Did Noah's Ark actually happen?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

[1000 word argument, followed by this conclusion...]: Everything before the Abrahamic covenant in the Bible is myth.

Acts 17:24-26 "The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by hands. 25And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything, because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. From one man he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth"

Seems that Mars Hill once heard an appeal directly contradicting the conclusion of your dissertation.  And if your conclusion is wrong, your points are likewise.

The Bible is not a book of science, and it has no reliability as a history of any peoples other than those of the people writing its books. If you want science then read Darwin, Einstein, Freud, and the like.

Whut?

Also, LOL at this thread. Jmfsct's attempt to retreat into metaphysics based around completely arbitrary premises in order to defend his argument is amusing to behold. Though I don't hold that "faith" is bad.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Also, LOL at this thread. Jmfsct's attempt to retreat into metaphysics based around completely arbitrary premises in order to defend his argument is amusing to behold. Though I don't hold that "faith" is bad.

in english, please.  How on earth am I retreating into metaphysics?

I fail to recognize the non-Englishness of my original post.

As for your retreat to metaphysics:

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Your arbitrary defined premise is that the bible is true, my arbitrary defined premise is that it is not. However I have the world of sense perception, scientific data, geology, biology, genetics and so forth on my side and you have faith and have thus tried to explain all these things away via some vast metaphysical conspiracy by God, which under my premise I don't have to believe in at all. Nothing wrong with faith, as I said earlier, but if "God the Conspiracy theorists against Man" is the best one can come up with well.....

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Your arbitrary defined premise is that the bible is true, my arbitrary defined premise is that it is not. However I have the world of sense perception, scientific data, geology, biology, genetics and so forth on my side and you have faith

[Setting aside the laws of thermodynamics which testify to the need of a Creator..].

Abraham had both facts and faith.  And his facts were CONTRARY to his faith.  Yet he didn't waver, but believed God's word and God's word turned out to be true.  Likewise, Noah had never seen rain, so Noah's facts were also CONTRARY to God's warning of a flood.  But Noah proved God to be true and "by his faith he condemned the word" (Heb 11:7).

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and have thus tried to explain all these things away via some vast metaphysical conspiracy by God, which under my premise I don't have to believe in at all. Nothing wrong with faith, as I said earlier, but if "God the Conspiracy theorists against Man" is the best one can come up with well.....

HUH?!

I have NEVER even hinted at a conspiracy theory on God's part. After all, he gave us his word, the scripture. 

1Cor 14:33 "For God is not a God of confusion"

So, if anything, you are conspiring against yourself by not believing God's word:

Job 37:5 "He does great things beyond our understanding."

and...

Michal 7:4 "Now is the time of their confusion"

#1: Bemuse me (on how the laws of thermodynamics requiring a creator).

#2: As Dibble said, why should I care about Bible quotes, your argument is completely circular... to show the truth of the bible, you quote the bible and presume that it is true. There is no logic here.

#3: God deceived man to believe what is opposite to the case seems to me a conspiracy. Though however outside of bible quotes you have given me no reason to belief it. So why should I?

#4: Repeat: Why should I believe you, Jmfsct? Why should I?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

#1: Bemuse me (on how the laws of thermodynamics requiring a creator).

1) the universe is not infinitely old (Entropy)

2) the universe could not have created itself (Conservation: energy cannot be created or destroyed)

therefore, the mere existence of the universe is evidence of the existence of God:

Rom 1:20 "Since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse."

Neither #1 and #2 explain anything about how there is a need for god, additionally your use of scientific laws when you are seemingly attacking science is amusing to say the least. That the universe could not exist sui generis is a quite obvious fact.

Btw, let's be quite clear that I am not someone to holds onto a strong belief in the power of science especially theorhetical science which is often flawed, and can provide evidence if so desired. But what matters here is what hypothesis is the most likely? I agree that we can't rule out God as a hypothesis, but why should be based our facts on an arbitrary hypothesis. There is as much evidence, given the standard of what consists of evidence without getting into God-as-an-evil-genius-manipulating-the-universe-to-fool-man metaphysics for God's existence (and the Christian God at that..!) as there is for the hypothesis, say, that the universe is a dream wholly created a whole soliditary mind or life force or for Solipcism or for the hypothesis that the Universe was created out of the snot of Odin.. or any possibility. That there is entropy and that the universe can not be - it seems - a purely self-contained or self-created system, and there is still alot of science to be done on this, is not evidence for the existence of the creator. What it is evidence of is that there is some stuff we just don't understand, which of course doesn't mean we can't understand it in the future.

Why we should believe what I will now call the "Genesis Hypothesis" is never made clear by any of the illogical suppositions you make. And quoting the bible is not evidence of anything other than the fact you quote the bible, if I quoted The Origin of Species would that prove evolution? Would quoting The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe prove the existence of magic wardrobes that can enter other worlds? Only a mind unable to grasp any notion of evidence, analysis or comprehension would think that.

You will no doubt say that the Bible has been proven due to archaeology, historical data, etc which is a very selective use of facts, actually given that it involves the analytic method (well... Okay, most of the time) you seem to despise or dismiss so much by your conspiracy-metaphysics. Also that there was a King David, a Soloman's Temple or the Hittities does not prove that there was a great flood, a garden of Eden or the prophecies of The Book of Daniel. For instance take another classic text The Illad: there probably was a Troy and there certainly was a Sparta and possibly a war too, does that automatically mean that Achilles existed and was an invincible warrior except on his heal due to one of his parents being a god or that the war was won after the Trojans stupidity driving a wooden horse into the city thinking the Greeks had fled? Of course not.

And similiarily and finally using your conspiracy-metaphysics I could claim with absolutely no evidence what so ever that, say, Allah or Zeus or the Flying Spaghetti Monster is manipulating the archaeological evidence or all the evidence that they point towards a Christian God (which is none whatsoever) in order to trick people into believing the false Christian God as a test, as you claim God is doing to us. What is the basis for my claim? None what so ever, which is the exact same basis for your claim that God is doing that to us other than a couple of quotes for the Bible which as far as I am concerned don't prove anything other than their existence and I don't see why on a subjective judgement such as this I should believe you or that your opinion is better than mine, what objective basis would one have for chosing your argument over mine except that you have "the word", which if someone made that judgement would be a completely arbitrary decision based on one's own perception (ie. that they might be believers too).

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#2: As Dibble said, why should I care about Bible quotes, your argument is completely circular... to show the truth of the bible, you quote the bible and presume that it is true. There is no logic here.

Seeing that my argument agrees with the physical laws that you say you put your trust in, it seems my argument is more logical than your argument in that at least mine isn't self-contradicting

Yet as I have said already you use this laws if convient and that they don't prove your arguments in any way what so ever.

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#3: God deceived man to believe what is opposite to the case seems to me a conspiracy. Though however outside of bible quotes you have given me no reason to belief it. So why should I?

there is no deception in the bible quotes - God simply promised Abraham that He would do something to change Abraham's/Sarah's physical abilities (to reproduce after the age of childbearing).  The "contrary to facts" part was that it was contrary to the facts of natural process.  Abraham believed God simply because Abraham reasoned that God had the ability to change his circumstance.

If God wasn't able to step in and change my circumstance, then I wouldn't need God at all for there would be nothing He could do for me.

Which is a fantastic way of avoiding the question, of why God would fool us so to believe in things outside of his existence and furthermore, whatever argument you use which seems to involve self-referentially quoting from the bible (and thus is a pseudo-argument) why should I believe it? Or think that it may be? Why should I prefer "the word of God" over the perception of sensory data and the modern accumulation of knowledge (which of course can and does err, quite frequently).

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#4: Repeat: Why should I believe you, Jmfsct? Why should I?

I am not saying you should believe the word of jmfcst, but I am saying you should believe the word of God.

I am unconvinced.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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I agree with the first bit (but then if God is fooling us then how can we be sure of anything, isn't everything then an assumption) but the highest assumption at all is that God created the Earth and heavens, etc and what do we have to base that on... surely less than that of the Moon-collision hypothesis.

EDIT: Will post more later.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

unless your looking for everything in science to say "ok this is what we think happened but it may have been divine intervention" which would render the whole thing pointless

there are MORE natural possibilities than the ones that have been currently thought up.  That's why throughout history scientific "claims" have been found to be bogus and replaced by better informed scientific "claims".

If science would just present the facts: "It appears..." instead of "This theory is fact..." and treat theories as what they are ("theories") instead of "fact".  The only scientific "facts" are experimental results.  But, all to often, scientists extend repeatable "facts" to their theories about the past and claim their theory is a "fact". 

Since the vast majority of scientific theories stated as "fact" have been proven to be wrong, you would think the smugness of scientists would be tempered.  But, alas, it is not. 

If the end result of science is truth, they why have the majority of past scientific theories proven to be false?  If scientists would be truthful, they would admit they are still only scratching the surface of knowledge.

2Tim 3:7-8 "They are always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth."

1Cor 8:1 "We know that we all possess knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up."

Yes, yes, I agree with all that (except the bible quotes) and believe me I am well educated on the problems of scientific knowledge*, but you still haven't given us a reason to choose your particular metaphysical system which invokes the Christian God in a literalist intrepretation of the bible over any other particular one which tries to explain the whole reality. Personally I quite like the idea of a God who is the substance of universe (as opposed to a concious creator) which shifts and moves as according to the rules of that substance. Is that worse than your God? How so?

And you still haven't replied fully to my earlier comment.

* (Btw, alot of experimentation is flawed as well, not all of it obviously, but a significant degree of it, especially in Psychology - even if we consider that a 'science'.)

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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Way to fail to read. I didn't question the laws of Thermodynamics, I merely affirmed that there is entropy and that the universe can't be a purely self generating system.. point of which confirm your point. My point was that you can't put that down to God, the amount of potential causations is infinite.

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Again I'm not denying the laws of Thermodynamics, and I agree that Evolution is a hypothesis, though one which seems the most plausiable (even though I have a strong distaste for many evolutionary theorists viz. Dawkins). So what are you arguing about?

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#1: Ah, but you hinted at that in your previous post which I quote earlier
#2: Again the amount of potential hypothetical causations for the universe are infinite and in a rational system have all equal value (that is, we can't know one is more correct or less correct than the other) so the existence of the universe doesn't prove God at all, least of all the Christian God. Unless you wish to argue, like I hinted earlier at, that God is the Universe, but that may sound a bit too like Eastern Mysticism to you.

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That evidence of God being what...?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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Allah, Yahweh, Brahma, Zeus, Jupiter, Osiris, The Tao, a powerful ideal mind which shapes the universe and is the universe simultaneously, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the congealed remains of Odin's Snot, The mental configuration of my mind transposed onto nothingness, A mad computer machine, beings from another universe which created this universe out of some unknown substance only accessible to themselves, Satan, some unknown 'being' like a God but unknown to the human religions, a delusion of the mass human mind as to prevent it from going insane, Spinoza's God as unitary life force, a fourth form of matter which includes all the elements of the other three and so on.

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So, you are contradicting yourself?

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I'm arguing the fundamental nature of the universe is unknowable given our current tools of knowledge, that is all. Any hypothesis is just that a hypothesis, and much harder to show than 'evolution'.

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I have made my choice. Consider me one who likes popping pretensions.

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God here is a thing which acts as a universe or the universe, it has no will, it is totality, it is just 'there'. (Why do we believe that there must be someone behind all this? Why can't we see what is there?)

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Way to fail to read. I didn't question the laws of Thermodynamics, I merely affirmed that there is entropy and that the universe can't be a purely self generating system.. point of which confirm your point. My point was that you can't put that down to God, the amount of potential causations is infinite.

such as...

Allah, Yahweh, Brahma, Zeus, Jupiter, Osiris, The Tao, a powerful ideal mind which shapes the universe and is the universe simultaneously, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the congealed remains of Odin's Snot, The mental configuration of my mind transposed onto nothingness, A mad computer machine, beings from another universe which created this universe out of some unknown substance only accessible to themselves, Satan, some unknown 'being' like a God but unknown to the human religions...

yo, Dorthy, you forgot the Wicked Witch of the West

Indeed I did, just where does the time go, now why tell me is that more absurd than God. Personally If he did create the universe, the Christian God has got alot of explaining to do.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Indeed I did, just where does the time go, now why tell me is that more absurd than God. Personally If he did create the universe, the Christian God has got alot of explaining to do.

why does God need to give you an exhaustive explanation beyond what the bible has already explained?

Because I have no reason to follow the bible... on your logic what makes the Bible better than the Qu'ran precisely?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Jmfcst, your circular reasoning is ridiculous; why should we believe anything you say? (No Bible Quotes allowed please).

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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Nonsense.

What I pointed out was that that is not evidence[/u] for the bible in itself. Just because something has not been falsified* does not make it true. Like the Flying Spaghetti monster.

(* - ... and has already been pointed out parts of the bible have been falsified, your ruminations about Noah's ark fly in the face of the mass of Geological, Geographical and Archaeological evidence of the past 200-250 years at least. Which brings us back to conspiracy metaphysics...)

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So what you are saying is that the Bible must be true because of your ACTIONS in searching for the 'truth' (whatever that is) and let any doubt of anything, never mind empirical validity, be damned.

Now If I look for the Truth in find it in a snowflake which looks like the image of Jim Jones, and write a holy text for it and quote it as validity of the truth, then it is correct. Why not, it's my truth? (See I'm not that much of a postmodernist relativist, Alcon)

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Okay then:
Gen 6:3 And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man,
        for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred
        and twenty years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeanne_Calment

A person who lived to 122 can somewhat contradict what is above. Personally I find most of the bible especially revelation and the prophecies alot of obscurantist and inchoate nonsense*, for it doesn't ring 'true' for me, so how is it true, is Jmfcst's standard via the mediation of Jesus the only standard of truth?

(* - Of course other parts of the bible are strongly profound, but that is not what is at issue here.)

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Why does no one ever listen to me?

you mean God, or your contributions in this thread?

I mean, people continue to debate with jmfcst depsite the fact that every argument that they use is not one that he would care about and vise versa. It is an exercise in pointlessness. 

The amazing thing is how he keeps misintrepreting my posts, and ignored those bits he knows he can't argue with.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

The amazing thing is how he keeps misintrepreting my posts, and ignored those bits he knows he can't argue with.

report your question

I have already stated that the laws of thermodynamics (among other things) show that the universe is not and can not be a self-generating body or purely a self-enclosed system. However that does not prove anything other than the facts I have already stated, it no furthers proves God then it proves Allah or Brahman or anything else, what it proves is that the universe is not a self-generating body and not a purely self-enclosed system. Which we agree upon. But that does not logically show the existence of the Christian God, when you try to show that it does you quote the bible, of which we have no empirical basis for knowing its connection to the knowledge of the foundation of the universe, if any, but you just assume that it does. Your argument is completely circular.

Also it has already been shown on this very thread that Noah's Ark could not possibly have happened, for all science flaws it has not shown any evidence suggesting that the great flood did happen, much on contrary all scientific evidence flies in the face of it. You are quite happy to use the laws of thermodynamics to prove your case but not geology or climatology shows that you are being ridiculously selective with facts, choosing only those does that help your argument. Also if Noah's Ark has been shown to be empirical disproved, then parts of the bible must be wrong too and can not be used literally to show anything about the nature of the universe.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Well, at least we agree on two things:
1) every experiment ever conducted has demonstrated that nature cannot create itself, which leaves science at a dead end.
2) God creating the universe solves problem #1

3) The Flying Spaghetti Monster creating the universe solves problem #1.
4) Invisible Pink Unicorn creating the universe solves problem #1.
5) <Fill in the blank> creating the universe solves problem #1.

ok, a supernatural force  creating the universe solves problem #1...I wasn't trying to be specific.

So why then posit God for anything? And ditto for the end of universe as well.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

So why then posit God for anything? And ditto for the end of universe as well.

Dude, I was simply showing the necessity of a Creator from the laws of Thermo.

Yes but then you were positing that this was God's result and that it proves the existence of God.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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Ah yes, but you implied this by:

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Indeed I did, just where does the time go, now why tell me is that more absurd than God. Personally If he did create the universe, the Christian God has got alot of explaining to do.

why does God need to give you an exhaustive explanation beyond what the bible has already explained?

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That seems to me evidence of your line of logical reasoning --> It at least implies that "laws of thermodynamics" = proof of God.

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Now we are back to conspiracy metaphysics... we should believe your account of Genesis outside of the record of the Bible, you are still very unclear on this.

You didn't respond to many points I made earlier on biblical history (my comparsion to The Illad) or your rejection of the Qu'ran, which is entirely based on a personal assumption or the fact that you pick and choose which science to listen to and so forth. Actually I can't help that I am arguing in a circle here. It is true I've never read the bible cover to cover, though have read many parts of it, the Genesis quote was my error, but you still haven't given us any reason to believe ANY OF YOUR ASSERTIONS AT ALL EXCEPT THAT YOU STAY THEY ARE IN THE BIBLE AND ARE THUS TRUE. IN SHORT, YOU GIVEN ME A REASON FOR ME TO READ THE BIBLE EXCEPT FOR CONSTANT "IT'S THE WORD OF GOD" HOMILIES. On this issue "faith" does not quite cut it, as I have none, at least not in Christian God, which is an alien concept to me.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

the laws of thermo prohibit the universe always existing

Actually, for the first law to really be true it has to have always existed.

and so the 1st law contradicts the 2nd law?  I don't think so.

The context of the 1st law is NATURAL FORCES can't create or destroy energy.  Period.  It does not attempt to make a statement of the supernatural.

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so, to get back on track, in this thread we have shown two things:
1) The laws of thermo agree with the bible pertaining to the necessity of a Creator.
2) Noah's Flood does NOT contradict the geological record (lack of huge mud flows) since the Flood did not target plants and thus did not affect the soil - no mud flows.

"Mud flows" are hardly the only sign of a massive flood Jmfsct. Why do we have such long lasting botanic evidence, a massive flood would surely have wiped out a significant proportion of plants... yet it did not it seems. What about the Meteorological evidence, which does not hint at all of there being such a flood. The simple fact is that we have no evidence at all that the flood took place, but we have lots of things which strongly suggest otherwise (Genetic records... there is another one). So why should we believe you?

As already stated #1 only posits that nothing can't create something, there must have been a starting point, an x, but what that is, is up to complete speculation. We simply don't know, and anyone who does is an intellectual charalatan basically.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

the laws of thermo prohibit the universe always existing

Actually, for the first law to really be true it has to have always existed.

and so the 1st law contradicts the 2nd law?  I don't think so.

The context of the 1st law is NATURAL FORCES can't create or destroy energy.  Period.  It does not attempt to make a statement of the supernatural.

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so, to get back on track, in this thread we have shown two things:
1) The laws of thermo agree with the bible pertaining to the necessity of a Creator.
2) Noah's Flood does NOT contradict the geological record (lack of huge mud flows) since the Flood did not target plants and thus did not affect the soil - no mud flows.

"Mud flows" are hardly the only sign of a massive flood Jmfsct. Why do we have such long lasting botanic evidence, a massive flood would surely have wiped out a significant proportion of plants... yet it did not it seems.

that's exactly my point, the plants were not targeted

#1: Thanks for ignoring everything else I said

#2: How the hell is that possible, really. A massive bloody flood would certainly things to plants which can be quantified, don't you think... or what about the soil content, or archaeological evidence or anything... at all.

#3: Why the F--- should we believe this.