Backyard Dig

Made By Alexander DiGiuseppe, Steven Liedel, Tyrese Luckett, and Tommy Cohn

Analysis

We dug a large hole and found rock layers with fossils in them. (Bottom to top) The bottom layer was granite, and it didn’t have any fossils. The second layer was limestone, and it had trilobite fossils, the third layer was sandstone, and it had a dinosaur bone fossil in it, and the last layer was conglomerate, and it had a fossilized fish of some sort.

The layers were very clear so we believe that they are undisturbed. Therefore, the principle of superposition states that the granite is the oldest the fossil remains fit in with these layers perfectly.

We hypothesize that the trilobite is from the Paleozoic era, the dinosaur bone is from the Mesozoic era, and the fish is from the Cenozoic era. There weren’t any fossils from the Precambrian era, but the granite was carbon-dated to that era and it might contain evidence of life in the end of the Precambrian.

We have concluded that the principle of superposition can not only show which rock layer is older but show which fossil is older, proving that some fossils are older than others. Our final analysis of the rock layers, with the help of carbon-dating, that the granite is from the Precambrian era, the limestone is from the Paleozoic era, the sandstone is from the Mesozoic era, and the conglomerate is form the Cenozoic era.

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Sources:Hall, Prentice Exploring Earth Science