Then how do we explain fossils of life being found in layers of sedimentary strata dating back well over 3 Ga (billion years)?
If the premise is faulty, the conclusion is on a shaky foundation.
“The
premise that the processes affecting the earth today are the same as in the past is the basis for determining how sedimentary features in the rock record were formed. …
The scientific basis of this is the principle of uniformitarianism, which states that the sediments within ancient sedimentary rocks were deposited in the same way as sediments which are being deposited at the Earth's surface today. …
Ref.:
https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Sedimentology
“Based on the rule of superposition —that is, the lower the strata, the older the fossil—creatures thought to have evolved first are considered to be the oldest and are placed at the bottom of the geologic column and creatures thought to have evolved later are placed higher up on the geologic column. Paleontologists simply guess how long it would take for one fossil animal to evolve into another, and then date the fossils and rocks accordingly.
Again, evolution is assumed as a basis or premise for this dating technique.
This has led many competent scientists to object to what is termed circular reasoning. Evolutionists maintain the age of index fossils is validated by the superposition of rock strata and the age of rock strata is validated by index fossils. Isn’t this circular reasoning based on the assumption of evolution and uniformitarianism? …
If uniformity theory over many millions of years were true, rock layers and formations would be uniformly deposited regionally and globally. In reality,
this is not the case. The typical situation in geology is that only a few rock formations are superposed (that is, younger rock layers placed over older rock layers).
Most often, rock formations are inverted, folded, inserted, repeated, or missing, and fossils are in reverse order from that demanded by evolution. Such inconsistencies are found throughout the world and are completely consistent with catastrophic geologic processes (that is, earthquakes, volcanism, flood, sedimentation, orogeny, and erosion) occurring within a short period of time. …”
Ref.: http://www.creationsciencetoday.com/24-Standard_Geologic_Column.html
How Reliable is the Geologic Column?
“Back in November of 2010, we posted two articles on the discovery of the oldest fossil shrimp:
‘Remarkably Preserved’ Shrimp Is 350 Million Years Old?,
‘Oldest’ Fossil Shrimp?. In those articles we discussed how this one fossil shrimp extended its known fossil range by 115 million years (evolution date) and how finely preserved it was. Today I want to take a quick look at what this fossil and others really tell us about the evolutionary interpretation of the geological column.
Currently sedimentary rocks are extremely difficult to date by any radioisotopic method. Therefore, the prevailing method of dating sedimentary strata is by what fossils are found in what particular layer
Ref.: http://creationrevolution.com/how-reliable-is-the-geologic-column/