So scientists are skeptical that bacteria can survive, hermetically sealed in a grain of salt, for 250 million years? ("Bacteria That Predate Dinosaurs?" Star Tribune, October 19, 2000)

Rather than just suspecting contamination and musing about the implications for astrobiology if living things might survive long enough for trips in space, there is one more thought that would occur if it were not unthinkable. The whole dating scheme might be wildly off base.

What if the deposits were laid down less than 5000 years ago in a worldwide flood? Survival would still be amazing but not impossible. And it would be as if God said, "Now that you have the technology to understand, I will let you discover this conundrum." The reasonable response is to reconsider the Biblical timetable. But doctrinaire evolutionism covers its eyes and says, "I can't see you!"

Ross Olson MD, Pediatrician