since then, there is scarcely an issue of any creationist journal that does not have at least one article referring to fossils. Creationism also has an interest in global patterns (such as those patterns that might identify and characterize the global Flood). Yet, in spite of the importance of fossils, and the emphasis in global patterns, creationists have made little use of the Paleobiology Database (PBDB). The PBDB is a repository of data on fossils from all globally defined stratigraphic levels, and from localities all over the world. Although the PBDB is still in development, it already contains data from millions of fossils from all over the world. We agree with Ross’s (2012, 2013, 2014a, 2014b) arguments for the reliability of PBDB data. We would like to encourage the use and mining of PBDB data by creationists by offering one example of the use of PBDB data in the development of creationist Flood models. In particular, we would like to use the PBDB to examine the persistence of biological form through the stratigraphic record—what we call biostratigraphic continuity. Scientists have used various forms of biostratigraphic continuity—and discontinuity—for as long as paleontology has been a discipline. In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, global biostratigraphic discontinuity was used to argue for biological extinction and mass extinction, as well as define the biostratigraphic column. Biostratigraphic continuity at particular taxonomic levels has been used to argue for everything from species stasis (e.g., Eldredge and Gould 1972) to class-level evolutionary faunas (Sepkoski 1981). In creationism, biostratigraphic continuity has been used to argue both for biological change (Wood et al. 2003) and against biological change (e.g., Scheven 1990). Biostratigraphic discontinuity has been used to identify the pre-Flood/Flood boundary (e.g., Austin and Wise 1994), and the Flood/post-Flood boundary (e.g., Ross 2012). For these reasons, we believe biostratigraphic continuity—especially global biostratigraphic continuity—has great potential in providing creationist insight into earth history. In this paper, then, we will extract biostratigraphic continuity data from the PBDB. Since multiple measures of biostratigraphic continuity are possible, and we will only use one in this paper, we believe this could Kurt P. Wise, Truett McConnell University, 101 Alumni Dr., Cleveland, Georgia 30528 USA kwise@truett.edu Donna Richardson, 611 Knightly Mill Rd., Mount Sidney, Virginia 24467 USA dlrich17@gmail.com © Cedarville University International Conference on Creationism. The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily represent those of Cedarville University. 9th 2023 Wise K.P., and D. Richardson. 2023. What biostragigraphic continuity suggests about earth history. In J.H. Whitmore (editor), Proceedings of the Ninth International Conference on Creationism, pp. 611-625. Cedarville, Ohio: Cedarville University International Conference on Creationism. WHAT BIOSTRATIGRAPHIC CONTINUITY SUGGESTS ABOUT EARTH HISTORY KEYWORDS pre-Flood, Flood, post-Flood, paleontology, biostratigraphy, boundary criterion.
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