Word: fossilizing
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When was the earth formed? What are the ancient milestones in man's development? In recent years, scientists have tackled such mysteries by means of radioactive dating. By comparing the amount of radioactive carbon 14 in a fossil with the amount contained in a living counterpart, for example, paleontologists determine when the fossil was part of a functioning organism. Using similar methods, scientists date meaningful objects as old as 3.5 billion years...
...Evidence. Walker's most proven technique is based on the fact that most rocks and minerals contain a small impurity of uranium, which fissions (splits), leaving tiny scars or tracks inside the substance. Until recently, this phenomenon remained unobserved. Walker found that even with an electron microscope the fossil tracks were too tiny-.001 of an inch long and only ten atoms wide-to see in significant numbers...
...Three months after Siegel's discovery, Harvard Paleontologist Elso S. Barghoorn reported that he had found 2-billion-year-old microfossils near Kakabeka Falls in western Ontario. Among them were a number of fossils that bore no resemblance to any living organism. One was an elaborate structure that Barghoorn named Kakabekia umbellata. When Siegel saw a photograph of Kakabekia, he exclaimed: "I've seen that thing before." Indeed, some specimens of Barghoorn's fossil and Siegel's living organism were remarkably similar. "When photographs of the two were compared," says Karen Roberts, one of Siegel...
...drawing of two hands pressed together, with passages lettered beneath in a Russian so archaic that it is said that even Slavonic scholars have been unable to decipher it. Coelacanth is a brightly colored portrait of the prehistoric fish, his wizened face gleaming like a phosphorescent fossil. Plavinsky, says Mrs. Stevens, is entirely unaware that a fish is the Christian symbol for Christ...
...dilemma for Buddhists and the more awkward the questions that arise. Can Buddhism accommodate itself to nationalism and the modern desires for material advancement, which are seemingly the very opposite of Buddhist doctrine? The author's answer: "If Buddhism does not adapt, it will become a cultural fossil. If it adapts too much, it becomes adulterated and loses its essence and integrity." It is the search for the middle way between these two alternatives, suggests Schecter, that causes the painful grimace so often discernible today on the new face of Buddha...