The equations of the Ark

[Wertbag]

This was an article I wrote to a Christian website who had made the claim that as few as 50,000 animals could have been on the Ark, and that the average size would be that of a sheep:

 

Its obvious, the Bible says the Bible is true, therefore it must be. This is proven because the Bible says Jesus said the Bible was true, and as it had already said Jesus doesn't lie, then it must also be true.

Same way that ol' Jo Smith convinced millions that the book of mormon was ancient writings and therefore true...

 

Back to the original debate, Noahs flood. Its one of the most easily shot to pieces stories as it is illogical in so many ways. Lets try some basic maths as a few examples:

 

Example 1: If we say there were 50,000 animals (ignoring the fact there are some 3 million species today), with the average size being similar to a sheep, and we know the average sheep drinks about 2 litres of water a day, we have 100,000 litres a day. Times the around 300 days they were in the Ark and you have requirements of 30 million litres of water. There are obvious storage issues and trouble keeping it from stagnating. Keep in mind all of the external water was full of dead bodies, plant life and decay, completely undrinkable and of course no filtration systems existed.

 

Example two: If we say only 10% of the animals were carnivores (probably be higher but to be safe aim low), and an average sheep sized carnivore would eat at least 3-4kg of meat a day (lets say 2kg to be safe), thats 10,000kg of meat a day, or over the 300 days 3000 metric tons of meat. And this was before refrigeration. Even just collecting and preparing that much meat would be a massive undertaking by todays standards, left alone 4000 years ago. Now think of the herbivores... 45,000 of them eating 2kg of plant material a day, thats 90 tons a day, or 27,000 tons over 300 days. Of course this is ignoring the special diets of many animals and things such as grains/fruits/veges to make sure health problems from lack of vitimins (scurvey, rickets etc).

 

Example three: You have 8 humans looking after 50,000 animals. If we say they worked 16 hour days, 7 days a week for a year (barring the obvious exhustion that would hit pretty quick), we have 960 minutes of work per person or 7680 total working minutes (460800 seconds) or a grand total of just over 9 seconds per animal per day. In those 9 seconds you have to travel around the boat, collect and distribute feed, clean the waste products, and of course at some point look after your own needs of food and rest.

 

Its impossible from so many angles, the food, the boat, the ages of the people, the physics of the flood, the geology, collecting the spreading the animals. Even just the number of things to cause extinction of the animals (especially with only 2 of each) not to mention the human race (heat in the boat, travel to and from the boat, lack of food and care, disease, lack of excercise, carnivores, injury, inbreeding, breeding failures, lack of shelter afterwards, lack of clean water and food afterwards). The only answers seem to be heaping miracle upon miracle to make it happen, all of which aren't mentioned in the story.

[trashy]

don't forget the average breeding times of many animals - how many births would have occurred in 300 days?

[Prolix]

don't forget the average breeding times of many animals - how many births would have occurred in 300 days?

Noooo, God had them spayed and neutered before they got on the ark.

[crazy-tiger]

don't forget the average breeding times of many animals - how many births would have occurred in 300 days?

Noooo, God had them spayed and neutered before they got on the ark.

Hmm... mass extinction for all species then.

[All Gods Fail]

The other thing for me is the flood itself. Some questions to ask fundy square-heads:

 

Just how much water would have to cover the earth to kill everyone, including mountain-dwellers? And for how long? Where did the water come from? Didn't anyone else have boats (Greeks, Chinese, Vikings)? What was the sea level - low enough that Noah didn't need oxygen tanks? Where did all the water go afterwards? How did it affect the oceans and plankton photosynthesis? Wouldn't all that fresh water have played hell with the world's oceans? What about the temperature of the polar ice caps?

 

Etc, etc, etc. Anyone who believes this myth is true is dumber than a bag of hammers.

[Vigile]

I think the most interesting dilemma that fundies get themselves into here is as follows.

 

They can and do obviously answer "goddidit" to all of these critiques.

 

The real question then is that if in fact god can do anything, why the detailed physical explanation for the flood and the arc in the first place?

 

If god could overcome all the physical impossibilities that can be found in the arc myth, why did he need to flood the earth in the first place? Why did he need Noah to build a boat? Why did he need to save one of each pair of animals? Why couldn't he have just snapped his fingers, sent all sinners to hell bar holy Noah and his family?

 

When the author takes the trouble to detail the dimensions of the arc, the number of days at sea, etc, then the author leaves open the door to scrutiny based on knowledge of the physical world. To argue otherwise would be intellectually dishonest even by a fundy's standards.

[Wertbag]

True, the whole premise is devoid of logic. Christians are always saying everyone has a soul and can become saved, yet God obviously decided not a single person was worth saving, not even the babies who had not commited a crime, so kill everyone and everything.

 

Of course a boat as large as is claimed (between 400-450 feet long) is not recorded in human history until the 1400's. The only reason they could build that large was through knowledge of metal work to strengthen the hull. But old Noah with no apparent history of ship building (as far as the story mentions he was a farmer) with only his family to help builds this marvel of engineering...

 

Obviously he'd figured out to keep the front section of the boat cool enough for the penguins and polar bears, the rear heated for the desert dewelling animals and the centre temperate for the rest. Good trick with no technology.

 

Its just one of those stories which is so full of holes, so blatantly wrong as to be ridiculous to believe... yet incredibly all Christians take it as a given that it happened as claimed.

[Taphophilia]

Slightly off topic here, but everytime I hear the story of Noah, I think of Hamm.

 

Christians seem to gloss over the story of Hamm now a days too. They don't like to mention that story used to be used as justification for the atrocity of slavery. Hamm and all his decendants were cursed, so it's all right to enslave and own, who they thought were Hamm's decendants, human beings as property. It's was also all right to humiliate, rape, torture, and even murder said people because the Bible tells me so.