Flood/no flood

[beccareb]

The difference is that there is evidence against creationism, but the only evidence against the flood is that there is no evidence.

[pgrmdave]

That entire book is intriguing in its almost complete ignorance of science and morality.

 

How is the book ignorant in morality? Please explain this strange idea to me.

[Tormod]

The difference is that there is evidence against creationism, but the only evidence against the flood is that there is no evidence.

There are a couple of problems with the flood if taken as a factual event. First of all, if it happened as recently as the Bible claims then the entire human race was wiped out except one family, which means that our evolutionary history does not match our observations.

 

Secondly, the sheer amount of animals and creatures on this Earth that are alive today are descendants of millions of species and these could not survive the flood either.

 

So the flood fails on the surrounding stories in the Bible.

[Stargazer]

The story about Noah and the flood is not about rethorics at all. You only have to look at the total absurdities of the story and the complete lack of any evidence to support it, to see there's really nothing to discuss.

[beccareb]

You win, I'm wrong. I just always believed the story when I was young (it was my favorite) and hate to admit I was wrong for the first ten years or so of my life. You all seem to love demostrating how people's beliefs are wrong and pointing out how stupid they are to believe it. I love you guys anyway though....

[IrishEyes]

beccareb,

Are you a Christian? You said that you believed in the flood when you were a kid, that it was your favorite story. Yet earlier in this thread you clearly indicated that you do not believe in creationism. I guess I'm just trying to figure out where you are, besides New Jersey. :hihi:

[sanctus]

You win, I'm wrong. I just always believed the story when I was young (it was my favorite) and hate to admit I was wrong for the first ten years or so of my life. You all seem to love demostrating how people's beliefs are wrong and pointing out how stupid they are to believe it. I love you guys anyway though....

 

 

I don't love to make you feel stupid and I guess nobody else does it here. The point all of us that criticise the bible stories is that it is not defendable on a logical basis, but you can still believe it.

[maddog]

Each of the stories of the bible had an oral tradition before they were written down. This

can lead to errors in the story line. Also, they were copied/translated from Hebrew to

Babalonian back to Hebrew and to Greek and back and back and forth between Hebrew and

Greek before translating to Latin and English. I would not expect the original meaning to

come through a 100%. So the myth of great waters to me is more substantial than how

long Noah lived. Taken as a story you look to see what was going on at the time.

 

... there was a time that the mediterrean sea wasn't there and then one day the atlantic ocean (if I remember right) started to fill up the mediterrean sea with huge waterfall.

Now if people was far away from that waterfall, they had to find a reason for this water, the easist one is to tell it was from god. With generations going in slowly got transformed in a legend (and as well transformed by story tellers) and then it was written in a book, as it was a good way to make people follow your instructions (as otherwise the "good" god punishes you).

 

There were some anthropologists/archeologists who had a science show on TLC or the

History channel a few years ago. On it was a theory about the flood. They developed the

idea that as the mediteranean filled up with the melting glaciers by 5400 BC it had broken

the Bhosporous near where Istanbul is now. The Black Sea was then thought to be about

a 1000 feet lower than sea level. So if this is what happened, it would be like a wall of

water (tsunami) as it hit the shore. The geography is such that on the Turkey side is

bluffs and the northern shore in Romania is a gentle slope and would have been totally

devastated. They had found pottery in the mud consistent with that. It is however sheer

conjecture (totally unfounded) this was the origin of the Noah myths. Sounds good though.

 

A second item such that if an asteroid/comet of sufficient size to hit the earth in the ocean,

this could cause extreme devestation. Such objects fly through the solar system at

approximately 30 km/s. This is a lot of energy. The was another book (think it was called

Enoch Machine), refering to the mysterious "missing" book of Enoch. The authors in there

speculate if multiple object hit near simultaneous that devestation could be gloabal (they

had it as 5 such objects all hit ocean all over). So could we accept that Noah was actually

Romanian (or the time pre-Sythian or pre-Cimmerian), you decide. :hihi:

 

Maddog

[Aquagem]

You all seem to love demostrating how people's beliefs are wrong and pointing out how stupid they are to believe it. I love you guys anyway though....

This is unfair. I would NEVER "love demonstrating how people's beliefs are wrong". I would, however, "love demonstrating something that adds to our understanding of the world", which I consider a true calling. Nearly all of my early ideas have been corrected by others, and I thank them for the new information and perspective on the wonders of the world and the universe.

 

As far as the flood lacking evidence... It's not a lack of evidence that makes the flood unsupportable, but the direct and reliable COUNTER-evidence against it. Call the flood story one among many hypotheses. It's perfectly appropriate to lay out just such a story, make predictions based on it, and then test them for their fit with the real world of nature. This requires a study of hydrodynamics, geology, paleobiology, cosmology, flood mechanics, physics, and so on, and comparison of previous predictions with observed phenomena.

 

By any set of rational criteria, the Genesis Flood is a failed hypothesis. The "rebuttal" to this pronouncement by creationists has normally been to try to discredit science and reason, usually using one or more of several approaches:

• Deny that science has any validity.
  
• Posit a divine intervention that makes it unnecessary for the flood to have left evidence (different laws of physics).
  
• Assume there is a worldwide conspiracy of haters of the Truth to undercut religion.
  
• (Any of a hundred more commonly used refutations...)
  

We are still seeing "through a glass darkly", but now and again, as in the case of Noah's flood, we discover a shot of Windex to remove a smudge or two and see just a bit more clearly. Most of the time, we see something that makes us give up this or that "favorite story", and grief and loss spiral in our passing wake. But the hope of seeing "later, face to face" is a bright light that beckons us to find the real story's end, even if that means not living "happily ever after"!

[IrishEyes]

Ok, as usual, I'm a bit confused.

The flood is just a myth because there is no evidence to confirm it?

or

The flood is just a myth because the lack of evidence to confrim it is clearly evidence that it never happened?

or

The flood is just a myth because of the large amount of counter-evidence against it?

 

Is it that there is no evidence FOR the flood, or that there is direct evidence AGAINST the flood? Most people here seem to agree that the flood never happened, but have given differing reasons for their conclusion. Is there a general concensus?

[IrishEyes]

You win, I'm wrong. I just always believed the story when I was young (it was my favorite) and hate to admit I was wrong for the first ten years or so of my life. You all seem to love demostrating how people's beliefs are wrong and pointing out how stupid they are to believe it. I love you guys anyway though....

Another thing...

Regardless of what you believed, or what you still believe (or accept, or have faith in, or whatever), admitting you were wrong is not the issue here. If you believed the story of Noah because that is what you were taught, then why do you not like examining another point of view now? I have to examine and re-examine my views on a myriad of subjects every single day. Some days I have to re-adjust my way of thinking, and some days I don't, but every day is a chance to learn, and grow, and adjust, and mature... It's all about the journey, beccareb.

 

And if you truly feel that anyone at this site is trying to ridicule you for your beliefs, regardless of what those beliefs are, PLEASE send me a PM immediatly. You are NOT stupid to believe in things, ok? There will always be people that have different opinions than you do, and that is OK. However, we don't allow people to call each other stupid, or imply that our members are stupid. We are all here to learn. :hihi:

[Tormod]

So could we accept that Noah was actually

Romanian (or the time pre-Sythian or pre-Cimmerian), you decide. :rant:

But...how did they procreate after the flood if it was global? :hihi:

[Aquagem]

Ok, as usual, I'm a bit confused.

The flood is just a myth because there is no evidence to confirm it?

or

The flood is just a myth because the lack of evidence to confrim it is clearly evidence that it never happened?

or

The flood is just a myth because of the large amount of counter-evidence against it?

 

Is it that there is no evidence FOR the flood, or that there is direct evidence AGAINST the flood? Most people here seem to agree that the flood never happened, but have given differing reasons for their conclusion. Is there a general concensus?

You've probably seen my immediately previous post about reliable evidence AGAINST the flood, so I won't say any more about that.

 

As far as a general consensus, the answer is "yes", in fact, several of them. Science, relying on observation, evidence, and inference, says several floods have happened that might have given rise to the story within the window of recent pre-history and more recent historical times, but no gigantic flood of whole-Earth proportions. Don't forget, though, that the people who wrote about the Flood couldn't conceive of a world any bigger than maybe a thousand miles, and so felt perfectly comfortable talking in global terms. Religion, of course (young-Earthers, anyway), stand by the Genesis account, on the shaky grounds that their book has to be perfect, no matter what. (I always have said that, if I were Satan, intent on deluding Man into damnation, I'd give him a book, convince him it was absolutely true, and then sit back and watch the show. He might quit looking for the truth that way, but his attempts to shut his mind off to it would be a spectacle, indeed!)

 

My aim in later posts (from our earlier discussion) is to widen the sphere of inquiry, not to blend the two accounts, which I believe can't, and shouldn't be, reconciled, but to uncover the deeper motives of both sets of proponents and try to offer them some common ground, whether it's been flooded or not.

[Tormod]

Is it that there is no evidence FOR the flood, or that there is direct evidence AGAINST the flood? Most people here seem to agree that the flood never happened, but have given differing reasons for their conclusion. Is there a general concensus?

Does it have to be? All things discussed point against taking the biblical flood literally. I think that's the real issue here.

[Aquagem]

However, we don't allow people to call each other stupid, or imply that our members are stupid. We are all here to learn. :hihi:

That's a really important message for all of us. Always. Thanks.

 

"A good discussion should be like a ballet, not a battle!"

[IrishEyes]

Does it have to be? All things discussed point against taking the biblical flood literally. I think that's the real issue here.

Well, for ME at least, it would be nice to know what 'all things' point against it. That's the basis of my question, I guess. People have said that it didn't happen because there is no evidence for it. While others say that the lack of proof for it proves it never happened. Rather circular, but i understand that logic. :hihi: If anyone has 'proof' (for lack of a better word) that the flood never happened, can they please post it?

I can't physically get to my notes right now, due to some unforeseen physical limitations, but I know I have stuff that indicates that a flood is very possible. I remember this as being one of my first discussions here. I wish this discussion were taking place in about a week, or a week ago :rant:

[IrishEyes]

sorry, Aquagem. I only saw the posts that were displayed on this page, starting with post #31. I didn't realize you responded before that, as did Tormod. I missed a page, and will go back and read those again. Does that happen to others... not realizing how many responses have been posted before you answer? Or posting a reply only to realize that 3 other people posted while you were typing your response up?