The Roraima Pollen Paradox

"I'll concede the broad point that finding pollen from the Precambrian would be a big problem for the Theory of Evolution." This concession is worthless. My opponent must either concede that Evolution predicts pollen first evolved 135 myrs ago, or argue that it predicts a different date. If my opponent refuses to do either, then he is effectively rendering the theory unfalsifiable and, by extension, unscientific. A fundamental requirement of a scientific theory is that it makes falsifiable predictions. "I concede this point with the proviso that more recent radiometric dating [1] resolves much of the confusion in the radiometric ages that Stainforth mentions" Is my opponent conceding that the pollen has been found in Precambrian rock, or not? "P3 only follows from P1 and P2 if it can be demonstrated that the pollen in the Roraima Formation rocks was deposited at the same time as the sediments." I appreciate the concession that P3 follows from P1 & P2, but my opponent has neglected to address my conclusion. If he doesn't remark on whether my conclusion follows from my three premises, he is wasting our time by dancing around the most crucial point of this debate. "I will now demonstrate that my worthy opponent cannot demonstrate that the pollen is an original component of the rocks." And I will demonstrate that I can. "the paper was published in 1966. It will be half a century old next year and is quite old by the standards of any scientific paper." Yes, the paper is quite old; maybe if we let it get a bit older, it will yellow with age until it's unreadable, or even get lost, then Evolutionists won't have to worry about it. "Ironically, geology is one of our youngest sciences." Geology is older than Evolution itself. Lyell founded Modern Geology in the early 1800s[3], and Darwin's Origin of Species wasn't published until decades later. Without Lyell's geological timescale, Darwin would not have had his long ages on which to base Evolution. The biblical timescale was in vogue at this time. "If the scientists of the time with all of the data at hand could not arrive at this conclusion then how can my opponent do so on the basis of a brief paper in Nature?" Because the scientists are working under a false dichotomy. They consider only two options. One, the radiometric age of the rock is correct, and the evolutionary age of the pollen is correct, and pollen simply crept in later. Or two, the radiometric age of the rock is wrong, but the evolutionary age of the pollen is correct, and no need for the ad hoc contamination hypothesis. Both cases refuse to doubt the evolutionary age of the pollen, but there's a third option: Both the radiometric age of the rock, as well as the evolutionary age of the pollen, are wrong. This is my position; however, I only need to prove that the evolutionary age of the pollen is wrong to win this debate. "This pollen could not have been an original component of a rock that was formed at 400 C to 600 C. It is obviously a later contaminant." This is false. A recent experiment confirmed that tiny, organic fossils can survive 500 C.[4] "Stainforth describes the rock collected as "cleaves along finely laminated bedding planes which are coated with limonite."[...] Its presence on the bedding planes of the samples is evidence of water flow. It is not unreasonable to suggest that the same water that deposited the limonite also deposited pollen, transferred by groundwater from the top of Mount Roraima." My opponent is guilty of quote-mining. Voters, read the quote in context: "The rock cleaves along finely laminated bedding planes which are coated with limonite. Every effort was made to avoid these planes[...] Nevertheless, microfossils of the same type as before were recovered." My opponent's limonite argument is worthless because pollen fossils are in the rock even where limonite is not present.My opponent made two main arguments to support his pollen contamination hypothesis. One, that pollen could not have remained intact during the rock's formation since it involves high temperatures. Two, limonite indicates pollen contamination via water.I proved the first argument false by citing a recent experiment, and I proved the second argument false by showing that pollen was still found even when the paleontologists avoided areas that contained limonite.[3]http://kids.britannica.com...[4]vsgc.odu.edu/src/Conf08/Papers08/Schiffbauer - Paper.pdf