If we are going to study these rare creatures, it would be wise to obtain a bit of background information.  First of all, dinosaur means “terrible lizard.”  They are large reptiles (Segraves 25).  Something we must know about the world of the dinosaurs, is that the climate was much different from what it is today.  The planet was obviously warmer.  Fossil evidence indicates that it was warmer worldwide, which means people and animals lived longer (Segraves 28).  Many of the dinosaur and plant fossils are huge (Sippert 59).  We know that plants get larger and larger depending on how long they live.  Dinosaurs are reptiles that grow like plants, which means that they continue to get bigger as long as they are living. (Segraves 26, Dinosaurs and the Bible).  So in all actuality there is nothing so terrible about a big dinosaur like the brachiosaurus.  It is just an extremely old, giant lizard.  The Tyrannosaurus Rex, on the other hand, is worth calling terrible. 

   Dinosaurs are as numerous in variety as any other species of animal.  Some weighed as much as 100 tons, that is about as much as fourteen buses stacked on top of each other (Dinosaurs…).  Others were as small as chickens.  Some dinosaurs swim in the sea and have four flippers like the plesiosaurus.  Others swim with two flippers and have a long tail like a crocodile.  Some dinosaurs walk on two legs and have sharp teeth and claws.  Other dinosaurs have four legs with long necks and tails.  If we consider the book of Job to be reliable, some dinosaurs breathed fire (Job 41:1,19-21 NIV).  Some dinosaurs flew with huge wings like the pterodactyl.  A dinosaur is a large reptile that can reside in any conceivable environment, providing the dinosaur is equipped for its habitat.

   Finally, not only dinosaurs went extinct at the end of what scientists call the cretaceous period, but also marine plankton died out temporarily as well.  The land plants of North America also suffered considerable damage.  We should also note that many species of reptiles and amphibians are left in the world today (Wilford 235).  After careful analysis of the pattern of extinction, which occurred at the end of the cretaceous period, geologists could find no determining factor.  Scientists have no idea why some animals continued to thrive and others became extinct (Wilford 235).  One thing is certain; whatever caused the extinction was global and catastrophic.  Halstead reads as follows:  “It is surely stretching credulity too far to imagine that this virtually simultaneous extinction of what has been calculated as 75% of living species could have been simply coincidence” (160). 

   Scientists are then forced to search for clues in the fossil record.  Then after careful examining of the evidence some theory must be deduced.  "For any theory to be viable it has to provide some kind of explanation by postulating some cause which selectively attacks the large animals on the land and the microscopic organisms on the surface waters of the oceans…” (Halstead 161).  Despite the lack of a pattern, science must live up to its reputation of “having all the answers.”  Therefore any theory that fits this description is credible.  We can only begin to count the vast number of possibilities suggested for dinosaur extinction in the world today.  Scientists’ only limit is their creativity and what they can find as evidence to support their theory. Therefore, we are only exploring only one scientific angle of this mystery, which consists of two theories.

   The view we shall study states that mass extinction occurs abruptly on earth for certain species of animals every 26.2 million years.  Scientists say this theory is supported be the fossil record, and it is not uncommon in the cycle of the earth.  This mass extinction pattern seems rather unsettling, considering scientists assume that human beings are next on the extinction list.  They give us another 13.5 million years to live. They hope that determining what happened to the dinosaurs will help to solve their own questions concerning global extinction (Wilford 251)

   Fortunately, scientists do not remain clueless.  A universal layer of iridium rich clay was discovered throughout the earth, just after the dinosaur fossils ended.  This layer has been considered by many to be a useful clue to the source of dinosaur extinction.  Iridium is not uncommon in outer space.   It suggests that the cause of the dinosaur extinction was extraterrestrial.  Therefore, a few paleontologists who pooled their resources together with some astronomers determined two possible solutions to this extinction problem. Both these views result from quite a lot of study and hard work; therefore, they merit our attention.  One theory suggests the earth was struck by an asteroid millions of years ago and the asteroid sent clouds of debris into the earth’s atmosphere, this debris clouded out the sun.  (Wilford 224-226)  The iridium samples in the clay layer suggest an asteroid anywhere from six to twelve miles in diameter would have to strike the strike the earth. This was the size necessary to send that much iridium into the atmosphere (Halstead 161).  Theoretically, photosynthesis was prevented by such an attack due to the thick cloud of gas blocking out the sun.  The immense cloud of dust and gas produced by this asteroid would also cause cyanide to settle onto the surface water and thereby kill off the plankton and anything that drunk the water (Halstead 161).  A dramatic increase in the amount of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere would result, consequently a mass greenhouse effect would occur throughout the earth.  An increase in temperature would cause the dinosaurs to overheat.  It is a scientific fact that reptiles can only endure so much heat.  A ten-degree change in temperature would have a tremendous effect on the giant lizards.  Overheating dinosaurs are tired dinosaurs.  Tired dinosaurs would not feel much like mating (Wilford 217).  Furthermore, without photosynthesis, there would be no plants; therefore, plant-eating dinosaurs would become extinct.  If plant eating dinosaurs died out, meat-eating dinosaurs would have nothing to eat and eventually dinosaurs would die out completely (Halstead 162-164).

   However, it does not seem logical for this large an asteroid to simply drift out of its place in the asteroid belt and go plummeting towards the earth.  Scientists have uncovered a theory for this as well.  Apparently the sun and the planet’s orbiting paths become a bit shaky every 33 million years or so.  Presumably because the sun may have a sister star.  Scientists suggest that the star approaches our solar system approximately every 33 million years (Wilford 265).  Widely accepted as the Nemesis Star Theory, or the Nemesis Hypothesis.  They believe the ancient peoples knew something of the damaged a star, comet, or large asteroid could do to the earth; because the Latin word for disaster originates from the words for “death star”  or “evil star” (Wilford 258).  This theory appears to be quite plausible at first glance.  Unfortunately, no sister star to earth has been discovered as of this date.  Not to mention that no correlation between the shaky planet cycles and the mass extinctions on the earth have been found.  One event is thought to occur every 26.2 million years and the other is said to occur every 33 million years.  These two events are unlikely to occur at the same time, in purely mathematical terms, especially since there is no saying when the extinction cycle and the twin star’s cycle started (Wilford 255).  Due to all this, the Nemesis Hypothesis does not work well scientifically.

   The second theory is the Planet-X theory.  This theory suggests that an undiscovered planet on the outskirts of our solar system, or in a neighboring solar system approaches the Oort cloud where comets are born.  As it swings by, it pulls a few these extraterrestrial rocks out of space and they begin their cycle as comets around our sun (Wilford 261).  Theoretically, a few of these comets could hit the earth around the same time period having the same basic effects as the asteroid.  The sun's rays would be blocked out preventing photosynthesis.  Carbon dioxide would increase in the atmosphere causing a greenhouse effect.  Cyanide would pollute the waters and mass extinctions would occur.

   Now we will review a few of the loopholes in these “scientific hypotheses.”  First of all, scientists do not really know how old the earth or the universe really is.  There may not be 26.2 million years in the history of our planet!  The scientific dating method is based on circular reasoning.  We shall now explore how scientists date rocks and fossils. They take a rock which they say is from the cretaceous era and send it to a laboratory with a note saying how old they think it is and what fossils should be found in the general vicinity.  The technicians in the lab compare the paleontologist’s estimate to a chart that says what types of fossils are in that kind of rock.  If the rock looks like it could have come from the cretaceous era and there should be that kind of fossil nearby, lab technicians will run as many tests as they need to on that rock to come up with a date close to the scientist’s estimate.  Furthermore, if a scientist wants to date a fossil, he looks at a geological chart that states in which era that fossil falls and what its age should be.  Then that fossil is sent to a lab with a note stating the scientist’s estimate.  The lab technician picks up the fossil, compares it to the geological chart, and determines the scientist’s estimate to be correct.  That kind of fossil is supposed to be found in that kind of rock.  After that, the technician runs as many tests as he needs to on that fossil to make it agree with the scientist’s estimate( Segraves 17-21). 

   Radiometric and carbon-14 dating are both inaccurate because they are based on the assumption that the earth is millions of years old.  It also assumes that geologic life on the earth has continued at the same speed for millions of years (Segraves 17-21).   It has no concept of the rapid changes that occur in the earth's crust during catastrophic events, such as violent volcanic eruptions, floods, and other natural disasters.  Therefore, scientists do not really know how old the earth is. It should also be noted that up until about two hundred and fifty years ago, the earth was considered to be relatively young; about six or at most ten thousand years old (Dinosaurs…).  It was only after Darwinism and the Evolution theory became popular that the earth was considered to be millions of years old.  Evolution scientists needed lots of time to make a rock become a person, so they decided that the earth must actually be much older than they had previously thought (Sippert 161).  It should be noted that human and dinosaur footprints have been found imprinted next to each other in limestone streambeds (Segraves 37).  If people lived at the same time as dinosaurs, the earth would have to be much younger than scientists had estimated to support Darwinism.  We can assume that the presence of humans allows for the presence of other, less advanced animals as well; therefore, evolution has just been exposed as the hoax it was to begin with.

   From here, we come to our second point, if all the dinosaurs and plankton were killed by the fallout from the comets or asteroid, the other animals should have been effected by it.  There are literally hundreds of thousands of animals on the earth.  They should all have disappeared after this catastrophic event (Sippert 142, Halstead 161).  Also, for the gas and soot to accomplish the damage on the earth which scientists suggest it did, it would have to remain in the atmosphere for about three years.  Most of the ash and soot would have settled out in about three months.  After that the life cycle could continue as it always had (Wilford 230).  The April 29, 1986 issue of The Mankato Free Press states that "…the  period of darkness would need to have lasted ten years or more to wipe out the prehistoric reptiles…" (qtd. in Sippert 142)  Another valid point is that no crater large enough has been found with the correct geologic age for this event.  Scientists will say that if comets did hit the earth, several possible craters have been found.  Unfortunately, they leave no craters for normal asteroids which strike the earth’s crust on occasion as they orbit too close to the earth (Wilford 228-229).  Another problem is that fossils must be buried rapidly for proper formation.  The kind of deaths dinosaurs would die under this alleged cloud of soot would be slow and gradual.  The fossils would have no opportunity to form (Sippert 430).  We can only assume that if an asteroid or comet did strike the earth it had no significant effect on the earth’s inhabitants or on the dinosaurs.  This leads to the question of how the iridium came to be in the soil at that time.  Iridium can also be produced by massive volcanic activity from within the earth’s mantle (Wilford 216, 242-243).  A final proof is that the last dinosaur bones in the Hell Creek area were found three meters below the iridium layer.  The dinosaurs would have to have died out prior to the volcanic activity or the asteroid (Wilford 239).  Wilford concludes by saying this:  “If an asteroid or some other large object crashed into the earth, as it seems to have done, this was of no concern to the dinosaurs.  They were probably already extinct.  If a few had survived that fatal moment, the asteroid impact only hastened their inevitable end…”  (249).  Basically, whether an asteroid or some other large object hit the earth or not does not matter.  The occurrence happened ex post facto, after the dinosaurs had presumably gone extinct.

   We are now going to look at a more plausible solution the dinosaur mystery. This view suggests a gradual decline in dinosaur number immediately following the global deluge, until the dinosaurs became nearly extinct, as they are today.  It goes right along with the Bible and its account of earth’s the earth's history.  We are going to look at it chapter and verse.  The Bible tends to date the earth at about six thousand years old, and says that human beings and animals were created on the same day (Genesis 1:24-26 NIV).  Dinosaurs are included in “all the creatures that move along the ground”.  God created the dinosaurs, just like men and other animals.  It should also be noted that dinosaur and human fossils have been found together in the fossil record (Segraves 37).    Paintings of dinosaurs have also been done inside caves by ancient people in Rhodesia.   To paint a dinosaur, one must first see it.  Scientists labeled the creatures as aardvarks or giraffes without even going out to see them.  Anyone who sees these creatures for themselves knows they are brachiosaurs (Segraves 39).  There are also pictures of dinosaurs painted inside on the walls of the Grand Canyon, as well as inside caves in Africa (Dinosaurs…).  The Bible describes a behemoth in Job 40:15 (NIV) 

15  Look at behemoth, which I made along with you and which feeds on grass like an ox.  16 What strength he has in his loins, what power in the muscles of his belly!  17  His tail sways like a cedar; the sinews of his thighs are close-knit.  18  His bones are tubes of bronze, his limbs like rods of iron.  19  He ranks first among the works of God, yet his maker can approach him with the sword… 21  Under the lotus plant he lies, hidden among the reeds in the marsh…  23  When the river rages, he is not alarmed, though the Jordan should surge against his mouth…

   If the Bible, which was being written several thousand years ago, mentions dinosaurs; Dinosaurs ought to exist in the world today.  Most people will say that the Bible does not account for the fossil record at all.  Furthermore it leaves no clue as to why dinosaurs do not exist today.  To the contrary, the Bible does offer a few possibilities.  Genesis states that the earth was subjected to a global flood shortly after creation, we can recall.  Normally the credibility of such a catastrophe would require several pages of documented evidence.  However, there is enough evidence to fill seven or eight pages and we need not include it all.  We will cover the main points briefly. 

   First of all, every culture on the earth has a flood story somewhere in its history (Dinosaurs…).  Secondly, the fossil record has evidence of the violent water burial of thousands of dinosaurs, fish, plants, and mammals in states of terror and confusion (Segraves 24 -25).  The Grand Canyon and many other areas of the world have been carved out by water activity such as a global deluge would produce (Sippert 431).  The dramatic change in the earth’s climate could have occurred as a direct result of the loss of a water vapor canopy around the earth.  The fountains of the great deep bursting open sending geyser water several hundred feet into the air triggered the global deluge.  Intense plate tectonics would result causing volcanoes to erupt all over the planet.  Large traces of iridium would be expected to appear in the post-flood soil.  Obviously they have been found (Sippert 430-431).  Also, the September 1977 issue of Reader's Digest on p.129 states that it considers the flood to have occurred (qtd. in Sippert 82).  If Reader's Digest is convinced that a global deluge occurred, it is safe to assume that it happened. This is adequate information to support the theory if a global deluge.  Any animal that was not within the ark would perish (Genesis 6:17 NIV).  Dinosaurs are animals, obviously. 

   However, the story does not end there.  God did say to bring on board the ark two of every living thing.  Noah had a moral responsibility to the dinosaurs.  He could have brought a few baby dinosaurs with him into the ark (Segraves 30-31, Dinosaurs…).  In fact literary evidence suggests that he did.  In Job 40:15 God said, “Look at behemoth”  He did not say, “think of a behemoth” or “imagine a behemoth.”  He said to look at it.  Obviously behemoth was still present on the earth at that time.  Also, after the flood, there was a great number of mythological tales that developed about men slaying dragons.  Let us remember that the word dinosaur was never invented before 1841.  Any lizard large enough to harm a man would be a dragon.  The Epic of Gilgamesh, Beowulf, and many other stories have been written of men killing dragons.  Alexander the Great reports 100-foot dragons sticking their heads out of caves in India and hissing at his men.  King Arthur’s royal crest bore the symbol of a dragon (Dinosaurs…).  The Catholic Bible, 14:23-30 has Daniel slaying a dragon (TJB, Dinosaurs…).  On Nebuchadnezzar’s seal, Murdok, his god goes before him, riding the back of a dragon.  Encyclopedias from the fifteenth century list dragons as "extremely rare, though still living creatures" (qtd. in Dinosaurs…).  Realizing completely that tales get stretched severely over time until they are completely out of proportion and not everything they say is true, we should still take into account their validity simply because so many tales exist.  There had to have been a dragon or a giant lizard of some kind in order to tell the story to begin with.  Maybe what they saw did not have five heads.  But it could have had one head, sharp claws, and possibly breathed fire.  Job does say some do.  There had to be a source of humanity’s fear, even if it were a thirty-foot long brachiosaurus.  Not all dinosaurs perished with the Arthur legends. 

   If we take a good look at our history, we will find that dinosaurs have been sighted more recently than we would like to admit. A plesiosaurus was washed ashore on the coast of California in 1925.  A dead one was pulled up off the coast of New Zealand by a Japanese fishing boat in 1977.  There is one living in Lake Erie, named Bessi.  There is one living in Lake Champlain, named Champ.  The Loch Ness Monster (Nessi) has been seen by Sir Francis of Scott and his wife.  He is the equivalent to a United States senator.  Not to mention eleven thousand other people, they cannot all be crazy (Dinosaurs…).   Plesiosaurus is not the only dinosaur they have sighted, Brachiosaurus is also quite popular. The Likouala Swamp is a 55,000-mile swamp in the Congo in Africa.  It is also 80% unexplored, people go in to explore it and some do not come out.  Those who do come out, have reported several brachiosaurus sightings in recent years (Dinosaurs…).  If we were to show a picture of a brachiosaurus to a native man near the border of the swamp, he would look at it and say Moholi Membi.  Which is their word for brachiosaurus.  Dinosaurs have also been sighted in the Amazon rainforest, by friends of missionaries  (Dinosaurs...).  People in the jungle do not know the dinosaurs are extinct.  They see them on occasion, although there are only about two hundred or so left on earth.  Dinosaurs are reported as shy creatures with very keen hearing.  Many times people do not see them until they are too close to react.  That is why the few pictures that have been taken of them are blurry or just bad pictures. Although a rare sight in the world today, dinosaurs have not died out completely (Dinosaurs…).

   The only semi-concrete argument against the existence of dinosaurs today is the fact that there are so few sightings.  We must remember that only two of every creature boarded the ark.  So the survival of a species of dinosaurs was contingent upon how well it could cope with its new habitat.  We remember from earlier in this paper that the earth was substantially warmer prior to the flood.  The change in climate would be struggle enough for the reptiles.  The Bible also states that after the flood, God gave man permission to hunt for food (Genesis 9:3 NIV).  This clues us in to two possibilities.  After the flood, the earth was so devastated that men had to hunt to survive, prior to that they ate plants.  The other animals would also be competing for the few plants left on the earth.  The dinosaurs would find it hard to find enough vegetation to survive (Halstead 165).  Also, men probably began to hunt the dinosaurs for food, they could probably feed the whole town on one dinosaur if it were large enough.  We remember the post-flood dragon-slaying legends.  After the flood, it became a heroic feat to kill a dragon  (Dinosaurs…).  Dinosaurs were hunted to extinction the same way that men hunted the buffalo to extinction in the Great Plains.  Because of this mass hunting, the few dinosaurs that exist today live in parts of the world, which few men dwell in, and they are very skittish of human beings.  For all these reasons, it would be safe to assume that few men would be likely to see dragons in the world today.

   Although science has come up with several theories of dinosaur extinction, there is one that far exceeds the probability of them all.  This theory states the following:

• One, God created men and dinosaurs on the same day, and they have always lived with people. 
• A global deluge occurred shortly thereafter, creating the fossil record and causing the near extinction of these fabulous beasts.  
• The new climate and lack of vegetation, which occurred immediately after the flood, threatened dinosaurs.  
• Men began to hunt the dinosaurs for food, and eventually that led to hunting them for sport.  Men hunted the dinosaurs to the point of near extinction around the 1500's, so people forgot the creatures existed.  
• There are probably a few hundred land dinosaurs remaining in remote parts of the world today. 
• The sea dinosaurs have always been doing well, they have merely been frightened away with the invention of diesel engines and noisy ships.  
• We should take note of the fact that there is no evidence available to refute this theory at this time, therefore it is a safe to assume that it is indeed true. 

• Bible., The Jerusalem Bible. Garden City, NY:  Doubleday & Company Inc., 1966 
• Bible., The New International Version Giant Print Reference Bible.  Grand Rapids, MI: The Zondervan Corporation, 1990. 
• Dinosaurs and the Bible.  Videotape.  Dr. Kent Hovind.  American Portrait Films, 1994.  120 min. 
• Halstead, L.B. Dinosaurs. U.K.:  Blandford Books Ltd.  1981. 
• Segraves, Kelly L. The Great Dinosaur Mistake.  San Diego, CA:  Beta Books, 1975. 
• Sippert, Albert.  Evolution is Not Scientific: 32 Reasons Why.  N. Mankato, MN: Sippert Publishing Co., 1975. 
• Whitcomb Jr., John C. The World that Perished.  Grand Rapids, MI:  Baker Book House Co., 1973. 
• Wilford, John Noble.  The Riddle of the Dinosaur. N.Y.:  Random House Inc.  1985. 

October 2, 1997
Final Copy
Research Paper