Noah and the Animals

[JoeyKnothead]

From Post 311 here:

Noah did not take a lab and a terrier and a wolf and a fox and a coyote aboard the Ark. He took a pair of canines, male and female, and from them come all the different groups of canines that you see today.

For debate:

Please offer some means to confirm the above statement is true and factual.

[Slopeshoulder]

Noah's ark = pure myth.

I try not to visit Kentucky.

Gotta love it when architects take up theology. It's like musican's taking up baking.

[DiscipleOfTruth]

What about insects? How would Noah had been able to keep enough of them so they wouldn't die off without letting his ark get infested?

[Metatron]

What about insects? How would Noah had been able to keep enough of them so they wouldn't die off without letting his ark get infested?

And what happened to the Triceratops, Baluchtheriums, Smilodons, Dimetrodons, etc. Was there no room left on the Ark for them?

[Shermana]

A literal interpretation of the Noah's Ark myth is one of the most ludicrous beliefs of conservative Christianity. Ignoring the fact that the Noah story is really just a reworked version of the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, the events it discusses are completely physically impossible. Additionally, there is no evidence of a global flood whatsoever. Plus, it would be impossible to repopulate the earth from just two members of each species / genus / whatever a "kind" is of animal, because there would not be enough genetic diversity to sustain a healthy population.

Read this for more information: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html

Once again, I state, there is NO Historical precedent for taking any of the Old Testament stories, whether they have compatability with other "myths" that are similar, as purely intended as allegorical, it is pure post-modern revisionism which basically sweeps aside thousands of years of Midrash and Rabbinical commentary. You don't have to believe that it happened, but to deny that it was INTENDED as literal and real, as most post-modern "liberal scholars" do, is 100% pure revisionism.

Now as for being a "reworked" account of other myths, as I'm not an inerrantist, I believe that it's a possible game of "operator" with some errors, for instance the Chaldean version of the story has Noah as one of the giants himself, and Shem is named "Sem" (showing an indication of the corruption of the letter "S" to "Sh" over the years). But I also think the Epic of Gilgamesh is a redacted edition of a source story as well, in which the Chaldean version may be closer.

However, I also believe that the Ark found near Mt Ararat on the Eastern border of Turkey may be the one in question, how does one account for such a giant piece of wood showing up in the mountains anyway? If it weren't for the PKK and Turkish politics, one could go and determine it conclusively.

[McCulloch]

You say it would not be possible to populate the earth from two of each species, and yet you most likely believe in evolution, from the context. So basically you believe the entire earth was entirely populated from nothing.

Moses Yoder criticizes us for not believing that two of each kind, enough to fit on one boat, could populate the whole earth in a few thousand years. Because we do believe that in conditions far different from the current earth, abiogenesis could occur naturally over a few billion years. Do I understand correctly?

[Moses Yoder]

You say it would not be possible to populate the earth from two of each species, and yet you most likely believe in evolution, from the context.

And you appear to believe in some sort of creationism. As far as I know there are many kinds of creationism such as

Young Earth creationism
Modern geocentrism
Omphalos hypothesis
Creation science
Old Earth creationism
Gap creationism
Day-Age creationism
Progressive creationism
Neo-Creationism
Intelligent design
Theistic evolution

Perhaps you could write in the left column on the forum which kind of creationism you believe in?

Labels don't fit me too well. I am an individual. I believe in the type of creation that is spoken of in the first couple chapters of Genesis. I believe since the Bible says "The evening and morning were the first day" etc. that Genesis is talking about a 24 hour time period. So I believe the Earth was created in 6 24 hour days, which I guess we can call "Literal Creationism."

[Moses Yoder]

You say it would not be possible to populate the earth from two of each species, and yet you most likely believe in evolution, from the context. So basically you believe the entire earth was entirely populated from nothing. That would not be from 2 of each species, it would mean from where there were no prior species.

Please keep your terms straight. The whole "life from nothing" bit is abiogenesis not evolution. Two different concepts. There are theistic evolutionists out there who believe that God initiated life but still allow for the existence of evolution.

I go to a Bible study with one of the architects who helped design a replication of Noah's ark. You will be able to visit it in Kentucky if plans are accomplished. I look forward to having some of my questions answered there. It is being built full scale from what I heard.

http://creationmuseum.org/whats-here/exhibits/

Cool. Is the Noah's ark replica going to show where Noah installed the force field generator that would have been necessary to allow the ark to survive having the functional equivalent of Niagara Falls dumped on it for 40 days and nights? Or perhaps the sophisticated environmental simulators that would be necessary to keep such a diverse group of animals alive? Or maybe the advanced food replicating devices to feed over a million different species for a number of months (advanced indeed since many carnivores will only eat LIVE prey!) I also assume that he would need storage compartments to keep the teleportation devices that he would have previously used to bring all of these animals together from around the world since he will obviously need them to return the animals to their natural habitats (which admittedly may take a great many years to repair from having been flooded, but I digress.)

Look forward to seeing this ark in all of it's technological glory!

http://www.niagarafalls.ca/living/about ... facts.aspx

At the above website you can see that the Niagra Falls river flows at aproximately 35 miles per hour. So in forty days (24 hour periods) it would dump a column of water 33,600 miles high. How high is the highest mountain? You say the ark would have to withstand the equivalent of Niagra Falls. How do you figure? Or are you just making up large "facts" as you go?

You obviously lack faith. God could easily have brought these animals together and fed them. He fed the Israelites manna in the wilderness for about 40 years according to the Bible, and their clothes did not wear out during that period. A year or so for a couple thousand animals and 8 people would be like a vacation for God.

[Moses Yoder]

You say it would not be possible to populate the earth from two of each species, and yet you most likely believe in evolution, from the context. So basically you believe the entire earth was entirely populated from nothing.

Moses Yoder criticizes us for not believing that two of each kind, enough to fit on one boat, could populate the whole earth in a few thousand years. Because we do believe that in conditions far different from the current earth, abiogenesis could occur naturally over a few billion years. Do I understand correctly?

Yes, that is correct. Actually, if you can prove the earth is a few billion years old, I might believe in abiogenesis and evolution myself. I just don't have that much faith.

[Haven]

You obviously lack faith. God could easily have brought these animals together and fed them. He fed the Israelites manna in the wilderness for about 40 years according to the Bible, and their clothes did not wear out during that period. A year or so for a couple thousand animals and 8 people would be like a vacation for God.

Why should I blindly believe that God flagrantly broke the laws of nature to carry out the events of the Flood myth, and then erased all the evidence afterward, when a perfectly good naturalistic explanation is available?

[Jax Agnesson]

Can someone (preferably a theist) explain to me why Abrahamic theists (almost without exception AFAICS) recoil at the use of the word "magic" in these contexts?
If a Supernatural God can do things that wouldn't be possible under the laws of physics, why isn't that simply called 'magic'? Then we can have something like Gould's non-overlapping magisteria.
We atheists can smirk all we like about how the spiny anteaters could have waddled all the way to Noah's boatyard. (and how and why the flightless birds walked all the way to Australia and New Zealand afterwards) but we atheists would then be in the position of having to accept that we simply don't know anything about, and don't even acknowledge the existence of, the realm (or magisterium, which sounds grander but means the same) of God's magical powers. The theists can shrug off all the smart-ass quibbles from us atheists with a brave and honest statement of 'Our God can do things like that because he's magic."
What's wrong with that?