Jonah and Leedsichthys Problematicus, the Problem Fish

Perspectives convection, but little attention has References Jonah and been paid to the source of carbonate. Theoretically, the only source of 1. Apart from igneous rocks, the only major Leedsichthys additional calcium is the peridotite. bound or diagenized rocks forming today are travertine and tufa, along with some minor problematicus, the Clinopyroxenes are an alternative, but beach rocks. Evaporites are not forming as no mention is made in the literature bound rocks, and likewise reefal constructions problem fish about their presence.12 are not true rocks but rather aggregates, as they need diagenesis to become limestones. So, Initial thermodynamic calcula- Matthew Murdock tions of the serpentinization process volumewise, I believe travertine and tufa are the most important true rocks forming today. have yielded ages of 100 to 10,000 The book of Jonah talks about years.10 14C dating of the carbonate 2. Ford, D.C. and Williams, P.W., Karst Geo- morphology and Hydrology, Chapman & a ‘great fish’ that was large enough structures, on the other hand, have Hall, London, p. 20, 1992. to swallow a man alive. Many have revealed ages of up to 30 ka,13 while 3. Chafetz, H.S. and Folk, R.L., Travertines: scoffed at the Bible, claiming that no the age of the oceanic lithosphere is depositional morphology and the bacterially whale or fish could ever swallow a man. ‘confidently’ established (by way of constructed constituents, J. Sed.Pet. 54(1): magnetic anomalies) to be in the or- 289–316, 1984. These critics, however, are unaware of 10 the fossil evidence of ‘great fish’ in der of 1.5 Ma. Once again, there is a 4. , October 2004. countries all around the world. About ten years ago I visited the dating methods. 5. Diagenesis refers to all the physical, chemical and biological changes that occur within a Ann Arbor Museum of Natural His- Rapid processes sediment after deposition as it compacts and tory in Michigan. I recall staring in lithifies. Diagenesis excludes weathering and amazement as I stood next to a skull metamorphism. 1 Long-age geologists generally of an extinct fish named Dunkleosteus 6. Silvestru, E., The standing stones of creation, terrelli (figure 1).2 The skull itself was accept that diagenesis is a very slow TJ 18(1):3–5, 2004. process, taking hundreds of thousands about 1 m high, but the largest skull 7. Rosen, M.R., Arehart, G.B. and Lico, M.S., found was 1.2 m high. to millions of years. These new dis- Exceptionally fast growth rate of <100-yr-old coveries have reduced the duration of tufa, Big Soda Lake, Nevada: Implications I thought to myself that if the skull certain types of diagenesis by two or for using tufa as paleoclimate proxy, Geology was this big, then its body length must three orders of magnitude. While, to 5:409–412, 2004. be incredible. Some quick research the secular geologist, travertine and 8. Pearson, P.N., Ditchfield, P.W., Singano, J., indicated that this armored fish may tufa formation is a rapid process, ser- Harcourt-Brown, K.G., Nicolaus Copernicus, have reached a length of almost 5 m. pentinization and other similar proc- C.J., Olsson, R.K., Shackleton, N.J. and Hall, If it were not for the glass separating M.A., Warm tropical sea surface temperatures esses are considered to take a very long in the Late Cretaceous and Eocene epochs, Na- us, I could have easily climbed into its time. The fact that large amounts of ture 413:482, 2001. mouth. Also, if Dunkleosteus was this water and heat can dramatically reduce 9. Schwarzschild, B., Isotopic analysis of pris- large, then there could be other fossil this duration has come as a surprise. tine microshells resolves a troubling paradox fish somewhere even larger, and per- In contrast, young-earth creation- of paleoclimatology, Physics Today 54(12):16, haps even fossil evidence of a fish large 2001. ists have always emphasized that the enough to swallow a man. exceptional, unrepeatable event of 10. Kelley, D.S. et al., An off-axis hydrothermal the Genesis Flood was accompanied vent field near the Mid-Atlantic Ridge at 30º N, Nature 412:145–149, 2001. World’s biggest fish fossil by tremendous amounts of water and found; but largely ignored volcanic and igneous heat altering the 12. Normal ocean water does not precipitate carbonate. massive sedimentary deposits that it The fossil bones of a giant fish had created. Regional-scale hydrolyze- 11. Oxidizing of olivine and pyroxenes into ser- named Leedsichthys problematicus type, exothermal, chemical reactions pentine (magnesium iron silicate hydroxide). (figure 2) provide support for the reli- (like serpentinization) are potentially 13. Früh-Green, G.L. et al., 30,000 years of hydrothermal activity at the Lost City Vent ability of the book of Jonah. L. prob- important geological mechanisms, in 14 Field, , October 2004. Thus, most of the sedimentary depos- farmer, Alfred Leeds, who discovered 14. In contrast, modern sedimentology has the first fossils of this species in the its could have been subjected to intense restricted epigenetic formations to areas of heat and water circulation that could known centres of igneous activity, completely late 1800s. The name ‘problematicus’ have generated almost the complete ar- excluding such regional-scale processes from refers to the problem paleontologists ray of sedimentary and metamorphic the equation. See: Selley, R.C., Applied Sedi- encountered trying to classify this rocks known today. And where igneous mentology, Academic Press, London, p. 14, new fish. 2000. Yet another example of an unholistic and chemical heats met, the resulting approach in earth sciences. Leeds sold this skeleton to the rocks could have been very complex Hunterian Museum (Glasgow Univer- and of high metamorphic grade. sity) way back in 1915, but few have

TJ 19(1) 2005 Perspectives

We are not given enough details to know for sure what sea creature this was, so any ideas on how Jonah was not digested would be mere speculation. The Bible said that God ‘prepared’ the creature, so I’m sure He protected Jo- nah from the natural decay process and digestion as well. Or He could have: (1) caused the decay process to stop while Jonah was inside the fish, or (2) undone the damage this process would do when Jonah was later regurgitated. The whale shark can turn its stomach inside out and bring up its contents in a process called gastric eversion.8 The whale shark may not have been the only ‘fish’ with this ability, and Jonah’s body could have been easily ‘spat out’ upon dry land. Figure 1. Skull of Dunkleosteus terrelli ever heard of this discovery. Oddly plankton and small fish from the water.6 Conclusion enough, work on reconstructing it This fish was large enough to swallow began only about five years ago. This a man whole. We must recognize that it is not fish, alleged to be 155 million years possible to know with certainty what old, was an astonishing 15 m long. But Avoiding the digestive process species of fish swallowed Jonah; the a new specimen of the same species Bible does not tell us. But having found recently surpasses this, reach- How did Jonah survive inside the found fossil evidence of some of these ing a length of about 30 m!3,4 This creature? Hydrochloric acid breaks giants should help silence the sceptics is about the length of 3 school buses down food inside the stomach and is (who claim that the story is impossible) and is twice the size of a whale shark strong enough to go through stainless and support biblical accuracy. (14 m),5 or about the size of a blue steel. Is it possible for Jonah to have whale, making it the largest fish ever remained undigested? References discovered. Some sharks are able to control Unlike Dunkleosteus, Leedsichthys their digestive systems, and could keep 1. Alleged to be 360 million years old, but fish were made only one day before man, according would not have torn its prey apart with from digesting a swallowed object for to Genesis. its teeth. In fact it didn’t have teeth several days. Because of this, undi- 2. Dunkleosteus is named after Dr David Dunkle, on its jaws; it used thousands of gill gested food is commonly found inside one of the first men to study this creature. The rakers with needle-like teeth to filter shark stomachs during dissection.7 name Dunkleosteus literally means ‘Dunkle’s bones’. 3. , 15 December 2004. 4. , 15 December 2004. 5. The whale shark is not a whale at all, but a member of the shark family. 6. , 15 December 2004. 7. Richards, W., Letter to editor, Creation 17(3): 5, 1995. 8. Whale sharks, , 14 December 2004.

Figure 2. Artist’s impression of Leedsichthys problematicus (from )

TJ 19(1) 2005