![]() ![]() By those scientists who accepted extinction, the debate focused on when the extinction had occurred: specially, had the giant deer survived the Noachian flood? If the giant deer had survived the flood, the next logical conclusion was people must be responsible for the extinction of the giant deer. By 1812, Cuvier resolved that the giant deer was unlike any modern animal and thus extinction did occur. Georges Cuvier, a French paleontologist, was using the giant deer to defend extinction as a natural phenomenon. Extinction was the first great battleground of modern paleontology and the extinction of the Irish elk was hotly debated. Had God experimented continually in both creation and destruction? If so, the world was surely older than the six thousand years literalists allowed. New fossil species were continuously being unearthed and eighteenth-century geologists were having increasing difficulty in arguing unknown creatures were all still living in some remote region of the globe. For the next century, scientist argued as to which modern species the giant deer belonged? Opinion was equally divided between the North American moose and the reindeer. Molyneux's convictions were shared by most scientists of his time. "That no real species of living creatures is so utterly extinct, as to be lost entirely out of the world, since it was first created, is the opinion of many naturalists and Ôtis grounded on so good a principle of Providence taking care in general of all its animal production that it deserves our assent." (Sic) Molyneux's limited knowledge of the North American moose allowed him to satisfy his religious conviction that God wouldn't allow any of his creatures to go extinct. Molyneux argued the Giant Irish Deer was not extinct but rather the North American moose. In 1697, Thomas Molyneux wrote the first scientific description of Megaloceros giganteus. We now know the giant deer ranged as far east as Siberia and China and as far south as northern Africa. The first continental discovery followed in 1781. Furthermore, Ireland's exclusive claim to the giant deer vanished in 1746 when a skull and antlers were discovered in Yorkshire England. The name was first given because the European moose - an "elk" to the English - was the only familiar animal with antlers that even approached those of the giant deer in size. The Irish elk was the largest deer that ever lived. ![]() For starters, the Irish elk was neither exclusively Irish nor an elk. Even the name Irish elk is a point of debate. The Irish elk has been the focus of debate since its discovery. ![]()
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