At UD, vjtorley has posted a bizarre, 5,000-word “rebuttal” of Jerry Coyne. It begins:
Over on his Why Evolution Is True Website, Professor Jerry Coyne has posted a short passage on the papal condemnation of Galileo, excerpted from Andrew Dickson White’s A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom(New York, NY: D. Appleton and Company, 1896). However, all the passage proves is that neither White nor Coyne understand the theological doctrine which they are attacking: they are all at sea about the dogma at which they are aiming their barbs.
One slight problem: Coyne isn’t attacking anything. VJ Torley is tilting at windmills.
Coyne doesn’t express agreement or disagreement with the passage. He merely points out a funny proofreading edit pencilled into his copy of the book by a previous, seemingly obsessive reader:
Now I don’t even know if that correction is grammatically necessary, but I had to smile at the anonymous reader who got annoyed and took the trouble to add the proofreader’s transposition symbol.
VJ is evidently so sensitive to any attack on Catholic doctrine, real or imagined, that he’ll fire off a 5,000+ word “rebuttal” without even reading the post he’s responding to!
Right. The Ark only has to float—which means that the Ark’s total mass, that being the weight of the boat itself plus the weight of everything the boat is carrying, absolutely must be less than the mass of the water that’s being displaced by the Ark.
If Younce’s figures are accurate, that means the Ark’s volume was (450 * 75 * 45 =) 1,518,750 cubic feet. The density of water is 62.4 pounds per cubic foot, so the Ark-plus-payload absolutely must not have added up to more than (1,518,750 * 62.4 =) 94,770,000 pounds, or (94,770,000 / 2,000 =) 47,385 tons, because otherwise, the Ark would not have been able to float.
So: How much weight was the Ark carrying?
To answer this question, I’m going to use some figures from John Woodmorappe’s ‘feasibility study’. According to Woodmorappe…
…the Ark’s cargo of living animals added up to 5,500 tons.
…the animals on the Ark ate 1/30 of their body weight in food every day. Okay, that’s a bit over (5,500 / 30 =) 183 tons of food every day.
Subtract the 5,500 tons of living animals from the total theoretical maximum load of 47,385 tons, and that leaves (47,385 – 5,500 =) 41,885 tons of ‘spare’ capacity for the Ark itself plus all the food for the animals.
Since the animals ate 183 tons of food per day, that means the Ark could not carry enough supplies to keep its animal cargo fed for more than (41,885 / 183 =) a bit less than 229 days.
According to the “Biblical Overview of the Flood Timeline” page on the Answers in Genesis website, the Ark was afloat for 370 days. That’s (370 – 229 =) 141 days more than could be accommodated by the maximum possible food supply that could have been carried on the Ark.
See any problems for the Ark, coldcoffee?
Well, for a start it is made out of wood. Wood cannot bear the huge stresses on the beams.
Answer here
Doctors Morris and Whitcomb in their classic book,The Genesis Flood state that no more than 35,000 individual animals needed to go on the ark. In his well documented book, Noah’s Ark: A Feasibility Study, John Woodmorappe suggests that far fewer animals would have been transported upon the ark. By pointing out that the word “specie” is not equivalent to the “created kinds” of the Genesis account, Woodmorappe credibly demonstrates that as few as 2,000 animals may have been required on the ark. To pad this number for error, he continues his study by showing that the ark could easily accommodate 16,000 animals.
Let’s be generous and add on a reasonable number to include extinct animals. Then add on some more to satisfy even the most skeptical. Let’s assume 50,000 animals, far more animals than required, were on board the ark, and these need not have been the largest or even adult specimens.
Remember there are really only a few very large animals, such as the dinosaur or the elephant, and these could be represented by young ones. Assuming the average animal to be about the size of a sheep and using a railroad car for comparison, we note that the average double-deck stock car can accommodate 240 sheep. Thus, three trains hauling 69 cars each would have ample space to carry the 50,000 animals, filling only 37% of the ark. This would leave an additional 361 cars or enough to make 5 trains of 72 cars each to carry all of the food and baggage plus Noah’s family of eight people. The Ark had plenty of space.
About space for animal feed
The animals may have gone into a type of dormancy. It has been said that in nearly all groups of animals there is at least an indication of a latent ability to hibernate or aestivate. Perhaps these abilities were supernaturally intensified during this period. With their bodily functions reduced to a minimum, the burden of their care would have been greatly lightened
If it doesn’t work, use magic. Why need a boat at all? Or why didn’t God just kill the few million humans he didn’t like “supernaturally”, and be done.
Evidence of massive Chinese ships
That was quote from ChristianAnswers.Net. You may ignore that last para if you don’t want to believe in that explanation. Please see my post above regarding Stress and wooden ship
The assumption that the ships followed the proportions of traditional junks is not warranted.
Nonetheless, building a huge wooden ship is a tricky engineering problem. Noah and his handful of helpers would not have been able to overcome it. Unless magic.
Because all the evidence from the real world falsifies it.
Honey, I hate to tell you this, but your ark was bigger than any wooden ship we puny modern humans have ever managed to keep afloat. See, the thing is, wood flexes, and when the various planks flex they open seams in the hull. And then, water flows in through the seams, because that’s what water does, it flows, but once it’s inside the boat the only way to get it back out is to pump it out. In the absence of engine power, men have to work the hand pumps around the clock even in calm waters. Sailing ships – not even as big as Noah’s supposed coracle – have a crew of 80-100, and part of the reason they need so many is because there are always crew belowdecks manning the pumps.
Noah and his three boys? Not a chance. Glub glub glub.
Of course, god could have miraculously sustained the ark from taking on water and sinking, but if god had to commit a miracle to hold the boat up, then why didn’t god just hold the humans and animals up directly? Cut out the whole shaky ark thing, eliminate the middleman so to speak ….
You should try harder to not get sucked in by the liars-for-Jesus. They make your god look stupid and impotent.
How about Evidence of massive ships
Scientific Study Endorses Seaworthiness of Ark
Ark balance
The proportions of the Ark were found to carefully balance the conflicting demands of stability, comfort, and strength.
Noah’s Ark was the focus of a major 1993 scientific study headed by Dr. Seon Hong at the world-class ship research center KRISO, based in Daejeon, South Korea. Dr. Hong’s team compared twelve hulls of different proportions to discover which design was most practical. No hull shape was found to significantly outperform the 4,300-year-old biblical design. In fact, the Ark’s careful balance is easily lost if the proportions are modified, rendering the vessel either unstable, prone to fracture, or dangerously uncomfortable.
The research team found that the proportions of Noah’s Ark carefully balanced the conflicting demands of stability (resistance to capsizing), comfort (“seakeeping”), and strength. In fact, the Ark has the same proportions as a modern cargo ship.
The study also confirmed that the Ark could handle waves as high as 100 ft (30 m). Dr. Hong is now director general of the facility and claims “life came from the sea,” obviously not the words of a creationist on a mission to promote the worldwide Flood. Endorsing the seaworthiness of Noah’s Ark obviously did not damage Dr. Hong’s credibility.
Source: worldwideflood.com/ark/hull_form/hull_optimization.htm
Dr. Seon Won HongDr. Seon Won Hong was principal research scientist when he headed up the Noah’s Ark investigation. In May 2005 Dr. Hong was appointed director general of MOERI (formerly KRISO). Dr. Hong earned a B.S. degree in naval architecture from Seoul National University and a Ph.D. degree in applied mechanics from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.
VJT as quoted by hotshoe: “We have it on the authority of Jesus Christ Himself (when teaching His disciples) that humanity was made “male and female” in the beginning, that Noah built an Ark, and that Jonah was a real person. Consequently, Christians who regard Christ as infallible (and if anyone thinks He wasn’t, then I don’t know why they’d even bother calling themselves Christian) must accept these assertions as historically true: they’re non-negotiable.”
It’s not a requirement for Christians (Catholics at least) to think Jesus was infallible. It is a requirement to believe that Jesus was at the same time completely human and completely divine. To be human is to be fallible, and so wouldn’t that make VJ Torley a heretic?
Perhaps Ken Ham will settle this by actually building one. That’ll show the doubters.
Yeah, no surprise, no explanation for why the god-given-inbuilt-moral-compass of the Pope pointed to torture and burning at the stake as “good”.
You might have an inbuilt compass, but them? Even though they were the Holy Leaders of the Holy Mother Church, they either:
a. didn’t get their compass from god
b. did get their compass from god, but god caused it to point towards a different kind of “good” and “evil” than your modern compass does
c. acted in opposition to their compass, while continuing to maintain they were men of god acting as god would desire them to.
Which is it?
How is it that you, personally, have better morals than the men of the Church? How do you think that comes about?
coldcoffee,
I offered to give you the boat. For free. It’s emphatically not about the technological difficulties with the boat.
For the reasons I listed, and many, many more. It goes against every rational principle in biology, geology, meteorology, physics … there’s limestone on top of Mt Everest, FFS! Of course, you can invoke some post-diluvian earth movements for that, if you are desperate to preserve biblical literalism. But there is no evidence. None whatsoever.
How about evidence that Nova thinks a crew of 4 men were able to keep one of those ships afloat for a year?
coldcoffee,
Similarly, macroevolution may have ‘just happened’. Isn’t science fun?
Basic physics.
“How did God punish all the really bad ducks?” – Eddie Izzard.
The thing I like about the ark story is the fact that in addition to preserving all those animals, Noah’s family preserved all the sexually transmitted diseases that have no carrier other than infected humans.
Thank you God, for choosing this family.
How did they determine the Ark’s “4,300-year-old biblical design.”? All the Bible gives is the external dimensions.
Is there any Creationist swill you won’t swallow uncritically?
The story of Noah is just not possible as presented in the bible.
Mike Elizinga has noted much the same and more. The fact is, no such boat could ever possibly have existed as described, never mind ever carried more than a few dozen animals.
Lying liars for Jesus, how sad.
No, it was never the “focus of a major scientific study”.
They didn’t build and test any boats. They didn’t do any materials studies. They didn’t do any science whatsoever, although they did do a handful of engineering calculations, nothing more complicated than what we’ve already done in this thread.
The “work” was paid for by the Korean Association of Creation Research. It was never published in a scientific/engineering journal, so no unbiased review.
There are only 10 references for their paper, and 4 of them are religious books:
New American Standard Bible, The Lockman Foundation, 1960.
Scott, R. B. Y., 1959. Weights and measures of the Bible. The Archaeologist, XXII(2).
Cummings, V. M., 1982. Has Anybody Really Seen Noah’s Ark?, Baker Book House, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
Morris, J. D., 1988. Noah’s Ark and the Lost World, Creation-Life Publishers, San Diego, California.
P.S. It wasn’t the first time and it won’t be the last that a world-class university is fooled into granting advanced degrees to a conman like Hong.
Thornton, if you’re reading this soon enough, please de-guano your comment.
IF not soon enough … [shrug]
I think coldcoffee displays a disturbing lack of faith in pure magic.The business of trying to find naturalistic explanations for miracles is just silly. And doomed.
The whole business of design, construction, gathering, weathering, feeding, cleaning and so forth was obviously enchanted.
What I don’t understand is why God chose the most disease ridden family that ever existed as the one to survive.
Or alternatively, having chosen a clean family, why He would take such pains to re-introduce smallpox, polio, AIDS, syphilis, herpes and dozens of others.
If it agrees with coldcoffee’s preconceptions, that’s good enough for him. Apparently.
I’m seriously amazed at how uncritically this kind of nonsense is swallowed by believers. Some guy with a degree can just write almost any crap pretending to agree with creationism in some way, and they’ll instantly believe it.
petrushka,
It’s a Post-Fall world.
Rumraket,
Morton’s Demon
(and yes, if Gregory/WJM are onlooking, I note the irony wrt my own irritation at the ‘ideological blinkers’ line).
It was my impression that he planned only to build it as a museum piece, with no intention of trying to float it.
We apparently are not a Maytag, nor do we have a Maytag repairman.
Fall I, Adam. Fall II, Noah. Fall III, Jesus. Fall IV, Mohamed. Fall V, Joseph Smith. Fall VI, Rev Moon. Fall VII, Jim jones.
The sequels are never as good as the original.
Can you explain how the evidence falsifies it?
The irony is that, even on solid ground with no wave stress on the timbers,. Hammy-boy still needs steel reinforcing for his ark. Well, maybe the county/state health and safety folks are to blame for requiring steel reinforcement. But still, it’s a horrible test of whether a Noah-type coracle could be built and float using only the materials and technology of Noah’s time.
There are hundreds of millions of US dollars in the coffers of the fundamemtalist churches. One o them should put their money where their mouths are and build an actual replica.
They expect us to take their bible seriously, the least they could do is take it seriously first.
Coldcoffee: “The ark was not shaped like a ship, but was shaped as a rectangle, like a three-story barge. It was never built to sail, only to float.”
Then why was it rectangular instead of square? Ships are made long and narrow so they’ll move through the water with less drag. But this makes ships less stable. They always capsize to the left or right – towards the narrow side. If you design something to just float, you make it square. Why was the ark a tippy rectangle?
Ken Ham says the flood was in 2348 BC. The Egyptians were building the pyramids then. Why didn’t they notice that they’d all drowned? Was it because they were heathens?
Coldcoffee,
Thanks for your answer about the Koala.
One other question.
Did the flood happen before or after the pyramids were build?
If after, how many people were alive when the Pyramid of Cheops was built? And how long after the flood was that?
That kind of A = Not A thinking could get you banned at UD.
Seriously, though, the act of observing influences the result.
The link I provided goes to an article that details the impossibility of the ark story as provided in the bible. Feel free to show any mistakes the author made in his assessments.
You couldn’t possibly mean that…?
A quote from the same article by Adam Gopnik (I may have quoted it in an earlier discussion):
Gopnik refers to a different complaint, but the moral is still the same.
By the way, there’s an article by Gopnik in the latest issue: Bigger Than Phil: When did faith start to fade?
Yes, but to be honest I’d rather just make fun of the sheer idiocy of it all.
I posted this as a new thread.
Banned long ago. I think it was in the aftermath of one of those mass-shooting-perpetrator-is-Darwinist arguments in favour of ID.
I notice that nobody has been rude enough to bring up the matter of … err … waste disposal on board the ark. You can’t just chop a hole in the bottom and dump the crap into the ocean.
I find it hard to fathom how an agricultural people ever took the ark story seriously. They knew better; they knew from daily experience how many helpers it takes to keep the stables clean. It’s actually easier in some ways to believe in the animals in the ark nowadays when almost no one has direct experience of shoveling shit.
Me, I know better. I worked as a farmhand. We never had more than 24 animals, and during winter weather when they were confined to the barn, we always had at least 1 person whose full time job was forking up manure/wet straw, throwing down clean straw, and emptying the dirty bucketsful “overboard”. When confined, the animals have to have clean straw to stand in or their feet get fungus infections, and ultimately they can die from it.
The Israelite villagers who told the Noah tale knew that. They knew that Noah’s family could take care of somewhere around 500 animals all told (as they would work harder and longer than I did). In their defense, maybe that was a big-enough number to imagine it was “two of every kind”. After all, how many “kinds” of animals did they think existed? Goat, sheep, pig, cow, dog, cat, fox, mouse, rat, duck, chicken, dove …
But the Romans knew there were more than a few hundred “kinds” of animals; they had menageries. And they knew how many hands were needed to take care of exotic animals being shipped across the Med from Egypt. By the time the christians collected the old Jewish books and the new testament into one bible, they knew that the Noah tale could not possibly be believed literally.
Biblical literalism is only possible for a certain set of truly ignorant 20th century urbanites. Shit, what shit? You mean that stuff you flush down the toilet? Easy peasy. Food, what food? You mean that stuff that comes in big bags from the pet supermart? Easy peasy. Too easy for them to not think through the simple facts of life, because modern life has made them all soft.
Now I understand this the science that falsifies Noha´s ark and claims evolution is a fact.
That is a paper that give historical arguments against the Bible story. How can you say it foalsfies the ark?
There’s a relevant account here involving the Sumerians.
Good, then I take it we don’t have to waste any more time on silly notions such as the global flud and the fable of Noah anymore.
I hope you watched part 2 all the way to the end too. It raises many interesting questions.
For example I would like to know how it is possible to produce the entire extant biodiversity on the planet, from a couple of thousand pairs of biblical “kinds”, simply through “within-kind” microevolution, in less than 4.000 years, given that according to creationists, beneficial mutations that affect bodyplans are so incredibly rare they’re supposed to be impossible even if evolution had hundreds of millions of years.
Yet we’re supposed to believe that in those 4000 years, a single pair of frogs evolved into tens of thousands of different species of frogs, with vastly different lifestyles and large variations in biochemistry and physiology. Some with posion glands that secrete novel toxic proteins, others with pores in their skin where they carry their developing eggs. All that, in 4000 years.
And creationists tell us no new proteins or metabolic pathways or regulatory networks could possibly have evolved in the 5-15 million years of the cambrian explosion. But apparently unfathomable swathes of novel regulation and biochemistry, in frogs alone, had no issue evolving “within kind” in 4000 years, post-flud. Now multiply the problem for every imagined “kind” on the Ark, which even the most conservative creationist estimates, still accept would have had to be in the thousands to avoid conceding macroevolutionary change.
If you can convince yourself that this happened, you have lost your mind.
About the only thing I will ever agree with Mapou on, is on how YEC – most especially, the Flood – can make religion appear to people with a decent scientific education. Or a calculator.
I don’t think you read the article I linked to. Hogging is a physics argument, not an historical one. The amount of energy released by the water that would have to have fallen to cover the planet is also a physics argument. Here it is in fact:
So, I don’t know what you read, Blas, but the link I provided went considerably beyond historical arguments.
Many wooden ships of massive proportions have been sea worthy. Evidences of massive ships : pbs article
Noah’s ark was built to float, not navigate.