Early Major Predator Activity
TNRTB Archive – Retained for reference information
Paleontologists challenged significant components of both the young-earth creationist and naturalistic evolutionist models. They found evidence that creatures living 400 million years ago called crinoids were regenerating their tentacle-like arms in response to large-body-sized predators. This evidence establishes that large carnivores existed long before Adam’s first sin, which contradicts a major doctrine of young-earth creationism (namely, that there was no animal predation until after humanity’s fall into sin). The same evidence shows that optimal large-animal predator-prey relationships date back at least 400 million years. This date leaves less than 140 million years for such animals and the ecological relationships to “evolve” from microorganisms and microorganism colonies, a severe challenge for any naturalistic evolutionary model. From a biblical perspective, such early large-animal predator-prey relationships demonstrate the extent and duration over which God was creating and re-creating an enormous diversity of large animals so as to maximize the biodeposit resources for future human beings.
- Thomas K. Baumiller and Forest J. Gahn, “Testing Predator-Driven Evolution with Paleozoic Crinoid Arm Regeneration,” Science 305 (2004): 1453-55.
- https://www.sciencemag.org/
- Erik Stokstad, “400-Million-Year-Old Wounds Reveal a Time When Predators Romped,” Science 305 (2004): 1386.
- https://www.sciencemag.org/
- Related Resource
- Hugh Ross, “The Faint Sun Paradox”