Nicolaus Steno argued in his Preliminary Discourse to a Dissertation on a Solid Body Naturally Contained within a Solid (1669) that fossils came to be laid down inside solid rock because the fossils:
A) had grown inside the rock, a common opinion of the time.
B) were older; the rock was originally laid down as a liquid, solidifying around the fossils.
C) were younger; they became trapped inside the rock after the rock had already solidified from its liquid state.
D) and the rock were the same age, both forming together at the same time.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Nicolaus Steno proposed that fossils were older than the rocks in which they were found because the rocks had originally been laid down as sediments in a liquid state that later solidified, embedding the fossils within them. This was a significant departure from other theories of the time and laid foundational principles for stratigraphy and geology.

Nicolaus Steno Argued in His Preliminary Discourse to a Dissertation