How big can an animal get? Science fiction frequently shows animals of enormous size, and yet in reality land mammals can only get so big. The amount of oxygen in the air, the type of muscle development needed to run, the limitations of reproduction by live birth, and a host of other technical problems are involved in limiting the size of land mammals. This is not just true of mammals, but it is true of birds which are also warm-blooded. Reptiles, on the other hand, never stop growing. An 80-year-old T. Rex was still growing, but I can tell you from personal experience that an 80-year-old man is not. This issue has a lot to do with whether the dinosaurs were birds, and whether dinosaurs and humans could have lived at the same time.
Over 20,000 footprints of dinosaurs have been discovered in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia. In late 2016, one was found that was 42 inches long and 30 inches wide. In an American shoe size that would be a size 104. Researchers are interested in how the dinosaur was able to stand and walk with such enormous size. One thing seems certain–the conditions on the Earth were different than they are today. Almost certainly there was a higher oxygen content in the atmosphere. God was preparing the Earth for humans, and certain conditions were required to form the materials humans would need for advanced civilization. “In the beginning, God created the earth” just says that God did it. How he did it may have involved far more than we can understand, even today. Reference: The Week, October 21, 2016, page 19.
–John N. Clayton © 2017