Coral on a Shoe

Charles Darwin observed coral atolls in the south seas which were more than 1,000 metres (3,000 feet) thick. He believed that this proved that millions of years must have elapsed, and therefore the Bible’s time-frame must be wrong. After all, he argued, coral growth is incredibly slow.

He was mistaken, as this amazing photograph shows. This coral growing firmly attached to a modern shoe was found between Cebu and Bohol in the Philippine Islands. It was displayed at an international shell-collector’s fair in Wattenschied, Germany, in the autumn of 1992, where it came to the attention of Dr Joachim Scheven, who kindly provided this photograph.

The owner told Dr Scheven that it had been assessed by a university professor who said that the shoe could not be any more than four years old at most.