GENESIS PARK EXHIBIT HALL

ROOM 1: THE DINOSAURS

THE ORIGIN OF DINOSAURS

"Where did dinosaurs come from? That apparently simple question has been the subject
of intense debate amongst scientists for over 150 years..." (The Natural History Museum
Book of Dinosaurs, 1998, p. 12.) Some evolutionists speculate that reptiles, including
dinosaurs, evolved from the amphibians; while the amphibians developed from the fish. It
is believed that the Age of the Reptiles began during the Triassic period, approximately
225 million years. Certain tetropods that are thought to have lived in the late
Permian/early Triassic (like gorgonopsians, the shovel Lizard Lystrosaurus, and
Massetognathus) are supposed to have branched into both small rodent-like mammals
and dinosaurs. The predecessors of dinosaurs are often vaguely described as the
"Archosaurs of the Triassic." Most of the better known species of dinosaurs are said to
have appeared in the Jurassic period, approximately 200 million years ago. According to
evolutionary theorists, the dinosaurs flourished through the Cretaceous period, becoming
extinct over 60 million years ago. Could random mutations and natural selection actually
turn a fish into an Apatosaur, even in millions of years? There are serious problems with
the naturalistic Darwinian scenarios and the accompanying probability arguments. It is
also interesting to note that the dinosaurs are challenging to evolutionists because the
diverse kinds of dinosaurs elude all attempts to construct a clear lineage back to a
common ancestor (phylogeny) and transitional candidates are rare.

The Scripture says that on the fifth day of creation God created great sea monsters and
flying creatures. This would have included the great swimming and flying reptiles (like
the plesiosaur and pterosaur in Genesis Park). On the sixth day God created the land
animals, which would have included all of the dinosaur kinds (Genesis 1:20-25). The
scriptures are clear that everything was made in six days and therefore dinosaurs and man
came into existence at the same time. "For in six days the LORD made the heavens and
the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day." (Exodus 20:11)
Naturalists would exclude the consideration of such a view of origins, regardless of the
evidence for intelligent design. They wrongly claim that science cannot consider
supernatural explanations. Nonetheless there are several compelling lines of evidence that
the Bible is God’s Word.

From: http://www.genesispark.com/genpark/origin/origin.htm

DID THE DINOSAURS EVOLVE INTO BIRDS?

The "feathered dinosaurs" continue to make science headlines. While there is nothing in
the creation model that would prevent some dinosaurs from having feathers, the hype that
has been generated around this leaves even some evolutionists like Storrs L. Olson,
Curator of Birds at the Smithsonian Institution disgusted by the unwarranted speculation.
In 1999, National Geographic was forced to admit that their much-touted Archaeoraptor
fossil was a fraud. Independent studies by embryonic researchers and respiratory experts
reported in the journal Science that dinosaurs evolving to birds is just not a reasonable
scenario. (Creation Ex Nihilo 20:41, 1998)

Archaeopteryx is considered by many evolutionists to be an ancestral form linking

reptiles and birds. While Archy certainly is a unique creature, its fully-formed feathers,
wish bone, and perching feet clearly establish that it was a bird. Evolutionists point to it
having a tail and claws on its wing. But some birds that are alive today exhibit these
features. It is best described as a mosaic creature (like a platypus) that has some special
features, like teeth. Some Darwinists have even suggested that the small carnivorous
dinosaur Compsognathus could be the transitional dinosaur between Archy and the
reptiles. Although the Compy appeared to have hollow bones, it makes a poor specimen
for the evolutionists speculation because it co-existed with Archaeopteryx. Moreover,
dinosaurs are divided into two formal groups: lizard-hips and bird-hips. Modern
evolutionists have altered the story and now claim that it is these lizard hipped dinosaurs
that evolved into birds, which appears to be rather contradictory. And since Compy is a
saurischian, he becomes an even less plausible ancestor!

In June of 2009 researchers at Oregon State University made a fundamental new

discovery about how birds have a lung capacity that allows for flight - and the finding
meant it was unlikely that birds descended from any known theropod dinosaurs. "It's
really kind of amazing that after centuries of studying birds and flight we still didn't
understand a basic aspect of bird biology," said John Ruben, an OSU professor of
zoology. "This discovery probably means that birds evolved on a parallel path alongside
dinosaurs, starting that process before most dinosaur species even existed." (Quick,
Devon, Ruben, John , "Cardio-pulmonary Anatomy in Theropod Dinosaurs: Implications
from Extant Archosaurs," Journal of Morphology, Vol. 270:10, May 20, 2009, pp.1232 -
1246.)

Most problematic of all for the dinosaur-to-bird story are the birds that have been found
in the fossil record contemporaneously and even before most dinosaurs. "Fossil remains
claimed to be of two crow-sized birds 75 million years older than Archaeopteryx have
been found....a paleontologist at Texas Tech University, who found the fossils, says they
have advanced avian features. ...tends to confirm what many paleontologists have long
suspected, that Archaeopteryx is not on the direct line to modern birds." (Nature, vol.322,
1986, p.677) More recently, Dr. Alan Feduccia of the U. N.C. and the author of the
encyclopedic The Origin and Evolution of Birds (1999) studied ostrich embryos and
concluded: "Whatever the ancestor of birds was, it must have had five fingers, not the
three-fingered hand of theropod dinosaurs." (Naturwissenschaften 89:391-393, 2002)
Lastly, well-preserved bird-like fossil footprints appear in clearly established Late
Triassic sediments of northwestern Argentina. This discovery is said to be 55 million
years earlier than Archaeopteryx, a time when (according to the evolutionary paradigm)
there were not even many dinosaurs around yet! (Melchor, R.N., de Valais, S. and
Genise, J.F., "Bird-like Fossil Footprints from the Late Triassic," Nature, 2002, vol. 417,
pp. 936-938.)

From: http://www.genesispark.com/genpark/birds/birds.htm
 WHAT KILLED THE DINOSAURS?
Hollywood has produced any number of recreations of the idyllic
world in which dinosaurs once roamed the earth in vast numbers.
What happened? Noted dinosaur authority Edwin Colbert wrote,
"The great extinction...was an event that has defied all attempts at a satisfactory
explanation" (The Age of Reptiles, 1997, p. 191). Evolutionary naturalists have proposed
numerous divergent theories to explain what caused the demise of the dinosaurs. The
implication of 2006 research by Niels Rattenborg, of the Max Planck Institute for
Ornithology in Germany, is that the inability of dinosaurs to experience slow wave sleep
may have been one of the reasons why they became extinct! Evolutionary naturalists
have proposed numerous divergent theories to explain what caused the demise of the
dinosaurs. Evolutionary naturalists have proposed various theories to explain what
happened to the dinosaurs that once roamed the earth in vast numbers. The most popular
theory today is that a giant asteroid hit the earth, causing dramatic climactic change.
Some believe this resulted in a "deep freeze" with a blanket of dust darkening the globe
for months or even years. While this certainly could have wiped out the dinosaurs; how
come insects, flowering and freshwater plants, and other more susceptible organisms did
not become extinct? Others suggest that the great reptiles were killed because the
asteroid’s fiery embers ignited a worldwide firestorm that burned them up. But how could
every dinosaur have been destroyed by this cataclysm and yet thin-skinned mammals,
delicate birds, and turtles have survived? The primary evidence for this great collision
comes from certain types of clay with metal called iridium in them. Asteroids have this
element, as does the earth’s core. Could some of these deposits be evidence of large
volcanic eruptions of iridium in the past? The Flood would have caused the greatest
earthquakes and volcanic eruptions ever known. In April of 2009 a mainstream geologist
challenged the conventional belief that all dinosaurs went extinct by the end of the
Cretaceous period. Jim Fassett, a paleontologist who holds an emeritus position at the U.
S. Geological Survey, published a paper in Palaeontologia Electronica producing fossil
evidence that points to a pocket of dinosaurs that somehow survived in remote parts New
Mexico and Colorado and made it into the Paleocene Age.

For the creationists, the answer is simple. The conditions of the early earth were ideal for
dinosaurs to spread around the globe. The dinosaur bones that we discover fossilized
today were laid down by the Genesis Flood. Indeed the Dinosaur Death Poses provide
strong evidence that they died from asphyxiation. After the Flood, the descendants of the
representatives mating pairs that were preserved on the ark only survived in smaller
populations. As other populations flourished, many dinosaur species would have
succumbed to the harsher environment. Those kinds that did not become extinct in the
centuries after the Flood were hunted down as a threat or were killed for food so that only
a few still survive today in very remote areas. This view is supported by the evidence
presented on the Genesis Park site, including extant dinosaurian creatures, soft tissue in
dinosaur bones, depictions of dinosaurs by ancient civilizations, and reports of dragons
throughout history.

From: http://www.genesispark.com/genpark/killed/killed.htm
TYPES OF DINOSAURS

Types of Dinosaurs

There were many different kinds of

dinosaurs.

• The smallest types were about the

same size as a chicken, and the
largest were over 100 feet (30
meters) long.

• Different dinosaurs ate different

diets. Some types of dinosaurs
ate only meat ("carnivores"), some
ate only plants ("herbivores"), and
some ate both plants and meats
("omnivores").
Dinosaurs Poster
Buy at AllPosters.com
• Just like modern animals, the
different types of dinosaurs were related. Biologists use the terms "order", "family",
"genus" and "species" to classify dinosaurs and to indicate how closely different types
of animals are related.

A dinosaur which is the same species as another dinosaur is of the exact same type,
whereas two dinosaurs which are of the same genus are closely related but of different
types, and two dinosaurs of the same family are a bit more distantly related and so on.

The chart below shows some of the different types of dinosaurs (divided into herbivores,
carnivores and omnivores). In most cases, the chart shows a genus or family of dinosaur,
although in some cases a single species may be indicated.

From: http://www.dinosaurjungle.com/dinosaur_species.php