Geologic Time

Geologic time scale

Relative dating principles
Absolute dating w/ radioactivity
Correlation of rock layers
 
Geologic time
• The relative
geologic time scale
has a sequence of
 eons
 eras
 periods
 epochs
Law of
Faunal
Succession
Note the general
appearance of
more familiar
species the
closer one gets
to the present
time.
 Geologic time scale

Eons
Phanerozoic - last 570 million years
Eras
Cenozoic - recent life
0-66.4 m.y.a (mammals, humans)

Mesozoic - age of middle life

66.4-245 m.y.a (dinosaurs, 1st scrawny mammals)

Paleozoic - ancient life

245-570 m.y.a (fish, trilobites, clams, corals, ferns )

Precambrian - from birth of Earth up to before

complex life forms developed
(algae, bacteria, some fossils without shells like jellyfish)
 Quaternary
The Quaternary Period is a subdivision of
geological time scale. Evolutionists say that the
Quaternary period lasted the last two million
years up to the present day. The exact length
of this period is a matter of debate. Many
evolutionists have placed the period between
1.8 million years and 2.6 million years.
This period saw the ice age and the most
climate change. It also saw the extinction of
most of the prehistoric animals like the saber-
tooth cat, the woolly mammoth and others.
 Tertiary
Tertiary period is the name for a major
portion of the Cenozoic era. It is also the most
recent of the geological eras. It lasted from
about 26 to 66 million years ago. The name
of Tertiary was first given in about the middle
of the 18th century. It was given to a layer of
sediments geologically younger than other
deposits know as Primary and Secondary
layers. Later the Quaternary period was added
around 1830 as a fourth division.
 Evidence shows existing mountain ranges of
North America were elevated, in Europe other
mountain ranges were formed, and in Asia the
Himalayas were formed.
At the beginning of the Tertiary period,
mammals replaced the reptiles as the dominant
animal group. Modern types of animals such as
birds, reptiles, fish and invertebrates were
numerous at the beginning of the period or they
appeared at the very beginning of the Tertiary
period.
 Cretaceous
The Cretaceous period is normally noted for
being the last period of the dinosaurs. This
period is believed by evolutionists to have
lasted from about 144 to about 65 million
years ago. Also, during this period a new kind
of dinosaur, the ceratopsian and
pachycepalosaurid appeared. It also found the
first fossils of many insects and many modern
mammals and bird groups, and the first
flowering plant fossils.
 The breakup of the world-
continent Pangaea, which began
during the Jurassic period
continued into the Cretaceous
period. This continued breakup led
to increased regional differences
between the northern and southern
continents. At the end of the
Cretaceous period many types of
animals and dinosaurs
disappeared.
 Jurassic
The Jurassic period is believed by
evolutionist to have began exactly 210 million
years ago and lasting for 70 million years of
the Mesozoic Era.
In the Jurassic period the great plant
eating dinosaurs walked the earth eating the
growths of ferns and of palm-like cycads. The
smaller but more aggressive and vicious
carnivores stalked the herbivores.
 The oceans contained fish, squid, coiled
ammonites, and the great ichthyosaurs and
the long-necked plesiosaurs. The pterosaurs
and the first birds were also in this period.
This, the Jurassic period, was part of the
Mesozoic Era. The Jurassic period was named
after the Jura Mountains, which are situated
on the border of France and Switzerland.
 Triassic
The Triassic period was a time of transition.
This period is said to have lasted from 248 -
206 million years ago. During this period the
world continent Pangaea existed which altered
global climate and ocean currents. The Triassic
period was ended with a large extinction of the
animals that had been living then. The Triassic
period was named in 1834 by German
geologist Friedrich August Von Alberti.
 Permian
The Permian period lasted from around
290 to about 248 million years ago. This
period was the last period of the Paleozoic Era.
The major difference between the Paleozoic
and the Mesozoic was one of the largest group
of extinctions in recorded history. This
affected many groups of animals, but it mostly
affected marine life.
 Some of the groups of sea life survived this
mass extinction but they never recovered their
large populations again. This cleared the way
for new species of sea life.
On land a smaller extinction was going on.
This extinction led to what is known as "The
Age of the Dinosaurs". The plants in this age
also switched over to gymnosperms instead of
being Cycads.
 In the beginning of the Permian the plates
of the earth brought the super-continent of
Pangaea together. Most of the continents came
together in Pangaea; the super-continent took
up much of the area between the southern and
northern poles. The rest of the Earth was
covered by a single ocean know as
Panthalassa with a smaller ocean to the east
called Tethys.
 Pennsylvanian
The Pennsylvanian started 320 million
years ago and ended 286 million years ago.
During this period there were low lying
swamps and deltas that covered most of what
is now Virginia and the western U.S. These
conditions were perfect for the beginning of
coal formation in the U.S.
 Some trees in standing position are found in
surface mines. The trees are sometimes 30ft
tall, suggesting a rapid burial of the tree.
They age of these rocks are determined by
measuring the tonstein parting in a seam. A
tonstein parting is created from volcanic ash. A
tonstein parting can almost always be
accurately dated according to evolutionists.
 Mississippian
The Mississippian period lasted from 360
to 325 million years ago. The period was
named Mississippian because the rocks were
first collected in Mississippi. In Europe
however, they call the period the Devonian
Carboniferous.
In the U.S, they split it into the
Mississippian and the Pennsylvanian. Rocks
are classified Mississippian based on a
particular group of fossils found inside them.
 Devonian
The Devonian Period lasted from 417 to
354 Million Years Ago. It was also called the
“Age of the Fishes”. The first major plant life,
like Zosterophyllophytes and Trimerophytes,
a vascular plants.
During the Devonian, groups of animals
colonized the land and different types of coral
and many new types of fish colonized the sea.
 The major landmasses in this time period
were North American and Europe, which had
most of its land covered by water, which were
together at the time, and were near the equator.
Also another continent, consisting of South
America, Africa, Antarctica, India, and
Australia covered the southern part of the
world.
 Silurian
The Silurian lasted from 443 to 417
million years ago. In this period the first
corals and jawless fish appeared. Also in this
period glacial structures melted and added to
the sea. This period saw many new types of
sea life and animals.
 The end of the period saw the first jawed
fish. The rest of the period was much more
stable then the other time periods before it,
because it didn't have dramatic environmental
changes. At the end of the period, a new super-
continent was formed, called Laurussia.
 Ordovician
The Ordovician began about 510 Million
Years ago and ended 445 Million Years Ago.
All of the earth's land was in one super-
continent called Gondwana (or
Gondwanaland). During this period the super-
continent shifted toward the south pole. This
period also had much sea life. It is also
suggested that plants occupied the land in great
numbers.
 At the end of the Ordovician, Gondwana
finally stopped its migration to the South
Pole. This caused many small seas to drain
and seas to shrink in size and in volume,
causing a mass extinction at the end of the
Ordovician.
 Cambrian
The Cambrian Period is said to be 543 to
490 million years old. The Cambrian Period is
also an important point in history of the
beginning of life according to the evolutionists.
During this time the major groups of animals
appeared in the fossil record.
 In the Cambrian fossil layers there is a
sudden outburst of fossils, this outburst of
fossils is called the "Cambrian Explosion".
The Cambrian Explosion is a fast appearance of
fossils in the Cambrian fossil record. The
Cambrian had been considered as the rock layer
that had the first fossils of animals, but those
fossils can also be found in the older Vendian
strata.
• Relative dating of fossils is a system in which a
fossil is given an age designation in terms of epoch,
period, or era which can be compared to other
geologic units of time as older or younger, but
without the burden of assigning a specific number.
– For example, a Pennsylvanian lycopod bark impression is
older than a Cretaceous oyster and younger than a
Mississippian brachiopod
– Relative dating is best explained when covering the law of
superposition and a geologic time scale

• Absolute dating of a fossil involves assigning a

specific quantity of age with a fossil such as saying
that an echinoid, Hardouinia bassleri, is 83 million
years old.
 Relative Dating: Key principles

“Telling time geologically”

 Earth’s history concealed in rocks

 Goal of geology: unraveling Earth’s history

 Principle time keeping devices:

Relative dating - putting rocks/events in proper order

Absolute dating - determining event’s actual time
 Relative Dating: Key principles

Law of superposition
A bed of rock is older than that above, younger than that below
Principle of original horizontality

Principle of cross-cutting relationships

Inclusions

Unconformities
 Relative Dating: Key principles

Law of superposition
A bed of rock is older than that above, younger than that below
Principle of original horizontality
Sedimentary layers deposited flat
Principle of cross-cutting relationships

Inclusions

Unconformities
 Relative Dating: Key principles

Law of superposition
A bed of rock is older than that above, younger than that below
Principle of original horizontality
Sedimentary layers deposited flat
Principle of cross-cutting relationships
Faults & dikes are younger than beds they cross
Inclusions

Unconformities
 Relative Dating: Key principles
Inclusions
Fragments of one rock enclosed in another
Unconformities
Fragments of one rock
enclosed in another
 Relative Dating: Key principles
Inclusions
Fragments of one rock enclosed in another
Unconformities
Break in time in deposition

• An unconformity represents a long period

during which deposition stopped, erosion
removed previously formed rocks, and
then deposition resumed.

(Conformable layers: deposited w/out interruption)

Relative Dating: Key principles Unconformities
3 types
 Angular unconformity
• An angular unconformity indicates that during the
pause in deposition, a period of deformation
(folding or tilting) and erosion occurred.
 Disconformity
• A disconformity is when two sedimentary rock
layers are separated by an erosional surface.

 Nonconformity
• A nonconformity is when the erosional surface
separates older metamorphic or intrusive
igneous rocks from younger sedimentary rocks.
Relative Dating: Key principles Unconformities
3 types
 Angular unconformity
Tilted/folded sedimentary rocks overlain by younger, more flat layers

 Disconformity

 Nonconformity
Recipe for an angular unconformity

Deposition
Folding/Uplift
Erosion
Subsidence/more erosion
Relative Dating: Key principles Unconformities
3 types
 Angular unconformity

 Disconformity
Layers on either side of unconformity are parallel

 Nonconformity
Relative Dating: Key principles Unconformities
3 types
 Angular unconformity

 Disconformity

 Nonconformity
Interface between sedimentary layers and metamorphic or igneous rock
 Correlation of rock layers

Matching up rocks from different places

that are similar in age

 Physical criteria
 Fossils
 Correlation of rock layers

 Physical criteria (OK for short distances)

 position of a bed in sequence of beds

 distinct/uncommon minerals
 Correlation of rock layers

 Fossils

 fossil organisms succeed each other in

 systematic fashion

 any time period can be determined by

 fossil content

“principle of fossil succession”

 Correlation of rock layers

“Index fossils”

geographically wide-spread

short span of time

T&L Figure 8.10

 1 2 3 4
Kansas Indiana Ohio Pennsylvania
correlated sequence

Mostly
nonmarine
limestone
 Absolute dating w/ radioactivity
 Chemistry review

Atom
model n s
r o
ct # protrons = atomic #,
e
el defines the element

nucleus
protrons # neutrons can vary:
neutrons “isotopes”
Absolute dating w/ radioactivity
Carbon Dating