TBC NewsWatch

WERE SAUROPODS WADING IN CHINA?

ICR.org, 2/25/16, “Were Sauropods Wading in China?” [Excerpts]: It’s tough to beat a genuine dinosaur trackway for a fascinating glimpse of ancient life. But newly exposed tracks from Gansu Province in northern China have experts scrabbling to explain why they only preserve sauropod hind feet.

Perhaps the dinosaurs were wading or partly swimming, like other tracks elsewhere in the world. But if that were the case, the ancient animals’ hind feet might make swipe marks where only the claws touched the bottom sediments. These tracks in China look normal with no swipe marks—but contain no front footprints.

Were the dinosaurs somehow walking on their hind feet?...Lida Xing, lead author of the study published online in Scientific Reports, told University of Bristol News, “Nobody would say these huge dinosaurs could stagger along on their hind legs alone—they would fall over.”

The research team conceived a new solution. They hypothesized that these medium-sized giant dinosaurs were walking on muddy flats soft enough for their hind legs to puncture an overlying mud layer, but that mud layer was hard enough for their front feet to leave no impressions in a sandy layer just below the mud.

Even if this scenario actually solves the hind track mystery, it introduces new questions. For example, where does sand discretely underlie a mud layer without a rapid rise in water level, whether surrounding environments are transitioning or not?

And about that supposed transition: How long would it have taken, considering dinosaurs walked right through it? It looks like hours or days. And how does thick mud so quickly cover sand without some type of flood event?

(http://goo.gl/HtOJrJ)

FABRICS DATING BACK TO DAVID

ChristianHeadlines.com, 2/25/16, “Archaeologists dig up fabrics dating back to David and Solomon” [Excerpts]: Israeli archaeologists have discovered fragments of “remarkably preserved” 3,000-year-old fabrics, leather and seeds dating to the era of the biblical kings David and Solomon.

This is the first discovery of textiles dating from the 10th century B.C. “and therefore provides the first physical evidence” of what residents of the Holy Land wore, said Erez Ben-Yosef, the lead archaeologist with the Tel Aviv University excavation team that did the dig.

The excavation, carried out in southern Israel at the ancient copper mines of Timna...took place in late January and February. The textiles, just 5-by-5 centimeters in size, are the remnants of clothing, tents, ropes, cords and bags. They were preserved thanks to Timna’s extremely dry conditions, the archaeologist said.

Ben-Yosef said the fabrics, which vary widely in weaving style, color and ornamentation, provide “new and important information” about the Edomites, the descendants of Esau who often fought against the Israelites and mined in Timna.

Vanessa Workman, a member of the excavating and analysis team, said the Hebrew Bible is chock-full of references to fabrics and dyes. “Blue colors and green colors and red colors and what the high priest wore, the tabernacles. Linens, woolen fabrics.”

Workman said the discovery at Timna “is an affirmation” of biblical texts. “It brings the desert culture of that period alive.”

(http://goo.gl/4qyOeL)

“ROME WILL BE CONQUERED” BY ISLAM

UnitedWithIsrael.org, 2/25/16, “Canadian Cleric Says ‘Rome Will be Conquered’ by Islam” [Excerpts]: Radical Canadian imam Shaban Sherif Mady claimed that all of Europe would one day be conquered by the Muslims.

Mady has called for Jerusalem to become the capital of a future Islamic State in his sermons at Muslim community meetings in Edmonton.

With over a million members, the Muslim community is the fastest growing religious group in Canada.

While Canada has, for the most part, eluded Islamic terror attacks, an ISIS-inspired shooting that claimed the life of a Canadian army corporal and targeted the Canadian parliament took place in 2014. The assailant was a Quebec native who had converted to Islam.

(http://goo.gl/D8ztLY)