Animals into the ark two by two? Not if you believe the BBC

The Sunday Telegraph (U.K.) ^ | 03/07/04 | Chris Hastings

[Old Professer]

Spend a couple of hours on Google under Progeria and then rethink all you "know" about aging.

[Ahban]

You will note I said WIDELY understood.

[Miss Marple]

I think it quite possible that there was a large, local flood in the Mideast, perhaps the Black Sea event. I think that to people living there it would have seemed "world-wide." After all, I don't think those who wrote Genesis knew about Europe, let alone the Americas and Australia.

In a time where people rarely traveled more than 20 miles from their village, world-wide has a different connotation.

As far as the size of the ark, it is quite possible that the critics are wrong. It is also possible that the animals involved were LOCAL animals, leaving out elephants and penguins.

The primary purpose of the story is obedience to God and the cleansing of the area to remove iniquity. The BBC is simply doing their best to denigrate the Bible, as apparently that is part of their charter.

[Junior]

...the thing that turned the palm trees and mammoths into ice on the North Pole...

Ahem. Citations, please. There is no land at the north pole, so therefore there would be no palm trees and definitely no mammoths.

[Theo]

Some of these mammoths have been found in Khatanga, inside the arctic circle (it's to the right of center in the map below):

There is some discussion as to what these animals were eating (tropical plants, or regular plants), and how quickly they froze (very suddenly, or more slowly). Here are a couple of paragraphs from http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-128.htm :

The bones of thousands of animals have, in fact, been found frozen in the tundra of Siberia. Hippopotamuses, sabertooth tigers, mammoths, and other animals normally associated with the tropics have been found frozen, some in relatively fresh condition in the frozen Siberian muck. This muck is full of plant and animal remains to depths of several thousand feet.

The presence of fresh tropical plants and flowers in the stomachs of certain frozen Siberian mammoths indicates the temperature drop in some locations occurred suddenly. The fact that some of the mammoths were frozen in the muck and were found relatively fresh, indicates that the temperature drop was extreme and permanent. Such a scenario matches the predictions of the vapor canopy model very well.

I'm not an expert on this topic, but do find it fascinating. I'm not "settled" in what I believe about these animals, and will continue to read up on them.

[Theo]

You're right -- as far as I can tell, there's no land on the North Pole. The mammoths (and other animals) in question are within the Arctic Circle. Here's a better map (I've highlighted Khatanga, the town that has the mammoth dig):

[aruanan]

It claims that the story in the Book of Genesis was a fabrication inspired by the story of King Gilgamesh, who was caught up in a flood while trying to transport his own livestock.

I suppose it doesn't even cross their minds that the Epic of Gilgamesh (and many other flood stories from around the world) may have had as its antecedent an actual event of which the account of Noah in Genesis is the more factual version. At least the dimensions of the boat given in Genesis, taken most literally to mean a rectangular craft, would have yielded a seaworthy vessel with great stability. Gilgamesh's boat was a cube!

But then the minds of these folks were already made up and already dominated by the idea that any story from the past that describes a great or, to us, fantastic event must have started from something completely unremarkable, or barely remarkable, that, with retelling and embellishment, grew over the centuries to assume its present, clearly unbelievable, state. This is the evolutionary hypothesis applied to history/myth. Simple life emerged from the slime and developed, through accidents of circumstance, into something that looks a lot more remarkable than it originally was. Gilgamesh simply tried to save his livestock in a local flood and that story was retold until it became a morality tale of worldwide judgement.

[hellinahandcart]

"It is time to forget the original story and start again."

I find this so insulting.

He states "it is time", so naturally we'll get right to the job of revising Scripture to suit him.

(Go jump in a 40-day, 40-night LAKE!)

[bondjamesbond]

Heaven help those poor souls who are dependent of the BBC for confirmation of their beliefs.

[Stone Mountain]

Apparently, great flood stories exists in many cultures around the world. It would make sense to believe either there were a lot of local large floods or one universal flood.

Well, I'm sure a lot of cultures have flood stories. However, it makes sense that cultures would have stories of huge natural disasters that happened to them in the past. I'm sure a bunch of cultures have earthquake stories, typhoons, hurricanes, fires, etc. Do you think there are more flood stories than there are non-flood disaster stories?

[Little Ray]

Didn't they find evidence of a great flood in Mesopotamia (aka "Iraq") in the form of a layer of clay 5 feet thick? Supposedly this deposit indicates flooding at the 40 ft. level.
The "Great Flood" didn't have to be a worldwide event.

[steve-b]

Also interesting to note that people after the flood -- immediately after it -- lived a lot shorter, to maybe 120 or less years. Makes you wonder if that water layer protected people from bad sun rays?

If non-exposure to the sun does it, then computer geeks would live to be 500.

[Monty22]

Story doesn't even get the Gilgamesh part right. It wasn't Gilgamesh himself, but Utnapishtim that is the Noah character.

[Theo]

... then I guess I'm going to out-live my wife, who's 12 years younger than I am....

[Library Lady]

Have you read The HAB Theory by Alan Eckert? It is in novel form, but takes the theory of a pole shift being behind a great many unexplained geographical mysteries. Unfortunately it is out of print, but you may be able to get it through interlibrary loan as I did.

[Junior]

There is some discussion as to what these animals were eating (tropical plants, or regular plants), and how quickly they froze (very suddenly, or more slowly). Here are a couple of paragraphs from http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-128.htm :  The bones of thousands of animals have, in fact, been found frozen in the tundra of Siberia. Hippopotamuses, sabertooth tigers, mammoths, and other animals normally associated with the tropics have been found frozen, some in relatively fresh condition in the frozen Siberian muck. This muck is full of plant and animal remains to depths of several thousand feet. The presence of fresh tropical plants and flowers in the stomachs of certain frozen Siberian mammoths indicates the temperature drop in some locations occurred suddenly. The fact that some of the mammoths were frozen in the muck and were found relatively fresh, indicates that the temperature drop was extreme and permanent. Such a scenario matches the predictions of the vapor canopy model very well. I'm not an expert on this topic, but do find it fascinating. I'm not "settled" in what I believe about these animals, and will continue to read up on them.

Additional Reading: Woolly Mammoths Remains: Catastrophic Origins?

A little research might help.  TalkOrigins.org has a lot of information on this particular subject.  You might not like them and think they are nothing but an "evolutionist" site, but they do document everything they post, and much of their documentation refers to original, published research, not speculation or quote mining. For instance, with regard to how quickly the animals in question were frozen: The reports of frozen mammoths with well-preserved flesh are greatly exaggerated. The Berezovka mammoth, perhaps the most famous example, was rather putrified; the excavators found its stench unbearable. It must have taken several days to freeze, since scavengers were able to mutilate it before it froze, and the flesh showed "deep penetrating chemical alterations as the result of very slow decay." [Weber 1980] The food found with the mammoths were arctic species. That some was found in their mouths doesn't show that they died quickly; it merely shows they didn't brush their teeth between meals. It goes on further: Frozen mammoths are not common. As of 1961, only 39 have been found with some flesh preserved, and only four of those were more or less intact [Farrand 1961, cited by Weber 1980]. Furthermore, we find no frozen animals in Siberia except mammoths and wooly rhinoceri. We would expect such large animals selectively to succumb to falls and morasses. A catastrophic cause of death would be expected to preserve many other species as well. So, no, there haven't been "thousands of animals" found frozen in Siberia, but only a relative handful, and these relegated to mammoths and wooly rhinos.

 

 

 

[Theo]

As you point out, different researchers have different "takes" on what's up there. Experts from your site (who document what they report) say one thing, while experts from the site I cited (who document what they report) say something different. Other sources report various findings and conclusions. That's why I ended my post saying that I'm interested in reading up more on this subject.

Speaking of which, have you seen this article: Antarctica 'Lost World' Found ( http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1092606/posts ) ? Interesting stuff.