Rats: No Evolution!

Usually dark animals with pointed noses and hairless feet and tails, they are similar to, but generally larger than, mice (both rats and mice are members of the order Rodentia).

Rats are aggressive, active, and adaptable, and they have accompanied man throughout the world, traveling on ships and boats of all sizes. They are able to breed at three to four months of age, and can produce up to seven litters a year, each containing six to 22 young. It is commonly believed the rat population of the United States is equal to the human population: more than 1,000 rats per acre were reported on one Iowa farm!

Given rats often carry disease—and can eat anything man can eat—it’s easy to understand how destructive these rodents can be. In rural areas, rats are a threat to seed and grain crops. Even after harvest, the rat continues to be a menace, not only eating the grain stored on farms, but also rendering it unsuitable for humans to eat because of its droppings. About 23 kilograms (50 pounds) of grain are required to support a rat for a year, but the total amount of grain loss (including spoilage) is about 70 kilograms (150 pounds) per rat per year.

The senses of rats are highly sophisticated, and their ability to climb, jump, burrow and gnaw gains them entry to places inaccessible to other mammals.

Despite the fear and loathing they often engender, wild rats play an important part in the biological economy of this fallen world. This is not only from their obvious role as scavengers, but as food sources for other creatures.

Like all other rodents, the rat spends a great deal of time gnawing, much of which serves simply to wear down the front incisors, which continuously grow at a rapid rate (upward from two millimeters, or 0.08 of an inch, per week). When gnawing, the rat’s lower jaw moves backward and forward, with the upper incisors holding the object while the lower incisors cut against it.

Encyclopædia Britannica describes rodents as being “relatively primitive” in most aspects and “not highly specialized” mammals, yet when discussing the specializations needed for gnawing, it states the gnawing mechanism is “of an efficiency that is not approached by that of any other mammals.”1

Britannica claims the earliest known rodents come from the upper Paleocene (supposedly about 57 million years ago) of North America, yet it admits these animals “had already acquired all of the diagnostic features of the order.” In other words, these “early” animals were easily recognizable as rodents.

Comprising 50% of all mammal species, rodents should be prolific in the fossil record, and evolutionists should expect to find numerous examples of transitional species. However, Britannica states: “Rodents are relatively poorly represented in collections of fossils, in spite of their great abundance at the present time.”2 This situation is clarified with the explanation that rodents have often been “overlooked” because of their small size, “but modern exploration for fossils usually results in a much more abundant representation of small mammals, especially rodents.” The bottom line—there is no fossil evidence for the evolution of any rodent from a non-rodent.

Duane Gish, in his book Evolution: the fossils STILL say NO! agrees rodents should provide evolutionists with a group of animals ideal for evolutionary studies “given their enormous numbers and their ability to flourish under all conditions.” Yet, he quotes evolutionist Romer as admitting the origin of rodents is “obscure,” and that at their first appearance in the fossil record, they were already “true” rodents.

Romer says: “Presumably, of course, they had arisen from some basal, insectivorous, placental stock, but no transitional forms are known.”3 Yet the lack of transitional evidence in the fossil record is easily understandable from the Genesis account of Creation, that God created all creatures to reproduce “after their kind.”

The two rat species mentioned earlier almost certainly descended from the same original kind. Rats may actually share ancestry in the same created kind as mice; the evidence clearly confirms, though, that they did not share a common ancestor with some non-rodent. All the genetic information for rats was brought into being six days after the beginning of everything. In other words, rats, like all other creatures, are not the product of evolution.