Digging Deeper Links for Noah: The Man, The Ark, The Flood SESSION ONE: NOAH THE MAN The Bible Trumps Everything—Even Creation Science: This article explains the danger of clinging too tightly to models arising from Creation science. It examines some early Creation science models that have given way over the years and discusses the strengths and weaknesses of current models describing the flood. Flood! This article briefly surveys some of the numerous flood accounts in ancient civilizations. Noah’s Flood: the Gilgamesh Epic and Genesis: Some scholars argue Genesis borrowed its flood account from the Akkadian Epic of Gilgamesh. This article challenges that assertion and provides an alternate view. Living for 900 Years: Today few people reach the age of 120 years. We’re understanding more … but, with new research, can we live longer? Fascinating new information about how and why we age casts fresh light on the long lifespans of pre-flood people. Decreased lifespans: Have we been looking in the right place? This article looks at some possible reasons for the decrease in longevity after the flood. Meeting the Ancestors This article shares a fascinating observation about the patriarchal lists of early Genesis. Extreme Aging Tragically, some children age at tremendous rates, resulting in an average lifespan of thirteen years. SESSION TWO: THE ARK Thinking Outside the Box This webpage takes an in depth look at the ark and how it safely brought Noah, his family, and all those animals through the Flood’s devastation. Where does the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod stand on Genesis 1? This page contains the Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod’s official doctrinal position. (Look for #5 “Of Creation”). Hibernation, Migration, and the Ark This article discusses attempts to find natural processes to explain how the animals came to the ark and how Noah cared for them there. Were Dinosaurs on Noah’s Ark? This Creation Ministries International article searches the Bible for possible clues. Depicting the Ark This article traces the different ways artists have rendered Noah’s ark over the centuries. Can the Usher Chronology be Trusted? Examines how Archbishop James Ussher calculated his chronology dating events from Creation to the Fall of Jerusalem. Is there a Link between Noah’s Flood and the Tower of Babel? The famous Jewish historian Josephus offered a link between the flood and the Tower of Babel in his book Jewish Antiquities. Safety Investigation of Noah’s Ark in a Seaway. In this detailed article a Korean firm studied the seaworthiness of the ark. Ancients’ Couldn’t Have Built a Wooden Ship that Large, Could They? This article discusses large ships built in antiquity to prove Noah could have built that large a ship. Was the Ark Seaworthy? A blogger who called himself, “Froggie” challenged the seaworthiness of Noah’s ark. In a three-part series, Tim Lovett (mechanical engineer with Answers in Genesis) answered his challenges. Could Noah’s Ark Float without Problems? Are Wooden Ships Reliable? Was Noah’s Ark Seaworthy, or is that Impossible? Has the Ark been Found? In 1960 articles came out reporting a pilot sighting a boat-like shape on Lesser Mount Ararat. Was it the ark? SESSION THREE: THE FLOOD The Black Sea Flood This article investigates claims from some scientists that a local Black Sea flood was Noah’s flood in the Bible. Was Noah’s Flood Local or Global? This article poses some problems with the view that the Flood was local. Flood Models: The Need for an Integrated Approach This article discusses various models that explain the source of the flood waters, the pattern of sentiment deposition and dinosaur tracks. Drowned from Below The Genesis account of the Flood says “all the fountains of the great deep burst forth” (Genesis 7:11). Now scientists believe there is far more water beneath the Earth’s crust than in the oceans. Fountains of the Great Deep on Mars? Scientists have long thought water was responsible for the surface features of Mars. Some even think there were vast stores of water underground—and there still may be. Did Meteors Trigger Noah’s Flood? In this article Dr. Andrew Snelling considers the possibility that massive meteor strikes shattered the Earth’s crust into tectonic plates and triggered the fountains of the great deep to burst forth. Probing the Earth’s Deep Places Creation Magazine interviews plate tectonics expert Dr. John Baumgardner about evidence for rapid plate tectonics. What Geologic Processes were Operating during the Flood? This article describes the fountains of the great deep, the motion of tectonic plates, and the effects of all that water on the earth. SESSION FOUR: THE AFTERMATH Genesis and Catastrophe this article discusses how the Genesis Flood could have been the main mechanism for laying down the fossil record. New Evidence of Noah’s Flood An international research team puzzled over a dinosaur find in Mexico. Is Hawaii an Aftermath of the Flood? Geologist Dr. Andrew Snelling considers how plate tectonics connected to the Flood could have formed the Hawaiian Island chain. Dinosaur Footprints Huge dinosaurs flee rising waters of Noah’s flood in Australia. Dinosaur Herd buried in Noah’s Flood? Geologist Dr. Tas Walker discusses a herd of more than twenty-five juvenile dinosaurs that became trapped in mud and buried in sentiment in Inner Mongolia, China. The Mystery of Coal Geologist Dr. Steve Austin discusses some mysteries in the formation of coal that challenge conventional notions. Did Natural Gas take Millions of Years to Form? This article describes experiments which show the production of natural gas and oil occurs very swiftly. Warped Earth In this article geophysicist Dr. David Allen discusses how rocks could be folded without fracturing. A Receding Flood Scenario for the origin of the Grand Canyon Many creation scientists think a breach of lakes left after the Flood formed the Grand Canyon from east to west. This article proposes an alternate origin. The Yellowstone Petrified Forests—Evidence of Catastrophe? This article discusses evolutionist and creationist views of the formation of the Yellowstone petrified forests with insight from Mount St. Helens. “I Got Excited at Mount St. Helens!” Ken Ham describes his tour of Mount St. Helens, and the many geological effects catastrophic events can cause in a short period of time. Mount St. Helens—Explosive Evidence for Creation In this 26:30 YouTube video episode of the show “Origins,” Dr. Steve Austin discusses findings at Mount St. Helens. * After Devastation … The Recovery After the devastating 1980 explosion of Mt. St. Helens, scientists lamented that over 200 square miles of land would be desolate throughout their lifetimes. The rapid recovery tells us something about the world’s recovery after the flood. * How did Animals get from the Ark to Places such as Australia? This article explores possible answers to this challenging question. * Natural Rafts carried Animals around the Globe Fishermen have logged instances of animals floating to new lands on natural rafts. Could this be part of the answer to animals repopulating the earth after the flood? * * These articles include extra-Biblical hypotheses or conclusions that may or may not be true. Please consider them food for thought and the current best guess of creation scientists. Digging Deeper Links for Noah: The Man, The Ark, The Flood The Bible Trumps Everything—Even Creation Science http://creation.com/flood-models-biblical-realism Flood models and biblical realism by Jonathan Sarfati Biblical creationists by definition believe in a globe-covering flood. But how this occurred has been a matter of intense debate within the creationist geologist community. Some general observations can be made from a theological, philosophic and scientific perspective. Hold the Bible strongly; hold models loosely Figure 1. Calculated vertical temperature profile for a vapour canopy model of the earth‘s atmosphere compared with the temperature profile today (after Rush and Vardiman, ref.61). Increased water in the canopy increases the surface temperature of the earth limiting the amount of precipitable water that can be feasibly stored. The Bible, as God‘s written word, should be non-negotiable. Its teachings are propositional truth, and must be the foundation for all our teachings, including about the Flood. This applies not only to explicit statements, but to anything logically deducible from these statements.1 In fact, Jesus Himself endorsed the Flood as a real event, the Ark as a real ship, and Noah as a real person (Luke 17:26–27), so how can any of His professing followers deny it? But where the Bible is genuinely silent, we are free to use science to help build models to help elucidate the clear teachings of Scripture. But these models are just man-made—they must never be given the same authority as Scripture. In any case, science is always changing, so being married to a model today will probably result in being widowed tomorrow. Worse, if the Bible is too tied up with a model later discarded, many will think that the Bible itself was refuted (cf. the church‘s adoption of Aristotelian cosmology v Galileo2,3). Model-building should be an example of the ministerial use of science. Model-building should be an example of the ministerial use of science. In contrast, the magisterial use of science, practised by all compromisers on Genesis, overrules the clear teaching of the Bible to come up with a meaning inconsistent with sound hermeneutics. Instead of the Reformation principle ofSola Scriptura (Scripture alone), this is Scriptura sub scientia (Scripture below science).4 With these principles, some popular ideas can be examined. Pre-Flood paradise? Many creationist works from a few decades ago portrayed the antediluvian world as a paradise, which was horribly spoiled at the Flood. But this is not taught in Scripture. Furthermore, it obscures the teaching that the big spoiling of paradise occurred at the Fall.5 This was the time that death, childbirth pain, and thorns and thistles were introduced, when Adam and Eve were tossed out of the Edenic paradise, and when the whole creation started groaning in pain.6 The only genuinely biblical evidence adduced for a pre-Flood paradise is that people before the Flood lived for over 900 years, while lifespans dropped exponentially after that. Yet Noah‘s lifespan wasn‘t shortened despite spending the last third of his life in the alleged ruined environment. Rather, in the 1990s, it was proposed that the decline in lifespans had genetic causes.7 Recent advanced computer programs vindicate this proposal, showing that an exponential decline of lifespans fits well with accumulating mutations after the catastrophic population bottleneck at the Flood.8–11 Figure 2. In the catastrophic plate tectonics model, runaway subduction into the earth‘s mantle of the oceanic plates drives the motion of the rigid lithosphere at metres per second. The only remaining support for an environmental cause of the decreasing lifespan is Shem, born before the Flood bottleneck, but living only ⅔ as long as most of his ancestors. But here there is also a plausible genetic explanation: he was born when his father was 502,12 i.e. over half-way through his lifespan. His ancestors were much younger when they begot their named sons. It has long been known that children born to aged mothers have a higher risk of developing non-hereditary genetic disorders such as Down‘s Syndrome, and it is plausible that Mrs Noah was about the same age as Noah. But even if she were much younger, more recent research points to agedfathers as a major source of genetic disorders. This should not be surprising since men keep producing sperm throughout their lives, and older men have more mutations.13 So it is not surprising that Shem, while very fit by today‘s standards, would have been considerably less fit than his parents, and carried extra heritable mutations. No rain before Flood? Many older creationist models asserted that there was no rain or rainbow before the Flood, based on Genesis 2:5, ―for the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the land‖, and the Noahic Covenant in Genesis 9:13. This is supposed to result in a warmer and more even climate in the antediluvian world. Yet the first passage is describing the situation before Man was created; it is silent on whether there was subsequent rain in the 1656 years before the Flood (Genesis 5). And there are plenty of examples in Scripture where God took pre-existing objects or actions and bestowed a new covenantal meaning on them. For example, bread and wine obviously pre-dated the Lord‘s Supper. Furthermore, the Bible gives no indication that the ‗laws of nature‘ (really God‘s regular ways of upholding His creation14) were any different before the Flood from what they are now. Yet they would have to be if there were no evaporation, precipitation and differential refraction before the Flood. Higher atmospheric or oxygen partial pressure One idea for the pre-Flood world, derived partly from the fallacious pre-Flood paradise assumption, is that oxygen concentration15 or atmospheric pressure was higher than today. This would supposedly have beneficial effects duplicated in today‘s hyperbaric chambers. These increase the oxygen partial pressure16 as per Dalton‘s Law.17 Yet would they be as beneficial as claimed, given the known health benefits of anti- oxidants? To be fair, evolutionists have also proposed higher oxygen concentration or higher atmospheric pressure in the past, for some of the reasons below.18 This is supported by some scientific evidence, yet this does not hold up:19 Higher oxygen levels in amber air bubbles: yet they are not a closed system—gases diffuse in and out. Furthermore, contraction under solidification would shrink bubbles, thus raising pressure according to the law named after the creationist ‗father of modern chemistry‘, Sir Robert Boyle (1627–1691), that gas pressure is inversely proportional to volume. Also, even the formation of bubbles in itself must increase pressure, to counteract the resistance of surface tension to producing the new surface area of the inside of the bubble. This excess Laplace pressure is given by the equation: ΔP = 2γ∕r where ΔP is excess pressure, or difference between inside and outside; γ = surface tension; r is bubble radius. This extra pressure is considerable in tiny bubbles, so the partial pressures would also be increased, according to Dalton‘s Law. Pterosaurs need high pressure to generate enough lift to fly: but previous models of pterosaur flight overlooked the function of the tiny pteroid bone, that would have supported a controllable flap. This would greatly increase lift in both takeoff and landing.20,21 Gigantic insects could not have gained enough oxygen under normal pressure. The fossil record shows huge insects such as Meganeura, a dragonfly with a wingspan of 71 cm. For a long time, scientists thought that insects didn‘t breathe, and oxygen diffused passively through holes (spiracles) through tiny tubes in the abdomen (tracheae). Since this could work only over very short distances, how could such a creature survive without extra oxygen?22 Yet recent synchrotron X-ray microscopy shows that insects really do ‗breathe‘ by squeezing the tracheae, such that half the gas is exchanged every second.23,24 This doesn‘t disprove a higher oxygen concentration and air pressure, but it shows that they were not needed scientifically. They are definitely not needed on biblical grounds. Meteorite impact In the Bible, the first cause for the Flood was ―all the fountains of the great deep burst forth‖ and the second was ―the windows of the heavens were opened‖ (Genesis 7:11). Keil and Delitzsch comment: ―The same day were all the fountains of the great deep (םוהת te hôm the unfathomable ocean) broken up, and the sluices (windows, lattices) of heaven opened, and there was (happened, came) pouring rain (םשג geshem) in distinction from רטמ (mātār) upon the earth 40 days and 40 nights.‘ Thus the flood was produced by the bursting forth of fountains hidden within the earth, which drove seas and rivers above their banks, and by rain which continued incessantly for 40 days and 40 nights.‖25 Thus the Flood began with fountains in the sea and other deep parts of the earth, and only secondarily from the rain. However, some Flood models involve a meteorite initiating the Flood. But this could never be derived from the biblical text, and is instead driven by ‗science‘. But could it be acceptable anyway? Certainly, there is strong evidence of large numbers of impacts on the earth and other solar system bodies. Further, the evidence from lunar craters—their location mainly in one quadrant and the ‗ghost‘ craters26,27 —suggests that the main source of bombardment was a narrow meteoroid swarm that passed by before the moon had moved very far in a single orbit.28 A likely time for this swarm was in the Flood year. Indeed, multiple impacts would provide sufficient energy to maintain the Flood, including causing much water (liquid and vapour) to shoot into the sky and return as rain. The Bible is genuinely silent on this, so such a model is biblically acceptable; whether it can solve all the geological problems is an ongoing question.29 But a meteorite as an initiator of the Flood seems unacceptable. This contradicts the clear teaching that the Flood began deep within the ocean and underground, not the sky. Furthermore, this is not an argument from silence, but an argument from conspicuous absence. If a meteorite really were the primary cause, then why does Genesis not mention such a dramatic event? Elsewhere in Scripture, we have the description of ―stars falling from heaven‖,30 and in both Hebrew and Greek, any bright heavenly object was called a ‗star‘, including a ‗shooting star‘. So one would expect Genesis 7:11 to read ―a star fell from heaven, and all the fountains of the great deep burst forth … ‖, or even ―God cast a star down from heaven … ‖. In formal logical terms, an argument from conspicuous absence is a valid argument called denying the consequent (or modus tollens): if something as dramatic as a meteorite caused the Flood, then the Bible would have mentioned it. The Bible doesn‘t mention it, therefore a meteorite didn‘t cause the Flood. Conversely, an argument from silence is a logical fallacy called denying the antecedent: if the Bible had mentioned that Noah used nails to build the Ark, then Noah used nails; the Bible doesn‘t mention nails, therefore Noah didn‘t use them.31 One defence is that Noah didn‘t see the meteorite, but only the resulting tsunamis, so the Bible recorded only the latter. But by the same token, would Noah have seen the happenings in the deep central ocean either? Even more serious, this is identical in principle to a major argument of local flood compromisers: the world was flooded as far as Noah could see, but it was still only regional. In any case, the Genesis Flood account was clearly a God‘s-eye view, hence the revelation of the global character of the Flood by its repeated use of ―all‖ (Hebrew לכkol), including the ‗double kol‘ in Genesis 7:19.32