Graduate students in the sciences tend to be an intriguing lot. As a professor, I've met some truly unique individuals, who often have very interesting life histories. One ICR grad student told me how, before she had accepted Christ as her Savior, she and friends traveled to Scotland in hopes of seeing the elusive Loch Ness Monster. One morning just after breakfast in a lodge by the loch, she looked idly out the window. I'll let her tell the story.
Suddenly I saw something--really saw something--that I'd been vaguely aware of for the last few minutes. I jumped up, almost spilling my coffee, and called for my companions to come see what I was seeing, swimming along out there, below us in the lake. It wasn't just one, it was four large bulbous beasts swimming along together! ...Because of their size and the fact that while they were traveling together along parallel paths but obviously swimming independently, we determined we had found the object of our quest, the Loch Ness Monster....
The "swimmers" appeared to be of different lengths; the largest was perhaps between 15 and 20 feet, and the smallest probably half that.... The heads were small and barely above the water, but far enough out in front of each "swimmer" to guesstimate the neck lengths at from 1-1/2 to 2 feet for the small one, and 4 to 5 feet for the largest one. The bodies appeared to be slightly elongated ovals, fatter in the middle, with flexible necks.
They swam slowly south towards the Fort Augustine end of the lake, about 100-250 feet away from the western lakeshore where we were watching from the lodge window, approximately 200 feet above the water. We had been watching for several minutes when they suddenly stopped. Glancing further south we saw the reason, a fishing boat from Fort Augustine was heading right at the "swimmers." They remained right where they had stopped swimming, until the boat chugged to within about 1/4 mile or so. Then, all at once and all together, they sounded, and we never saw them again.
I make no pretense of claiming that this story is true, but I do vouch for the lady, a sober and honest woman. As you know, virtually hundreds of eyewitness accounts have surfaced over the years of an unknown something in the loch. Serious scientific teams have attempted to solve the mystery, but with few concrete results.
All I know is that it would be wonderful to discover a living relic of the long ago past. Evolution insists that large reptiles like the plesiosaurs went extinct some 65 million years ago. Creation holds that they mostly died in the great Flood of Noah's day, but what if some survived in isolated pockets like the deep, cloudy Loch Ness?
Such a discovery would not disprove evolution, since that nebulous hypothesis would morph to accommodate any observation. Nor would it prove creation. Neither view rises or falls on this point, but having said that, I would certainly like to find one. Creation could certainly account for the existence of such a creature far better than evolution could.
* Dr. Morris is President of the Institute for Creation Research.
Cite this article: Morris, J. 2008. An Interesting Sighting. Acts & Facts. 37 (9): 3.
