The so-called ‘Taylor trail’
Since the 1930s, dinosaur tracks have been known from the bed of the Paluxy River, near Glen Rose, Texas. What makes these tracks so controversial are claims that as well as the footprints of dinosaurs, there are unmistakably human footprints in the same strata. Even creationists admit that some of them are fakes. In some of the ‘man tracks’, it is possible to make out traces of toes to the side of the ‘foot’, which suggests that they are nothing more mysterious than highly eroded three-toed dinosaur tracks. Some also show claw marks at the ‘heel’ of the print, which is another feature typical of a dinosaur footprint but not of a human footprint. In at least one footprint sequence, there is the inexplicable coincidence that dinosaur tracks and ‘human footprints’ alternate.
The Paluxy River ‘man prints’ may resemble human footprints superficially, but they lack the anatomy of real human footprints. Furthermore, dinosaurs and humans are of very different size and weight, but in the Paluxy River, tracks made by both dinosaurs and supposed humans are sunk to the same depth in the rock, which suggests that both types were made by creatures of the same general weight. In the same way, the distances between footfalls are spaced the same distance apart, showing that they were made by creatures with similar stride lengths.
Close-up of the tracks
The creationist explanation for how the two sets of tracks are found together does not quite match the scenario they propose. The creatures that made the tracks were supposed to have been running from the rising waters of the Great Flood. However, there are several thousand feet of water-deposited sedimentary rock beneath the footprints and several thousand feet on top of them, both of which ought, according to creationist beliefs about geology, have been deposited by the waters of the same Flood the creatures were fleeing. To have produced this sequence, the base rock would have to be deposited by an early ‘high tide’ of the Flood, which then receded long enough for the dinosaurs and humans to run across the valley and leave their tracks, subsequently covering them with a tidal wave that sealed them with a layer of mud, without damaging them. This sequence would have been repeated on numerous occasions, as the dinosaur and ‘human’ tracks appear in a number of superimposed layers. The biggest problem with this, of course, is the question of where the creatures had remained hidden during the early stages of the universal flood if they were rushing to higher land later. But logic never got in the way of religious dogma…
The tracks were investigated by Glen Kuban in the 1980s, whose investigations showed that the tracks are not human footprints. The supposed “manprints” were made by the same three-toed dinosaurs: they appear to be human because only the middle toe is visible. In a number of cases, “manprints” have subsequently eroded to show their true origin. The TalkOrigins website has a very detailed sub-web dealing with the ‘manprints’.
In my opinion somethingh must be in those stories abuot big humanoids and dinosuars.
I visited the Paluxy River several times as a child, as my mother’s parents lived near by, and my mom had grown up in that area, as well. Shown here are clearly tracks of dinosaurs which I remember, and my memory records very well-defined dinosaur tracks, as well. However, there is a problem with these photos being the only ones presented! I remember seeing human footprints as well whenever I walked along the limestone. Why are these images omitted from this page? By the way, I never to undergo religious indoctrination, attend churches, that sort of thing, although I did visit various institutions in many religions with friends, from stupa to synagogue to cathedrals to churches. On my own, I’ve participated in Native Ceremonies, meditation, and have studied Anthropology as well as researched mystical third eye initiations into the Logos, Word, Amen, Om, Am, Tao, Sound Current, etc… held in common in every generation and spanning many cultures, basically, that have been recorded from Pythagoras to present day. I have European and First Nations ancestry on both sides of my family, my mother Kiowa and my father Wicomico, (back to Captain John Smith and Chiefs William Tapptico I and II) and we all have quite high IQs, my father having been urged to join Mensa. So, please make no assumptions that I am biased in any way in my reporting. Actually, it is perplexing to me that Creationists can make claims involving human and dinosaur footprints fitting into their limited world-views. Don’t the most extreme claim that we have been around for only a few thousand years? This, to me, is not a religious debate. I look forward to finding more anomalies, and, already, many have been discovered.
I think that the biggest problem believers in the Paluxy River ‘manprints’ have to deal with is the way that the prints change over time. They are in a river bed and subject to water erosion. Things that initially look vaguely human have been shown to have eroded slowly from three-toed dinosaur tracks.
I don’t want to present a photograph heavy page, which is why I have shown only a small selection. There are plenty of other sites, such as the one linked to above, that give many more.
The Creationist desire to have humans and dinosaurs living together is to show that the earth is young. These creatures aren’t the remains of animals living millions of years ago, because in their view the earth cannot be so old, but because they aren’t around today, then they must have been destroyed in Noah’s flood. Finding human remains alongside dinosaur remains would prove to Creationists that their views are right. The fact that they never are, except in cases of mistaken identity like this or outright fraud, as has been shown in some instances, shows that humans and dinosaurs never co-existed.
It is highly obtuse to conclude that “The Creationist” is necessarily a “young-Earther that believes humans walked with dinos”. While there are undoubtedly many believers that hold to a ‘strict English transliteration’ of the Old Testament, there are an ever increasing number of believers that ardently oppose such conclusions based on ancient Hebrew text. While we do agree that life could not have spontaneously emerged through a purely Darwinian evolutionary processes (Darwinian evolution cannot explain the beginning of life, only changes within existing life, and that, only on the micro level: as agreed with by evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins) our similarities stop there (with regard to physics, geology & biology).
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I’m the “Glen Kuban” referred to in the article. I have been doing on site study of the Paluxy tracks and related controversies for over 30 years. I am glad the article referred to my work, but disappointed that instead of accurately summarizing my conclusions, it perpetuated some old misconceptions about the tracks, including the idea that they are due to “middle toe impressions” of dinosaur tracks. I never said such any thing; that is an old speculation by Texas paleontologist Wann Langston which is not borne out by on site research (Langston no loner holds this interpretation). As I explained in my articles, and the intro at my site, the alleged human tracks involve a variety of phenomena. The majority are forms of elongate, metatarsal dinosaur tracks, made by bipedal dinosaurs that sometimes impressed their metatarsi (heels and soles) as they walked. When the digit impressions of such tracks are subdued by mud-backflow or secondary infilling, a somewhat human shape often results. Other alleged “man tracks” including purely erosional features (often selectively highlighted to encourage human shapes), indistinct marks of undertain origin, and a smaller number of doctored and carved tracks (most of the latter occurring on loose blocks of rock). To contrary to the impression left in the article, the alleged human tracks do not involve only a single phenomena, and none are middle toe impressions of dino tracks. A few individuals such as Carl Baugh, Don Patton, and Ian Juby, continue to promote the Paluxy “man tracks” or alleged human tracks in Mesozoic or Paleozoic from other localities, but such claims are not considered credible by either mainstream scientists or major creationist groups. When examined thoroughly and carefully, the Paluxy tracks provide no evidence for young-earth creationism, and instead further support the many lines of evidence that indicate that the earth has had a long and complex history. Thank you for allowing me to make these clarifications. For more info please see my Paluxy site at http://paleo.cc/paluxy.htm
Evolution does not propose to explain the “Origins of Life”. It is simply the mechanism that provides for the level of diversity after biological origination.
Also, I am pretty sure that if your belief in God hinges on a distant culture’s mythical interpretation of the origins of man: YOU ARE MISSING THE POINT.
What concerns me is the way science now emulates the medival church….you cannot challenge Dogma. I’m not agreeing with creationists, I can think of many explainations for these footprints. Fakes, mistakes Aliens, or time travellers…. man and dinosaur in the garden of eden wouldn’t be my first thought, but I’m not discounting out of hand.
I don’t understand your analogy. How does science emulate the medieval church? There is no dogma, proposed from on high and enforced by an inquisition, that forces adherents to believe things against the evidence. While there may be a reluctance to abandon long held theories, they do eventually crumble under the weight of contrary evidence. Contrast that with the medieval attitudes to scripture still held by creationists: no amount of contrary evidence will ever permit them to abandon their belief in the literal truth of biblical narrative.
As for the Paluxy footprints, if a single genuinely human footprint were to be identified among the many preserved there—and, to date, none has—scientists would have to account for it.