How do Christian creationists explain Noah's ark?

[monavis]

@Mangetout

Creationists typically get around these objections by saying that it was catastrophic changes in the Earth’s crust during the flood that made everest so high, thus reducing the total amount of water required, also that mature vegetation survived on ‘floating mats’ - that entire islands of loamy soil, complete with mature trees would have floated around, then settled back down and planted themselves when the waters subsided.

No, of course it doesn’t bear any resemblance to reality; it isn’t meant to - creationist arguments are just misdirection - they aren’t intended to inform, just to try to divert the recipient away from the evidence as swiftly as possible.

Even with it raining that hard the platforms would be in a constant state of excess water, Remember,it took just 40 days to rain 29,000 feet since the Ark would be above the clouds after the rain stopped they would have to have some way to survive it would be pretty cold as it is at that altitude. Then when all this rain stopped, the waters evaporation rate would be so strong it would be impossibel to survive in such a structure. The platforms would break down. The waters of the oceans would be less saline and a lot of sea life could not survive for that amount of time. It takes a pretty big stretch of the imagination to swallow that,so their point is just silly in my understanding. It is their belief, and like a spouse who makes excuses for their unfaithful one,even when they have a picture of them cheating, will say, Oh, he (or she) was just, _________fill in the blanks. It is so important to them they need the story to fit their desires.

Monavis

[David_Simmons]

@cruel butterfly

I have always known that Moses was the actual writer of these books having been inspired by God.

Deuteronomy includes an account of Moses death and the place of his burial in Deut. 34:5-6. Moses wrote that?

[Doctor_Shaft]

Noah’s Ark story is certainly controversial, as are many other issues within the Bible.

Nonetheless, I still choose to believe in it, though I too am not a “literalist,” if that’s the term we seem to approve of using.

What irks me, however, is that we allow without question the changing and/or modification of scientific or logical theory (oh, well, i was wrong, it’s really kind of like this, or maybe like that), but if we don’t accept an exact, literal, word-for-word, it just can’t be our own durn translating fault, then suddenly the whole thing is a wash.

Granted, one can look at these tales in their best translated form or their worst and still come out saying, “I don’t believe in this crap.” And that’s perfectly fine. But to say that adherents to the text are simply nuts for trying to rationalize or reconstruct possible reasoning is also a bit disconcerting.

You’re allowed to adjust a theory as experimentation warrants it… but Momma forbid you attempt to deconstruct a possible reasoning for a story that, taken literally, is simply child-like and ridiculous by today’s standards and knowledge.

And really, at the end of the day, is it truly critical that the Ark Story be 100% accurate, supportable, provable, etc., in the grand scheme of things? It has little to do with doctrine, or even the presence or non-presence of God in the long run. Whether the tiger got on the boat and shared a room with juicy steak -er, i mean cows, is irrelevant in the ultimate message trying to be put forth throughout the rest of the book.

Whether dinosaurs rested next to men, or whether the Earth is 1 billion kajillion years old is just a battle that “Creationists” and “Evolutionists” enjoy having with each other. Meanwhile, the Earth is still spinning.

JMHO

[jimpatro]

Doctor Shaft

What irks me, however, is that we allow without question the changing and/or modification of scientific or logical theory (oh, well, i was wrong, it’s really kind of like this, or maybe like that),

C’mon, ya can’t compare adjustments to our observations of the physical world to any speculation based on magic, which has not been observed.

[David_Simmons]

@jimpatro

Doctor Shaft
C’mon, ya can’t compare adjustments to our observations of the physical world to any speculation based on magic, which has not been observed.

You shouldn’t, but you can if you have been trained by a post-modern literature professor who is ignorant about how science works.

[Sir_Dirx]

I haven’t read the whole thread yet (I know, I’m sorry), but I feel I’m qualified to answer the question in the thread title. I used to have a literal interpretation of the Bible (please note the past tense), especially of the more interesting stories, such as that of Noah’s Ark. How did I explain it? I didn’t. I just didn’t think about it. It never occured to me to consider space constraints and the tremendous host of problems that go along with the whole Ark business. I never tried to figure out how Adam & Eve could fit in with the theory of evolution. I just never thought about any of it. I just blindly believed it.

I eventually stopped this kind of faith as I educated myself more (my friend turned me on to Carl Sagan, and at about the same time I was hanging out in the school library reading Gould’s articles in Natural History and perusing Dawkins’s The Selfish Gene). I just grew out of it, really.
Now, I hate to post and run (another taboo; I’m really sorry), but in a couple hours I’m leaving for Mexico for a week to take part in a paleontology dig, to gain some field experience before I apply to gradschools for a degree in the subject. I guess you could say I’ve done a 180 since early high school.

[baronsabato]

@Mangetout

Creationists typically get around these objections by saying that it was catastrophic changes in the Earth’s crust during the flood that made everest so high, thus reducing the total amount of water required, also that mature vegetation survived on ‘floating mats’ - that entire islands of loamy soil, complete with mature trees would have floated around, then settled back down and planted themselves when the waters subsided.

Wow, that’s really incredible. I thought that I had heard all the crazy Creationist “theories” before, but that one just takes the cake! Whatever people say about Fundamentalists, you can’t claim they lack imagination. Anyone know how they explain how all the saltwater fish managed to survive?

@Doctor Shaft

Granted, one can look at these tales in their best translated form or their worst and still come out saying, “I don’t believe in this crap.” And that’s perfectly fine. But to say that adherents to the text are simply nuts for trying to rationalize or reconstruct possible reasoning is also a bit disconcerting.

Well, I don’t think it’s nuts for some Christians to attempt rationalizing a story like the Flood. It’s human nature to rationalize the ridiculous and doing so is almost a tacit acknowledgment by Christian literalists that such stories do indeed defy common sense. However, I do think such convoluted explanations, like the one Mangetout mentioned above, are unnecessary, very ignorant, and in a way, missing the point. I and other moderate/liberal Christians have no problem believing in stories like Noah’s ark, the Creation and Fall of Man, and still accept the factuality of evolution, the scientifically determined age of the Earth, and other scientific findings/facts that are rejected by Fundamentalists.

@Doctor Shaft

And really, at the end of the day, is it truly critical that the Ark Story be 100% accurate, supportable, provable, etc., in the grand scheme of things? It has little to do with doctrine, or even the presence or non-presence of God in the long run. Whether the tiger got on the boat and shared a room with juicy steak -er, i mean cows, is irrelevant in the ultimate message trying to be put forth throughout the rest of the book.

I agree wholeheartedly. Many stories in the Bible, if not most, do not have to be accepted by a Christian as factually and historically accurate. Noah’s Ark and the Creation account, whether you choose to interpret it literally or figuratively, is not a very important matter of faith, and I think that is something that many conservative Christians- and occasionally some non-Christians- seem to forget.

[cruel_butterfly]

@David Simmons

Deuteronomy includes an account of Moses death and the place of his burial in Deut. 34:5-6. Moses wrote that?

Yeah, where did you think the term “ghost writer” came from?

[Hung_Mung]

It was a guy on a barge. The story grew to legend, the legend to myth. Next thing you know you’ve got a fable (I’m willing to bet that NOBODY rational has ever believed the Ark Myth…I doubt ancient Sumerians believed it) that gets incorporated into the mythology of a people. The Israelites, remember, spent a good long time in Babylon. This presented an excellent opportunity for cross-cultural myth exchange from which the Jews could absorb the story of the flood. Eventually the story is accepted as canon and thus becomes the divine, inspired word of God. Hence, people start arguing about how to fit all those animals (did they have beavers and platypuses in the Middle East?) on one little boat.
At least, that’s my supposition.
Does anyone else get a kick from the idea of Noah walking in to the hold to feed the cows and the pterodactyls? Maybe the polar bears and brontosauruses slept on the deck.

[Walloon]

I don’t have the time to read through all 68 responses, but one explanation I heard from a biblical literalist is that the larger mammals could have been brought aboard as newborns. That saves space.

[David_Simmons]

@cruel butterfly

Yeah, where did you think the term “ghost writer” came from?

Now cut that out. ([sup]TM[/sup] Jack Benny.)

[Magiver]

I got into a discussion once with an adult who insisted the Bible was literally accurate. The proof of the flood was seashells on mountaintops. After patiently explaining how tectonic mountains were formed I was met with a blank stare and silence.

I went home and explained it to my cat and got the same stare but at least the cat purred back.

[Mangetout]

@Walloon

I don’t have the time to read through all 68 responses, but one explanation I heard from a biblical literalist is that the larger mammals could have been brought aboard as newborns. That saves space.

At the same time as hugely increasing the workload for the crew. But that doesn’t matter, because the argument is just a dodge anyway; they’re all dodges - ask a YEC/flood believer how all plant life could have survived the flood and they’ll throw you a handful of examples of seeds that can survive in seawater, swiftly brushing aside the vast majority that can’t. Ask them how fish with very specific water requirements could have survived everything getting mixed up in one global ocean and they’ll throw back a handful of examples of fish that can tolerate difficult conditions, brushing aside the majority that can’t. And so on; ask how all the animals could have survuved on the ark and the answer is things like “animals can hibernate” or “animals could have been brought aboard as fertilised eggs” or some such.

[Hung_Mung]

Wheeee! This is swatting a fly with a Buick. Take THAT, Bible!

[Mangetout]

@Hung Mung

Wheeee! This is swatting a fly with a Buick. Take THAT, Bible!

I don’t think there’s necessarily anything wrong with the Bible, what we’re doing here (or I am, at least) is criticising a certain specific interpretation of it - the proponents of this interpretation happen to assert that theirs is the only reasonable position, but I don’t see any particularly good reason to believe them about that either.