There really were dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden, exactly as the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, would have us believe. Tyrannosaurus rex coexisted with lions. Diplodocus grazed alongside sheep. Duckbills delved in the swamps (for Eden had its moister parts to accommodate such creatures) alongside actual ducks. All creatures great and small had come into being in the space of less than a week by acts of special creation, and they dwelt together happily in the Peaceful Kingdom, doing no violence to one another, although this caused some malnutrition among the T. Rexes and Allosaurs because their long, dagger-like teeth were really not suitable for chewing grass.
But there was harmony in the Garden, more or less, largely because the T. Rex had a brain the size of a walnut and lacked the imagination to desire anything more.
The problem was Man, or more precisely, Man and Woman, for male and female were they created, and they tended to get on each other’s nerves. The Man talked too much. He berated the T. Rex for having a brain the size of a walnut and for lack of imagination. The Woman, overhearing all this, took it as a veiled criticism of herself.
It was the Woman who first ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which had been expressly forbidden by the Creator. (Later attempts to blame this on temptation by the Serpent have proven hard to verify, due to a lack of reliable witnesses.)
“So,” she said to the Man, “if you’re so smart why don’t you have a bite too?”
“I think I will!” he replied, and he took from her the apple, and he did eat.
The Tyrannosaurus stood by, gaping stupidly.
“What are you staring at?” said the Man. “You’ve got a brain the size of a walnut. Here, try this. Maybe it’ll make your brain grow a little.”
He tossed the remains of the forbidden fruit into the T. Rex’s gaping maw, and T. Rex swallowed reflexively.
All sorts of new knowledge flooded the minds of the Man and the Woman. They knew good and evil. They saw their nakedness and sought fig leaves. They understood that E equals MC squared.
The T. Rex however, having begun with a brain the size of a walnut, understood considerably less, but it did figure out what its long, sharp teeth were actually suited for, and it ate, and kept on eating, devouring first the Man and the Woman, then several other dinosaurs, and all the mammals save those so small they went skittering around its ankles; and when the Creator walked in the Garden and saw the results of the carnage (of which the T. Rex was entirely unashamed, being too stupid to work out the finer philosophical implications), the only possible solution was to drive all the dinosaurs out of Eden and set an angel with a flaming sword to stand watch to make sure none of them got back in. (Dinosaurs may not be very bright, but they are impressed by flaming swords.)
The creator watched them go, knowing that they would rule the Earth for millions of year, rending the flesh of their fellows until the eventual extinction of all. Then he looked down upon the sorry remnants of the order Mammalia skittering around his ankles and said, “I think I’ll try evolution next time.”
By Darrell Schweitzer. Published in the May 2008 Analog Science Fiction and Fact and copyright by the publisher.
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) as the "creator" of all but also teach the science that is out there in our world regarding evolution. As Lisa Loves Pooh posted earlier, if you have access to museums, you can show that there but I'm sure that there is specific course material/curricula you can find that work with religious beliefs since the Catholic schools are teaching that routinely.
