Page 52 - Atlas of Creation Volume 2

The discovery of this imaginary missing link, once believed to have close links to man's alleged ancestors,
in the form of a living fossil, was a most significant disaster for Darwinist circles. The coelacanth, the greatest
supposed proof of the theory of evolution, had suddenly been demolished. The most important potential

candidate in the fictitious transition from the sea to dry land turned out to be an exceedingly complex life
form still alive in deep waters and bearing no intermediate-form characteristics at all. This living specimen
dealt a heavy blow to Darwin's theory of evolution.
When the fish was introduced to the press in the middle of March 1939, articles about it appeared in
newspapers and magazines all over the world, from New York to Sri Lanka. Full-size illustrations of the crea-
ture were printed in the Illustrated London News. Alongside the picture was an article by Dr. E. I. White of the

British Museum. Titled "One of the Most Amazing Events in the Realm of Natural History in the Twentieth
Century," the article described the discovery as "sensational" and claimed that the discovery was as as sur-
prising as the finding of a living example of the 2.5-meter-long Mesozoic dinosaur Diplodocus. 23
J. L. B. Smith conducted countless investigations into the coelacanth in the years that followed, devoting

literally his entire life to it. He led research in various parts of the world in order to find a living coelacanth at
the sea bottom and examine its internal organs in detail. (Since the first captured coelacanth was submitted to
Smith only long after the event, it had been impossible to preserve its internal organs.)
A second coelacanth was found in later years. However, the fish died soon after being removed from the
deep waters in which it lived and brought to the warm, shallow sur-
face waters. Nonetheless it was still possible to examine its internal

organs. The reality encountered by the investigating team, led by Dr.
Jacques Millot, was very different to that which had been expected.
Contrary to expectations, the fish's internal organs had no primitive
features at all, and it bore no features of being an intermediate form,
nor of a supposedly primitive ancestor. It had no primitive lung, as

evolutionists had been claiming. The structure that evolutionist in-
vestigators imagined to be a primitive lung was actually a fat-filled
swimbladder. 24

The picture below shows J. L. B. Smith, with a coelacanth caught
alive. To the side are letters sent to Smith, from the East London
Museum, on the subject and a notice he issued to other coelacanth
hunters.

50 Atlas of Creation Vol. 2