Chapter 3:

Two Worldviews in Conflict
What do thousands of scientists believe about creation and evolution?

Dinosaurs

• Without a doubt, dinosaur fossils tell of the great variety and large numbers in which the giant creatures once existed. Gigantic fossil remains have revealed the awe-inspiring size to which some of the dinosaur species grew. Often, one cannot help feeling a sense of mystery about the total absence of dinosaurs today, leading to the question, “What caused the extinction of the dinosaurs?”
  
  
• The prevailing evolutionary explanation for why dinosaurs disappeared is that the impact from a massive meteorite threw up so much dust that the skies darkened, causing the climate to cool and the vegetation sustaining the giant, coldblooded herbivores to die. Then, with widespread starvation among the herbivores, carnivores were left without adequate prey on which to survive.
  
  
• However, one evolutionary book on dinosaurs explains the many problems associated with such dinosaur extinction theories: “Now comes the important question. What caused all these extinctions [of dinosaurs and other animals] at one particular point in [history]? Dozens of reasons have been suggested, some serious and sensible, others quite crazy, and yet others merely as a joke. Every year people come up with new theories on this thorny problem. The trouble is that if we are to find just one reason to account for them all, it would have to explain the death, all at the same time, of animals living on land and of animals living in the sea; but, in both cases, of only some of those animals, for many of the land-dwellers and many of the sea-dwellers went on living quite happily into the following period. Alas, no such one explanation exists.”^[97]
  
  
• But one such explanation does exist, according to creationist scientists. Like evolutionists, creationists believe that the dinosaurs became extinct as a consequence of some major catastrophe. But while most evolutionists believe this catastrophe may have been a colossal meteor collision with earth, creationists believe it to be the cataclysmic, worldwide deluge known as the Genesis flood.
  
  
• A recent discovery of thousands of fossilized dinosaur eggs shows that dinosaur eggs were only about the size of little grapefruits (including species which grew up to 50 feet long).^[98] So from a creationist perspective, very young (thus very small) dinosaurs could have been taken aboard Noah’s ark with ample room to spare, but not have survived as long in the new environment following the Genesis flood. (Interestingly, it is acknowledged by evolutionists that the eggs were rapidly buried in silt from a flood.^[99])
  
  
• After the Flood, the land animals that survived on the ark would have found their new world to be much different than the one before. Due to (1) competition for food that was no longer in abundance, (2) the destruction of habitats, (3) man hunting for food, and (4) other catastrophes, many species of animals would have continued to eventually die out even after the Flood. Today numerous animal species become extinct every year — extinction seems to be the rule in earth history.^[100] Thus, the group of animals now called dinosaurs could have simply died out in addition to the other animals that became extinct after the Flood.
  
  
• As described in the previous section, many sea creatures would have died out during the Genesis flood, but some would have survived. In addition, all of the land animals outside of the ark would have died, but the representatives of many of the kinds that survived on the ark would have continued to live in the new world after the Flood. Indeed, these points alone explain satisfactorily, as noted above, “the death, all at the same time, of animals living on land and of animals living in the sea; but, in both cases, of only some of those animals.”
  
  
• It can thus be seen that although evolutionists believe “no such one explanation exists,” they probably have not considered the creation model, which can satisfactorily explain the observed data surrounding the extinction of the dinosaurs and other animals.
  
  
• Is there a dinosaur/dragon relationship? Clearly, it seems far-fetched, at first, to imagine dinosaurs living alongside mankind. After all, Hollywood films such as Jurassic Park portray dinosaurs as vicious predators who ruled the earth. But, actually, even evolutionists believe that most dinosaurs were not the vicious predators often pictured, but rather, just vegetarians or scavengers! In fact, the American Museum of Natural History acknowledges that, based on the evidence to date, meateating dinosaurs such as T. rex, the most famous of all fearsome dinosaurs, may not have been the ferocious predators often imagined: “While the Tyrannosaurus rex is posed as if it is stalking prey, we do not in fact know for sure whether meateating dinosaurs such as this were active hunters — tracking down, attacking, and killing prey — or scavengers, feeding on the carcasses of other dinosaurs.”^[101] Significantly, many animals today that might look like vicious killers are often not.^[102]
  
  
• Since it is known that dinosaurs indeed lived alongside other mammals in the past, there is no reason to assume that dinosaurs could not have been contemporaries with mankind as well.^[103] Stories abound of ancient legends of dragons, sea serpents, and monsters, such as the Beowulf epic, and St. George and the Dragon. Tales of enormous fire-breathing monsters can be found in diverse parts of the world. Interestingly, ancient depictions of these dragons tend to exhibit one recurring observation: they bear a remarkable resemblance to today’s dinosaur fossil reconstructions. Indeed, the article on dragons in the 1949 edition of Encyclopedia Britannica noted that dinosaurs are “astonishingly dragon-like.” The most recent edition of the Encyclopedia notes that the belief in dragons “apparently arose without the slightest knowledge on the part of the ancients of the gigantic, prehistoric, dragon-like reptiles [dinosaurs].”^[104]
  
  
• It may simply be a coincidence that, before dinosaur bones were discovered about 150 years ago, ancient people depicted creatures which highly resemble today’s fossil dinosaur reconstructions. But is it necessarily a coincidence? Is it possible that such drawings and stories have a basis in real past encounters with dinosaurs, suggesting that at least some dinosaurs might have been contemporaries with mankind in the past? Even the biblical Book of Job describes some creatures whose descriptions strongly resemble a dinosaur (Job 40:15–24; Job 41). Scholars have suggested that Job may be the oldest book of the Bible; perhaps he was an eyewitness to these animals. This is one of the very few animals in the Bible that is singled out for such a detailed description, suggesting that Job knew what this animal looked like and lived alongside it.

• That large dragon-like creatures (dinosaurs) once roamed the earth is certainly evidenced by the fossil record. But breathing fire? Surely preposterous. Even if dragon stories do have basis in real past encounters with dinosaurs, it is likely these accounts have also accumulated some mythical elements over the centuries, such as breathing fire. But consider these bizarre facts:
  
  
  • Some dinosaurs (specifically the Lambeo-saurus) are particularly notable for the hatchet-shaped hollow bony crest on top of their skulls. The Encyclopedia Britannica describes this crest as containing “complex chamber extensions of the breathing passage between the nostrils and the [main tube by which air enters the lungs].” The article notes that “the function of these chambers is not known,” although various uses have been suggested.^[105]
    
    
  • One possibility is that these complex breathing chambers may have been similar in concept to the reaction chamber of an insect called the bombardier beetle. This little beetle is endowed with an ability to imitate exploding gunpowder. Little sacs at the tip of its abdomen spray a noxious fluid at boiling-hot temperatures. The fluid itself consists of toxins called quinones that react explosively (at an estimated rate of 500 bursts per second) in an internal “combustion” chamber with hydrogen peroxide, which is also produced by the beetle and stored in a separate body compartment.^[106]
    
    
• With complex chambers in their breathing passages, could certain dinosaurs have had the same kind of defense system operating from their heads as the bombardier beetle (i.e., some type of fire-breathing capabilities)? To date, there has been no other definitive explanation for these dinosaurs’ strange head-crest chambers.

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