Darwin’s Zoo

I love going to the zoo with my family. From baby orangutans to noisy macaws, the zoo brims with beautiful creatures that showcase God’s creativity. Though we have a must-see list of animals, we don’t just walk directly to those exhibits. Instead, we follow the zoo’s layout, organized by continent. Starting in Asia, we’ll see leopards, sun bears, and eventually the top-of-the-list tiger and elephants. As the day goes by, we’ll walk through Africa, North America, and other areas, seeing hundreds of creatures, each created by God.

In a way, Charles Darwin observed the animal kingdom as we do, except rather than taking a day to walk through a local zoo, he spent nearly five years sailing around the world and observing animals in their natural habitats.

In 1831, Darwin joined a South American survey expedition as a naturalist aboard the HMS Beagle, traveling to South America, the South Pacific, and Australia. While we often think of Galápagos finches and tortoises as the keystone animals in Darwin’s evolutionary ideas, his thinking was also shaped by a vast collection of animal specimens, some of which he discovered on his voyage and others that he later studied back in England.

When he joined the expedition, Darwin had already begun to doubt the biblical account of a global flood in favor of the uniformitarian belief that all processes in the past occurred in the same way and at the same slow rate as the present. He also came to question the fixity of species, a common teaching in the church at the time that claimed all species were created as they appeared in the present. To his credit, Darwin was right to doubt this erroneous claim, and some of his ideas concerning evolution were correct.

However, it is important to note that the word evolution has multiple meanings. Its most basic meaning refers to “gradual change over time.” While we do see these types of changes in the world around us, evolution, in a biological sense, usually refers to molecules-to-man evolution, in which all life evolved from a single common ancestor.

Through his research, Darwin provided support that speciation was a natural process by which animal populations with certain traits survived better in a given environment. However, Darwin went a step further, arguing that many small changes, as those he observed between similar species within the same kind, could add up over millions of years and cause one kind of animal to evolve into a completely different kind (like dinosaurs into birds). Rather than believing the Genesis creation account, Darwin became more and more convinced in his own ideas that life evolved from a common ancestor.

Darwin saw what he was looking for—and so do we. We interpret what we see around us through our worldview. When we start our thinking with God’s Word, the evidence will always confirm an all-powerful Creator who made the world in six 24-hour days, as recorded in Genesis. But when we doubt the veracity of Scripture, we are susceptible to the error of our own fallen reasoning.

Darwin’s perspective of his “zoo” of animals provided the groundwork for his many publications, including On the Origin of Species, a book that would change the course of scientific thinking forever. But when biblical creationists look at those same animals, we see intricate design rather than evolutionary chance.

Rheas

Animal Number 1

The Beagle made an early stop in Patagonia. While exploring the region, Darwin learned from the locals about the South American ostrich, also known as a rhea. After seeing large numbers of the flightless birds in Northern Patagonia, he spent months trying to catch a smaller variant of the rhea. And finally he found one—when he realized that he and the crew were eating it for dinner! Darwin ran from plate to plate, gathering as many bones as possible, which he then shipped back to England.

In his journals, Darwin noted that while the larger and smaller rhea species were closely related, the greater rhea lived on the grasslands farther upriver, but the lesser rhea preferred the more arid plains closer to the Atlantic Ocean. Also, the rheas had different feather colors that matched their environment, with the greater rhea having brighter gray and brown plumage than that of the lesser rhea.

As Darwin compared the two rheas, he decided that their differences were the result of differing environments. This divergence in species based upon the environment prompted Darwin to theorize that creatures slowly changed into new creatures as they struggled to survive in their environments.

Scholars point to the rhea studies as one of Darwin’s key moments in developing his theory of evolution, but Darwin was only observing variety within a kind. Though the two species have size and color differences, they are both still rheas, and their minor environmental adaptations are fully within the genetic boundaries that God has provided to each kind of creature. This variety between the two species is likely the result of certain traits in the bird population being selected for or against based on their local environments, just as God intended when he commanded creatures to “be fruitful and multiply on the earth” after the flood (Genesis 8:17).

Insects

Animal Number 2

Darwin discovered that 200 of the 500 known beetle species on the Portuguese island of Madeira were flightless.

Darwin eventually visited the island of Madeira (a Portuguese island off the coast of Morocco) and collected many of its fascinating insects. While many insects in the world fly about, some island insects have lost this ability. Since strong gusts of wind are common on islands, Darwin speculated that lack of flight prevented these insects from being blown into the ocean, a speculation supported by modern scientific research.1

Though Darwin correctly identified the reason these insects did not fly, he linked these examples of natural selection with his theory of evolution. While natural selection does aid in survival, these island insects actually lost normal functions as their populations adapted to their windy environments.

Ultimately, evolution requires the addition of genetic information. This is certainly not the case for these flightless insects, which survive because they are either suppressing or losing the information needed for flight. Rather than gaining new information to evolve into new creatures, these insects remained insects, though now incapable of flying.

Platypuses

Animal Number 3

After arriving in Australia, Darwin explored deep into the continent. Though he collected many interesting creatures, he was most perplexed by the platypus. Like many other explorers, Darwin was fascinated by the creature’s appearance with a tail like a beaver, feet like a duck, and fur like an otter (to name just a few of the platypus’ eccentricities).

However, as Darwin studied the platypus, he found it behaved similarly to the water rat of England and North America. Darwin reasoned in his diary that “two distinct Creators must have been at work; their object, however, has been the same, and certainly the end in each case is complete.”2 At this point in his life, Darwin was still willing to consider that a designer might have created the world; however, the existence of both the water rat and platypus suggested, to Darwin, that a single Creator would not have “wastefully” designed two creatures to function so similarly.

Though Darwin acknowledged the possibility of a Creator, he assumed that this entity was strictly utilitarian. However, God did not need to merely create one creature to function in one type of habitat; he can design whatever he pleases for his own pleasure. Far from a mere accidental redundancy, the platypus demonstrates God’s wild creativity and his wisdom for designing organisms with similar features to thrive in similar environments around the world.

Barnacles

Animal Number 4

While visiting the coast of Chile, Darwin became fascinated with tiny barnacles that lacked a shell. Fascination turned into obsession when, long after his trip on the Beagle, he was still hoarding piles of these foul-smelling creatures from across the world.

Until this point, all barnacles were thought to be hermaphroditic, possessing both male and female reproductive organs. But Darwin was the first to discover a barnacle species with distinct male and female specimens. With the discovery of this unusual barnacle species, he likely observed an instance of hermaphrodites that had developed into distinct sexes.

Hermaphroditic barnacles rarely self-fertilize. Instead, the male reproductive organs seek out other barnacles’ female reproductive organs to reproduce. These barnacles Darwin discovered consisted of dwarf males attached to females. The males are so small, in fact, that Darwin had been discarding them at first, thinking they were some sort of parasite.

Dwarf males are more likely to survive to maturity than hermaphrodites and reach sexual maturity faster, which means they can reproduce sooner. This sexual dimorphism increases fertility in part because these attached males have greater access to the females than the hermaphrodites do. With these beneficial traits, dwarf males become more prevalent in a population.

As more males appear, the need for hermaphroditism reduces, and the hermaphrodites, which were focusing more on their female organs, produce fully female barnacles. Eventually, the dwarf males lose their shells and are reduced to nothing more than a sac with male organs and genetic material because they are protected by their female partners.

In Origin of Species, Darwin repeatedly references barnacles (called cirripedes) as examples of natural selection, for “when a cirripede is parasitic within another cirripede and is thus protected, it loses more or less completely its own shell.”3 In Darwin’s mind, natural selection was the driving force behind evolutionary change since the protected barnacles no longer needed their shells and used their energy for other tasks.

However, while Darwin was observing these changes, this was certainly not proof of molecules-to-man evolution. The barnacles were still barnacles, no matter if they had a shell or were changing from hermaphrodites to distinct male and female specimens. God, in his wisdom and love of variation, equipped barnacles with the genetic variation to allow these changes to occur.

Earthworms

Animal Number 5

Shortly after returning from his historic trip on the Beagle, Darwin began to earnestly study earthworms. And in 1881, he published Worms, a book entirely about the invertebrates.

Darwin performed many experiments using earthworms, including placing them on his piano to see their reaction to different music notes. During his experiments, he realized that the worms were not merely functioning on instinct but seemed capable of solving some basic problems, such as determining the best way to drag triangular paper into their burrows. This ability shocked Darwin, who wrote, “We can hardly escape from the conclusion that worms show some degree of intelligence in their manner of plugging up their burrows . . . . It is surprising that an animal so low in the scale as a worm should have the capacity for acting in this manner.”4

At the end of Origin of Species, Darwin indicated that his theory of natural selection could be used to understand even human psychology, with the “acquirement of each mental power and capacity by gradation. Much light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.”5 In light of Darwin’s molecules-to-man evolutionary ideas, his demonstrations of earthworm intelligence seemed to suggest to Darwin that man was not unique in having intelligence but merely had a more highly evolved form of intelligence.

While Darwin correctly noted that earthworms are more intelligent than we often realize, the intricacy of animals, from lowly earthworms to mighty elephants, does not provide evidence of evolutionary ideas but indicates that these organisms were created by a supremely intelligent Creator.

God created earthworms for a specific function and provided them the physical and intellectual capabilities necessary to accomplish these tasks. But humans bear God’s image, with the vast intelligence to have dominion over all creation and the capacity for a relationship with our Creator.

Pigeons

Animal Number 6

Darwin began breeding pigeons when he returned to England. Though Darwin intended to only study them for science, he eventually became attached to the birds. When his friend Charles Lyell was planning to visit, Darwin exclaimed, “I will show you my pigeons! Which are the greatest treat, in my opinion, which can be offered to a human being.”6

Darwin became fascinated with the many varieties of pigeons established through breeding, including pigeons with enlarged beaks, variations in neck shape, and even a fantail similar to a turkey’s!

His fascination with pigeon research likely reflects the wonder Darwin expressed when he said, “There is grandeur in this view of life . . . whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.”7 Sadly, Darwin once again failed to realize that he was not observing evolution, for all of the pigeon breeds were still pigeons. Darwin was merely noting variety God endowed in the pigeons’ genetic makeup.

Dogs

Animal Number 7

Throughout his life, Darwin surrounded himself with dogs, becoming particularly close with his terrier Polly, often praising her in letters to friends. He believed that the varying mannerisms and supposed emotions he perceived in dogs, including remorse and sympathy, were a precursor of human emotions, including morality.

When discussing human emotions, Darwin explained in Descent of Man that “courage and timidity are extremely variable qualities in the individuals of the same species, as is plainly seen in our dogs.”8 He further expressed that “a pointer dog, if able to reflect on his past conduct, would say to himself, I ought . . . to have pointed at that hare and not have yielded to the passing temptation of hunting it.”

To Darwin, humans were merely more highly evolved animals with more highly evolved emotions and morals. However, while Darwin is correct that dogs can appear to have humanlike emotions, they have no true understanding of right and wrong and no morality rooted in an understanding of God.

Peacocks

Animal Number 8

Not every animal that Darwin studied automatically supported his ideas concerning evolution. In fact, some creatures troubled Darwin because he did not understand how or why they may have evolved. For example, the male peacock’s majestic tail utterly confused Darwin. Only a year after publishing Origin of Species, an exasperated Darwin wrote, “The sight of a feather in a peacock’s tail, whenever I gaze at it, makes me sick!”9 Though he appreciated the peacock’s beauty, Darwin could not understand why these birds needed the feathers—or why nature had created beauty at all. The feathers are marvels of design and symmetry, yet they seemingly served no purpose, despite being a large part of the creature’s size and weight.

Years later, in Descent of Man, Darwin finally concluded that this beauty must be the result of sexual selection.10 Though the feathers of the peacock did not provide any survival advantage, they did make the bird more attractive and thus more likely to find a mate. To an extent, Darwin was correct. Sexual selection does play a role in propagating the peacock’s kind; but it does not aid in new organisms springing into existence. One thing’s for certain: the peacock’s flashy spectacle displays the Creator’s love of outlandish beauty.

During Darwin’s lifelong stroll through this menagerie, his molecules-to-man evolutionary worldview caused him to see “proof” that all animals likely evolved from a common ancestor over millions of years as a result of minor changes. However, with my biblical worldview, I see evidence that these animals were designed by God to fit certain roles in their ecosystems and to adapt, or speciate.

Both Darwin and I encountered the same evidence—the same facts from which to draw conclusions. But as Darwin looked around the world, he chose to reject God and trust his own finite wisdom.

The next time you visit the zoo, as you watch your favorite animals, don’t miss spotting the Creator’s handiwork. He not only gave us a breathtaking variety of creatures to enjoy but also provided the record of how he spoke those creatures into existence, not through evolution, but through the power of his Word, giving them the phenomenal ability to adapt in our now-fallen world.