# How did Noah care for 8.7 million species?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830
**Category:** Great Debates
**Created:** [August 23, 2011, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830 "2011-08-23T23:28:58Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@REDEYZZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/REDEYZZ)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/1 "2011-08-23T23:28:58Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Humans share the planet with as many as 8.7 million different forms of life, according to what is being billed as the most accurate estimate yet of life on Earth.
>
> Researchers who have analysed the hierarchical categorisation of life on Earth to estimate how many undiscovered species exist say the diversity of life is not equally divided between land and ocean. Three-quarters of the 8.7m species – the majority of which are insects – are on land; only one-quarter, 2.2m, are in the deep, even though 70% of the Earth’s surface is water.
> **[Planet Earth is home to 8.7 million species, scientists estimate](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2011/aug/23/species-earth-estimate-scientists)**
>
> Latest bid to count and catalogue the living world is billed as the most accurate yet – but only a tiny proportion is known to science
Would someone care to explain how Noah was able to take care of approximately 8.7 million creatures?
How did he feed them all?
How did he clean up the waste?
How did he gather them all?
How did he get them to all to successfully mate?
How did he fit them on the boat?
How did fish survive with all that fresh water in the ocean?(or did he have 3 million aquariums on board?)
I can’t quite put my finger on it…but something does not add up here… :dubious:
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### Author:  [@Pitchmeister](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pitchmeister)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/2 "2011-08-23T23:34:47Z")
A wizard did it.
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/3 "2011-08-23T23:36:00Z")
He didn’t have every species, he had every _‘kind’_. Duh.
Just don’t ask for a coherent or useful definition of ‘kind’, or details of how speciation within ‘kind’ (but nothing more evolution-y than that) is possible.
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### Author:  [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/4 "2011-08-23T23:40:43Z")
One large wildebeast could support a bunch of them insects.
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### Author:  [@woodstockbirdybird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/woodstockbirdybird)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/5 "2011-08-23T23:45:14Z")
Probably had a dog whisperer along to make things easier.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/6 "2011-08-23T23:46:24Z")
How does Bugs Bunny speak English (okay, Brooklynese…but close enough)? Stories are stories. No mystery there.
I se you are new to the Dope. Welcome.
You might, however, consider rewording your post. It is hard to tell if you are intentionally showing the absurdity of taking that particular story seriously as a factual desription of events, so you can provoke thesitic (or, more specifically, Judeo-Christian theistic) Dopers into a response. There is a glut of threads right now on the absurdities of theism, and I don’t think yours is going to add much to the debate.
If you are, instead, interested in possible, more or less verifiable _real_ events that may have inspired the Noah myth (and other flood myths in Bronze Age Eurasian cultures), such as the geological filling in of the Black Sea basin, then you might be specific about this. You could also approach in a kind of psycho-cultural way, if you’re curious about what human needs or desires are fulfilled by recounting this particular myth.
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### Author:  [@REDEYZZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/REDEYZZ)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/7 "2011-08-23T23:47:32Z")
Not sure if this has been posted , but this explains everything. 😉 It’s a must watch for the biblical scholar types.
[ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_BzWUuZN5w)
[ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLr5vl-n0Bo)
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### Author:  [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)
#### Post date: [August 23, 2011, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/8 "2011-08-23T23:51:42Z")
I thougth this was going to be about the government of Kentucky advancing religion with the new creationism park that they are making over there.
[http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/12/hooo-weeee\_look\_what\_the\_state.php](http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2010/12/hooo-weeee_look_what_the_state.php)
> [@](#):
>
> This ain’t gonna be free: the state guvmint is kickin’ in $37 million in tax incentives to help a gang of Bible-totin’ theocrats build a fancy Disneyland for ignoramuses. This is what it’s gonna look like, they think:
> Lookie there: the centerpiece will be a genuwine, life-sized, full scale copy of Noah’s very own ark, all 300 cubits by 50 cubits by 30 cubits of it, and they say it’s gonna be built with materials and methods as close to possible as the ones in the Bible. Where they gettin’ gopherwood? And are they really gonna build it with handsaws and mallets and wooden pegs? That’s gotta be impressive, but it’s gonna be tough to git’r done by 2014.
>
> But wait a consarned minute: it ain’t floatin’. And there’s no talk of stockin’ it with 8,000 pairs of animals, or however many they say there ought to be in there. I’ll give ‘em a pass on fillin’ it with dinosaurs (well, maybe not…some say they’re daid, but the folk at AiG say they’re just hidin’), but I want elephants and hippos and giraffes and sheep and pigs and cassowaries and kangaroos and rhinoceroses and monkeys and squirrels and everythin’ tucked in there, to give me the true and odoriferous varmint-rich Ark Experience.
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### Author:  [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/9 "2011-08-24T00:00:10Z")
Okay, I just now enjoyed a few minutes from various parts of that instructive animated production. It’s mildly funny, that’s true.
Listen, parodies of received-religion-holy-book-stories have their place. But it just seems like such an endless (and easy) target. I don’t think they can do much convincing of many Biblical literalists to change their minds. People who take Bronze Age myths seriously as factual accounts are dimwitted (or brainwashed-as-children) enough that they would probably just be offended by such _lege-majeste_. Meanwhile, folks who are most likely to be at best mildly amused by it, like myself, are just the ones who need no such convincing at all.
But who knows? Maybe if we spread those videos, and others like them, around, we might just catch an impressionable young person, indoctrinated in Biblical literalism, in time. Kind of like those “It gets better” videos that Dan Savage, Tim Gunn, et al. promote.
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/10 "2011-08-24T00:06:52Z")
> [@REDEYZZ](#):
>
> Would someone care to explain how Noah was able to take care of approximately 8.7 million creatures?
>
> How did he feed them all?
> How did he clean up the waste?
> How did he gather them all?
> How did he get them to all to successfully mate?
> How did he fit them on the boat?
> How did fish survive with all that fresh water in the ocean?(or did he have 3 million aquariums on board?)
>
> I can’t quite put my finger on it…but something does not add up here… :dubious:
Noah: “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/11 "2011-08-24T00:06:59Z")
Early quantum state phenomenon.
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### Author:  [@kanicbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kanicbird)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/12 "2011-08-24T00:09:04Z")
> [@REDEYZZ](#):
>
> [Planet Earth is home to 8.7 million species, scientists estimate | Biodiversity | The Guardian](http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/aug/23/species-earth-estimate-scientists)
> Would someone care to explain how Noah was able to take care of approximately 8.7 million creatures?
This gives some wiggle room:
> [@](#):
>
> Gen 7:14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings.
What is a kind? Could one pair of cats take care of lions, tigers, cougars, and Fluffy? Could one bird pair take care of all birds of prey, another pair for all aquatic birds including penguins\*?
\*Mentioned only because penguins are cool 😃
This is also one of the counter arguments to the unguided theory of evolution, where there are animal ‘kinds’ (or souls) which allow a good deal variation within a kind, but can a particular kind can not vary outside it’s limits set by God.
This was the de-arking instruction:
Gen 8:17 Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”
Which may indicate the kind becoming the multiple species.
> [@](#):
>
> How did he feed them all?
Noah was to gather all the food for them:
Gen 6:21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”
The actually method I don’t know
> [@](#):
>
> How did he clean up the waste?
?
> [@](#):
>
> How did he gather them all?
They came to him and entered the ark
Gen 6:20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground **will come to you to be kept alive.**
Gen 7:8 Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah.
> [@](#):
>
> How did he get them to all to successfully mate?
The Lord made Noah bring male/female pairs, the wild animals know what to do from there, though the livestock may require help, but probably could have went without for 40 days.
> [@](#):
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> How did he fit them on the boat?
It seems like the animals fit themselves in “came to Noah and entered the ark”
> [@](#):
>
> How did fish survive with all that fresh water in the ocean?(or did he have 3 million aquariums on board?)
Noah was not instructed to do fish, and it seemed to indicate that this was a land flood and land and air animals perished. Sea may not have been effected.
> [@](#):
>
> I can’t quite put my finger on it…but something does not add up here… :dubious:
Well that’s all I got so far. 🆒
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### Author:  [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/13 "2011-08-24T00:16:33Z")
> [@kanicbird](#):
>
> This gives some wiggle room:
>
> What is a kind? Could one pair of cats take care of lions, tigers, cougars, and Fluffy? Could one bird pair take care of all birds of prey, another pair for all aquatic birds including penguins\*?
>
> \*Mentioned only because penguins are cool 😃
>
> This is also one of the counter arguments to the unguided theory of evolution, where there are animal ‘kinds’ (or souls) which allow a good deal variation within a kind, but can a particular kind can not vary outside it’s limits set by God.
Can you explain how these supposed limits are imposed? What is the mechanism?
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### Author:  [@REDEYZZ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/REDEYZZ)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/14 "2011-08-24T00:21:20Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Could one pair of cats take care of lions, tigers, cougars, and Fluffy?
Ummm, no, a lion can not turn into a housecat by speciation or vice versa.
> [@](#):
>
> They came to him and entered the ark
So the Polar bears walked across the continent from the north and adapted to hotter temperatures in a few days?
> [@](#):
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> Noah was not instructed to do fish, and it seemed to indicate that this was a land flood and land and air animals perished.
Yet it says the the highest mountain will be submerged in water, that would not be a “land flood”.
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### Author:  [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/15 "2011-08-24T00:28:29Z")
Presumably with Gods aid. Seriously, what did you think was the answer? It’s just a story, and even if you take it as literal truth, God presumably created the entire universe and all the species in it…keeping them alive on a big ass boat (and making the boat in the first place, as well as getting all the species there from all over the world and back again after the event, making an unpowered boat that would be inherently unstable be able to survive massive waves and storm, getting water of that volume on the earth to cause the flood in the first place then back off again, etc etc etc and blah blah blah) would be nothing. Power of God and all that.
-XT
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### Author:  [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/16 "2011-08-24T00:29:26Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#):
>
> Noah: “We’re gonna need a bigger boat.”
Actually, Noah ([as played by Sean Connery](http://youtu.be/8njvAEpzmhA)) lobbied for a speedboat, saying that it would look better in pictures in The Bible.
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### Author:  [@Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Fun_Ball)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/17 "2011-08-24T00:34:30Z")
> [@REDEYZZ](#):
>
> Ummm, no, a lion can not turn into a housecat by speciation or vice versa.
Why not, ain’t you ever heard of evolution? Uh, wait a minute, I done forgot that there ain’t no such thing.
Must’ve been magic? Who are you, anyway, to question the ways of the Lord. He works in mysterious ways!
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### Author:  [@OneMissedPost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OneMissedPost)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/18 "2011-08-24T00:35:05Z")
> [@REDEYZZ](#):
>
> I can’t quite put my finger on it…but something does not add up here… :dubious:
It doesn’t add up because there’s no proof that it actually happened. It’s a Bible story; it isn’t truth as we know it.
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### Author:  [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/19 "2011-08-24T00:38:03Z")
A variation of [this question](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYW_lPlekiQ) come to mind(warning-Youtube video).
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [August 24, 2011, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-noah-care-for-8-7-million-species/593830/20 "2011-08-24T00:41:36Z")
> [@OneMissedPost](#):
>
> It’s a Bible story; it isn’t truth as we know it.
In other words, it isn’t true at all.
“Truth as we know it”? What’s that supposed to mean anyway? As opposed to what? Horta truth?
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