Posted on 05/04/2010 3:52:00 PM PDT by FootBall
Dogubayazit (Turkey’s Iran-Armenian Border) • For the first time in the seven decade-long history of the search for the legendary Noah’s Ark, a Turkish-Hong Kong exploration team on Tuesday came out with “material evidence”, to prove that the Ark was nestled on Mount Ararat, Turkey’s highest mountain peak bordering Iran and Armenia.
A panel of experts, comprising Turkish authorities, veteran mountaineers, archaeologists, geologists and members of Hong Kong-based Noah’s Ark Ministries International, also displayed an almost one-metre-long peice of petrified wood before the media and specially invited international experts.
The experts claimed it to be a part of a long structure they had unearthed during their February-August 2007 exploration. “It is for the first time in the history of the Ark search that an exploration team is getting a material evidence and graphic documentation. This makes it not only a the significant breakthrough in the Ark-search, but one that is supported with the most substantial evidence in recent history,” the panel said.
The revelation is expected to open up a fresh chapter in the ongoing debates in the scientific community on the search for Noah’s Ark.
Narrating the genesis of their exploration on Mount Ararat, the mount which has a direct reference in Holy Quran (Mount Judi) and Bible, the panel said the search team had made several foiled attempts before unearthing the evidence at an altitude of 4,500-metres of the estimated 5,165 metre volcanic mountain.
“The structure was discovered in the interiors of an unusual cave. The 11.5m wide and 2.6m high white wooden texture was revealed after removing thick layers of volcanic ash on the cave wall,” panel members said at a press conference.
One of the underlying issues in the search for the Ark is the proper identification of its wood fragments. A petrographic examination carried out by the Applied Geoscience Centre of the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Hong Kong, identified the object as a petrified wooden structure, the panel said.
“Some of the big holes found on the structure indicate the locations where branches used to grow on tree. In places, original holes are partly or completely replaced by individual minerals and crystalline materials that can be found in rock materials,” said Dr Ahmet Ozbek, a panel member, who is also a faculty of Geology Engineering Kahramanmara Suctcu Imam University.
Dismissing the possibilities of the structure being wood that could appear naturally around the discovery site, Professor Oktay Belli, director, Eurasian Archaeology Institute, University of Istanbul, said researches have proved that there was no vegetation on Mount Ararat ever since 2000BC, because of the asperities of Ararat’s climate.
Talking to The Peninsula, Cemalettin Demircioglu, Dogubayazit City Governor, under whose jurisdiction the mount is located, said the civic body will invite more international experts to conduct further scientific studies on Mount Ararat.
“History has more than one times corroborated the legendary evidence that the ark was nestled on Mount Ararat. We will introduce the latest findings to the world and continue the scientific study. All interested scientists and NGOs can join our missions” he said. However, he said, those who are involved in the project must ensure the findings are not used politically, religiously, or for any vested interest.
Located in the Far Eastern Turkey, Ararat is great prize for mountain collectors. Ark sighting has often been reported from this mountain. The observation of Vessel-shaped features in aerial photograph of Ararat had caused a stir in the late 1950’s. However, this is the first time an exploration team is coming out with “material evidence”.
could ... might ... uh huh. It’s unlikely anything survived. They are certainly free to look for whatever they want and I am free to say they’re nuts.
could ... might ... uh huh. It’s unlikely anything survived. They are certainly free to look for whatever they want and I am free to say they’re nuts.
Well, you're saying that the wood won't last. I'm saying that there are examples of where wood and plant material does last and is well-preserved.
The difference between what you're saying and what I'm saying is that with what I'm saying there are actual examples of it, so we know it's true. With what you're saying -- "you're just saying it" ... that's all ... LOL ...
And, of course, you can say whatever you want to -- but here on Free Republic, people generally like to have facts that are backed up by some examples and other kinds of evidence -- and simply not "talking through one's hat" ... doncha know ... :-)
Can’t you read? I said its unlikely. It’s possible you could win 10 million dollars in Vegas but not likely. Wood rots. That is fact. There are always edge cases and of course its possible wood could survive but the probability is so low as to be inconsequential. Have you ever studied probability theory?
Why shouldn’t the wood survive, we are finding blood cells and soft tissue in perfect shape inside dinosaur bones. The truth is, the wood could easily be preserved in that environment. Have you fogotten the petrified forests? Sure, the wood has been replace, but nonetheless, it is there.
Not exactly.
As I said before, you’re dealing with a wood variety grown in very different conditions than what we have now. And mind you, this was wood that was picked by God, in telling Noah how to build the Ark, that was particularly well-suited to what was needed. I can easily envision how God would have instructed Noah to use a wood variety, that was available, pre-flood, which would have been extremely dense and very heavy-duty and this could very easily give it longevity as a secondary result.
It was also covered with some kind of protective material. Today we have wood that is specially preserved (commercially) and designed to last longer. This was something that God gave Noah instructions for, in order to make a sturdy boat that would be extremely strong and sturdy for what was needed (and you can imagine the structural strength that would have been needed in such tumultuous conditions as a world-wide flood [talk about “rogue waves” nowadays, they probably had them five times worse than that during the flood), plus the amount of weight that would have been carried.
I can’t see any reason why you are thinking that it is “likely” to have rotted and disappeard by now, given that it’s pre-flood, it’s of a variety that we know nothing about, grown in pre-flood conditions (like I said, hyperbaric chamber-like and a much denser atmosphere) and that it was covered with some kind of material for protection (obviously for that reason, although it doesn’t state it’s for that reason, but we can surmise it).
It would be “more likely” that it would survive than “less likely” that it would survive... :-)
BUT, as I said up above, there’s a good chance that it would have been disassembled for shelter and other building projects, as those few human beings had to survive in a radically different environment than they had been used to before. That seems to be a greater possibility to me than it rotting. Rotting seems unlikely.
In fact, if it did survive (versus being disassembled), it probably did so, because of the radical conditions of the earth at that time and with the environment trying to reach a new equilibrium and probably a lot of earthquakes and landslides and subsequent “mini-floods” from the remaining trapped bodies of water, leading to it either being covered in sedimentation and/or lost (i.e., “buried”) in several other and future catastrophic events.
The earth would not have been a pleasant place to survive at that time and I can see a lot of volcanic action, lava flows, landslides, mini-regional floods, severe weather and massive plate-tectonic action going on for quite a while afterwards. I would imagine that the Ark was subjected to landslides, mini-floods, sedimentation deposits and earthquakes and uplifts for quite a while.
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