The science of antediluvian plushies

Posted 18 November 2012 by PZ Myers

One creationist claim that's commonly laughed at is this idea that 8 people could build a great big boat, big enough to hold all the 'kinds' of animals, and that those same 8 people were an adequate work force to maintain all those beasts for a year in a confined space on a storm-tossed ark. So the creationists have created a whole pseudoscientific field called baraminology which tries to survey all of taxonomy and throw 99% of it out, so they can reduce the necessary number of animals packed into the boat. Literally, that's all it's really about: inventing new taxonomies with the specific goal of lumping as many as possible, in order to minimize the load on their fantasy boat.

In the past, I've seen them argue that a biblical 'kind' is equivalent to a genus; others have claimed it's the Linnaean family. Now, Dr Jean K. Lightner, Independent Scholar (i.e. retired veterinarian), has taken the next step: a kind is equivalent to an order, roughly. Well, she does kind of chicken out at the Rodentia, the largest and most diverse group of mammals, and decides that those ought to be sorted into families, because otherwise she's reducing the number of animals on the ark too much.

Given the characteristics that unite this order and the controversy in suborder classification, one could argue that the obvious cognitum is at the level of the order. Given my personal observations of squirrels and rats, which usually are placed in different suborders (except on the dual suborder scheme where they are both in Sciurognathi), I find this suggestion appealing. However, for the purposes of this project the order is too high for such a diverse group without considerably more evidence. For this reason the level of the kind will be considered to be at the level of the family.

She needs "more evidence" to be able to squish all of the rodents down to one common ancestor 4,000 years ago! You know, there's no evidence given anywhere in the paper: it's just a series of abbreviated descriptions of each order (or, for the rodents, family). She made this determination by looking at photos on the web. That's it. She comes to the conclusion that only 137 kinds of mammals had to be on Noah's Ark (350, if you count extinct species, which of course she should -- Ken Ham is adamant that all kinds were on the ark).

In this paper 137 kinds have been tentatively identified. If the fossil record is taken into consideration, this number could easily double. Beech (2012) listed terrestrial vertebrate families represented in the fossil record. In the list of mammals 210 to 218 families are not recognized here. This suggests that closer to 350 mammal kinds were on the Ark. The large number of extinct families may be partially from a tendency for paleontologists to be splitters. However, much of it reflects the fact that a large amount of the diversity previously found in mammals has been lost.
In this serious attempt to quantify the kinds represented on the Ark, the numbers which resulted are lower than many had anticipated. Previous work had estimated the genus as the level of the kind, knowing this would significantly overestimate the number, in order to emphasize that the Ark had sufficient room for its intended purpose (Woodmorappe 1996). In discussing the results of this study with other creationists, many are surprised at how incredibly spacious the accommodations on the Ark would have been. In any case, this work is a reminder we have a Creator who cares for His creation and, even in judgment, He provides a way of salvation to those who will trust in Him.

Ah, that spacious ark. "Only" 350 mammals had to be cared for by those 8 custodians, and she hasn't considered the birds and reptiles and amphibians yet. Of course, that's still a lot of poop to shovel…except she seems to have solved that problem, too.

Here's the quality of her scholarship: this is one of her kinds, the greater gliding posum. Look carefully at that photo. Notice anything odd about it?

Maybe you'd like a closer look to be really sure. RationalWiki noticed this peculiarity.

Hmmm. It reminds me of the time we found that Harun Yahya was using photos of fishing lures to illustrate modern insects. What great science!

But it does solve a lot of problems if the ark were stuffed full of plushies! It's also a phenomenal marketing opportunity — the museum will be the gift shop!

207 Comments

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Just curious: does she do any computation or even speculation on the total number of actual animals on the Ark? Some in pairs; some in sevens; some in a large HERD, because something had to supply all the carnivores with prey for long enough to allow the minimum ark pairs to proliferate to the point where a whole "baramin" couldn't be extinguished by a single act of predation.

Actually, there would need to many different herds or flocks or whatever of carnivore fodder, since ferrets and owls aren't going to have much luck bringing down elk; and crocodiles and tigers aren't going to make it on mice.

Gary_Hurd · 18 November 2012

That is great. I needed a good laugh today.

I wonder how she well account for "clean" versus "unclean" kinds. Noah had to collect 14 of the clean ones.

Gary_Hurd · 18 November 2012

Bob, according to Answers in Genesis brand of creationists, there was no meant eating until after the flood was over.

DS · 18 November 2012

How about the order Coleoptera? Did she consider insects at all? I guess she just figured that they are small enough so it isn't a problem for the magical ark. Man, over half a million species evolved in just four thousand years! Great.

What about the dinosaurs? Are they a kind? Were they on the magic ark? DId they get left behind? Or did god save them just to wipe them out later?

Man I wish I could claim that my biased opinions are "evidence". I could certainly publish a lot more.

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Gary_Hurd said: Bob, according to Answers in Genesis brand of creationists, there was no meant eating until after the flood was over.

That's what I'm getting at: even after leaving the ark, after the flood, how large a herd of antelope, say, would you have to have to keep lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, cougars, jaguars, wolves, hyenas, crocodiles, alligators, pythons, anacondas (and if dinosaurs were arked, tyrannosaurs, ceratosaurs, raptors, etc.) and all other large predators, both currently living and extinct, adequately fed without running out of prey before the prey can proliferate?

DS · 18 November 2012

Just Bob said:
Gary_Hurd said: Bob, according to Answers in Genesis brand of creationists, there was no meant eating until after the flood was over.
That's what I'm getting at: even after leaving the ark, after the flood, how large a herd of antelope, say, would you have to have to keep lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, cougars, jaguars, wolves, hyenas, crocodiles, alligators, pythons, anacondas (and if dinosaurs were arked, tyrannosaurs, ceratosaurs, raptors, etc.) and all other large predators, both currently living and extinct, adequately fed without running out of prey before the prey can proliferate?

It's even worse than that. Remember, all terrestrial plants are also wiped out, so nothing for herbivores to eat either. Guess no one thought to take plans on the ark. But they did apparently think clearly enough to take every known parasite and pathogen with them. Smart!

Marty · 18 November 2012

I love the plushie photo.

Since they suggest a common designer as an explanation for genomic similarity, I don't see how they can be sure that 'cognitum', the similar appearance of animals, can allow them to differentiate between kinds.

She says she bases some of her decisions on whether the animals can hybridize. If an embryo can get to the blastocyst stage she counts that as the ability to have hybridized in the past. This allows her to add together some similar-looking animals together as kinds even though they can't actually hybridize. (Of course mutations since the Flood could have added those reproductive barriers to hybridization after the initial post-flood population growth.) But if the designer used a similar design, at what point were the barriers to reproduction put in? If two species do not reproduce because of behavioral differences that inhibit mating, as opposed to differences in fertilization, maybe those were the very barriers the designer intended to differentiate the kinds.

As far as I can tell, the mammalian 137 kinds is a minimum number but doesn't address the idea that all the genera and species within those kinds that do not hybridize could actually be the kinds created by the designer, giving a much larger number. I don't see any discussion of a biblical justification for choosing her hypothetical minimum number, except their concern for getting as few animals on the Ark as possible.

Lightner's essay and Ken Ham's approval of it are interesting because they set a framework for using genomic differences such as pseudogenes as arguments against their position. A common pseudogene between lions and tigers would not be a useful argument since they assume that lions and tigers micro-evolved from the original cat kind pair after the flood. You would need something like a common pseudogene between dogs and cats.
(It also seems like it would limit the types of interesting mammals that they can display in their Noah's Ark park - no lions and tigers both - but I suppose they can use artistic license to get around that if they want to.)

Marty · 18 November 2012

BTW, the photo has been changed. I had downloaded the original essay when it came out, and it does have the plushie photo. But on their website now there is a different photo of that animal.

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Gary_Hurd said: Bob, according to Answers in Genesis brand of creationists, there was no meant eating until after the flood was over.

I thought meat-eating commenced immediately after the Fall. In the Garden tyrannosaurs ate flowers, and black widows used their webs to catch berries, then envenomed them until they quit struggling. Isn't that the creationist boilerplate? Did all the carnivores revert to vegetarianism for the year on the Ark? Or for several year after until there were enough prey animals that they wouldn't go extinct when the tiger had his lunch?

https://me.yahoo.com/a/JxVN0eQFqtmgoY7wC1cZM44ET_iAanxHQmLgYgX_Zhn8#57cad · 18 November 2012

Considering that Noah et al. had no idea how to care for the animals, and they'd have all died, plus all of the other problems, this actually solves a lot of issues.

Just sew up a bunch of animals. It's as good as any creationist/ID "science." If nothing else, you can pretty much prove that the possum in the picture certainly was designed.

Glen Davidson

stevaroni · 18 November 2012

Well, I suspect that individual depicted in this photo can glide very well, having developed the useful adaptation of lightweight fiber filling instead of heavy, liguid-filled, organs.

prongs · 18 November 2012

Just Bob said:
Gary_Hurd said: Bob, according to Answers in Genesis brand of creationists, there was no meat eating until after the flood was over.
That's what I'm getting at: even after leaving the ark, after the flood, how large a herd of antelope, say, would you have to have to keep lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, cougars, jaguars, wolves, hyenas, crocodiles, alligators, pythons, anacondas (and if dinosaurs were arked, tyrannosaurs, ceratosaurs, raptors, etc.) and all other large predators, both currently living and extinct, adequately fed without running out of prey before the prey can proliferate?

Why a miracle, upon a miracle, upon a miracle, of course. All the carnivores simply didn't need to eat until the herbivores replenished. The herbivores didn't need to eat plants until the plants replenished. Don't you know anything?

stevaroni · 18 November 2012

DS said: How about the order Coleoptera?

Forget that, how about the order Cestoda,our friends the parasitic flatworms? Well, on the plus side, I suppose at least Noah and family had readily available vessels for transporting and feeding those....

Marty · 18 November 2012

I think she used 'cognita' and possible hybridization in grouping familiar animals like cats or pigs, but for the less familiar small families she went with standard taxonomy. I wish there were some interesting example in her essay of where she chose a\ to create a baramin based on cognitum that was wildly different from taxonomy. Maybe there are; I didn't read most of it. But it seems that she stays as close to standard taxonomy as she can, while creating her Ark-friendly kinds.

harold · 18 November 2012

Remember, all terrestrial plants are also wiped out, so nothing for herbivores to eat either

Also most aquatic life. Aquatic life is mainly adapted to particular levels of salinity. Pushing all freshwater and saltwater life into an environment that's salty, but a fraction as salty as today's oceans, would be devastating.

stevaroni · 18 November 2012

P.Z. Sez ...and that those same 8 people were an adequate work force to maintain all those beasts for a year in a confined space on a storm-tossed ark.

I'm always surprised that while creationists tally up the work of caring for the animals, nobody ever considers the labor involved with maintaining the ark itself. This, to my mind, is clear and convincing evidence that ark advocates do not, as a group, tend to own sailboats. And especially, none of them own old, wooden boats. Modern sailors have the advantage of contemporary materials, power tools, and drydocks as they build and maintain their boats, but even given that wooden sailboats are monstrously labor intensive. The Modern HMS Bounty needed a crew of about 12. Now, granted, the Bounty was a finer vessel, maintained to a higher standard than the rough-hewn and utilitarian ark, which is basically a cargo barge, but the ark has it's own problems. The Bounty was built in a modern shipyard, by men with the advantage of a thousand years of maritime tradition and knowledge behind them. They knew how to build strong boats and had power tools. It's reasonable to assume their frames were solid and their joinery was tight. It's reasonable to assume that the modern fasteners used in the Bounty kept everything together and kept those tight joints from working loose. it's reasonable to assume that the modern coatings and sealants for the most part kept the water out of the hull and protected the wood. And yet Bounty, a modern vessel of proven seaworthiness, still took water, floundered, and sank in Sandy, a very large, but not especially violent, storm. Noah's ark was maybe 10 times heavier and had maybe 5 times as much submerged hull. Noah didn't come from a long line of shipwrights. He had never even seen a large wooden hull because in the year -2000 nobody had seen a large wooden hull. Noah had no power tools, sawmills, silicone sealants, or marine varnish. His joints were cut with copper axes and lashed together with simple rope and sealed with pitch or asphaltum, materials that don't adhere to saturated wood all that well. And he would sail his barge through the worst storm in planetary history. Screw feeding the animals - Noah would have needed a small army of carpenters working around the clock just to stop the rain. The rain inside the ark. And don't even get me started on how hard it is to patch a crack 20 feet below the waterline. Mike Elzinga can probably chime in on damage control drills in the Navy and how difficult it is for 8 young, strong, men using modern materials to control a small hole below the waterline. Imagine fixing a wooden Liberty Ship being tossed in the biggest storm ever when your technology is ropes and rocks and candles in a methane-soaked atmosphere and the average age of your crew is north of 100 years. I suspect that feeding the animals would be the least of their problems.

TomS · 18 November 2012

DS said: How about the order Coleoptera? Did she consider insects at all? I guess she just figured that they are small enough so it isn't a problem for the magical ark. Man, over half a million species evolved in just four thousand years! Great.

Many creationists say that the Bible specifies animals "wherein is the breath of life" were taken on the Ark, and, so they say, that excludes invertebrates. Insects could, they say, be carried on debris. What strikes me is that nowhere do we get a description of what a "kind" is, to justify whether "kinds" are species, genera, families, or orders. They can say whatever they want. They can put cows together with turtles in one kind, or they can put white goats in one kind and spotted goats in another kind, whatever suits their fancy, with no disputing it. There is nothing in the Bible which says that a given animal always belongs to one and only one kind. Does a caterpillar change its kind when it becomes a butterfly? In the Bible, in the time of Abraham, there are distinctions made between sheep and goats, so that seems to indicate that there has been that much differentiation since the Flood. And that much "microevolution" would have taken place in something like 300 years.

ogremk5 · 18 November 2012

I did a post on this a while back ago and how the YECs need evolution to work faster than any biologist thinks it actually works. Here; http://skepticink.com/smilodonsretreat/2012/11/08/creationists-need-faster-evolution-than-evolution/

stevaroni · 18 November 2012

TomS said: Many creationists say that the Bible specifies animals "wherein is the breath of life" were taken on the Ark, and, so they say, that excludes invertebrates. Insects could, they say, be carried on debris.

It's been a while since I had to dissect grasshoppers and earthworms, but I'm pretty sure they "breathe the breath of life" by any reasonable definition. You can easily demonstrate this by putting them in an environment where they can't "breathe" (like, say under an inch of turbid floodwater) and watch just how quickly "life" proceeds to elude them.

Marty · 18 November 2012

stevaroni said:
It's been a while since I had to dissect grasshoppers and earthworms, but I'm pretty sure they "breathe the breath of life" by any reasonable definition.
Genesis 7:22 "All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died." Insects don't have 'nostrils'. That is the rationale. I look forward to Lightner's next essay on the non-mammals. I wish she were doing fish too, but since they didn't go on the Ark I don't think she will. I'd like to know how many fish kinds she'd come up since they're all fish.

Marty · 18 November 2012

sorry, poor formatting

Marty · 18 November 2012

My previous comment should look like this, below (I don't know how to edit or delete on this site):

stevaroni said: It's been a while since I had to dissect grasshoppers and earthworms, but I'm pretty sure they "breathe the breath of life" by any reasonable definition.

Genesis 7:22 “All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died.” Insects don’t have ‘nostrils’. That is the rationale. I look forward to Lightner’s next essay on the non-mammals. I wish she were doing fish too, but since they didn’t go on the Ark I don’t think she will. I’d like to know how many fish kinds she’d come up since they’re all fish.

Flint · 18 November 2012

What I always find fascinating is the effort to rationalize the ark, and the flud, while minimizing the number and scope of miracles. Sure, the flud itself was a miracle, we're told that directly. But all this stuff about logistics, rapid evolution, shipbuilding, etc. ultimately requires an entire library of miracles.

If baraminology is nothing but the effort to keep the population of the ark feasible without miracles, it fails hopelessly because it needs miracles to patch miracles to patch miracles wherever it looks. So why not propose more practical miracles. God could have telescoped whole large clades together to be unrolled later, and then miniaturized them as part of loading them onto a magic boat.

Then after miracling away all that excess water and miracling global geology to look extremely ancient without any flood, God could have taken all these bundles and unrolled them into perfect environments He miracled up on top of all the geology.

Granted, this sequence of miracles would seem to have the disadvantage of leaving not a trace of evidence of the ark or the flud, but when has evidence mattered? Certainly Lightner doesn't worry about such stuff.

Mike Elzinga · 18 November 2012

stevaroni said: I suspect that feeding the animals would be the least of their problems.

Indeed; a fine understatement. Fire aboard a ship, especially a submarine, is a very serious problem that must be contained very quickly. Firefighting is one of the more common drills aboard ship. Sailors, beginning in boot camp, train to fight fires and learn how to walk into them with a fire hose or chemical spray beating down the fire as they go. We never hear from creationists how this safety issue was handled on the ark; with all that methane and bombardier beetles to set it off, even if the animals below deck were not all suffocated first. Ventilation problems in the holds of ships are serious issues not only because of the buildup of explosive gases, but also because of the dangers of suffocation. All ships, large and small, including submarines, have equipment to remove dangerous gases from their holds and from their engine and battery compartments. We had a discussion about this issue of ventilation on another thread a while back. Never mind the issue of lumping “kinds” together to reduce the animal count. If it eats, it defecates. Microbes (how many species of those were on the ark?) generate the flammable gases that their deity should have foreseen. Why don’t we read of the most dramatic kind of fire fighting training required of sailors in preparation for forty days and nights of being tossed around on the ocean? Surely some of those thousands of non-human passengers would have defecated during that entire trauma. And how about the build-up of ammonia? After about a week, a cat litter box needs to be changed just because ammonia starts driving the cats out of the box. What would they do with ammonia in the ark? What happens to ammonia that becomes mixed with water? Did anybody think of all the corrosive problems and wood rot problems that would come with all that urine and manure? Even if the ark could take all that pounding from the billions upon billions of megatons of energy per square mile being dumped on the planet by all that water, imagine all those animals being tossed around, urinating, defecating, and vomiting inside what must have been far worse than a power paint can shaker. What fun!

Richard B. Hoppe · 18 November 2012

ogremk5 said: I did a post on this a while back ago and how the YECs need evolution to work faster than any biologist thinks it actually works. Here; http://skepticink.com/smilodonsretreat/2012/11/08/creationists-need-faster-evolution-than-evolution/

There used to be an audio recording of Kurt Wise speaking at some Bible college in which he said something like in the couple of centuries after the Flud new species were popping up every day. It's no longer on the web, but I downloaded it and it's on the hard disk in an old computer whose motherboard fried. I'm going to have to recover that one of these days.

harold · 18 November 2012

forty days and nights of being tossed around on the ocean?

I've made this mistake before, too. It rained for forty days and forty nights. They were on the ark much longer. In the austere and traditional, but tolerant and humane, non-Southern Baptist church I grew up in, Noah's Ark was treated as a children't story. A rather inappropriate children's story, in retrospect, but no more inappropriate than a vast amount of stuff at the time (1970's) that was considered "children's" because it was too simplistic for adults, or because it was in the form of a comic strip, or even simply because children seemed to be interested in it. The drowning sinners aspect was brushed over and the image of a grandfatherly Noah with animals was emphasized*. An adult who thought the story was literally true would have been treated with kindness as a simpleton. I don't recall ever thinking it was literally true. It isn't written as if it were intended to be interpreted literally. *It was usually presented in bowdlerized "Bible stories", but children were permitted to read the actual KJV Bible if they wanted, even though that was actually recognized as containing "adult" themes. I don't want to get into the endless battle of who reads creationist minds best, but I do doubt the sincerity of "literal Noah's Ark" believers. Well, maybe not all believers. But for the most part, it seems as if they protest too much.

Henry J · 18 November 2012

Slogan for the Ark: No kind left behind! --- As for clean vs unclean - hey, just give the unclean ones a bath (maybe a shower?), then they'll all be clean! --- But to be slightly more serious for a moment, why would "kind" have to mean a particular rank of biological classification? After all, the rank associated with any given clade is really for the convenience of those doing the classifying, i.e., it's a subjective judgment. ---

Pushing all freshwater and saltwater life into an environment that’s salty, but a fraction as salty as today’s oceans, would be devastating.

Not to mention dependencies on having a sea floor close enough to the surface to get light and oxygen, and without the added pressure of being under kilometers of water. ---

Screw feeding the animals - Noah would have needed a small army of carpenters working around the clock just to stop the rain. The rain inside the ark.

Maybe he had carpenter ants? ---

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

prongs said: Why a miracle, upon a miracle, upon a miracle, of course. All the carnivores simply didn't need to eat until the herbivores replenished. The herbivores didn't need to eat plants until the plants replenished. Don't you know anything?

But if we can pile up multiple layers of miracles, then I have to wonder why Yah needed a flood and an ark, anyway. Why didn't he just miracle away all the evil people, and leave the animals and innocent children alone? And how well did that flood work in teaching humanity not to displease Yah? The god of Genesis is severely limited in omniscience, omnipotence, imagination, and apparently intelligence.

Marty · 18 November 2012

Henry J said: But to be slightly more serious for a moment, why would "kind" have to mean a particular rank of biological classification? After all, the rank associated with any given clade is really for the convenience of those doing the classifying, i.e., it's a subjective judgment.

I haven't seen an explanation for why 'kind' has to be above the species level. In normal usage, 'kind' would just mean each type of animal, not some special larger classification.

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Mike Elzinga said: ...forty days and nights of being tossed around on the ocean? Surely some of those thousands of non-human passengers would have defecated during that entire trauma.

Yo, Mike. Forty days was just the shake-down cruise. They were trapped in that stinking deathtrap for damn near a year before they walked down the gangplank into a world that had been submerged in brackish water for a year. Think about how suitable for farming land would be that had lain under a flood devastating enough to lay down the whole geologic column, for a whole year.

Henry J · 18 November 2012

But where did that dove (or was it a pigeon?) find that leaf that it came back with?

Mike Elzinga · 18 November 2012

An adult who thought the story was literally true would have been treated with kindness as a simpleton.

It’s hard to imagine treating simpleton, Ken Ham, with kindness. He apparently really believes it to the point of making his living by it.

Yo, Mike. Forty days was just the shake-down cruise. They were trapped in that stinking deathtrap for damn near a year before they walked down the gangplank into a world that had been submerged in brackish water for a year.

Yeah, I keep remembering the 40 days as being associated with the rate of accumulation of all that water. Dumping that much water in a period of 40 days is far more energy than is required to vaporize all life on the planet. Then it takes something like a year to drain away to where? Is all that water still inside the earth somewhere? The fact that these simpletons put so much effort into trying to make the story work - either by changing the definition of “kinds” or by some other “explanatory fantasy” – makes one wonder if they have ever experienced anything in real life. How do these people find a toilet? Have they ever had to clean a house, or barn? Do they do anything but sit around dreaming up fairy tales? Can they walk? How do they survive? Who feeds them? What if they fall down and get a bruise or a cut or a scrape? Do they just lie there and die?

Flint · 18 November 2012

The fact that these simpletons put so much effort into trying to make the story work - either by changing the definition of “kinds” or by some other “explanatory fantasy” – makes one wonder if they have ever experienced anything in real life.

Well, proximately, god SAID it happened, therefore it happened. So the task is to figure out how He did it. The FACT that He did it is not on the table for discussion. I imagine it's frustrating for Believers that the entire tale is so thoroughly preposterous that each absurdity must be rationalized away individually, and ramifications and interactions of the absurdities must be carefully NOT thought about. But more abstractly, what I can't understand is the NEED to take such fables literally. How is it possible for a sane individual to invest so much of his identity in fairy tales that he not only can't see the obvious, he spends significant chunks of his life squaring the theological circles. What could possibly be driving such an idiotic fixation? The human mind seems to have some serious bugs, some sort of authoritarian quicksand.

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Nah, they save all the fantastic, fairy-tale stupidity for their religion. If they applied that level of idiocy to their daily lives, they would be dead. But then there are the rare few who REALLY believe all the bullshit, and try to pray away cancer, or a hurricane. Or they play with rattlesnakes, or drink strychnine. They sometimes really do end up dead. Or their kids.

harold · 18 November 2012

The best explanation for the flood story, of course, is that it is a story that recalls and rationalizes a real regional flood, and reassures that humans can somehow control whether there will be such a flood (even though they really can't).

"God wanted to punish people so he sent a global flood" makes no sense.

"There was a terrible flood in the part of the earth we know about, it traumatized us, so we made up a story that a judging god did it in order to explain it" is what happened.

It was flood first, must have been an angry god second, not angry god first, flood second.

DavidK · 18 November 2012

Per Duane Gish ("Those Mysterious Dinsaurs") provided some definitive answers for us:

* The invisible water vapor canopy kept the earth's temperature constant, everywhere, and no UV rays to harm anyone or anything.

* Two of every kind, but 7 of the clean ones, and after the flood one of each of the clean ones was sacrificed for food. [But "Since the people could eat only clean animals, the extra animals would also provide food for the people," per Gish, a claim that makes absolutely no sense.]

* Though most sea creatures died, enough were preserved to multiply, but they weren't on the Ark.

* Noah didn't know rain, since it had never rained on the earth, so rain was a surprise to him.

* Loading animals was safe as God muted their natural hunting instincts, 40,000 of them according to Gish, but only young'uns so they wouldn't take up much space.

* Animals were in stalls, and after an initial brunch, all were put into hibernation (kept the rabbit population down), for 371 days.

* After landing, animals regained their natural hunting instincts, eating each other, plants died (from UV rays), etc.

* Sorry, definitely no meteor to kill off the dinosaurs.

Throughout this little book Gish frequently inserts many "perhaps" as he has absolutely no clue about the whole thing.

Henry J · 18 November 2012

What's all that stuff about "clean" and "unclean" animals, anyway - why couldn't they just give the unclean ones a bath, then they'd be clean?

Or am I missing something? :p

ksplawn · 18 November 2012

DavidK said: Per Duane Gish ("Those Mysterious Dinsaurs") provided some definitive answers for us:

It wasn't until just a few years ago that I realized this is a book I had read on my own in first grade (in a Presbyterian private school; went to public school the following year). I recognized it only after seeing a scan from one of the illustrations where two dinosaurs were in a tussle and one of them was roasting the other with fire breath.

Rando · 18 November 2012

Henry J said: What's all that stuff about "clean" and "unclean" animals, anyway - why couldn't they just give the unclean ones a bath, then they'd be clean? Or am I missing something? :p

Oh you're not missing anything. "Clean" and "Unclean" usually means a lot of things, sometimes it meant sin free, other times it meant disease free, and yes, it even meant something was just dirty and needed to be cleaned. What I find weirdest is God never actually tells us what he means by "clean" or "unclean" until he explained to Moses almost two thousand years after the flood.

Just Bob · 18 November 2012

Rando said: What I find weirdest is God never actually tells us what he means by "clean" or "unclean" until he explained to Moses almost two thousand years after the flood.

Right, so how did Noah know which were clean? If god informed him, why isn't that in the story, and why wasn't that vital knowledge preserved so that god wouldn't have to spell it all out all over again a thousand years later to Moses?

Rando · 19 November 2012

Just Bob said:
Rando said: What I find weirdest is God never actually tells us what he means by "clean" or "unclean" until he explained to Moses almost two thousand years after the flood.
Right, so how did Noah know which were clean? If god informed him, why isn't that in the story, and why wasn't that vital knowledge preserved so that god wouldn't have to spell it all out all over again a thousand years later to Moses?

That's a good question, and in all honesty, I have no clue. Hey, Harold! Lets add this one to your list. "How did Noah know which animals were clean and unclean when God never explained the difference till one thousand years later?" Moving on... I have seen this gap in knowledge abused. Now it was either AIG or ICR that said it, but according to one of these outfits, "unclean" animals were actually mutts of the "clean" kind. Apparently mutts are actually an amalgamated mish mash of genetic material and it was because the "unclean" mutts possessed so much extra genetic material that animals were able to diversify so quickly. Now I have no idea why this blending of genetic information to produce new species is not new information, but they just put this under a form of microevolution and call it a day. Don't ask for specifics, cause honestly, it boggles the mind how this works. I tried to get specifics but after some questioning I was swiftly blocked. AIG and ICR both have me on their respective shit lists.

TomS · 19 November 2012

Rando said: Oh you're not missing anything. "Clean" and "Unclean" usually means a lot of things, sometimes it meant sin free, other times it meant disease free, and yes, it even meant something was just dirty and needed to be cleaned. What I find weirdest is God never actually tells us what he means by "clean" or "unclean" until he explained to Moses almost two thousand years after the flood.

Thanks for bringing up "diseased" and "dirty" (and, I would add, "injured" as well as other imperfections), for this suggests that "kind" is not like anything in modern taxonomy. "Cleanness" and "uncleanness" is not always inherited, and an animal can become unclean by something that happens to it. The YEC-Arkeology narratives bear gross anachronisms, concepts that have only developed in the last few centuries of taxonomy and genetics. Remember that people in Biblical times accepted spontaneous generation as a matter of course (see, for example, the plagues of Egypt in Exodus - the frogs and flies came from somewhere - and the story of the bees generating in the carcass of the lion in the Samson story). There is a good reason why the ID advocates and others of the creationist bent avoid giving descriptions of what happened and when - the descriptions have to be unbelievable or inconsistent with a "literal" reading of the Bible - or both.

Karen S. · 19 November 2012

Well, if just plushies were on the ark there would be room for one and all, and no messes to clean up.

Reminds me of that glossy creationist book where one of the fish was actually a photo of a lure--LOL!

eric · 19 November 2012

First, love the plushie. Its remarkable these folks think they are doing "research." Surely somewhere in their minds must be the thought "scientists don't just look at pictures on the internet, and maybe I'm not qualified to determine relatedness since I can't distinguish between a plushie and a real animal."

Mike Elzinga said: Dumping that much water in a period of 40 days is far more energy than is required to vaporize all life on the planet.

A quick, back of the envelope calculation tells me that, to overtop Everest, the rainfall during that 40 days would've needed to be approximately 5.5 inches per minute. Not quite firehose amounts, but about 5 times the world record for actual rainfall rates, at least according to this guy. :) Now, that means the water would've already been 30 feet high after an hour. Given standard depictions of the door on the side of the ark, and the fact that according to the bible it started to rain before Noah loaded the animals, that must've mean he got them all in something like 15 minutes. Otherwise, they drown while waiting in line. Maybe the elephants and giraffe can make it 45 minutes (~23 feet of water), but nothing else can. So, add another impossibliity to the record; loading hundreds or thousands of animals onto a boat in a few minutes.

apokryltaros · 19 November 2012

eric said: So, add another impossibliity to the record; loading hundreds or thousands of animals onto a boat in a few minutes.

That's why it requires a magical miracle.

TomS · 19 November 2012

eric said: A quick, back of the envelope calculation tells me that, to overtop Everest, the rainfall during that 40 days would've needed to be approximately 5.5 inches per minute. Not quite firehose amounts, but about 5 times the world record for actual rainfall rates, at least according to this guy. :) Now, that means the water would've already been 30 feet high after an hour. Given standard depictions of the door on the side of the ark, and the fact that according to the bible it started to rain before Noah loaded the animals, that must've mean he got them all in something like 15 minutes. Otherwise, they drown while waiting in line. Maybe the elephants and giraffe can make it 45 minutes (~23 feet of water), but nothing else can. So, add another impossibliity to the record; loading hundreds or thousands of animals onto a boat in a few minutes.

Remember that there are two versions of the Flood story intertwined in the Bible. One of these stories says that the water fell as rain, while another mentions fountains. Also, there are discrepancies in the timing. The animals could have been loaded on board starting before the water started to appear. It does seem that the logistics of the loading (and unloading) would present a problem, but I don't know that it is of the order of magnitude of the other problems. I'd think that one of the problems of logistics would be making sure that the pairs would stay matched. What about making sure that large animals wouldn't step on the smaller ones?

ogremk5 · 19 November 2012

Talking about the shipbuilding reminded me of something. Didn't it take Noah several decades/hundreds of years to build the ark in the first place?

Since he didn't have treated wood, wouldn't the first 'boards' have decayed/dry-rotted/been eaten by termites before the end of the project?

I've got a treated wood deck and I have to reseal it every other year or the boards warp, dry out, and all kinds of stuff like that. Since he had to be doing the joinery by dovetail (he might have had iron nails, but I doubt it, and iron and lots of water would create a whole 'nother set of issues), just the warping from the sun would destroy the integrity of the ark.

If a miracle can fix that, then why bother with anything else? Just say 'miracle' and be done with it.

Dave Luckett · 19 November 2012

ogremk5 said: (Noah) might have had iron nails, but I doubt it, and iron and lots of water would create a whole 'nother set of issues, just the warping from the sun would destroy the integrity of the ark.

The usual date for the Flood from fundamentalist sources puts it at about 4200 BCE. That's in the Neolithic, even in the near East, where the calcolithic - first use of copper - starts about 3600 BCE. Never mind having iron nails and strapping, Noah wouldn't even have had bronze. The Ark was pegged and doweled. And glued, no doubt. Suuuure it was. The Ark is impossible. Any ancient sailor presented with a vessel like that one would have laughed until he cried, until told he had to take it to sea, and then he'd just have cried. Cripes, for the number of miracles required for that sucker to float for more than a day on a still lake, God might as well have whisked Noah, his family and all the animals off to a bubble in space, and sterilised the Earth with Ham's autoclave comet. Less trouble all 'round.

SWT · 19 November 2012

Dave Luckett said:
ogremk5 said: (Noah) might have had iron nails, but I doubt it, and iron and lots of water would create a whole 'nother set of issues, just the warping from the sun would destroy the integrity of the ark.
The usual date for the Flood from fundamentalist sources puts it at about 4200 BCE. That's in the Neolithic, even in the near East, where the calcolithic - first use of copper - starts about 3600 BCE. Never mind having iron nails and strapping, Noah wouldn't even have had bronze. The Ark was pegged and doweled. And glued, no doubt. Suuuure it was. The Ark is impossible. Any ancient sailor presented with a vessel like that one would have laughed until he cried, until told he had to take it to sea, and then he'd just have cried. Cripes, for the number of miracles required for that sucker to float for more than a day on a still lake, God might as well have whisked Noah, his family and all the animals off to a bubble in space, and sterilised the Earth with Ham's autoclave comet. Less trouble all 'round.

I wonder why we never hear from any Raelians on this topic.

eric · 19 November 2012

TomS said: It does seem that the logistics of the loading (and unloading) would present a problem, but I don't know that it is of the order of magnitude of the other problems.

You're right about multiple stories being intermixed. And its just a story, so I dont want to spend too much time having a batman vs superman type of argument. But, putting on my FL hat (yes, of course its foil - why do you ask?), Gen 7:13 says they got on the ark "the very day" the rain started, so I'm assuming that's how we are supposed to read it.

TomS · 19 November 2012

eric said:
TomS said: It does seem that the logistics of the loading (and unloading) would present a problem, but I don't know that it is of the order of magnitude of the other problems.
You're right about multiple stories being intermixed. And its just a story, so I dont want to spend too much time having a batman vs superman type of argument. But, putting on my FL hat (yes, of course its foil - why do you ask?), Gen 7:13 says they got on the ark "the very day" the rain started, so I'm assuming that's how we are supposed to read it.

You're right and I was wrong. Sorry that I missed that. Nice point.

Just Bob · 19 November 2012

And we can't assume the rain fell at a steady rate. When does it ever do that? Maybe it drizzled for 39 days, while animal loading and disposition went on, then the rest of the water, enough to cover the mountaintops, all fell on day 40. Of course that would have imploded the ark and all within and boiled the seas -- but what's a minor physics difficulty to people who willfully abuse the SLOT?

Henry J · 19 November 2012

This whole Ark story should have undergone pier review.

Otherwise, they might miss the boat!

eric · 19 November 2012

Henry J said: This whole Ark story should have undergone pier review. Otherwise, they might miss the boat!

That dovetails nicely with how I sea it. Too bad most of the good journals are flooded with submersions and can't do ship about it.

Just Bob · 19 November 2012

Aaarghh, Mateys! Any more of that and I'll PUNt you over the rail.

Kevin B · 19 November 2012

The term "plushie" is not used in British English - we use "cuddly toy" instead, and for anyone old enough, it's hard not to think of the phrase without also thinking of a long-running game show, the "Generation Game".

This had family teams (usually parent+child) competing against each other, with 4 teams reducing to one over a couple of rounds. The first round usually had the teams trying to copy an expert in some practical task.

Perhaps the story of the Flood is actually a pilot episode. (Bruce Forsyth, the original compere, has been around long enough.) Noah and Shem were competing against Mrs Noah and Japeth, (which explains why Ham subsequently threw a tantrum....) Obviously the losing team's Ark was not up to scratch, which is why the dinosaurs sank. The last round had the last surviving contestant sitting behind a window while prizes trundle past on a conveyor belt. (There was always a cuddly toy....) After the window is closed, the contestant wins every prize he can remember. Noah clearly only got the olive branch.

BTW Is William Lane Craig confused about whether animals feel pain because he can't tell the difference between a real animal and a plushie either?

Just Bob · 19 November 2012

Kevin B said: Noah clearly only got the olive branch.

And some wine grape rootstock. Remember, his first crop was wine, with which he got stinking, passed-out, bare-assed drunk.

Bobsie · 19 November 2012

Here’s a very compelling explanation for the flood that should clear up all this confusion. Check out this depiction of our physical world based on “biblical” science. http://www.ncseprojects.org/image/ancient-hebrew-cosmology You can observe that the Earth floats on the Great Deep like a wood block in your bathtub.

You can demonstrate how the flood actually happened by pushing down on the block. Notice how the bath water quickly covers the entire top surface of the block to any depth you like without any rain from above. Also notice the depicted “windows” of heaven in the firmament holding all the waters above which when opened produces all our rain.

Now you know where the water came from and where it went. If you don’t believe me, this is all documented in the first few chapters of the word for word literal truth and inerrant Book of Genesis.

Rando · 19 November 2012

Bobsie said: Here’s a very compelling explanation for the flood that should clear up all this confusion. Check out this depiction of our physical world based on “biblical” science. http://www.ncseprojects.org/image/ancient-hebrew-cosmology You can observe that the Earth floats on the Great Deep like a wood block in your bathtub. You can demonstrate how the flood actually happened by pushing down on the block. Notice how the bath water quickly covers the entire top surface of the block to any depth you like without any rain from above. Also notice the depicted “windows” of heaven in the firmament holding all the waters above which when opened produces all our rain. Now you know where the water came from and where it went. If you don’t believe me, this is all documented in the first few chapters of the word for word literal truth and inerrant Book of Genesis.

Are you suggesting that the world is, bum bum bum (dramatic Reverb), flat?

DavidK · 19 November 2012

Regarding the building an the Ark replica, let's not forget the Dutch replica recently completed, though the builder cheated in its structural components:

http://sensuouscurmudgeon.wordpress.com/2012/07/30/hey-ken-ham-a-dutchman-builds-noahs-ark/

For a discussion regarding clean/unclean animals, I refer you to a book by Marvin Harris, "The Sacred Cow and the Abominable Pig" wherein he gives in Chapter 4 a very nice discussion as to the crazies surrounding what is clean/unclean and why.

And for those who might ask why Noah's wife or his son's wives are not named, in fact why there are very few woman who are accorded the honor of being named in the Bible it's because the Bible, as we all know, is a male-dominated patriarchal document written by males. Females were the property of males, to be given for a price, sold as slaves, even offered as prostitutes or as rape victims depending on the situation. See "God and Sex" by Michael Coogan.

Bobsie · 19 November 2012

Rando said:Are you suggesting that the world is, bum bum bum (dramatic Reverb), flat?

Of course not, wrinkled maybe but certainly not flat. You can tell that by just looking at the accurate depiction. Now with respect to food and excrement. The hypothesis is that God miraculously suspended all metabolism and infused all with a constant measure of energy. Thus everyone remained satiated throughout the journey and never needed to defecate or urinate. The few hands on deck could then focus their attention on keeping the Art trimmed and afloat. All you need to prove this hypothesis is reference a miracle which BTW, is a very common attribute for any supernatural.

Mike Elzinga · 19 November 2012

It doesn’t matter how one tries to rationalize the story of the ark; every attempt produces such ludicrous physics issues that even high school physics students can see the problems.

This brings up the issues that all ID/creationists have; including every one of their dear leaders. None of them has a science education that would pass 8th grade science; and they don’t seem to notice. Physics, chemistry, biology? Forget it; they just don’t give a damn.

All one has to do to verify this is look at the websites such as AiG, Uncommonly Dense, or the ICR. They simply make up crap as they go. Every “theory” of ID/creationism is founded on fundamental misconceptions and misrepresentations of science at even the most elementary level. None of the denizens of these sites wants to know anything about science because they apparently think that, by remaining ignorant of the science, all their pseudoscientific arguments are valid alternatives.

“Prove me wrong,” they taunt; knowing full well that no scientific argument can possibly do that because they simply assert that scientists are wrong and don’t understand science. By not knowing any science, all scientific evidence and theory are simply opinions to them; and they want to keep it that way. That’s why it is futile to “debate” an IDiot.

Just look at how Jason Lisle, “PhD” mangles physics. Just toss terms around rapidly and glibly, and all is solved; therefore the bible is true!

Snake oil. It’s enough to make a maggot gag.

Robert Byers · 19 November 2012

Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems.
Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping.
I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work.
Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story.

What a kIND is has not been determined.
The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity.
I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc.
There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc.
These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent.

By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.

Rando · 19 November 2012

Robert Byers said: Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems. Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping. I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work. Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark. Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story. What a kIND is has not been determined. The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity. I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc. There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc. These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent. By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.

If you DON'T know what a kind is then how precisely are we to determine which animals belong to the same "kinds?" I'm all ears, this should be fun.

MichaelJ · 19 November 2012

eric said: A quick, back of the envelope calculation tells me that, to overtop Everest, the rainfall during that 40 days would've needed to be approximately 5.5 inches per minute. Not quite firehose amounts, but about 5 times the world record for actual rainfall rates, at least according to this guy. :) Now, that means the water would've already been 30 feet high after an hour. Given standard depictions of the door on the side of the ark, and the fact that according to the bible it started to rain before Noah loaded the animals, that must've mean he got them all in something like 15 minutes. Otherwise, they drown while waiting in line. Maybe the elephants and giraffe can make it 45 minutes (~23 feet of water), but nothing else can. So, add another impossibliity to the record; loading hundreds or thousands of animals onto a boat in a few minutes.

I've heard some creationists say that the world was flatter before the flood, so a lot less water would be needed. Of course now you have the problem that nobody mentions the earthquakes caused by the floods.

Rando · 19 November 2012

MichaelJ said:
eric said: A quick, back of the envelope calculation tells me that, to overtop Everest, the rainfall during that 40 days would've needed to be approximately 5.5 inches per minute. Not quite firehose amounts, but about 5 times the world record for actual rainfall rates, at least according to this guy. :) Now, that means the water would've already been 30 feet high after an hour. Given standard depictions of the door on the side of the ark, and the fact that according to the bible it started to rain before Noah loaded the animals, that must've mean he got them all in something like 15 minutes. Otherwise, they drown while waiting in line. Maybe the elephants and giraffe can make it 45 minutes (~23 feet of water), but nothing else can. So, add another impossibliity to the record; loading hundreds or thousands of animals onto a boat in a few minutes.
I've heard some creationists say that the world was flatter before the flood, so a lot less water would be needed. Of course now you have the problem that nobody mentions the earthquakes caused by the floods.

If you've ever read Walt Brown's stupid book that exactly the way the world had to be. Literally a flat earth with no mountains or hills.

John_S · 19 November 2012

The problem facing creationists playing this game is how to allow enough evolution to account for bears, cats, seals and dogs, or mice and bats having a common ancestor without admitting that humans and chimps must have one, too.

And how did Noah know the difference between "clean" and "unclean" animals when God supposedly didn't define the difference until He gave the rules to Moses a thousand years later, as explained in Leviticus?

MichaelJ · 19 November 2012

Byers as usual popping to make a single point and ignoring all of the other posts that show why belief in a world wide flood is ridiculous.

alicejohn · 19 November 2012

For those confused by the creationist "discussions", I refer them to the bumper sticker:

The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it.

What else do you need to know?? Frankly, I don't understand why creationist even try to look for evidence or try to make sense of the science. Isn't the act of looking or trying to rationalize it a weakness of faith?? If they have faith, what are they looking for??? If they have faith, what are they trying to rationalize?

DavidK · 19 November 2012

MichaelJ said: ... I've heard some creationists say that the world was flatter before the flood, so a lot less water would be needed. Of course now you have the problem that nobody mentions the earthquakes caused by the floods.

Well, there it is, that finally explains the puzzle of what is meant by the four corners of the earth if the earth was flatter. Luckily, though, the Ark didn't fall off the edge.

Henry J · 19 November 2012

Remember that there are two versions of the Flood story intertwined in the Bible. One of these stories says that the water fell as rain, while another mentions fountains. Also, there are discrepancies in the timing.

Not to mention the additional version presented in the movie Evan Almighty.

apokryltaros · 20 November 2012

John_S said: The problem facing creationists playing this game is how to allow enough evolution to account for bears, cats, seals and dogs, or mice and bats having a common ancestor without admitting that humans and chimps must have one, too. And how did Noah know the difference between "clean" and "unclean" animals when God supposedly didn't define the difference until He gave the rules to Moses a thousand years later, as explained in Leviticus?

Through magic, of course.

TomS · 20 November 2012

alicejohn said: For those confused by the creationist "discussions", I refer them to the bumper sticker: The Bible says it, I believe it, and that settles it. What else do you need to know?? Frankly, I don't understand why creationist even try to look for evidence or try to make sense of the science. Isn't the act of looking or trying to rationalize it a weakness of faith?? If they have faith, what are they looking for??? If they have faith, what are they trying to rationalize?

One of the problems that they avoid is that there is enough that the Bible clearly says, but which is contrary to modern science, and about which the creationists (mostly) agree with modern science. An example being geocentrism. Up until the rise of modern science, everybody agreed that the Bible said that the Sun orbited a fixed Earth. Today most YECs accept the judgment of modern science over the plain reading of the Bible. They may claim that they have discovered the true meaning of the Bible, but it is obvious that they have arrived at that true meaning because of the findings of modern science. They choose to let the findings of modern science influence what they take to be the true meaning of the Bible only selectively. If they don't like being related to monkeys, but they don't get upset about orbiting the Sun, then that's what they will find in the Bible.

ogremk5 · 20 November 2012

Mike: And don't forget that it would require a monumental teaching effort just to bring creationists up to the level of merely wrong.

Whomever was talking about the Bible being from a Patriarchal society: This is very, very true. Which makes the attempt to reconcile the differing genealogies of Jesus in the gospels by claiming one of them is Mary's just absurd, but anything to try and save their precious.

alicejohn: Because creationism is an attempt to return the Bible to the classroom. It's not to try and learn about how the world works or explain the implications of the religion for our lives. It is 100% an attempt to put Bible studies back in the US public education system.

KlausH · 20 November 2012

Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.

Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.

KlausH · 20 November 2012

KlausH said:
Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Oh, and I thought the bible classified bats as birds. Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.

ogremk5 · 20 November 2012

It's OK Klaus, Byers thinks that Tasmanian Wolves are more closely related to canids than to marsupials (apparently because it is named "wolf").

His knowledge of biology is roughly equivalent to his knowledge of politics... that is zero.

KlausH · 20 November 2012

I hate the way this formatting works, at least on Chrome. :P

Prometheus68 · 20 November 2012

I just checked out Lightner's article and observed that the plushie picture (Figure 18) appears to have been replaced with that of a real animal. Still, the original figure speaks volumes about the peer review process of this "journal".

DS · 20 November 2012

booby spewed:

"What a kIND is has not been determined."

Tell that to the dipSTick who is trying to claim that it has.

Ron Bear · 20 November 2012

Dave Luckett,

Though I realize that accusing you of making a math error with respect to the flood is very similar to pointing out a math error in determining whether Batman could defeat the Hulk, I think you made a math error. I have never seen the 4200 BCE date for the flood. I have frequently seen a date of 4004 BCE for the entire world (Usher). The flood was supposedly roughly 1300 years prior to Solomon’s temple so roughly 2200 BCE. So I think when you said 4200 BCE you meant 4200 years ago or about 2200 BCE. I also think that the flood story was written about 500 BCE after the Israelis learned the Gilgamesh flood story. Other “ancient” stories written down about that time include nations and peoples that were in existence during the time of the writings but weren’t in existence at the times they purport to document. For instance Isaac and Abraham each met the King of the Philistines in roughly 2000 BCE even though there were no Philistines until roughly 1200 BCE. So I think it is obvious that the biblical fiction writers had a very naïve view that things had always been approximately the same as what they were currently experiencing. Therefore irrespective of 2200 BCE or 4200 BCE the authors were picturing that Noah had iron nails and Philistines. Doesn’t everybody?

corbsj · 20 November 2012

I don't speak German, but Ham's ark appears to have already been built and it's floating too!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZlwr8S1tX4

Note at 0.30 it has also solved the problem with plushies.

The bit at 4:45 is just scary, if anyone knows German, should the authorities be called?

Mike Elzinga · 20 November 2012

The BBC tells the story that might have been behind the Epic of Gilgamesh, and subsequently Noah’s Flood.

apokryltaros · 20 November 2012

KlausH said:
Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.

Actually, due to further genomic sequencing, bats are now considered to be the sister group of carnivorans + pangolins + even and odd-toed ungulates (and whales). True shrews (and moles and hedgehogs) are, in turn, considered to be the sister-taxon of bats + Fereuungulata, forming the taxon "Laurasiatheria" So, technically, it's incorrect to imply that bats are "flying shrews," as well.

apokryltaros · 20 November 2012

KlausH said:
Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.

Also, rodents (together with rabbits) are more closely related to humans than they are to either bats or shrews (unless we're talking about tree shrews, which are much more closely related to humans than rodents are)

Mike Elzinga · 20 November 2012

Here is a little back-of-the-envelope calculation of the energy deposited onto the Earth’s surface due to the Flood.

If the water covered Mt. Everest (8848 meters above sea level), the total mass of water is the area of the Earth multiplied by the mass density of water multiplied by the height of Mt. Everest. That works out to be 4.5 x 10²¹ kg.

If that water all fell from outer space, the total energy deposited was 2.8 x 10²⁹ joules.

If it was deposited evenly over the surface of the Earth over a period of 40 days, that works out to 1.6 x 10⁸ joules per second per square meter.

That works out to be 383 megatons of TNT each second for every square meter of the Earth’s surface (a megaton of TNT is 4.18 x 10⁵ joules).

The total mass of water is far, far greater than the mass of the meteor the wiped out the dinosaurs. It is hard to imagine how that water would “trickle” down from space over a period of 40 days. That would more likely be a frozen mass that would come down in a large lump in a few seconds. The rate of energy deposition would then be far greater (2.8 x 10²⁹ joules in a couple of seconds.).

Mike Elzinga · 20 November 2012

In case anyone wants to argue that the water came from inside the Earth, consider that volume of water stored evenly within the lithosphere. The layer of water would have to be more than 8848 meters thick since it is now at a smaller radius than when it is at the surface; and it would have to be far enough down into the lithosphere to be at temperatures above 250 degrees Celsius. If it were not distributed evenly, it would have to be in pockets that reached down closer to the Earth’s mantle where temperatures are approaching 1000 degrees Celsius.

Think of all that superheated steam, emerging from vents, and depositing its energy in the environment in order to condense into the liquid water that covers the entire Earth to the depth of Mt. Everest. How did the ark survive all this superheated steam pouring into the environment over a period of 40 days?

See how easy it is to use simple high school level science to refute the Flood story?

apokryltaros · 20 November 2012

Mike Elzinga said: See how easy it is to use simple high school level science to refute the Flood story?

Which is exactly why Creationists work with their political cronies to destroy education in order to turn children into Science-Hating Idiots For Jesus.

Robert Byers · 20 November 2012

Rando said:
Robert Byers said: Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems. Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping. I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work. Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark. Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story. What a kIND is has not been determined. The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity. I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc. There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc. These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent. By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.
If you DON'T know what a kind is then how precisely are we to determine which animals belong to the same "kinds?" I'm all ears, this should be fun.

KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc. The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.

Robert Byers · 21 November 2012

John_S said: The problem facing creationists playing this game is how to allow enough evolution to account for bears, cats, seals and dogs, or mice and bats having a common ancestor without admitting that humans and chimps must have one, too. And how did Noah know the difference between "clean" and "unclean" animals when God supposedly didn't define the difference until He gave the rules to Moses a thousand years later, as explained in Leviticus?

The bible didn't say God didn't define it or perhaps only clean creatures lived with mankind. The unclean being too extremely dangerous. So after the flood a dread was put into creatures in order to protect mankind. The man/ape thing is unique because we are unique. We were made in GODS image and then given the best type of body on earth for fun and profit. We are not a KINd as we do not have our own body type. We are just in a apes body type. Not by reproduction but separate creation.

Robert Byers · 21 November 2012

KlausH said:
Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.

Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats. I lump marsupials with placentals! To each his own lump!

Rando · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said:
Rando said:
Robert Byers said: Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems. Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping. I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work. Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark. Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story. What a kIND is has not been determined. The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity. I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc. There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc. These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent. By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.
If you DON'T know what a kind is then how precisely are we to determine which animals belong to the same "kinds?" I'm all ears, this should be fun.
KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc. The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.

You know, I was warned! I did not heed said warning, and this is my reward. I wanted to know how you would define a set of criteria to explain how to sort by a "kind". I did not get that answer, I didn't even get a coherent answer. What I got was a bunch of words strung together, so you can sound intelligent. Let me say this in an appropriate fashion, "what you just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point, in your rambling incoherent response, were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may god have mercy on your soul." Thank you Billy Madison.

ksplawn · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said: KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc.

Yeah, all those silly similarities and differences! What kind of way is that to categorize things?

The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.

Actually there may be even less of a connection between a T. rex and an Apatosaurus than between a giraffe and a rhino.

Robert Byers said: Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats. I lump marsupials with placentals! To each his own lump!

What criteria are you using for your lumping? How does your lumping perform against alternatives? What was unsatisfactory about the others?

stevaroni · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said: The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.

Ummm.... I always have to be careful when I try to translate from Troll, but apparently this means that dinosaurs weren't all of one kind and therefore Noah had to have several kinds of large dinosaur on the ark? And this somehow makes more sense because....???

apokryltaros · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said:
KlausH said:
Robert Byers said: Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark.
Bats are not rodents by any stretch of the imagination! They are highly derived insectivores, much more closely related to humans than rats.
Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats. I lump marsupials with placentals! To each his own lump!

Robert Byers, why do you refuse to tell us why we should trust your judgement on these matters when you demonstrate that you are an idiot who despises the very concepts of science and education?

apokryltaros · 21 November 2012

stevaroni said:
Robert Byers said: The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.
Ummm.... I always have to be careful when I try to translate from Troll, but apparently this means that dinosaurs weren't all of one kind and therefore Noah had to have several kinds of large dinosaur on the ark? And this somehow makes more sense because....???

According to Robert Byers The Idiot For Jesus, it makes more sense because he pulled his inanity out of his ass For Jesus, while all those stupid, evil, Jesus-hating scientists who don't know anything didn't pull anything out of their asses For Jesus. Therefore, Robert Byers makes more sense because JESUS.

DS · 21 November 2012

Rando said:
Robert Byers said:
Rando said:
Robert Byers said: Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems. Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping. I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work. Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark. Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story. What a kIND is has not been determined. The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity. I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc. There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc. These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent. By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.
If you DON'T know what a kind is then how precisely are we to determine which animals belong to the same "kinds?" I'm all ears, this should be fun.
KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc. The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.
You know, I was warned! I did not heed said warning, and this is my reward. I wanted to know how you would define a set of criteria to explain how to sort by a "kind". I did not get that answer, I didn't even get a coherent answer. What I got was a bunch of words strung together, so you can sound intelligent. Let me say this in an appropriate fashion, "what you just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point, in your rambling incoherent response, were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may god have mercy on your soul." Thank you Billy Madison.

Sorry Rondo, that's the best you can expect form a creationist who thinks the earth is six thousand years old. Robert just likes to spout nonsense to make himself feel good. He doesn't know or care that he is bat shit insane. He doesn't know or care that everyone is just laughing at him. He just keeps spouting nonsense. If you try to reason with him or get him to examine the evidence, or even explain his fevered mutterings, you won't get a coherent answer. Don't matter to him, he's only here to confuse and irritate. Make fun of him or ignore him, those are the only rational options, since he apparently cannot be banned.

Karen S. · 21 November 2012

Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats.

Gee, I think you lumped bats and rats together because they rhyme. (Too bad Noah didn't know about English)

Paul Burnett · 21 November 2012

Karen S. said: (Too bad Noah didn't know about English)

This reminds me of the fundagelical school board member who said the schools don't need to teach any furrin languages since English was good enough for Jesus.

W. H. Heydt · 21 November 2012

Paul Burnett said:
Karen S. said: (Too bad Noah didn't know about English)
This reminds me of the fundagelical school board member who said the schools don't need to teach any furrin languages since English was good enough for Jesus.

There is a classic joke about the Little Old Lady who says that if the King James Version of the Bible was good enough for the Apostles, then it's good enough for her. Byers shows a similar grasp of reality.

Karen S. · 21 November 2012

There is a classic joke about the Little Old Lady who says that if the King James Version of the Bible was good enough for the Apostles, then it’s good enough for her.

Ah, I do love King James Onlyism. Since the KJV floated down from heaven, there is no need for all that skollership!

gnome de net · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said:What a kIND is has not been determined.

Robert, you're too modest because...

Robert Byers also said:To each his own lump!

...you knew all along that a kIND — a method of lumping together groups of animals — is anything that a person wants it to be, whether for convenience or just because it makes a person feel good. Therefore, can we lump T. Rex, elephants and whales as a big Kind; shrews, hummingbirds and tarantulas as a small Kind; birds, bats and butterflies as a flying Kind; and dogs and cats as a Kind we like to have around the house?

gnome de net · 21 November 2012

Oops! Scratch the hummingbirds 'cause we can't have the same animal lumped in different Kinds. Make them tree frogs instead.

Rando · 21 November 2012

DS said:
Rando said:
Robert Byers said:
Rando said:
Robert Byers said: Yes there is a need to lump creatures more so then has been done. In fact I push my fellow YEC creationists to do more lumping and reject old school classification systems. Genesis prompts this but close study ealily overthrows the old lumping. I don't know this creationist women but she is right on in this work. Yes all rodents(including bats) are from a single pair off the ark. Once one accepts biological mechanisms to allow amazonian diversity and right quick, its a small step to reduce everyone into more managable kinds for the truth of the ark story. What a kIND is has not been determined. The biblical example is the snake kind. Just one kind but today fantastic diversity. I lump bears and dogs together and others like seals etc. There also should be a end of these old ideas of mammals or reptiles or dinosaurs etc. These are divisions that don't exist in the real world and today hint of evolutionary concepts of descent. By the way. Evolutionists should be more expecting these plushy critters to become thriving moving ones. just see if selection can turn into something better. Already a head start with those black eyes.
If you DON'T know what a kind is then how precisely are we to determine which animals belong to the same "kinds?" I'm all ears, this should be fun.
KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc. The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.
You know, I was warned! I did not heed said warning, and this is my reward. I wanted to know how you would define a set of criteria to explain how to sort by a "kind". I did not get that answer, I didn't even get a coherent answer. What I got was a bunch of words strung together, so you can sound intelligent. Let me say this in an appropriate fashion, "what you just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point, in your rambling incoherent response, were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may god have mercy on your soul." Thank you Billy Madison.
Sorry Rondo, that's the best you can expect form a creationist who thinks the earth is six thousand years old. Robert just likes to spout nonsense to make himself feel good. He doesn't know or care that he is bat shit insane. He doesn't know or care that everyone is just laughing at him. He just keeps spouting nonsense. If you try to reason with him or get him to examine the evidence, or even explain his fevered mutterings, you won't get a coherent answer. Don't matter to him, he's only here to confuse and irritate. Make fun of him or ignore him, those are the only rational options, since he apparently cannot be banned.

I, rAndo have to admit that I was shocked by his response. It is that this was the first time I experienced a response like this. When I debated creationists in the past there was always an element of coherent thought. Sure, they use lies, logical fallacies, and ignorance to make their points, but at least I could count on them to make sense. Congratulations Robert Byers, you are a first for me. I have no intention of responding to him again.

harold · 21 November 2012

I, rAndo have to admit that I was shocked by his response. It is that this was the first time I experienced a response like this. When I debated creationists in the past there was always an element of coherent thought. Sure, they use lies, logical fallacies, and ignorance to make their points, but at least I could count on them to make sense.

You have a generous definition of "making sense".

Congratulations Robert Byers, you are a first for me. I have no intention of responding to him again.

I certainly agree that there is rarely any reason to reply to Byers. Since creationists cannot ever be convinced, I reply to them only to demonstrate the flaws in their arguments to third party readers. There is seldom a need to worry that Byers might seem convincing to a naive mind. However, I don't personally consider Byers' to be of any worse quality than that of the more grammatically gifted weasels. On the contrary, I think his unintentionally absurdist approach is in many ways superior to the more typical approach of plagiarizing propaganda from creationst web sites, evading obvious questions, repeating arguments that have already been proven false, etc.

Robert Byers · 21 November 2012

ksplawn said:
Robert Byers said: KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc.
Yeah, all those silly similarities and differences! What kind of way is that to categorize things?
The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.
Actually there may be even less of a connection between a T. rex and an Apatosaurus than between a giraffe and a rhino.
Robert Byers said: Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats. I lump marsupials with placentals! To each his own lump!
What criteria are you using for your lumping? How does your lumping perform against alternatives? What was unsatisfactory about the others?

My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth. Then my own investigation. The present errors are still coming from veery old ideas from centuries ago. They rightly strive to lump but just got it all wrong. They emphasize constantly minor points. Like fur for mammal groupings or pouches for grouping when identical creatures , save the pouch, are said to be unrelated. Its not just the traits they pick but the whole concept of traits. Anatomy should be the great guide. The thousands of anatomical points of the twists and turns of creatures should be what unites and not teeth and trivial reproductive tactics.

ksplawn · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said: Like fur for mammal groupings or pouches for grouping when identical creatures , save the pouch, are said to be unrelated.

As I've pointed out to you before, marsupials are NOT identical to other placental mammals except for the pouch. They have other distinctive anatomical traits, including the structure of their pelvis. That's not even considering the genetic evidence (which you never do; surely molecular lumping would be at least as useful as lumping based on gross anatomy?).

DS · 21 November 2012

ksplawn said:
Robert Byers said: Like fur for mammal groupings or pouches for grouping when identical creatures , save the pouch, are said to be unrelated.
As I've pointed out to you before, marsupials are NOT identical to other placental mammals except for the pouch. They have other distinctive anatomical traits, including the structure of their pelvis. That's not even considering the genetic evidence (which you never do; surely molecular lumping would be at least as useful as lumping based on gross anatomy?).

genetics is atomic and unproven remember

KlausH · 21 November 2012

Robert Byers said:
ksplawn said:
Robert Byers said: KINDS is a direction for study and direction for rejection of wrong ideas. Its all about investigation of nature. The old ones were too quick to lump creatures together because of trial/silly connections of mammary glands, hair, scaly skin, egg laying etc.
Yeah, all those silly similarities and differences! What kind of way is that to categorize things?
The funniest one is of the decision to lump 'dinosaurs" as a group. Just because they were so different they right away imagined they were of a group that ruled the planet and further they were lizards. In reality there is no connection between a t rex and a bronto anymore then between a giraffe and a rhino. Something new got them too excited and false lumping happened.
Actually there may be even less of a connection between a T. rex and an Apatosaurus than between a giraffe and a rhino.
Robert Byers said: Its about lumping. You lump bats and people closer then bats and rats. I lump marsupials with placentals! To each his own lump!
What criteria are you using for your lumping? How does your lumping perform against alternatives? What was unsatisfactory about the others?
My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth. Then my own investigation. The present errors are still coming from veery old ideas from centuries ago. They rightly strive to lump but just got it all wrong. They emphasize constantly minor points. Like fur for mammal groupings or pouches for grouping when identical creatures , save the pouch, are said to be unrelated. Its not just the traits they pick but the whole concept of traits. Anatomy should be the great guide. The thousands of anatomical points of the twists and turns of creatures should be what unites and not teeth and trivial reproductive tactics.

You moron! That is EXACTLY why animals (and plants) are grouped in the taxons they are. There are a huge number similarities between marsupials and differences from placental mammals. For example, marsupials from kangaroos to opossums have the same basic skeletons. The bones are all there, except for tails, only differently shaped. A Tasmanian wolf skeleton is far closer to a kangaroo than a timber wolf's. Same thing with blood types, immune systems, and genomes. The relationship of Tyrannosaurus to Apatosaurus (your example)is actually roughly equivalent to your other example of Tasmanian wolf and timber wolf.

TomS · 22 November 2012

Robert Byers said: My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth.

There is nothing in the Bible about boundaries to a "kind". The concept of a "Biblical kind" is, as far as I can tell, an invention of the 20th century.

gnome de net · 22 November 2012

Robert Byers said: My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth.

Please provide more details about your "biblical boundaries".

Karen S. · 22 November 2012

My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth.

And my lumping starts when I make cream of rice!

Kevin B · 22 November 2012

gnome de net said:
Robert Byers said: My lumping starts with biblical boundaries which are the truth.
Please provide more details about your "biblical boundaries".

You can tell the Biblical boundaries because they have cherubim and flaming swords. BTW It's a pity that trolls aren't plushies, because we could tell them to go and get stuffed. Hmm. Perhaps Bobby is stuffed with kapok, which has got old and hard and lumpy....

Henry J · 22 November 2012

DS said: genetics is atomic and unproven remember

But if it's atomic, then it should be elementary!

Karen S. · 22 November 2012

You moron! That is EXACTLY why animals (and plants) are grouped in the taxons they are.

And I thought it was due to the way plushies are displayed at FAO Schwartz on 5th Avenue.

Henry J · 22 November 2012

You moron! That is EXACTLY why animals (and plants) are grouped in the taxons they are. There are a huge number similarities between marsupials and differences from placental mammals. [...]

Yeah, I would think that internal features (reproductive, etc.) are apt to be more persistent than outward shape as a species changes over time. After all, outward size and proportions aren't as likely to be entangled in inter-dependencies as the internal organs. Henry

stevaroni · 22 November 2012

Since this is, after all, national Dinosaur Dissection Day here in the States, I am reminded that Noah didn't have to carry a pair of big, dangerous Tyrannosaurs.

He could have simply carried a couple of Meleagris Gallopavo, the common turkey, and thereby fulfilled the requirement to include the "Theropod" kind.

Robert Byers · 22 November 2012

ksplawn said:
Robert Byers said: Like fur for mammal groupings or pouches for grouping when identical creatures , save the pouch, are said to be unrelated.
As I've pointed out to you before, marsupials are NOT identical to other placental mammals except for the pouch. They have other distinctive anatomical traits, including the structure of their pelvis. That's not even considering the genetic evidence (which you never do; surely molecular lumping would be at least as useful as lumping based on gross anatomy?).

Its just minor reproductive details. Then a few minor other things. Otherwise they are identical and so much they are the "classic: case for convergent evolution. The genetic evidence is evidence only of presumptions behind genetic theory. Gross anatromy is the obvious and intekligent standard to start with lumping things. Not bits and pieces. Then it all makes sense.

Robert Byers · 22 November 2012

Henry J said:
You moron! That is EXACTLY why animals (and plants) are grouped in the taxons they are. There are a huge number similarities between marsupials and differences from placental mammals. [...]
Yeah, I would think that internal features (reproductive, etc.) are apt to be more persistent than outward shape as a species changes over time. After all, outward size and proportions aren't as likely to be entangled in inter-dependencies as the internal organs Henry

The reproductive functions of marsupials are actually only at a late stage quite different from placentals. Its common to find reproductive differences in like creatures while they maintain looking like each other. Snakes and lizards birth live or by egg. Many insects of same almost same species birth live ir by other means. It is the anatomy that is the great thing that defines creatures and this is less able to radically change as need requires. ioT can but more difficult. Yes these inter changes would affect other matters in marsupials and this is what happened. this is why its genetics are alike for maraupials, in details, and not like their cousins we call placentals. It is about lumping and what is the smarter idea for how to lump. i always tell everyone to watch on the internet moving/still pictures of the marsupial wolf! Watch it and be convinced its a variety of wolf and not a more flexible kangaroo.

Henry J · 22 November 2012

I counted 8 errors in those 4 paragraphs.

Scott F · 23 November 2012

Robert Byers said: Its just minor reproductive details. Then a few minor other things. Otherwise they are identical and so much they are the "classic: case for convergent evolution. The genetic evidence is evidence only of presumptions behind genetic theory. Gross anatromy is the obvious and intekligent standard to start with lumping things. Not bits and pieces. Then it all makes sense.

Yup. Creationists haven't learned anything in over 2,000 years. If you learned what Plinius and Galen taught, that's all you need to know. Don't worry about all those pesky details and little fiddly bits. If you can't see the gross anatomy with your own bare eyes, it's just "presumptions" and "a line of reasoning". Creationism: Reinventing the Dark Ages as fast as possible.

Marilyn · 23 November 2012

As you know I'm not a maths person but if there are 350 animals on three decks that would be approx 117 animals in 112 pens each deck @ approx. 4 ft wide x 23 ft long 9 ft high. A giraffe is approx 10 ft tall so would be on the top deck. Would be approx 44 animals each for 8 people to look after.

TomS · 23 November 2012

Scott F said: Yup. Creationists haven't learned anything in over 2,000 years. If you learned what Plinius and Galen taught, that's all you need to know. Don't worry about all those pesky details and little fiddly bits. If you can't see the gross anatomy with your own bare eyes, it's just "presumptions" and "a line of reasoning". Creationism: Reinventing the Dark Ages as fast as possible.

Fixity of type is a fairly recent invention. The concept of a biological species didn't arise until the early modern era, and the concept of "created kind" (something larger than a species) is a 20th century invention.

stevaroni · 23 November 2012

Marilyn said: As you know I'm not a maths person but if there are 350 animals on three decks that would be approx 117 animals in 112 pens each deck @ approx. 4 ft wide x 23 ft long 9 ft high. A giraffe is approx 10 ft tall so would be on the top deck. Would be approx 44 animals each for 8 people to look after.

No, it would be 350 animals for one or two people to take care of - part time. For the most part the crew would have been so busy trying to not sink that feeding giraffes would be the last thing on the list. As we've discussed before, wooden boats require an enormous amount of maintenance. Particularly huge wooden boats put together by novice shipwrights, with the joinery quality achievable with copper axes, held together by wooden pins and rope, sealed by pitch and asphaltum (neither of which sticks well to saturated wood) and sailed through the largest storm of all time. Especially since the crew of the Ark were no spring chickens. Noah was several hundred years old. Assuming that he married at a typical age, that means so was Mrs Noah. If they had sons it was probably not all that long after they married (when did Methusala-aged women pass menopause in ancient times?), so their sons (and their wives) are north of 100. So you have 8 centenarians patching a roughly built, leaky, vessel the size of a wooden liberty ship without the aid of a bilge pump. What's that you say? The crew could have emptied the bilge? Well, let's look at that. You are, as you point out, clearly not a maths person, so let's walk it through. Assume a 12 foot draft and a couple feet of freeboard above that (for safety) to the water outlet. That means that each gallon of water takes just under 100 ft-lbs of work to heave over the side. An world-class cyclist can sustain about 1/4 horsepower for three hours (@ 30000 ft-lb-min / hp) . That means if you can hook a modern pump to an Olympic cyclist he could pump 75 gallons a minute out of Noahs boat. That's the best possible case imaginable. Professional athlete, efficient machine, good pump. Noah had none of these things. If he was smart, he had a well down to the bilge so he wouldn't have to climb stairs with buckets. Using a shift of 4 ordinary people and a mid-sized bucket in the equivalent of a 14' deep well, you're going to move maybe 8000 gallons in a really good day. Now, Noah's boat has a submerged surface of 45000 square cubits (a unit I never thought I'd use). Assume the hull planks are 8" ( .45 cubit ) wide (they have to be small enough to be carried by 4 old men ). That means that Noahs ark has 29 miles of seams. Rough-hewn seams poorly sealed and under constant flexture. And, by dint of being 12' underwater, all the seams across the bottom ( all 151000 feet of them ) are subject a 5psi hydrostatic pressure. Which is a lot. Go outside, put your hand over the end of your house's drainpipe and have somebody fill it up with a hose. Try to keep the water from leaking between your fingers. That's what 12' of hydrostatic pressure is. And you can't have a leakage rate of more than a few ounces per foot or Noah's ark is doomed. The fact that creationists forget this instantly betrays how little familiarity they have with boats and their maintenance needs. Really, Marylin, go find someone who once owned something a humble as a little Hobie and ask him about it.

Karen S. · 23 November 2012

Lumpy gravy!

ksplawn · 23 November 2012

Robert Byers said: Its just minor reproductive details. Then a few minor other things.

A few other minor things that pretty much all marsupials share and that placental mammals don't, especially the ones that are supposed to be almost identical? Why does a marsupial opossum's brain not have a corpus callosum while a placental muskrat's brain has one? Surely the structure of the brain is more than just a "minor" difference or a reproductive detail. Let's try this the other way: what could possibly convince you that your system of categorization doesn't work?

Scott F · 23 November 2012

TomS said:
Scott F said: Yup. Creationists haven't learned anything in over 2,000 years. If you learned what Plinius and Galen taught, that's all you need to know. Don't worry about all those pesky details and little fiddly bits. If you can't see the gross anatomy with your own bare eyes, it's just "presumptions" and "a line of reasoning". Creationism: Reinventing the Dark Ages as fast as possible.
Fixity of type is a fairly recent invention. The concept of a biological species didn't arise until the early modern era, and the concept of "created kind" (something larger than a species) is a 20th century invention.

Seriously? I'll grant you Linnaeus as being in the "early modern era", and the concept of baraminology as a fabrication of late 20th century YEC. But my understanding was that fixity of type was pretty commonly held as "fact" for most of human (Western) history. It's one of the ideas that Darwin had to struggle against. Even Linnaeus appeared to believe in the fixity of species. But then, I have a wiki-level understanding of most history, so I could be mistaken.

harold · 23 November 2012

TomS said:
Scott F said: Yup. Creationists haven't learned anything in over 2,000 years. If you learned what Plinius and Galen taught, that's all you need to know. Don't worry about all those pesky details and little fiddly bits. If you can't see the gross anatomy with your own bare eyes, it's just "presumptions" and "a line of reasoning". Creationism: Reinventing the Dark Ages as fast as possible.
Fixity of type is a fairly recent invention. The concept of a biological species didn't arise until the early modern era, and the concept of "created kind" (something larger than a species) is a 20th century invention.

Tom S. is fundamentally right here. It's critical to distinguish between passively held, unexamined background assumptions and active claims. If we fail to do so we end up in the trap of anachronistically equating people who had no possible access to contemporary evidence with people who have access to the evidence and deny it. Having been raised in fairly austere and traditional, but not traumatizing, rural Baptist church, I can assure you that the current creationist movement is post-modern. People being ignorant because they have personally been deprived of educational opportunity is and always was common, but politically-motivated denial of mainstream science is, while not unique to the post-modern era, highly characteristic of it. I've seen a book with creationist canards about the second law of thermodynamics and so on that dated from the fifties - it was published by a Bible college on the anniversary of Origin of the Species, and may have been a plagiarized but uncredited ancestor of many others - but contemporary creationism, with its overtly political goal of forcing sectarian science denial into public schools, can mainly be traced back to Henry Morris and other figures in the late sixties and early seventies. As an analogous situation, during the middle ages, almost every educated person thought that the earth was roughly spherical. Stylized maps notwithstanding, it's repeatedly referred in terms like "orb" and sphere-like objects were often used as symbols of domination of the earth. Columbus was an advocate of a "maverick" school of thought that misinterpreted the size of the spherical earth (mainstream scholars had it approximately right), which is why he thought he could get to Asia alive by sailing west (but the trip would actually have been too long and he would have died of thirst, starvation, or scurvy if the Americas had not been in the way). His skeptics and opponents generally did not think that the earth was flat, though, at least not the formally educated ones. However, prior to relatively late antiquity, many people assumed that the earth was flat. But they weren't equivalent to modern "flat earthers", because, although in theory they "could have" figured it out, they did not have access to evidence that it was round. Once clear evidence for a round earth was enunciated, only the ignorant and the mad continued to obsess over a flat earth. Not being aware of evidence that doesn't exist yet, versus denying evidence that does exist, are two different things.

harold · 23 November 2012

prior to relatively late antiquity

I misused the term "late antiquity" here, as widespread recognition of a round earth dates to classical times, if not a bit before. I should have said "for much of antiquity" people believed in a flat earth.

Marilyn · 23 November 2012

stevaroni said:
Really, Marylin, go find someone who once owned something a humble as a little Hobie and ask him about it.

OK what about the Mary Rose she was made from Oak a very large heavy ship and sea worthy. Though Cypress is said to be a favourite for ship building.

stevaroni · 23 November 2012

Marilyn said: OK what about the Mary Rose she was made from Oak a very large heavy ship and sea worthy. Though Cypress is said to be a favourite for ship building.

What about the Mary Rose? She sunk. She was better built than the ark. Better manned than the ark, She was smaller, therefore less flexible, than the ark. She used better joinery, better fasteners, and larger, more solid, timbers than the ark. She was built by professional, skilled shipwrights, who had years of practical experience, established reference designs and shipyard and support staffs in the hundreds. And she still sunk. So, um... what about the Mary Rose?

DS · 23 November 2012

Marilyn,

Are you seriously trying to argue that the magic flood was real? Do you actually believe that the ark was real?' Do you really think that the earth is six thousand years old?

None of these things is true Marilyn. Just thought you would like to know.

stevaroni · 23 November 2012

DS said: Marilyn, Are you seriously trying to argue that the magic flood was real?

No, I'm pretty sure she's a Poe. But she (he? it??) amuses me so I tend to respond.

sfink888 · 23 November 2012

Marilyn said: As you know I'm not a maths person but if there are 350 animals on three decks that would be approx 117 animals in 112 pens each deck @ approx. 4 ft wide x 23 ft long 9 ft high. A giraffe is approx 10 ft tall so would be on the top deck. Would be approx 44 animals each for 8 people to look after.

You are not an animal person, either, as your animal facts are plainly wrong. An adult giraffe, Giraffa camelopardalis, is 16 to 20 feet tall, among other things. That, and why should a sane person believe that all living and, possibly, all dead land animals on Earth are descended only from 350 animals that could fit into a wooden boat 4000 years ago? Where is the evidence for such a fabulously impossible-sounding claim? Or, should we just believe such fabulous bullshit simply because you Plopped Shit For Jesus?

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

sfink888 said: An adult giraffe, Giraffa camelopardalis, is 16 to 20 feet tall, among other things.

A baby one would be a lot smaller.

That, and why should a sane person believe that all living and, possibly, all dead land animals on Earth are descended only from 350 animals that could fit into a wooden boat 4000 years ago? Where is the evidence for such a fabulously impossible-sounding claim?

Darwin thought it was possible.

Or, should we just believe such fabulous bullshit simply because you Plopped Shit For Jesus?

I don't believe you should.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

DS said: Marilyn, Are you seriously trying to argue that the magic flood was real? Do you actually believe that the ark was real?' Do you really think that the earth is six thousand years old? None of these things is true Marilyn. Just thought you would like to know.

So we arose from the Iridium.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

stevaroni said:
Marilyn said: OK what about the Mary Rose she was made from Oak a very large heavy ship and sea worthy. Though Cypress is said to be a favourite for ship building.
What about the Mary Rose? She sunk. She was better built than the ark. Better manned than the ark, She was smaller, therefore less flexible, than the ark. She used better joinery, better fasteners, and larger, more solid, timbers than the ark. She was built by professional, skilled shipwrights, who had years of practical experience, established reference designs and shipyard and support staffs in the hundreds. And she still sunk. So, um... what about the Mary Rose?

She sunk accidentally in 1545 at the age of 34 years. Will be able to see her in the new museum early 2013.

Rando · 24 November 2012

Hey Harold, if you're still reading this list is there any way you could hit Marylin with your list of questions?

While I've got your attention, me and Just Bob were working on a new question that we thought you might want to add to your list. It goes like this: How did Noah know which animals were clean and unclean when God never explained the difference till one thousand years later?

Maybe while we are having these conversations with creationists, I've always wondered if it was appropriate that we should add a caveat to these conversations. Can you answer our questions about "The Flood" without having to add words or rewrite the entire story of your supposed inerrant holy book? I mean, am I the only one who gets bothered by creationists who will tell me, I have to fallow the bible word for word while, they simultaneously have to rewrite their holy book so, it can make sense?

TomS · 24 November 2012

Scott F said:
TomS said:
Scott F said: Yup. Creationists haven't learned anything in over 2,000 years. If you learned what Plinius and Galen taught, that's all you need to know. Don't worry about all those pesky details and little fiddly bits. If you can't see the gross anatomy with your own bare eyes, it's just "presumptions" and "a line of reasoning". Creationism: Reinventing the Dark Ages as fast as possible.
Fixity of type is a fairly recent invention. The concept of a biological species didn't arise until the early modern era, and the concept of "created kind" (something larger than a species) is a 20th century invention.
Seriously? I'll grant you Linnaeus as being in the "early modern era", and the concept of baraminology as a fabrication of late 20th century YEC. But my understanding was that fixity of type was pretty commonly held as "fact" for most of human (Western) history. It's one of the ideas that Darwin had to struggle against. Even Linnaeus appeared to believe in the fixity of species. But then, I have a wiki-level understanding of most history, so I could be mistaken.

First of all, I suggest looking at this book on the concept of a biological, taxonomic species: John S. Wilkins Species: A History of the Idea Berkely: U. of California Press, 2009 In pre-modern thought people recognized that living things could change over time. For example, the metamorphosis of caterpillars into butterflies. Also, do a search on the word "anatiferous": people thought that trees could give rise to barnacles, which in turn would turn into geese. And, of course, there was widespread belief in spontaneous generation. You can find hints at spontaneous generation in the Bible, such as in the description of the generation of frogs and flies in the plagues of Egypt in the book of Exodus. Also, in the story of Samson, there is the tale of bees arising in the scull of the lion. As late as the 18th century, people referred to that story as Biblical support for spontaneous generation. And I'd also mention the idea behind Jacob's trick for producing spotted sheep in Genesis 30. People often believed that offspring were affected by maternal experiences, even to the extent of producing monstrous births. It took a lot of work to arrive at the modern concept of genetics.

harold · 24 November 2012

Rando said: Hey Harold, if you're still reading this list is there any way you could hit Marylin with your list of questions? While I've got your attention, me and Just Bob were working on a new question that we thought you might want to add to your list. It goes like this: How did Noah know which animals were clean and unclean when God never explained the difference till one thousand years later? Maybe while we are having these conversations with creationists, I've always wondered if it was appropriate that we should add a caveat to these conversations. Can you answer our questions about "The Flood" without having to add words or rewrite the entire story of your supposed inerrant holy book? I mean, am I the only one who gets bothered by creationists who will tell me, I have to fallow the bible word for word while, they simultaneously have to rewrite their holy book so, it can make sense?

Marilynn - Well, I guess it might be interesting to see what your answers to these questions are - 1) Could any evidence convince you of the theory of evolution, and if so, what type of evidence is now lacking, that would convince you if present? 2) The Supreme Court ruled against the direct teaching of Biblical Young Earth Creationism as science in public schools; however, if that ruling were overturned, which would you support more, teaching of ID, or direct teaching of Bible-based YEC? 3) Do you think it is important for opponents of the theory of evolution to fully understand the theory of evolution? If so, can you explain it, and if not, can you explain why not? 4) Who is the designer? How can we test your answer? 5) What did that designer do? How can we test your answer? 6) How did the designer do it? How can we test your answer? 7) When did the designer do it? How can we test your answer? 8) What is an example of something that was not designed by the designer? 9) Some parts of the Bible suggest that pi equals exactly three, and that the earth is flat and has four corners. Do you accept these as facts of physical reality, and if not, why do you deny the theory of evolution on the grounds of Biblical literacy, if it can be symbolic about other scientific issues? Also - plenty of people are Christian without believing Noah's Ark is literally true, and "we arose from Iridium" is not the only alternative to "everyone is descended from Noah because of the flood".

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said: Marilyn, Are you seriously trying to argue that the magic flood was real? Do you actually believe that the ark was real?' Do you really think that the earth is six thousand years old? None of these things is true Marilyn. Just thought you would like to know.
So we arose from the Iridium.

So you do believe all that crap. Good to know. You are perfectly free to believe anything you want and I am perfectly free to point out that what you believe is contradicted by reality. You do realize that you are taking the side of the people who didn't know the difference between a plushie and a real animal don't you?

Sylvilagus · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
That, and why should a sane person believe that all living and, possibly, all dead land animals on Earth are descended only from 350 animals that could fit into a wooden boat 4000 years ago? Where is the evidence for such a fabulously impossible-sounding claim?
Darwin thought it was possible.

Do you have any evidence that he thought it was possible or did you just make that up? That rate of evolution is clearly impossible from a scientific point if view. The mutation rate alone would be overwhelming. Your creationist beliefs would require a rate of evolutionary change that is laughably wrong. It would require that thousands of new families, genuses and species appear each year, hundreds or thousands new each day, virtually over-night. Why do none of the written histories available from ancient societies report such amazing events as new forms of life appearing daily? Seems to me that you are just using wishful thinking without considering the ramifications of your assertions.

apokryltaros · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
sfink888 said: An adult giraffe, Giraffa camelopardalis, is 16 to 20 feet tall, among other things.
A baby one would be a lot smaller.

Giraffe calves are ten feet tall.

That, and why should a sane person believe that all living and, possibly, all dead land animals on Earth are descended only from 350 animals that could fit into a wooden boat 4000 years ago? Where is the evidence for such a fabulously impossible-sounding claim?
Darwin thought it was possible.

Did he? Do you have a direct quote saying Charles Darwin believed all land animals were descended from 350 animals on Noah's Ark?

Or, should we just believe such fabulous bullshit simply because you Plopped Shit For Jesus?
I don't believe you should.

Then how come you and all the other Creationist Trolls For Jesus always want everyone to believe whatever bullshit you Shit For Jesus is truer than true, because you did it For Jesus? While simultaneously refusing to present any sort of support to your inanity?

apokryltaros · 24 November 2012

Sylvilagus said:
Marilyn said:
That, and why should a sane person believe that all living and, possibly, all dead land animals on Earth are descended only from 350 animals that could fit into a wooden boat 4000 years ago? Where is the evidence for such a fabulously impossible-sounding claim?
Darwin thought it was possible.

Do you have any evidence that he thought it was possible or did you just make that up? That rate of evolution is clearly impossible from a scientific point if view. The mutation rate alone would be overwhelming. Your creationist beliefs would require a rate of evolutionary change that is laughably wrong. It would require that thousands of new families, genuses and species appear each year, hundreds or thousands new each day, virtually over-night. Why do none of the written histories available from ancient societies report such amazing events as new forms of life appearing daily? Seems to me that you are just using wishful thinking without considering the ramifications of your assertions.

One time Slimy Sal Cordova was here, he made unsubtle suggestions that all terrestrial life descended from "Biblical kinds" stashed in Noah's Ark. When he was asked about the ramifications of this, in the form of beetle diversity (i.e., having explained to him the logical extrapolation that the Beetle kind would be hyperevolving a couple hundred species every year since leaving the Ark 4,000 years ago in order to achieve today's current diversity), he became mute and ran away.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

harold said: Marilynn - Well, I guess it might be interesting to see what your answers to these questions are - 1) Could any evidence convince you of the theory of evolution, and if so, what type of evidence is now lacking, that would convince you if present? 2) The Supreme Court ruled against the direct teaching of Biblical Young Earth Creationism as science in public schools; however, if that ruling were overturned, which would you support more, teaching of ID, or direct teaching of Bible-based YEC? 3) Do you think it is important for opponents of the theory of evolution to fully understand the theory of evolution? If so, can you explain it, and if not, can you explain why not? 4) Who is the designer? How can we test your answer? 5) What did that designer do? How can we test your answer? 6) How did the designer do it? How can we test your answer? 7) When did the designer do it? How can we test your answer? 8) What is an example of something that was not designed by the designer? 9) Some parts of the Bible suggest that pi equals exactly three, and that the earth is flat and has four corners. Do you accept these as facts of physical reality, and if not, why do you deny the theory of evolution on the grounds of Biblical literacy, if it can be symbolic about other scientific issues? Also - plenty of people are Christian without believing Noah's Ark is literally true, and "we arose from Iridium" is not the only alternative to "everyone is descended from Noah because of the flood".

They might not be interesting answers but I'll have an attempt. 1) Well I do think there is a theory of evolution as in it is possible for one species to come from another, in theory it's possible. But, as I read Darwin his findings are that a type of horse comes from another type of horse but is of the same species that being a horse. Even if I saw a Zebra borne from a normal Horse or vice versa it would still be of the same type. If I saw a horse borne with long hair and a smaller head from normal parent horses it would still be from a horse, but if another pair of horses from a different heard that had no contact and gave the same offspring and the two offspring paired and produced the same I would be inclined to think a progress or a decline in species had been made and possibly might even call it evolution. 2) I actually don't know enough about either of those classifications but the bible does exist and accounts of existence are given in it and should be known about. 3) Yes I think opponents should understand the theory of evolution and not dismiss it without giving it a hearing. I don't fully understand the theory of evolution it hasn't quite clicked with me yet. 4) I would say the designer was God the Creator, I don't know how you could test that answer. Apart from there is a lack of new design now it is not ongoing just now. There is no different methods of life at this time. No one can deny the existence of the Bible and that accounts are in it weather they be laws laid down or actions taken agreed with or not. Still for me no other explanation has been found even with evolution you had to start with a building block however simple for it to develop into something that is not only flesh but also the substances of the earth and other things in the universe. 5) What did he do, well I think he ceased the moment, saw a place that he could develop and had a go. 6) I really don't know 7) When, well I would say in the beginning and realize that was a long time ago and not worry too much about the date but if ever it was found out I would be interested to know. To learn it was 4 billion years ago has been interesting. I think it's possible that civilized humans came 6000 years ago weather from apes of the planet or from stardust. I would think it would take longer for the Earth to become dwell-able. 8) For me it would be something not properly designed like too many concrete buildings in one place that would course imbalance to the Earth's gravity and orbit. 9) I don't think the Earth has to be flat to have four corners I understand the concept don't know as if I could explain it. I don't deny the theory of evolution I don't know enough about it to deny it, up to now I don't think the bible literacy denies it or explain it. It does give rise to imagination and reasoning of how to use it against right and wrong.

Just Bob · 24 November 2012

Rando said: While I've got your attention, me and Just Bob were working on a new question that we thought you might want to add to your list. It goes like this: How did Noah know which animals were clean and unclean when God never explained the difference till one thousand years later?

To which I would append the following: If the ritual cleanliness rules were given to Noah, but that vital detail left out of the story, why would his descendants have immediately forgotten them and immediately gone back to worshipping Baal, Ra, Moloch, or whomever? That worldwide flood must not have made much of an impression.

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn wrote:

"1) Well I do think there is a theory of evolution as in it is possible for one species to come from another, in theory it’s possible. But, as I read Darwin his findings are that a type of horse comes from another type of horse but is of the same species that being a horse. Even if I saw a Zebra borne from a normal Horse or vice versa it would still be of the same type. If I saw a horse borne with long hair and a smaller head from normal parent horses it would still be from a horse, but if another pair of horses from a different heard that had no contact and gave the same offspring and the two offspring paired and produced the same I would be inclined to think a progress or a decline in species had been made and possibly might even call it evolution."

You obviously didn't read Darwin. Speciation is not just a theoretical possibility, it has been observed in nature and in the laboratory. It rests on solid conceptual and empirical basis. The hypothesis of descent with modification explains the diversity of life that we see an the planet today, as well as the historical contingencies that constrain it. To deny this is to deny reality.

"2) I actually don’t know enough about either of those classifications but the bible does exist and accounts of existence are given in it and should be known about."

The bible offers no answers whatsoever about origins, kinds or anything else. Why are you willing to accept it without the slightest shred of evidence and yet refuse to accept the mountaiins of evidence demonstrating the fact of evolution?

"3) Yes I think opponents should understand the theory of evolution and not dismiss it without giving it a hearing. I don’t fully understand the theory of evolution it hasn’t quite clicked with me yet."

Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.

"4) I would say the designer was God the Creator, I don’t know how you could test that answer. Apart from there is a lack of new design now it is not ongoing just now. There is no different methods of life at this time. No one can deny the existence of the Bible and that accounts are in it weather they be laws laid down or actions taken agreed with or not. Still for me no other explanation has been found even with evolution you had to start with a building block however simple for it to develop into something that is not only flesh but also the substances of the earth and other things in the universe."

Once again, your double standard is apparent. You are willing to accept any biblical nonsense, but reject all of the evidence for evolution. SInce you admittedly don't understand it, why should anyone care?

"5) What did he do, well I think he ceased the moment, saw a place that he could develop and had a go."

Well I think that's a bunch of made up nonsense that doesn't mean anything.

"6) I really don’t know"

True.

"7) When, well I would say in the beginning and realize that was a long time ago and not worry too much about the date but if ever it was found out I would be interested to know. To learn it was 4 billion years ago has been interesting. I think it’s possible that civilized humans came 6000 years ago weather from apes of the planet or from stardust. I would think it would take longer for the Earth to become dwell-able."

Well once again you prove you have learned nothing. The earth is 4.55 billion years old. Deal with it.

"8) For me it would be something not properly designed like too many concrete buildings in one place that would course imbalance to the Earth’s gravity and orbit."

So god just didn't do a very good job of designin iI guess.

"9) I don’t think the Earth has to be flat to have four corners I understand the concept don’t know as if I could explain it. I don’t deny the theory of evolution I don’t know enough about it to deny it, up to now I don’t think the bible literacy denies it or explain it. It does give rise to imagination and reasoning of how to use it against right and wrong."

Well when you gain some understanding come back and enlighten us. Until then you can accept the provisional answers of science or reject them for no good reason. Your choice.

Henry J · 24 November 2012

But, as I read Darwin his findings are that a type of horse comes from another type of horse but is of the same species that being a horse.

That's exactly what the theory of evolution says: there might be small changes in one or a few generations. But thousands of small changes in the proportion of a limb can add up to a large change in proportions of that limb, e.g., legs to wings, or legs to fins. Or fingers to wings.

stevaroni · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: Darwin thought it was possible.

Yes. Yes he did think it was possible for all the worlds myriad animals to descend, with modifications, from a small number of simpler, common, progenitors. He even wrote a book about it.

stevaroni · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: She sunk accidentally in 1545 at the age of 34 years.

Um... yes. But I think "accidentally" is not the probative word here, seeing as how it's somewhat atypical for a large naval power to sink a major, important warship, on the cusp of an important battle, taking almost all hands with her, on purpose. I think we instead should focus on "sunk" part, which is probably the part that got peoples attention at the time. Sunk, in fair weather. Despite the best materials, workmanship, seamanship, naval architecture and vast resources of manpower available to a major seafaring nation.

TomS · 24 November 2012

apokryltaros said: One time Slimy Sal Cordova was here, he made unsubtle suggestions that all terrestrial life descended from "Biblical kinds" stashed in Noah's Ark. When he was asked about the ramifications of this, in the form of beetle diversity (i.e., having explained to him the logical extrapolation that the Beetle kind would be hyperevolving a couple hundred species every year since leaving the Ark 4,000 years ago in order to achieve today's current diversity), he became mute and ran away.

The Bible describes considerable variation in animals only a short time after the Flood. Abraham was born only about 300 years after the Flood, yet in the next couple of generations there is a diversity in the family Bovidae (cattle, sheep, goats and such).

harold · 24 November 2012

Marilynn - Thanks for your answers.

1) Well I do think there is a theory of evolution as in it is possible for one species to come from another, in theory it’s possible. But, as I read Darwin his findings are that a type of horse comes from another type of horse but is of the same species that being a horse. Even if I saw a Zebra borne from a normal Horse or vice versa it would still be of the same type. If I saw a horse borne with long hair and a smaller head from normal parent horses it would still be from a horse, but if another pair of horses from a different heard that had no contact and gave the same offspring and the two offspring paired and produced the same I would be inclined to think a progress or a decline in species had been made and possibly might even call it evolution.

This is a common misconception. What supports the theory of evolution is incremental differences between parents and offspring. The reason horses and zebras (note: there are several different types of zebras) look so similar is because they share a recent common ancestor. Horses and zebras share a common ancestor with mushrooms, too, but that ancestor lived a very, very long time ago.

2) I actually don’t know enough about either of those classifications but the bible does exist and accounts of existence are given in it and should be known about.

I completely agree with this statement. It doesn't answer the question, exactly, but anyway, I fully agree that educated people should know about the Bible and have some idea of how it was put together and at least the major ways in which it is interpreted and studied.

3) Yes I think opponents should understand the theory of evolution and not dismiss it without giving it a hearing. I don’t fully understand the theory of evolution it hasn’t quite clicked with me yet.

An honest answer, and a common situation. The theory of evolution is actually not that complicated, but it is a bit subtle.

4) I would say the designer was God the Creator, I don’t know how you could test that answer. Apart from there is a lack of new design now it is not ongoing just now. There is no different methods of life at this time. No one can deny the existence of the Bible and that accounts are in it weather they be laws laid down or actions taken agreed with or not. Still for me no other explanation has been found even with evolution you had to start with a building block however simple for it to develop into something that is not only flesh but also the substances of the earth and other things in the universe.

First let me say that the idea that God created something (set off the big bang, created the first cell, whatever), although not my personal belief, is not something I particularly bother to argue against. Of course, it's not not something that should be in public school science class either, for obvious reasons. Perhaps the teacher might be a Mormon in private life, for example, but teaching in an area where students' families are predominantly Buddhist, but with many other religions. Naturally, science class should just stick to science. That's something I do bother to argue.

5) What did he do, well I think he ceased the moment, saw a place that he could develop and had a go.

That's a purely religious/philosophical conjecture, which I have no answer for.

6) I really don’t know

Fair enough, in this context.

7) When, well I would say in the beginning and realize that was a long time ago and not worry too much about the date but if ever it was found out I would be interested to know. To learn it was 4 billion years ago has been interesting. I think it’s possible that civilized humans came 6000 years ago weather from apes of the planet or from stardust. I would think it would take longer for the Earth to become dwell-able.

As it happens, the "age of the universe" famously calculated by seventeenth century Church of Ireland bishop James Ussher is suspiciously close to the approximate age of urban and proto-literate civilization in the Middle East, which, given that he was working from ancient Middle Eastern sources, may not be a total coincidence. The contemporary Church of Ireland (which is neither the Catholic Church nor the denomination of anti-Catholic "Orangemen" in Ulster, but rather, an Anglican-like Protestant church which operates mainly in the Republic of Ireland) accepts evolution and scientific dating of the age of the earth and the universe, I am fairly sure.

8) For me it would be something not properly designed like too many concrete buildings in one place that would course imbalance to the Earth’s gravity and orbit.

Of course, someone might argue that the humans themselves who build concrete buildings were designed by the designer. Anyway, fortunately, I think it's very unlikely that we can imbalance the earth's orbit by building concrete buildings. The mass of the earth is much, much greater than the mass of even a very large concrete building.

9) I don’t think the Earth has to be flat to have four corners I understand the concept don’t know as if I could explain it. I don’t deny the theory of evolution I don’t know enough about it to deny it, up to now I don’t think the bible literacy denies it or explain it. It does give rise to imagination and reasoning of how to use it against right and wrong.

The theory of evolution does not tell us what is right or wrong in an ethical sense, nor is it supposed to - it is a theory that explains the diversity of cellular life and viruses on earth. No scientific theory attempts to explain what is right or wrong in an ethical sense. The theory of evolution does help us to understand where human brains came from. Imagination and reasoning are both challenges for, but also clearly amenable subjects for, scientific investigations.

phhht · 24 November 2012

Marilyn,

What makes you think the stories in the Bible are true, when the stories in the Harry Potter books are not?

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

DS said: Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.

I don't remember claiming that.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

stevaroni said:
Marilyn said: She sunk accidentally in 1545 at the age of 34 years.
Um... yes. But I think "accidentally" is not the probative word here, seeing as how it's somewhat atypical for a large naval power to sink a major, important warship, on the cusp of an important battle, taking almost all hands with her, on purpose. I think we instead should focus on "sunk" part, which is probably the part that got peoples attention at the time. Sunk, in fair weather. Despite the best materials, workmanship, seamanship, naval architecture and vast resources of manpower available to a major seafaring nation.

Are you suspecting sabotage.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

phhht said: Marilyn, What makes you think the stories in the Bible are true, when the stories in the Harry Potter books are not?

J K wrote about fictitious characters I have never heard otherwise.

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said: Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.
I don't remember claiming that.

If you think the earth is only six thousand years old, if you think that the ark is real, if you think that species cannot arise from preexisting species, you don't believe in evolution. Just be honest about it. Don't beat around the burning bush. The magic flood is just as fictitious as Harry Potter, deal with it.

stevaroni · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: Are you suspecting sabotage?

I'm suspecting water. My point was that accidentally or not, the Mary Rose sunk. You're the one who brought up Mary Rose in the first place. I simply pointed out that the sea managed to claim her, as it often does. Her experienced shipwrights made one simple mistake, and down she went. And all her sailors, with their lifetimes of skill, couldn't do anything about it. And she was a much better built, much better manned ship in much fairer weather than anything Noah could have possible working with.

stevaroni · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: J K wrote about fictitious characters ...

And your point is...?

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

stevaroni said:
Marilyn said: J K wrote about fictitious characters ...
And your point is...?

I know for sure Harry Potter is fictitious I don't know for sure the accounts in the Bible are wrong.

phhht · 24 November 2012

But what makes you think the stories in the Bible are not fictitious?

I ask because I, personally, cannot say what distinguishes the Biblical stories from Harry Potter, or, say, The Avengers.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

DS said:
Marilyn said:
DS said: Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.
I don't remember claiming that.
If you think the earth is only six thousand years old, if you think that the ark is real, if you think that species cannot arise from preexisting species, you don't believe in evolution. Just be honest about it. Don't beat around the burning bush. The magic flood is just as fictitious as Harry Potter, deal with it.

What makes you think that I think the Earth is only 6000 years old, I think of it as 6000 years BC so it now be 8000 years but I would think it nearer to millions of years old if not 4.55 billion years old, it has been proven 4.55 billion years old by science dating so for now I will go with that, for me that doesn't disprove God. I don't know for sure a species cannot come from another species, but I do think things keep to a kind, if science proves to me different then I would like you say have to deal with it, up to now I am not convinced, and for me that doesn't disprove God.

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
stevaroni said:
Marilyn said: J K wrote about fictitious characters ...
And your point is...?
I know for sure Harry Potter is fictitious I don't know for sure the accounts in the Bible are wrong.

They are contrary to reality, that makes them fictitious, whether you know it or not, whether you admit it or not. It's either metaphor or just plain wrong, those are the only choices.

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said:
Marilyn said:
DS said: Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.
I don't remember claiming that.
If you think the earth is only six thousand years old, if you think that the ark is real, if you think that species cannot arise from preexisting species, you don't believe in evolution. Just be honest about it. Don't beat around the burning bush. The magic flood is just as fictitious as Harry Potter, deal with it.
What makes you think that I think the Earth is only 6000 years old, I think of it as 6000 years BC so it now be 8000 years but I would think it nearer to millions of years old if not 4.55 billion years old, it has been proven 4.55 billion years old by science dating so for now I will go with that, for me that doesn't disprove God. I don't know for sure a species cannot come from another species, but I do think things keep to a kind, if science proves to me different then I would like you say have to deal with it, up to now I am not convinced, and for me that doesn't disprove God.

Species do not "keep to kind". All species shared a common ancestor, that is the conclusion of science whether you accept it or not.

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn,

If you don't examine the evidence you cannot be convinced by the evidence. Ignorance is no excuse. No one is trying to disprove the existence of god, that's impossible. But the fairy tales in the bible are just plain wrong. If your concept of god is constrained by those myths you are in for a big disappointment.

phhht · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: ...that doesn't disprove God.

I don't think it is possible to disprove God, any more than it is possible to disprove Harry Potter.

Marilyn · 24 November 2012

phhht said: But what makes you think the stories in the Bible are not fictitious? I ask because I, personally, cannot say what distinguishes the Biblical stories from Harry Potter, or, say, The Avengers.

I accept the Bible as a biography about Jesus who believed in what he was doing for people was necessary. The accounts have been interpreted in a few different ways to the extent that different religions have been formed from the accounts, but for me believing in God is not altogether down to which religion you belong to or what events took place but knowing about God. I believe whoever wrote the accounts was writing a biography not stories. My opinion is its when you apply it to your own life is when you know if it is true or a story. It's a personal adventure.

phhht · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said: I believe whoever wrote the accounts was writing a biography not stories.

But why? Why do you believe that, yet not believe that the Harry Potter stories are biographical?

DS · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
phhht said: But what makes you think the stories in the Bible are not fictitious? I ask because I, personally, cannot say what distinguishes the Biblical stories from Harry Potter, or, say, The Avengers.
I accept the Bible as a biography about Jesus who believed in what he was doing for people was necessary. The accounts have been interpreted in a few different ways to the extent that different religions have been formed from the accounts, but for me believing in God is not altogether down to which religion you belong to or what events took place but knowing about God. I believe whoever wrote the accounts was writing a biography not stories. My opinion is its when you apply it to your own life is when you know if it is true or a story. It's a personal adventure.

None of that has anything to do with accepting the reality of evolution. Many christians believe in evolution, they have been convinced by the evidence. If you refuse to accept the evidence you simply reject reality. You can belong to any religion you want, you just shouldn't have to deny reality to do so.

Rando · 24 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said:
Marilyn said:
DS said: Then why are you so quick to dismiss it? Quite frankly you aren't in a position to judge, by your own admission. You claimed over a year ago that you were here to learn about science. APparently you haven't learned anything.
I don't remember claiming that.
If you think the earth is only six thousand years old, if you think that the ark is real, if you think that species cannot arise from preexisting species, you don't believe in evolution. Just be honest about it. Don't beat around the burning bush. The magic flood is just as fictitious as Harry Potter, deal with it.
What makes you think that I think the Earth is only 6000 years old, I think of it as 6000 years BC so it now be 8000 years but I would think it nearer to millions of years old if not 4.55 billion years old, it has been proven 4.55 billion years old by science dating so for now I will go with that, for me that doesn't disprove God. I don't know for sure a species cannot come from another species, but I do think things keep to a kind, if science proves to me different then I would like you say have to deal with it, up to now I am not convinced, and for me that doesn't disprove God.

Well Marilyn, if you'd be kind enough to define what a "kind" is we can get to work on that for you.

Henry J · 24 November 2012

If "kind" is taken to mean the same as "clade", then "each according to their kind" just means the offspring will belong to the same clade as the parent(s). That interpretation is consistent with science, and as far as I can tell doesn't involve rewriting any verses to get there.

(I suppose that hybridization and symbiosis events would complicate that analysis, but not too much so.)

Henry

Dave Luckett · 24 November 2012

I do believe, Marilyn, that you mistake the nature of narrative. Biography is narrative, and so is most of genuine history. (Oh, sure, historians argue among themselves about how much of history should be narrative constructed from the materials available - but human history is still layers of overlapping narratives.)

Narrative is everywhere. We are the ape that tells stories. All our accounts of how things came to be, or how events happened, or will happen, or might have happened, or could have happened, or didn't happen but it's interesting to think about it happening - all of that, and much more, is narrative.

And all narrative has some fictional strand, integrated so deeply into it that it's often very difficult to separate it out. When the most sober, realistic historian says something like, "George Washington was at his lowest ebb at Valley Forge", or "The First Crusade was a manifestation of the Age of Faith", he or she is imposing an interpretation, and using metaphor to produce meta-fact. This is the first step towards fiction, but it is nearly impossible to avoid, when describing some large-scale event in the words of a human language, and it is a large step in itself. Other steps can follow. But the important thing to understand is that there is not some gulf, plainly obvious to anyone, between fact and fiction. There is no hard bright line. We are the ape that tells stories. We do it without knowing. We do it without meaning to. This has always been true of human beings.

You say the Bible is "a biography about Jesus". That's what the Gospels are, indeed. Well, they're partial biographies, at least. But there's a lot more to the Bible than the Gospels.

What do you think the first eleven chapters of Genesis is? Do you think it is a factual history of the creation, and of the events of early history? Or is it possible that this is not history, but legend, myth, stories? If you think it is fact, why do you think that? It doesn't say it's fact. It has talking animals, which is pretty much a marker for fable. It has divine explanations for things we know are natural, like the rainbow, which is definitely a marker for myth. It has people living anything up to 960 years, which is something you find in all near Eastern cultures, only about their own ancestors, not those of the Hebrews. It has giants, who are "sons of God" that get mortal women pregnant, which is found all over other myths and legends from Celtic Britain to ancient Greece and Egypt to India and China. It has stories of the ancestors and the patriarchs, who are always larger than life, which is common to all human cultures.

Do you think that King Arthur, round table, knights, Holy Grail, Merlin, and all, were all fact - or are they history that writers have embroidered and elaborated? Or are they completely made up? Nobody knows. Why do you think that the Bible stories must be different? Where does it say that they are different? Or do you think that God can't inspire people to tell stories with a point, like the Genesis stories? Or don't you think that God understands that we are the ape that tells stories, and that He allows us to tell them?

Rando · 25 November 2012

Henry J said: If "kind" is taken to mean the same as "clade", then "each according to their kind" just means the offspring will belong to the same clade as the parent(s). That interpretation is consistent with science, and as far as I can tell doesn't involve rewriting any verses to get there. (I suppose that hybridization and symbiosis events would complicate that analysis, but not too much so.) Henry

This is the problem with trying to define "kind" by our understanding, once we have, what we think is a definition, we will present an example of one "kind" coming from another "kind" and as soon as we do that, they will have to admit that we can demonstrate evolution, or, and this is the one they do the most often, change the definition of a "kind" and all of a sudden evolution becomes impossible again. This is why I always demand a creationist define "kind." "Kind" and "information" are their favorite weasel words and we have to get them to set a definition, or we can never demonstrate evolution to their satisfaction, or at least to a point to where denial becomes pointless.

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

phhht said: But what makes you think the stories in the Bible are not fictitious? I ask because I, personally, cannot say what distinguishes the Biblical stories from Harry Potter, or, say, The Avengers.

I‘ll tell you this story it’s a true story it happened to me so I would call it an account of the event. I was on holiday and full of all the sun and scenery and having a nice time, I decided I would visit the copper mine I’d never been in a mine or cave for that matter didn't totally know what to expect. So off the group of people and me went into the mine with the tour guide. All very nice as caves go climbed the metal steps listened to the commentary, I thought to think they sent little children into the tin mines, coal mines etc. Then the tour guide said I'm going to turn all the lights off I thought OK. Then he did and I was quite shocked at the experience I had never before been in complete total blackness. I was stood away from the wall and not with in touching range of a person and it had gone silent, I felt completely alone in a way as never before. I could feel my hand but it was as though it wasn't there I reached and felt the wall and it was just something stopping my hand and then I started to feel so alone there was no light in me, all there was anywhere was just my thoughts with absolutely no container at all. I thought and what if they go too, absolutely nothing, the lights came on then I slowly started to feel alive again. On the way out the tour guide gave me a piece of copper stone. A personal experience that someone else could experience but you don’t know for sure till it happens to you.

DS · 25 November 2012

Marilyn doesn't want to believe in evolution. She doesn't want it to be true. She wants to believe in god, she wants that to be true. She is willing to ignore the last two hundred years of scientific discovery in order to cling to her superstitions and myths. She is willing to have a double standard and accept any meager amount of personal experience as proof that she is right, but she rejects and even refuses to examine the mountains of evidence in peer reviewed journals that demonstrates conclusively that evolution is true. She mistakenly believes that if she believes in evolution that will somehow mean that she can't believe in god, She even goes so far as to accuse anyone who dares to tell her the age of the earth that they are trying to prove that god doesn't exist. Of course she knows nothing about the beliefs of those who attempt to persuade her with evidence.

Unfortunately, Marilyn and her black an white perspective are all too common. It's worthless to try to convince her of anything because she just takes it as an attack on her inviolate religious beliefs. SInce she is not apparently trying to convert anyone, her presence here seems to indicate that she realizes that she needs to learn something, she just seems confused as to what that might be. If she doesn't have the courage to examine the evidence she will just wallow in ignorance forever.

Dave Luckett · 25 November 2012

Marilyn, I've had exactly that same experience. It's something tour guides in caves and deep mines do as a sort of party trick. In my case, I was in a deep cave. The guide told us that there are glowing patches on the walls of the cave, very faint, but if we let our eyes grow used to the darkness for long enough, we'd see them. And after a while, yes, we did! I saw them. I'll swear to it. Everyone else said they'd seen them, too.

But when the guide switched the lights back on again, he told us that it was a lie. There are no glowing patches on the walls of the cave. They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there, nothing, no visible light at all. The "lights" are chance retinal nerves firing randomly, reinterpreted as lights by the visual cortex because it was getting no other nerve impulses. That is, the lights were only in our heads. We saw something that wasn't there.

When human minds don't have data, they fill the void with stuff they make up. That makes me think that we should rely on evidence, not the other stuff.

AltairIV · 25 November 2012

I think it needs to be clearly pointed out that the 350 number was for the mammal kinds only, not all animals. Marilyn's estimates are wrong on yet another count.

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

DS said: Marilyn doesn't want to believe in evolution. She doesn't want it to be true. She wants to believe in god, she wants that to be true. She is willing to ignore the last two hundred years of scientific discovery in order to cling to her superstitions and myths. She is willing to have a double standard and accept any meager amount of personal experience as proof that she is right, but she rejects and even refuses to examine the mountains of evidence in peer reviewed journals that demonstrates conclusively that evolution is true. She mistakenly believes that if she believes in evolution that will somehow mean that she can't believe in god, She even goes so far as to accuse anyone who dares to tell her the age of the earth that they are trying to prove that god doesn't exist. Of course she knows nothing about the beliefs of those who attempt to persuade her with evidence. Unfortunately, Marilyn and her black an white perspective are all too common. It's worthless to try to convince her of anything because she just takes it as an attack on her inviolate religious beliefs. SInce she is not apparently trying to convert anyone, her presence here seems to indicate that she realizes that she needs to learn something, she just seems confused as to what that might be. If she doesn't have the courage to examine the evidence she will just wallow in ignorance forever.

Your good at twisting the bread sticks for the dip DS

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

Dave Luckett said: Marilyn, I've had exactly that same experience. It's something tour guides in caves and deep mines do as a sort of party trick. In my case, I was in a deep cave. The guide told us that there are glowing patches on the walls of the cave, very faint, but if we let our eyes grow used to the darkness for long enough, we'd see them. And after a while, yes, we did! I saw them. I'll swear to it. Everyone else said they'd seen them, too. But when the guide switched the lights back on again, he told us that it was a lie. There are no glowing patches on the walls of the cave. They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there, nothing, no visible light at all. The "lights" are chance retinal nerves firing randomly, reinterpreted as lights by the visual cortex because it was getting no other nerve impulses. That is, the lights were only in our heads. We saw something that wasn't there. When human minds don't have data, they fill the void with stuff they make up. That makes me think that we should rely on evidence, not the other stuff.

That's amazing.

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

AltairIV said: I think it needs to be clearly pointed out that the 350 number was for the mammal kinds only, not all animals. Marilyn's estimates are wrong on yet another count.

Oh dear that's me then.

DS · 25 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said: Marilyn doesn't want to believe in evolution. She doesn't want it to be true. She wants to believe in god, she wants that to be true. She is willing to ignore the last two hundred years of scientific discovery in order to cling to her superstitions and myths. She is willing to have a double standard and accept any meager amount of personal experience as proof that she is right, but she rejects and even refuses to examine the mountains of evidence in peer reviewed journals that demonstrates conclusively that evolution is true. She mistakenly believes that if she believes in evolution that will somehow mean that she can't believe in god, She even goes so far as to accuse anyone who dares to tell her the age of the earth that they are trying to prove that god doesn't exist. Of course she knows nothing about the beliefs of those who attempt to persuade her with evidence. Unfortunately, Marilyn and her black an white perspective are all too common. It's worthless to try to convince her of anything because she just takes it as an attack on her inviolate religious beliefs. SInce she is not apparently trying to convert anyone, her presence here seems to indicate that she realizes that she needs to learn something, she just seems confused as to what that might be. If she doesn't have the courage to examine the evidence she will just wallow in ignorance forever.
Your good at twisting the bread sticks for the dip DS

And you are4 very good at obfuscation.

TomS · 25 November 2012

Dave Luckett said: Marilyn, I've had exactly that same experience. It's something tour guides in caves and deep mines do as a sort of party trick. In my case, I was in a deep cave. The guide told us that there are glowing patches on the walls of the cave, very faint, but if we let our eyes grow used to the darkness for long enough, we'd see them. And after a while, yes, we did! I saw them. I'll swear to it. Everyone else said they'd seen them, too. But when the guide switched the lights back on again, he told us that it was a lie. There are no glowing patches on the walls of the cave. They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there, nothing, no visible light at all. The "lights" are chance retinal nerves firing randomly, reinterpreted as lights by the visual cortex because it was getting no other nerve impulses. That is, the lights were only in our heads. We saw something that wasn't there. When human minds don't have data, they fill the void with stuff they make up. That makes me think that we should rely on evidence, not the other stuff.

One should be forgiven in wondering which story was the lie, thinking "Fool me once ..." Although I'm predisposed to believe the basic part of the second story, I do have my doubts about the elaboration "They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there".

phhht · 25 November 2012

Marilyn said:
phhht said: But what makes you think the stories in the Bible are not fictitious? I ask because I, personally, cannot say what distinguishes the Biblical stories from Harry Potter, or, say, The Avengers.
I‘ll tell you this story it’s a true story it happened to me so I would call it an account of the event. I was on holiday and full of all the sun and scenery and having a nice time, I decided I would visit the copper mine I’d never been in a mine or cave for that matter didn't totally know what to expect. So off the group of people and me went into the mine with the tour guide. All very nice as caves go climbed the metal steps listened to the commentary, I thought to think they sent little children into the tin mines, coal mines etc. Then the tour guide said I'm going to turn all the lights off I thought OK. Then he did and I was quite shocked at the experience I had never before been in complete total blackness. I was stood away from the wall and not with in touching range of a person and it had gone silent, I felt completely alone in a way as never before. I could feel my hand but it was as though it wasn't there I reached and felt the wall and it was just something stopping my hand and then I started to feel so alone there was no light in me, all there was anywhere was just my thoughts with absolutely no container at all. I thought and what if they go too, absolutely nothing, the lights came on then I slowly started to feel alive again. On the way out the tour guide gave me a piece of copper stone. A personal experience that someone else could experience but you don’t know for sure till it happens to you.

I don't get your point. I too have been underground with the lights out. That experience had no effect, as far as I can tell, on my ability to distinguish factual narratives from fictional ones. As Dave Luckett points out, there are often clear markers in the stories, and I can recognize them now as well as I could before the cave visit. I don't intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?

Henry J · 25 November 2012

I don’t intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?

That's what she was taught?

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

Henry J said:
I don’t intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?
That's what she was taught?

No I wasn't taught to believe the Bible. I am free to believe it or not.

Marilyn · 25 November 2012

phhht said: I don't intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?

I have no further answer for your question.

Dave Thomas · 25 November 2012

Marilyn said:
phhht said: I don't intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?
I have no further answer for your question.

I have no problem with those who accept the Bible on faith^*, I just don't like it when they confuse "Faith" with "Science." Marilyn, these are two different things. ^*1. strong or unshakeable belief in something, esp without proof or evidence

DS · 25 November 2012

Marilyn said:
Henry J said:
I don’t intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?
That's what she was taught?
No I wasn't taught to believe the Bible. I am free to believe it or not.

So you have no excuse for making the wrong choice.

phhht · 25 November 2012

Marilyn said:
phhht said: I don't intend to harass you, so I will ask one last time: What makes you think the Bible stories are true, while the Harry Potter stories are not?
I have no further answer for your question.

It seems such incapacity is common among religious believers. They believe - often fervently - but they cannot say why. All they can say is that they do. I'd find that predicament to be very uncomfortable. I want to try to understand why I believe what I do. I feel that if I don't understand that, I will be vulnerable to hucksters and liars of every stripe, from advertisers to politicians to preachers. I want to know that what I believe is, in fact, correct. And I have a way to check. I appeal to objective reality. Of course, that won't work for everything, so there are things I just cannot know, and even those things which check out must be subject to revision. It looks to me like certainty is very rarely justified. In the question of gods, I see no reason to suppose that they are anything more than campfire superhero stories from the early iron age. I don't understand why anyone would claim that such preposterous, self-contradictory, counter-factual stories are true. And indeed, religious believers like you can't give any such reasons. They have no answers. All they have is baffled silence and baseless faith.

Rando · 25 November 2012

Yes, it would seem that we are dealing with the most dishonest aspect of religion: Faith. Faith is the reason people believe even when we can prove the assorted fables of their respective holy book are wrong. Faith is the reason they will still believe even when they have no evidence to back them up. They can't tell us why they have faith, they just do. No other aspect of their lives are taken on faith. Everything else must have a reasonable aspect of proof to be believed, but not religion. Everything else in the faithfuls lives are analyzed with a critical inquiry, there's a thought process behind every decision they make, except one, and that is god. In any other situation, if you could demonstrate that what you said was true, they would accept it, but that element doesn't apply to god. Faith is a stoic conviction, defended against reason, and protected from all reason, and that is why it's dishonest. You can get proof of this dishonesty by simply asking them, what other element of their lives do they take solely on faith? What other element of their lives do they believe is true without reason, facts, or evidence?

Tell us Marilyn, what else in your life do you defend this way?

H.H. · 25 November 2012

Marilyn, I just wanted to say it's great to see you here asking questions. No one ever changed their mind overnight, nor should they. But a person should try to seek out the best arguments they can find and consider everything carefully.

Evolution is a simple idea with mind-blowing implications. I do not believe a human being can truly understand themselves without understanding where we came from. Evolution is the story of us. It's worth appreciating.

Dave Luckett · 25 November 2012

TomS said:
Dave Luckett said: Marilyn, I've had exactly that same experience. It's something tour guides in caves and deep mines do as a sort of party trick. In my case, I was in a deep cave. The guide told us that there are glowing patches on the walls of the cave, very faint, but if we let our eyes grow used to the darkness for long enough, we'd see them. And after a while, yes, we did! I saw them. I'll swear to it. Everyone else said they'd seen them, too. But when the guide switched the lights back on again, he told us that it was a lie. There are no glowing patches on the walls of the cave. They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there, nothing, no visible light at all. The "lights" are chance retinal nerves firing randomly, reinterpreted as lights by the visual cortex because it was getting no other nerve impulses. That is, the lights were only in our heads. We saw something that wasn't there. When human minds don't have data, they fill the void with stuff they make up. That makes me think that we should rely on evidence, not the other stuff.
One should be forgiven in wondering which story was the lie, thinking "Fool me once ..." Although I'm predisposed to believe the basic part of the second story, I do have my doubts about the elaboration "They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there".

TomS, you are observing here one of the crucial elements of narrative. I reported this as I remember it. But how much of it is objective fact? Is there an elaboration, a trick of memory, going on here? How many memories has it been through? Mine, at least. The tour guide's? Whoever told the tour guide that this had been done? Others? Who knows? I did try going on the net to investigate the phenomenon, and I found interesting material, but no direct confirmation as fact of the statement that there is absolutely no light in that situation. Cosmic rays can penetrate that deep, and who knows but that they may cause a retinal nerve to "fire"? There is a psychological phenomenon known as the "Ganzfeld effect", from the German "a blank", and it can be and has been the subject of experiment. Still, I can tell you, from reading history, that there's an awful lot of what we think we know that has no better attestation than the incident I reported. Mostly - a horrifying thought - it's a good deal worse. We are the ape that tells stories. "What is truth?" asked jesting Pilate.

phhht · 25 November 2012

I replied to Rando
here at the Bathroom Wall.

phhht · 25 November 2012

Dave Luckett said: Marilyn, I've had exactly that same experience. It's something tour guides in caves and deep mines do as a sort of party trick. In my case, I was in a deep cave. The guide told us that there are glowing patches on the walls of the cave, very faint, but if we let our eyes grow used to the darkness for long enough, we'd see them. And after a while, yes, we did! I saw them. I'll swear to it. Everyone else said they'd seen them, too. But when the guide switched the lights back on again, he told us that it was a lie. There are no glowing patches on the walls of the cave. They'd had the most sensitive equipment into that cave and there's not a lumen of light there, nothing, no visible light at all. The "lights" are chance retinal nerves firing randomly, reinterpreted as lights by the visual cortex because it was getting no other nerve impulses. That is, the lights were only in our heads. We saw something that wasn't there. When human minds don't have data, they fill the void with stuff they make up. That makes me think that we should rely on evidence, not the other stuff.

Oliver Sacks says in his latest book that similar hallucinations are near-universal and are associated with sensory deprivation. It looks like the rod of the human eye can detect a single photon (see here) - but the conscious self needs on the order of ten photons in 100 milliseconds.

Mike Elzinga · 25 November 2012

phhht said: Oliver Sacks says in his latest book that similar hallucinations are near-universal and are associated with sensory deprivation. It looks like the rod of the human eye can detect a single photon (see here) - but the conscious self needs on the order of ten photons in 100 milliseconds.

Such phenomena are real; but they depend a great deal on individual sensitivities to stimuli. It is a well-known fact of all sensors, whether biological or technological, that they are sensitive to random noise just due to the fact that they are at some finite temperature. The eye is fairly sensitive to noise; and in subdued light or in complete blackness they will fire and produce electrical impulses that the brain will interpret as flashes of light. But one has to be in total darkness for at least a period of about a half hour or more for most people. It is a phenomenon that one becomes aware of during watches at night or when one is on a submarine, for example. One learns to look out into the darkness by trying to place the images on various parts of the retina in order to verify that the source of the light is an objective source rather than something due to impulses within the eye. Older individuals who have had the lenses replaced in their eyes are more sensitive to ultraviolet light. Some blood pressure medications or cholesterol medications or other drugs make the eye more sensitive to light and therefore to thermal noise when in complete darkness. There is a fairly common phenomenon that occurs in people as they get older; namely, when the vitreous humor in the eye becomes detached from the retina, one sees flashes in the eye. One discovers when this happens when, in subdued light, one sees flashes of light in the eye when the loosened vitreous humor collides with the retina due to motion of the head. My ophthalmologist recognized this instantly when I described what I was experiencing. There are some related phenomena due to noise that are well-known. In hearing, for example, when one is in complete quietness – something that is very hard to achieve in our noisy modern world – one has the illusion of hearing “voices” which one can’t quite make out what they are saying. This again is due to noise in the inner ear that the brain tries to interpret as something familiar; hence subtle voices. The same occurs with smells and with touch. One can get “illusions” that the brain tries to interpret as something familiar. All sensors have this issue. In fact, there is a way to enhance one’s hearing, for example, by what has become referred to as “stochastic enhancement.” If one wants to pick up a very weak sound in a very quiet environment, one adds a small amount of white noise. When properly adjusted, this has the effect of setting an already sensitive organ on a more hair-triggered edge in which sounds that are nearly imperceptible are then clearly heard. This same trick is used in technological sensing devices as well. All this stuff is well known to people who work with image and signal processing while trying to extract tiny signals from a background of thermal noise. I have had considerable experience with this, and I have even had the fun of experimenting with the “illusions” created by my own sensory organs. Once one understands the underlying physics, it is easy to reproduce these phenomena. I suspect that the reason that most people don’t recognize this is because their senses are generally overwhelmed by stimuli in our modern society. It is uncommon in our environment to get into situations in which are senses are operating at their extreme limits of sensitivity. The reason is because of feedback within our sensory systems that have the effect of reducing sensitivity as stimuli increase. That is why our sensitivities to stimuli follow a somewhat logarithmic curve.

Just Bob · 25 November 2012

Marylin,

Think about the ark situation for a minute. If there were just two of each "kind " (seven of a few, but the extras were sacrificed), then what did predators like tigers and wolves eat for the whole YEAR on the ark, then for the first year or so after the ark? If there were just a pair of, say, the deer "kind" then just one lion's lunch would destroy an entire "kind" and eliminate all the descendant species that creationists think it evolved into!

Think about it. There could NOT have been just two of each "kind", or the meat-eaters would have destroyed most of the plant-eating "kinds", either in the year on the ark or within the first few months afterwards. They wouldn't even have to kill both of the pair.

So either something very important was left out of the ark story, or... maybe the whole thing is just an ancient myth, with little or no connection to any real events.

HOMEWORK : look up how many kills a beast of the large-cat "kind" has to make in a year to stay healthy.

sfink888 · 25 November 2012

Just Bob said: Marylin, Think about the ark situation for a minute. If there were just two of each "kind " (seven of a few, but the extras were sacrificed), then what did predators like tigers and wolves eat for the whole YEAR on the ark, then for the first year or so after the ark? If there were just a pair of, say, the deer "kind" then just one lion's lunch would destroy an entire "kind" and eliminate all the descendant species that creationists think it evolved into! Think about it. There could NOT have been just two of each "kind", or the meat-eaters would have destroyed most of the plant-eating "kinds", either in the year on the ark or within the first few months afterwards. They wouldn't even have to kill both of the pair. So either something very important was left out of the ark story, or... maybe the whole thing is just an ancient myth, with little or no connection to any real events. HOMEWORK : look up how many kills a beast of the large-cat "kind" has to make in a year to stay healthy.

Or should we assume that there was only one "cat-kind," that Noah stowed in the Ark, from which all cats, from tigers to tabbies, are descended from?

Rando · 26 November 2012

sfink888 said:
Just Bob said: Marylin, Think about the ark situation for a minute. If there were just two of each "kind " (seven of a few, but the extras were sacrificed), then what did predators like tigers and wolves eat for the whole YEAR on the ark, then for the first year or so after the ark? If there were just a pair of, say, the deer "kind" then just one lion's lunch would destroy an entire "kind" and eliminate all the descendant species that creationists think it evolved into! Think about it. There could NOT have been just two of each "kind", or the meat-eaters would have destroyed most of the plant-eating "kinds", either in the year on the ark or within the first few months afterwards. They wouldn't even have to kill both of the pair. So either something very important was left out of the ark story, or... maybe the whole thing is just an ancient myth, with little or no connection to any real events. HOMEWORK : look up how many kills a beast of the large-cat "kind" has to make in a year to stay healthy.
Or should we assume that there was only one "cat-kind," that Noah stowed in the Ark, from which all cats, from tigers to tabbies, are descended from?

Well, if you've ever been to the Creation Museum, you would know the answer is yes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mPPnN1c0jk

DS · 26 November 2012

GIve it up guys. Marilyn has the answer. She believes the bible because of sensory depravation and induced hallucinations. She was blind and now refuses to see. Facts don't matter. Logic doesn't matter. All that matters is that she wants to believe and she has found an excuse to believe.

Just Bob · 26 November 2012

Just wondering... has anyone tried to put together a biblical ark story that DOESN'T require an endless stream of miracles to rescue it from physical impossibilities? IOW, the only miracle was the magic flood. Everything else was perfectly possible, under the same laws of physics and biology that obtain today: no magic animal collection from all over the world, no hibernation for a year, keeplng the ark afloat, feeding, sanitation, supercharged evolution and global dispersal, a livable post -flood world, etc.

Does anybody try to put together the whole thing without resorting to endless magic?

Marilyn · 26 November 2012

DS said: GIve it up guys. Marilyn has the answer. She believes the bible because of sensory depravation and induced hallucinations. She was blind and now refuses to see. Facts don't matter. Logic doesn't matter. All that matters is that she wants to believe and she has found an excuse to believe.

Your assumptions are not true.

TomS · 26 November 2012

The best attempt that I've seen for putting together a plausible flood story is this book:

Robert M. Best
Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic: Sumerian Origins of the Flood Myth
Fort Myers, Florida: Enlil Press, 1999

It doesn't follow the Bible story at all closely. And it didn't convince me. But I think that it comes the closest.

stevaroni · 26 November 2012

Marilyn said: Your assumptions are not true.

His assumption is supported by a significant body of evidence.

Rando · 26 November 2012

TomS said: The best attempt that I've seen for putting together a plausible flood story is this book: Robert M. Best Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic: Sumerian Origins of the Flood Myth Fort Myers, Florida: Enlil Press, 1999 It doesn't follow the Bible story at all closely. And it didn't convince me. But I think that it comes the closest.

And how much did they have to add to the supposed inerrant bible to make it make sense?

DS · 26 November 2012

Marilyn said:
DS said: GIve it up guys. Marilyn has the answer. She believes the bible because of sensory depravation and induced hallucinations. She was blind and now refuses to see. Facts don't matter. Logic doesn't matter. All that matters is that she wants to believe and she has found an excuse to believe.
Your assumptions are not true.

Your denials ring hollow.

TomS · 27 November 2012

Rando said:
TomS said: The best attempt that I've seen for putting together a plausible flood story is this book: Robert M. Best Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic: Sumerian Origins of the Flood Myth Fort Myers, Florida: Enlil Press, 1999 It doesn't follow the Bible story at all closely. And it didn't convince me. But I think that it comes the closest.
And how much did they have to add to the supposed inerrant bible to make it make sense?

It's been a long time since I read the book, but as I recall, he is highly dependent upon the Sumerian version of the Flood. It was definitely a local flood, and while some Biblical literalists would accept a local flood, there were enough other changes that I am confident that a Biblical literalist would not be pleased by the result.

https://me.yahoo.com/a/XRnHyQl8usUn8ykD1Rji0ZXHNe.9lqmg3Dm7ul96NW4vxpbU3c_GLu.k#d404b · 28 November 2012

Marilyn seems to accept an old earth- why does acceptance of evolution as the best expalaination for the diversity of life (to her?) means that she can't believe in God?- I don't know - There are plenty of scientists, laypeople, religious people, and at least one Pope that are able to reconcile thier faith with acceptance of science/evolution. Science is a secular persuit not an athiestic one (God is irrelevant - not generally denied)

does every detail in the Bible need to be "lierally true word for word" in order for it to be a "true stoty" for the faithful? again, no - Plenty of religious authorities, biblical scholars etc (some who were later canonized!) recognize that the Bible is not to be taken as scientifc source material - Extremists (like FL) arr the only ones (that I know of) that insist the "Christianity" (as they define it) is not compatible with evolution