Noah and his Ark - Believe it or Not?

LittleNipper said:

The total number of "so-called" species stands at about 17,600; ...

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Source?

Druidus said:

Let's use a simplified version of this scenario. We'll throw the measurements out the window, so we don't have to worry about them first. Assuming only elephants were on the ship, we can say there were two animals on the ship, excluding the humans and possible stowaways. The amount of food the average elephant needs in one day is 75 to 150 kilograms. We'll go with 150 for simplicity. Over the year (approximately) that the ark was supposedly on the water, we would need 109.5 metric tons of elephant food with us, excluding what the humans need. Combine that with the weight of both of elephants 9.2 metric tons, we already have 118.7 metric tons of weight on the ship. This is only the two African Elephants. I'm not sure, but 118.7 metric tons, for just two of the required animals is to much for a paltry wooden ark to hold. The flooring might even break. 118.7 metric tons is equal to the weight of approximately 1493 people. Could his ark hold that many people?

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Baby elephants weigh that much?! yikes! It said nothing about whether the animals were mature animals or babies. What's the calculations if they are infant elephants?

To Everyone,
I accept the story of Noah's ark for three reasons: 1. Every society has a flood legend which, supports a worldwide flood; 2. Some have claimed to see the ark on Ararat; and 3. Some have noted two or three different narratives here but, that doesn't prove the flood false, it only proves that there were later additions to an earlier text.
Jamie

Little nipper you are incredible! You are actually going to try to figure out how all the animals can fit on the boat? You should read this thread even the other Christians have admitted that this may have posed a problem. But the equally insurmountable problem comes from the boat itself. It is long and thin. It would not have been able to float on water with the weight that 2 of each animal would have required. It would have sank. As a matter of fact the idea of the boat being long and narrow presents a problem because the boat even if it could have floated with all that weight (which it could not have) loaded with animals would have been apt to capsize it is was long and narrow. God who told Moses to make the boat somehow forgot to tell him and long and narrow =unstable and capsizable. A flater wider boat would have been more reasonable and logical in a long narrow one.

The number of species on earth by the way is measured in millions not thousands. The world book of encylopedia says that to date 1.5 million species have been discovered. E.O wilson a bilogist who has spent some time studying that question puts it at 1.4 million United Nations Enviromentent Programme says 1.75 million is a reasonable estimate science link puts it at 1.7 million discovered. What is the kicker as discovered and classified is the keyword and the biologists who devote their life to this study estimate that only 10 % of the species have been discovered and 90 % yet to be discovered. I put a thread up earlier this year that 117 fish were discovered last year. But lets say for the sake of arguement that all the species that existed than have been accounted for and that 1.4 million is the magic number and since that number included plants animals, fish and birds lets divide it by 7 (or cut it in 1/2 ) just to make a really really conservative hypothical number. That is still 700 thousand and at 2 of each gets us back up to 1.4 million or over 40 times the number you presented and according to biology really really lowballing it.

Jade0887,

1) the dictionary defines a legend as " A story about a mythical being or event". Your word choice alone implies that it is made up.

2) The boat is not on Arafat. The mountian has been combed for most of the 20th century and no boat found. In addition nobody has discoverd a boat that is about as big as a football field in all of history. Not just recently but noboby ever found the boat for thousands of years.

3) "later additions to the text" is a validation of fictional work. Written narratives about factual events have to keep a consistancy to remain factual where as made-up fictional stories can be alterated with no academic intregity sacrificed from edition to edition.

jade0887 said:

I accept the story of Noah's ark for four reasons:

1. Every society has a flood legend which, supports a worldwide flood;
2. Some have claimed to see the ark on Ararat; and
3. Some have noted two or three different narratives here but, that doesn't prove the flood false, it only proves that there were later additions to an earlier text.​

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Emphasis and formatting added. Enough said.

Just how old of a baby are we talking about? They are weaned at 2 years. Before 2 years, they need their mother's milk. GIve me an age, and I'll give you the required weight. Also, two baby elephants would likely die in the wild, with no parenting.

Everyone is also forgetting the single most likely reason the story is false. Massive salinity changes would have destroyed fresh-water eco-systems, and, all plant-life would have died. Unless Noah took them on the Ark too, thus requiring even more space and weight limits (Sequioa?).

robtex said:

As a matter of fact the idea of the boat being long and narrow presents a problem because the boat even if it could have floated with all that weight (which it could not have) loaded with animals would have been apt to capsize it is was long and narrow. God who told Moses to make the boat somehow forgot to tell him and long and narrow =unstable and capsizable. A flatter wider boat would have been more reasonable and logical in a long narrow one.

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IF only primary animals were selected, what would the count be? We have no idea how long it takes for species to evolve/mutate over thousands of years do we?

Jesus rebuked the wind during a storm on the Sea of Galilee. God must have kept rough sea's from flipping the floatilla.

Also how deep would a vessel go down in the water, laden versus unladen, with the type of wood that was available in the middle east? And, if Noah used solid tree's, which seems likely because I don't think they had the type of saw they do today in sawmills, the tree's themselves wouldn't break when under load, but they might have sagged a bit over length.

There's no mention of any construction details other than length, height and width.

I was an A student in my drafting classes in High School. So I have had questions regarding the construction of the ark. Someone once told me that since the vessel was not under it's own power, the ark didn't need to be shaped like a ship of today or any day. What was described to me was a barge type vessel. Barges aren't that wide as they are long if I remember correctly.

And even if that is so, there are many questions that need to be addressed:

1. What would Noah use to bind the ark width wise and length wise?
2. The length is 450 to 475 feet. How long were the tree's used?
3. What about the butt joints?
4. What kind of fasteners did they have?
5. Maybe it was post and beam construction. Where did they get the chisels from?
6. How would the tree's be surfaced edgewise when they were next to each other?
7. What did they use for a straight edge?
8. Who held the tree's up during the wall construction phase? Or construction of the floors?
9. How did they sure up the end walls? The side walls?
10. How did they lift the tree's up to the third floor and roof area?

Alex great questions u keep working on that and you will soon prove to yourself I hope, that the boat could not have existed. It doesn't matter if the winds were turbulant or still....because

1) the boat could not hold that kinda weight
2) narrow boat + heavy wait=capsizable boat irregardelss of wind or not.
3) Look up the species....google the biologist I mentioned E.O. Wilson and you pick an aggregate number ....and loosely justify it ..i think mine ain't bad for the hypothical

4) read druidus post about the plants and concieve of the way that Moses uprooted vegitation kept them alive while on the boat and unplanted for an extended period of time and than replanted them all.

the boat didn't happen no way no how.

robtex said:

Alex, great questions. u keep working on that and you will soon prove to yourself I hope, that the boat could not have existed. It doesn't matter if the winds were turbulant or still....because

1) the boat could not hold that kinda weight
2) narrow boat + heavy weight=capsizable boat irregardless of wind or not.
3) Look up the species....google the biologist I mentioned E.O. Wilson and you pick an aggregate number ....and loosely justify it ..i think mine ain't bad for the hypothical
4) read druidus post about the plants and concieve of the way that Moses uprooted vegitation kept them alive while on the boat and unplanted for an extended period of time and than replanted them all.

the boat didn't happen no way no how.

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Moses or Noah?

oh right noah ...sorry still the boat idea is great reading but fiction. I watched yesterday the movie basic and in it the commander sgt wes (played by samuel l jackson) makes a puzzle with moses on the ark as opposed to noah..don't know if that is reason why i did ooops.....

The God of the bible certainly has the powers to flood the planet. He could flood all the planets in the universe. Obviously he saved a family and some animals. Things evolved and life continues on. Pointless to argue over nuts and bolts on a boat. I'm sure the God of the stories is capable of many things like defing laws of the material plane. Had the boat weighted 100 times more, this God of the bible stories, could effortlessly float it. Obviously that God played a role in what went down. Powers to shrink animals to easily fit them in the boat with room to manuver is definatly possible or a type of dimensional space expanded within the boat. Either you believe in God or you don't. Its that simple.

true blood said:

The God of the bible certainly has the powers to flood the planet. He could flood all the planets in the universe. Obviously he saved a family and some animals. Things evolved and life continues on. Pointless to argue over nuts and bolts on a boat. I'm sure the God of the stories is capable of many things like defing laws of the material plane. Had the boat weighted 100 times more, this God of the bible stories, could effortlessly float it. Obviously that God played a role in what went down. Powers to shrink animals to easily fit them in the boat with room to manuver is definatly possible or a type of dimensional space expanded within the boat. Either you believe in God or you don't. Its that simple.

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I am so glad you brought that up. True God could have done anything. He could have

1) made the species the way he wanted them (presuming obedient so alas he fails again) the first time

2) snapped and redid the world

3) only eradicated what he did not want instead of flooding the planet.

4) made the boat himself instead of getting a human to make one and carry out an insurmountable task

but he didn't says the bible..he went about it one of the most difficult ways possible......why?

true blood said:

Pointless to argue over nuts and bolts on a boat. .

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I would contend the opposite.

1) The ablity to validify a story has a strong stemming in the consistancy of its presentation . In this thread with is only days old the story has already been changed many a times from shoehorns, to shrinking animals to a marriage of evolution and the big boat. The fact that many had to do it to make it believable lends heaviy critisim to its validity initself.

2) with the "facts" as presented in the Bible the story is impossible. That is why you and others have your little "alterations" and post scripts..to make it real. The story cannot stand on its own and as such you are all apt to alter it to make it feasaible but in the same breath deny that if you altered it without evidencing it that others before you could not have done the same. Such an irony.

3) the fact that the nuts and bolts don't add to up to a boat capable of saving 2 all of God's creatures metaphorically speaking is the reason why the story is invalid.

true blood said:

The God of the bible certainly has the powers to flood the planet.

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That's the thang isn't it. God is in the bible where this tale is which we are all debating over. Many people don't believe that God exists. Why? because of accounts like this in the bible.

I recently read something that states that scientists have discovered a two mile high 'corridor' of empty space in our atmosphere above the clouds. When I find the book I was reading I'll post the reference info.

In Genesis there's a passage that states 'waters between the waters' and some have suggested that this is the space above is the same as is depicted in flood scriptures of where the mass of water came from to flood the entire earth when the water at sea level couldn't have risen.

I'm not exactly trying to debate the validity of the story. I'm just trying to point out that no one will ever find this God of the bible by using logic and sensuality that many here demand in order to believe. Probably makes this invisible spirit called God laugh. Obviously you approach limits, not of belief but of comprehension. You're saying a boat could not hold that much weight. Why? A God has opened up some type of gate of the deep that is beyond space, beyone the galaxy and the other galaxy and the galaxies after that and channeled enough water from that gate to hit the planet earth and flood it and you are arguing over nuts and bolts and the weight of animals. You're defeated by the mere size of this God of the bible. No finite mind will ever grasp the infinite so why try to validify any biblical story?

true blood said:

I'm not exactly trying to debate the validity of the story. I'm just trying to point out that no one will ever find this God of the bible by using logic and sensuality that many here demand in order to believe. Probably makes this invisible spirit called God laugh. Obviously you approach limits, not of belief but of comprehension. You're saying a boat could not hold that much weight. Why? A God has opened up some type of gate of the deep that is beyond space, beyone the galaxy and the other galaxy and the galaxies after that and channeled enough water from that gate to hit the planet earth and flood it and you are arguing over nuts and bolts and the weight of animals. You're defeated by the mere size of this God of the bible. No finite mind will ever grasp the infinite so why try to validify any biblical story?

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Infinite powers?? http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7655 for a realistic look at God's powers

true blood said:

No finite mind will ever grasp the infinite so why try to validify any biblical story?

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I, for one, would never attempt to "validify any biblical story", much less the self serving statements about the Bible being inspired.

true blood said:

I'm not exactly trying to debate the validity of the story. I'm just trying to point out that no one will ever find this God of the bible by using logic and sensuality that many here demand in order to believe.

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1) The thread was created the debate the validity of the ark

2) the reason that one cannot find God using logic and sensibility (as opposed to sensuality? ) could be because God is illogical in concept and its belief unsensible.

3)It is not a demand but a debate and maybe the another thread would be the place for it, but quite a number of Christian's demand the exact opposite demanding belief

4) you and the other Christians have changed the story of Noah so many times to qualitfy it in this thread it is not even funny and than refuse to entertain the notion that maybe it was changed exaggerated or fabricated in it's presentation by the time it was written in the scriptures

5) The tsunami's of today could be a neo-noah of tomarrow...with a few twists and divine inspiration we could write up a gospel on here (gonna make a thread) and it could one day under the same constraint be as revered one day as the story of Noah.

Deut. 32.8 said:

Emphasis and formatting added. Enough said.

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Deut. 32:8,
That unintentional oversight was corrected. You were definitely being overly nitpicky in the quote above.
Jamie

jade0887 said:

Deut. 32:8,
That unintentional oversight was corrected. You were definitely being overly nitpicky in the quote above.
Jamie

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Actaully, I noticed that the reasons were the greater problem than the mistake in the number of reasons.

1. Every society has a flood legend which, supports a worldwide flood;
2. Some have claimed to see the ark on Ararat; and
3. Some have noted two or three different narratives here but, that doesn't prove the flood false, it only proves that there were later additions to an earlier text.

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1. Not every myth has a global flood. What may have happened in another part of the world does not prove the Biblical flood
2. And no ark has ever been found despite the number of expeditions.
3. Some of the flood myths predate the Biblical flood.

That, though I do not want to put words in Deut's mouth, might be the reason he wrote "Enough said".