What we observe in sea creatures is what we would expect to find if the Bible account is true
The ocean is a mysterious and wonderful place, and scientists are regularly discovering new sea creatures, many of which are weird and even bizarre.
This makes it more and more difficult to believe that the amazing variety of sea life was produced by a process of gradual evolution from a common ancestor.
Around 97% of living creatures are invertebrates (animals without an internal skeleton or backbone). Many of them have an exoskeleton – hard parts on the outside of their bodies.
No hard evidence for evolution of fish
Fish, however, are vertebrates (creatures with a backbone), and all living fish can be classified in three groups: cartilaginous fish such as sharks and rays, jawless fish like lampreys and hagfish, and bony fish.
But according to evolution theory, the first fishes evolved from some kind of invertebrate. This would have meant that, somehow, they lost their external skeleton and developed an internal one. Evolutionists believe that some kind of worm-like creature was the ancestor of all the vertebrates, but there is no agreed candidate.
According to Wikipedia, “The evolution of fish began about 530 million years ago during the Cambrian explosion. It was during this time that the early chordates developed the skull and the vertebral column.”
However, there is no hard evidence for this, and evolutionists can’t even agree on a candidate for the common ancestor of the vertebrates. According to Encyclopedia Britannica online, “The ancestral vertebrate (protovertebrate) has been sought for more than 100 years, and the likelihood of finding it today is not much greater than in the past. It can be assumed that the protovertebrate was small and soft-bodied, two factors that suggest the improbability of finding a fossilised form in a recognisable condition.” Yet numerous soft-bodied creatures, such as jellyfish, have indeed been preserved as fossils!
The origin of fish is obscure
the same as their fossil
counterparts (Credit: Silke Baron CC BY 2.0)
According to the British Geological Survey, “The origin of fish is obscure, but may be found in something like the invertebrate sea squirts or echinoderms” (www.bgs.ac.uk). However, the fossils of a true fish known as ‘Metaspriggina’ have been found in the same (Cambrian) rocks as fossil sea squirts, supposedly “500 million years old.” Incidentally, living sea squirts, like those in the photo, show no evolution from their fossil counterparts.
Variety within fish types is often presented as evidence of evolution. Two examples are guppies — popular aquarium fish — and cichlids. Guppies (see photo) come in a vast array of patterns and colours, and more than 1,000 species of cichlid fishes are found all around the world.
But is this really “evolution in action”? The Bible tells us that God created the creatures of the sea “according to their kinds” (Genesis 1:21).
What we observe is what we would expect to find if the Bible account is true. There has been no evolution from one kind to another, just variation, and all the species in each kind can interbreed.
Geoff Chapman is the director of Creation Resources Trust.
Find out more about creation and evolution at www.crt.org.uk