ASK THE EXPERTS

Q: When construction crews find fossils or archeological remains, who owns them?

A: If a fossil or artifact is found on public land in Tennessee, the state archaeologist determines its future. Fossils or artifacts unearthed on private property belong to the owner of the land. If, however, human remains are discovered, the site is treated as a cemetery and both the police and state archaeologist are notified. That's the legal answer. But lurking behind this simple question lie more complex issues about what fossils are, and about how much and why we value different types of fossils.

A fossil is any evidence of past life. At one end of this broad spectrum are bacterial cells and layered algal mats, fossils of the oldest (~3.4 billion years) and simplest life known. At the other end are recently departed Aunt Sue and Fido. (Some don't use the term "fossil" to refer to human or very recent remains.) Not surprisingly, we are most interested in preserving fossils toward our end of the spectrum than bacterial scum end -- especially if they are exotic and scary (e.g., T. rex) or if we identify with their experiences (e.g. humans).

Considering human remains, how much are they worth, particularly those hundreds to thousands of years old? Should they be excavated and removed? In West Nashville, Wal-Mart said "yes," Native Americans said "no." Wal-Mart won. What will happen to the human remains buried between the Divinity School and Garland as more and more buildings go up on the Vanderbilt campus and space gets tighter and tighter? Whether or not this or any fossil is removed depends ultimately on the legal outcome of the interplay between philosophical and religious values, intellectual curiosity, availability of space and economic forces.

Recent road construction in East Tennessee unearthed bones of huge, exotic animals that lived 10,000 years ago or more -- mastodons, sloths, tapirs, alligators. These articulated skeletons give a unique picture of the life of Tennessee in the relatively recent geological past. The Tennessee Division of Archaeology is ensuring that they are properly protected, excavated, and studied.

The veneer of lush grass on the Vanderbilt campus hides an incredible wealth of under-appreciated fossils -- fossils a lot closer to the bacteria end of the fossil spectrum than are the giant mastodons and sloths. Rock underlying Nashville is limestone, composed primarily of the shells and shell fragments of animals living in the shallow sea that covered this area 470 million years ago. Their sedentary lifestyle -- sitting and filtering algae from seawater -- did not require complex nervous or sensory systems, so they had neither head nor eyes. We don't respect or relate well to headless, eyeless animals, even those living today. (We eat them alive -- for them, a terrible ending. Yet when was the last time you saw an animal rights activist demonstrating at a raw oyster bar?) On Vanderbilt construction sites, particularly the Children's Hospital, each day literally millions of 470 million-year-old fossils are carted off in dump trucks after being blasted out of their final resting places. They are superficially too similar to oysters and too abundant to worry about.

Every fossil, no matter where it lies on the spectrum between bacteria and us, between the beginning of life and now, tells a story about the history of life -- a history that we are part of. When we preserve and understand those stories, we begin to see our place in the Big Picture, and recognize that it is far richer than the linear "bacteria to us" spectrum portrays. Preserving remains themselves (as opposed to their stories) is a different and complex issue.

As you walk around the Vanderbilt campus, imagine it as it was 470 million years ago -- like the Bahamas, mostly covered with a warm shallow sea. Pretend that you are snorkeling over the bottom with lots of animals in shells and on stalks. It is their broken, but otherwise unchanged skeletons that make the rock of the Peabody wall. It is their skeletons that form the firm foundation for the Children's Hospital and other Vanderbilt buildings. Our lives are richer if we appreciate theirs.

Molly Miller
Professor of geology

-- Compiled by Jessica Hathaway

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