Creation: Essential for a Healthy Christian Worldview

[OldEnglishSheepdog]

Sorry for my lack of clarification Shiloh;not from you. That was in response to some earlier discussion with OldEnglishsheepdog.

Maybe in respect for the direction Shiloh would like to take this thread we'll resume this discussion another time and place.

Does that sound OK LLC?

[LLC]

OldEnglishsheepdog, thanks for answering my questions with clarity. However, your responses bring new questions to my mind.

Edited April 27, 2011 by LLC

[LLC]

Why is there no mention of the Flood in the records of Egyptian or Mesopotamian civilizations which existed at the time? Biblical dates (I Kings 6:1, Gal 3:17, various generation lengths given in Genesis) place the Flood 1300 years before Solomon began the first temple. We can construct reliable chronologies for near Eastern history, particularly for Egypt, from many kinds of records from the literate cultures in the near East. These records are independent of, but supported by, dating methods such as dendrochronology and carbon-14. The building of the first temple can be dated to 950 B.C. +/- some small delta, placing the Flood around 2250 B.C. Unfortunately, the Egyptians (among others) have written records dating well back before 2250 B.C. (the Great Pyramid, for example dates to the 26th century B.C., 300 years before the Biblical date for the Flood). No sign in Egyptian inscriptions of this global flood around 2250 B.C.

How did sensitive marine life such as coral survive? Since most coral are found in shallow water, the turbidity created by the runoff from the land would effectively cut them off from the sun. The silt covering the reef after the rains were over would kill all the coral. By the way, the rates at which coral deposits calcium are well known, and some highly mature reefs (such a the great barrier) have been around for millions of years to be deposited to their observed thickness.

How did diseases survive? Many diseases can't survive in hosts other than humans. Many others can only survive in humans and in short-lived arthropod vectors. The list includes typhus, measles, smallpox, polio, gonorrhea, syphilis. For these diseases to have survived the Flood, they must all have infected one or more of the eight people aboard the Ark.

Other animals aboard the ark must have suffered from multiple diseases, too, since there are other diseases specific to other animals, and the nonspecific diseases must have been somewhere.

Host-specific diseases which don't kill their host generally can't survive long, since the host's immune system eliminates them. (This doesn't apply to diseases such as HIV and malaria which can hide from the immune system.) For example, measles can't last for more than a few weeks in a community of less than 250,000 because it needs nonresistant hosts to infect. Since the human population aboard the ark was somewhat less than 250,000, measles and many other infectious diseases would have gone extinct during the Flood.

Some diseases that can affect a wide range of species would have found conditions on the Ark ideal for a plague. Avian viruses, for example, would have spread through the many birds on the ark. Other plagues would have affected the mammals and reptiles. Even these plague pathogens, though, would have died out after all their prospective hosts were either dead or resistant.

How did short-lived species survive? Adult mayflies on the ark would have died in a few days, and the larvae of many mayflies require shallow fresh running water. Many other insects would face similar problems.

How could more than a handful of species survive in a devastated habitat? The Flood would have destroyed the food and shelter which most species need to survive.

How did predators survive? How could more than a handful of the predator species on the ark have survived, with only two individuals of their prey to eat? All of the predators at the top of the food pyramid require larger numbers of food animals beneath them on the pyramid, which in turn require large numbers of the animals they prey on, and so on, down to the primary producers (plants etc.) at the bottom. And if the predators survived, how did the other animals survive being preyed on?

How did animals get to their present ranges? How did koalas get from Ararat to Australia, polar bears to the Arctic, etc., when the kinds of environment they require to live doesn't exist between the two points. How did so many unique species get to remote islands?

How were ecological interdependencies preserved as animals migrated from Ararat? Did the yucca an the yucca moth migrate together across the Atlantic? Were there, a few thousand years ago, unbroken giant sequoia forests between Ararat and California to allow indigenous bark and cone beetles to migrate?

Why are so many animals found only in limited ranges? Why are so many marsupials limited to Australia; why are there no wallabies in western Indonesia? Why are lemurs limited to Madagascar? The same argument applies to any number of groups of plants and animals.

[LLC]

Yes that sounds fine. We shall continue this thread elsewhere.

[LuftWaffle]

Very interesting . Now, back to the flood. In order for your assertions to be true OldEnglishsheepdog, the flood must have been world-wide. To me, this seems improbable, especially because there is only a certain quantity of water on Earth.

When you say "To me, this seems improbable..." it seems as though you have a personal problem with the flood, but then you rattle off a list of questions copied from http://chem.tufts.edu/AnswersInScience/flood-problems.html

You've asked about large wooden ships collapsing under their own weight and we answered that question, to which you responded with "Interesting". Do you acknowledge that the question on wooden ships has been answered or are you instead ignoring the answer and moving on to other supposed problems, which are not your own but which you copy. And once we've answered those are you going to ignore them as well and copy more questions from more sources?

I'm asking this because if you have a question regarding the flood then it's fine, but if you're just going to copy anti-creationist propaganda and expect us to answer that (and ignore the answers) then the exercise would be a waste of time. If you can search for questions on google (because you can't come up with your own, then surely you can search for answers as well, yes?)

I also have to say that I find it rather interesting that you'd accuse FresnoJoe of not being able to think for himself and yet, it seems you can't come up with a question of your own regarding the flood, but instead must rely on other people to ask the questions for you.

[OldEnglishSheepdog]

LLC, please read what Luftwaffle pointed out to you. These questions are simply uninformed.

Why is there no mention of the Flood in the records of Egyptian or Mesopotamian civilizations which existed at the time?

There are: "Similarities between the account of Noah's Flood in the Hebrew scriptures and the Mesopotamian flood tales are great and obvious" (source: http://ncse.com/cej/8/2/flood-mesopotamian-archaeological-evidence).

You can't just assume what reality is based on what you might figure without having bothered to look into.

We can try to provide answer any legitimate questions you have, but first do just a broad overview of reading and you'll get reasonable answers to these questions, and second when we provide evidence that's crippling for the evolutionary interpretation that's doesn't mean that it's your job to continue to barrage us until there's something we haven't considered yet.

That's not intellectual honesty, and if we're keeping score let me suggest we keep it on both sides and tally it up at the end.

[OldEnglishSheepdog]

LLC, remember how I told you a while ago that it seems like you

[Guest shiloh357]

Well, Luftwaffle pointed that out nicely with his last post, and picking up where he left off, I