“Well, at least you are using the word creator instead of God which has a lot attached to it. We also could have been created by accident, like unintentionally created by a deity. Or there could be eternal Creators plural.” – dave
or the creator(s) could be very different than what we expect, and while powerful, may not be intelligent. the possibilities are endless and are not limited by our limited imaginations.
but kathy, pretending that you have a definite answer to an unknown and unknowable issue, does not make it right.
…and you’re basing your beliefs off of claims in a book that said virgins give birth, dead people rise from the graves, the sun moves backwards, that rabbits chew cuds, that the medes destroyed babylon, that a perfect god ordered the genocide of several tribal nations and the capture of virgin girls, that says it’s wrong to eat meat offered to idols, but that it’s okay to eat meat offered to idols, and that claimed god was father and son to himself, who had to be scarified because of his own rules…
what credentials, again, does the bible have for truth, or whatever?
I’d like to address the claim that Christianity has more evidence than any other religion.
To be fair, we should not just look at the amount of evidence, but also the amount of claims being made. More claims require more evidence.
Deism, for example, only makes the claim that there is a creative force greater than humans. I don’t have a graph chart, but you could try and visualize one: Line up all of the religions and first make a bar that represents the number of claims being made. Then make a second bar that represents the amount of evidence for each religion. I think this is a better way of comparing them.
“what scientific data backs that up??” BUT WAIT – there’s more!
The Earth is an oblate ellipsoid – a sphere slightly flattened at the poles and bulging at the equator. The distance around the Earth at the equator is 24,901.55 miles (40,075 kilometers). The distance around the Earth through the poles is 24,859.82 miles (40,008 kilometers). Let’s average that for the sake of simplicity, and say the average circumference is 24,880.685 miles.
Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world. Its elevation of 29,035 feet (8,850 meters/5.499053 miles) was determined using GPS satellite equipment on May 5, 1999, as confirmed by the National Geographic Society.
Mount Ararat is located in Eastern Turkey on the borders of Iran, Armenia, and Nakchivan. This volcanic mountain rises 5,165 meters or 16,945 feet (3.21 miles) high.
Since the circumference of a sphere can be determined by multiplying the diameter of the sphere by pi (3.1416), and since we know the circumference to be 24,880.685 miles, we can find the diameter by doing the opposite – dividing the circumference by pi, which gives us: 7,919.75 miles.
To summarize:
• Average diameter of Earth: 7,919.75 miles.
• The elevation of Mount Everest is 5.499053 miles.
• The elevation of Mount Ararat is 3.21 miles.
If I drew a sphere, to scale, whereby a certain fraction of an inch represented a mile, the sphere would be of a certain diameter – let’s call that the diameter of the Earth, or 7,919.75 miles.
If I were to draw another sphere, using the same scale, that would include the diameter of the Earth as well as the height of Mount Ararat on all sides (we would have to make it equal on all sides, for the water to be of an equal depth globally), that sphere, of course, would be larger. The diameter of the Earth (7,919.75 miles) plus twice the height of Mount Ararat (3.21 miles X 2) would give us the figure of 7,926.17 miles.
And larger still would be a sphere including the diameter of the Earth as well as twice the height of Mount Everest. We would have to add the height of Everest – 5.499 miles – to each radius, which would give us 7,919.75 miles for Earth, plus 10.998 extra miles for Everest, or 7930.748 miles.
Below we have such a sphere, representing both the Earth (green), the mountain in question (brown), and the water it would take to cover both the Earth and the mountain (blue).
Now the volume of a sphere – how much of anything that the sphere can hold – may be found by using the formula: (4/3)(pi)(radius, cubed) = cubic units.
First we need to cube the radius of the sphere. Since the average diameter of Earth was 7,919.75 miles, to find the radius, we would divide that figure in half, giving us 3,959.875 miles. To cube that figure, multiply it times itself three times, or 3,959.875, times 3,959.875, times 3,959.875, which gives us 62,093,255,524 – (62+ billion) – cubic miles.
Next we need to multiply that figure by pi (3.1416), the product of which is 195,072,171,554.
Finally, we need to multiply that figure by 4/3, which can be expressed as the decimal fraction 1.3333 – that process tells us that the volume of the Earth is approximately 260,089,726,333 – (260+ billion) – cubic miles in volume.
Applying the same process, we find the volume of a sphere to include Mount Everest, to be 261,174,777,009 – (261+ billion) – cubic miles, while the volume of a sphere to include Mount Ararat, as would be expected, is somewhat less, or 260,722,755,051 – (260+ billion) – cubic miles,
Are we having fun yet?
So how much water would it take to flood the entire Earth to such a depth that it would cover Mount Everest, with an additional 15 cubits (22.5 ft.) of H20?
(Genesis, 7:19, 20):
19: “And the waters prevailed exceedingly upon the earth; and all the high hills which were under the whole heaven, were covered.
20: “Fifteen cubits upward did the water prevail; and the mountains were covered.”
Now that means either that the water covered all of the Earth, to a height of 15 additional cubits above the highest mountains, or it simply means the flood was only 22.5 feet in total height, as it was in the original, factual,attested, historical Mesopotamian flood of the Euphrates River in 2900 B.C.E., from which Noah’s flood was blatantly plagiarised, in which case, it couldn’t even have covered a three-story building — you decide.
Since we’re only looking to find the volume of water it would take to cover the Earth to the height of Mounts Everest and Ararat, respectively, we’ll need to subtract the volume of the Earth from the two figures above.
We find the volume of the area from the surface of the Earth to the top of Mount Everest – (261,174,777,009 cubic miles, minus Earth’s volume, 260,089,726,333 cubic miles) – to be 1,085,051,676 – (1+ billion) – cubic miles.
And the volume of the area from the surface of the planet to the top of Mount Ararat, is 633,028,718 – (633+ million) – cubic miles.
Next, we need to convert the cubic miles to cubic feet. One cubic mile contains 147,197,952,000 – (147+ billion) – cubic feet, – i.e., 5,280, times 5,280, times 5,280 – we can do the math right here, but I’m kinda hoping you’ll just take my word for it, or do it on a rainy day, when there’s absolutely nothing on TV – you’ll thank me later.
The volume of a sphere, to include Mount Everest, would involve 159,717,384,521,367,552,000 – (159+ quintillion) – cubic feet, and Mount Ararat, a bit less, weighing in at 93,180,530,846,785,536,000 – (93+ quintillion) cubic feet – we’ll just do old Yahweh a favor and forget about the extra 15 cubits.
OK, we’re coming down the home stretch.
One US gallon is 0.133681 cubic feet, or 7.481 gallons per cubic foot. Using that figure, we learn that the number of gallons of water required to cover the Earth from its surface to the top of Mount Everest is – drumroll please – 1,194,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (1+ sextillion) – gallons of water! And for Ararat, a mere 697,083,551,264,802,594,816 – (697+ quintillion) gallons of water!* – **
Whew!
And from the National Geological Survey, we know that there are (approximately) 326,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (326 quintillion) – gallons of water – roughly 1,260,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (1+ septillian liters) – on, in, under, and above, our planet.
A little simple subtraction (the amount there is, minus the amount we need) clearly indicates that there’s a bit of a shortage – some 868,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (868+ quintillion) – gallons more water than Earth possesses, would be required to cover the Earth to the top of Mount Everest. But I saw a TV commercial last week that said there was 358,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (358 quintillion) – gallons of water on Earth, and we all know that TV commercials, much like Bibles, are noted for their honesty, don’t we? Anyway, let’s go with the higher amount just to give old Yahweh one more benefit of the doubt.
Using the larger figure leaves us only 836,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (836+ quintillion) – gallons short – I believe it was Mr. Spock who once said, “A difference that makes no difference, is no difference.” Sounds logical to me —
But what about Mount Ararat? Surely there’s enough water to cover Mount Ararat! Even using the higher, unsubstantiated number, Jehova would have to come up with an additional 339,083,551,264,802,594,816 – (339+ quintillion) – gallons of water – clearly twice as much water as there is on the entire planet – if he had any intention of soaking the peak of Mount Ararat!
*[Note: if any of you reading this can find and point out a mathematical error in my calculations – other than “It happened just like the Bible says, because the Bible says it did!” – please point it out to me, and if I’ve erred, I will promptly make corrections.]
**[I would like to personally thank Mr. Arnold Reinhold of diceware.com for creating and freely providing for public use, his Big Number Calculator – http://world.std.com/~reinhold/BigNumCalc.html – without which, I’d still be scrounging through my desk, looking for extra erasers!]
BUT WAIT, there’s STILL more —
We’ve done all of our mathematical calculations (well, I have, while you were off doing who knows what with who knows whom) based on the premise that the Earth is a solid, smooth ball, which it isn’t. We didn’t even factor in the oceans, and that’s where the vast majority of Earth’s water lies.
“The oceans are huge. About 70 percent of the planet is covered in ocean, and the average depth of the ocean is several thousand feet (about 1,000 meters). Ninety-eight percent of the water on the planet is in the oceans (emphasis, mine), and therefore is unusable for drinking because of the salt. About 2 percent of the planet’s water is fresh, but 1.6 percent of the planet’s water is locked up in the polar ice caps and glaciers. Another 0.36 percent is found underground in aquifers and wells. Only about 0.036 percent of the planet’s total water supply is found in lakes and rivers. That’s still thousands of trillions of gallons, but it’s a very small amount compared to all the water available.
“The rest of the water on the planet is either floating in the air as clouds and water vapor, or is locked up in plants and animals (your body is 65 percent water, so if you weigh 100 pounds, 65 pounds of you is water!). There’s also all the soda pop, milk and orange juice you see at the store and in your refrigerators. There’s probably several billion gallons of water sitting on a shelf at any one time!”
So we’ve already determined that there isn’t enough water in, on, under, or above this planet to have flooded the Earth to the extent the Bible says actually happened, yet with 98% of the 326-358 quintillion gallons – which was way too short as it was, to have caused a global flood – locked into the oceans, if a world-wide flood looked impossible before, it appears absolutely ridiculous, now that we’ve been reduced by the water in oceans, to an even smaller fraction of the original amount needed.
“But,” you may well say, “that’s not necessarily all of the water there was – Gen. 7:11 says, ‘…the same day were all of the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of heaven were opened.’”
I prefer simply to present, rather than interpret the contents of the Bible, otherwise I would sound too much like a preacher steering you in the direction he wants you to go, but in this particular instance, I’ll set that approach aside to explain to you this mysterious “deep” we’ve heard so much about (I have what I’m about to explain, from several reliable sources, it’s not just coming off the top of my head).
Pure water is actually clear – a body of water appears blue to us simply because it’s reflecting to our eyes, the blue of the sky – on a cloudy day, for example, it no longer looks blue. Early Man didn’t quite grasp this concept, in fact, he believed something closely approaching the converse to be true. Recognizing air to be invisible – transparent – He believed the blue of the sky to be due to “space” (as we know it today) consisting of a large body of (blue) water, which, seen through the transparent air, leaves us with the impression that the sky is actually blue. In other words, this planet, to some early civilizations, was covered by bubble of air, surrounded by a vast ocean of water above. Genesis, then, is telling us that “…the windows of heaven were opened,” allowing that water surrounding our little planetary bubble, to fall to Earth. An omniscient god, creator of both the heaven and the Earth (Gen. 1:1), would have known better, and would never have inspired Man to say otherwise.
Now, Kathy, if you’d please be so kind as to provide us with some scientific evidence that it happened as your Bible says it did —
“Genesis, then, is telling us that “…the windows of heaven were opened,” allowing that water surrounding our little planetary bubble, to fall to Earth. An omniscient god, creator of both the heaven and the Earth (Gen. 1:1), would have known better, and would never have inspired Man to say otherwise.” arch
and gen 1 also says that god separated the waters from below with the waters above with the firmament (sky). when you read gen 1 carefully, it’s easy to see that it was written by ancient man, who had no idea about the solar system or space, but saw a blue “gulf” where water (rain) came from. they were making assumptions, trying to explain their surroundings.
it’s easy for man to be wrong, especially ancient man… but for a god who created all to not know what the blue sky was?
or not know where he brought birds from (gen 1 and 2)?
Or for fun we could try explaining how the Akkadians, Sumerians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Chinese, Aztecs, Incans, Mayans, Aboriginal Australians, etc. must have all descended from Noah’s three sons in such a short period of time.
“Your list of possibilities of our origins ALL fall under one of two possible choices.. a Creator or accident.</em"
No, no, Kathy – we covered that, remember?
1. invisible magic spirit that lives beyond space and time,
2. accident,
3. explanation we haven't found yet.
I vote for 3, with a little bit of 2 thrown in for good measure. Your number 1 is a REAL "number 2," if you know what I mean —
The animals that left the ark would have had to survive in the barren flood lands that would have followed the great deluge. They must have all made quite a run for it after being released from their cages on the ark. Perhaps Noah gave the herbivores a head start.
Kangaroos must have left the ark and headed straight for Australia since they are found nowhere else on the planet (including fossil remains). The same goes for the Koala, the Tasmanian Devil, the Platypus and the Echidna (to name a few) that all high-tailed it for Australia. Lemurs decided to go directly to Madagascar and are found nowhere else. Armadillos on the other hand headed directly to South / Central America and are found nowhere else.
Also, in the post-flood world there were animals that had to get back to their natural habitats without dying on the way there. Try to picture the penguin family making their way from the middle east back to Antarctica. Or the rain forest animals waiting around for their ecosystem to grow back.
kathy, and many other believers will toss out bionically un-supportive evidence as being “wrong” or “just trying to find reasons to live sinful lives” because to them, the bible is the only “known truth.”
when they talk about evidence, they’re talking about things that support the bible, not because those things lend credence to the bible, but because the bible lends credence to them.
so with the above discovered site, they may acknowledge that such a town was real, but they’d dispute the dating methods without even knowing anything about them.
and at the same time, if anything gets dated that aligns with the bible, using the same dating methods, well then it’s true then, since the bible confirms it.
it’s a position that they would never take with any other book or source, yet they say they’er being objective, when they are blatantly biased.
“it’s a simple question that requires a simple answer.. which religion has the most evidence aka credentials to support it’s truth or claimed truth?”
“I didn’t ask which you believed to be the most true”
Sounds to me like you DID!
It always helps in a debate, Kathy, to remember what you’ve previously said, but then since you don’t know the meaning of the word, debate, I suppose you could be excused on the grounds of ignorance.
(Thanks, William, I know how painstakingly laborious that must have been.)
It didn’t take that much time, the two pieces came from the saved files of my original website, “in His own image,” which, much like the Phoenix, will one day rise from its own ashes.
I have another one on cow farts, but it’s a bit long. The ark was afloat for 10.5 months, with only one, 1.5 cubit window, and it was closed til the doves were released – any idea how much methane can build up from an arkful of animals in 10.5 months? I do!
For the REAL answer to where we come from, I suggest a series of five, hour-long videos, “The Incredible Human Journey,” superbly done by the BBC, featuring Dr. Alice Roberts, who has enough credentials to please even Kathy – the first of which I’ll offer here, the rest can be found on Youtube:
“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. it is simply too painful to acknowledge — even to ourselves — that we’ve been so credulous. “
— Carl Sagan —
neuro, thanks, it’s true, gay male brains are different. delightfully so.
Well, gay men do not compete with straight men for one thing, but they understand many, if not most, uniquely male concerns, because they are men.
And they share enough in common with women that they understand women’s concerns, too. Many lesbians are a bit taken aback by how indifferent many gay men are to feminist political concerns, but those aren’t the women’s concerns I mean. I’m talking about such things as ‘cognitive style’, ‘linguistic patterns’ and other things that you need a special dictionary to get.
I think most gay men can think both as a man and a woman, just as the author says. I know I do. I believe we can see both sides of the coin.
this is what i had referred to earlier as “gay male privilege”.
Actually, Paul, you have no way of knowing that, any more than I do that I was born straight. As a science teacher of mine once said, heredity and environment are so intertwined, they can never be separated.
In the news: 3300 year old cult complex discovered in Israel.
A massive cult complex has been discovered at the site of Tel Burna in Israel. The site contains burnt animal bones indicating animal sacrifice. They are not certain which god was worshiped at the complex although it possibly was Baal or Anat.
I was going to link to a news article, but I could not decide on which news website had the least amount of ads.
Kathy, do you think all of the priests in the ancient world who collected tithes from the commoners were nice guys or was it just the priests of yahweh that were trustworthy? Considering some of the laws these guys came up with were pretty foul:
When a man sells his daughter as a slave, she will not be freed at the end of six years as the men are. If she does not please the man who bought her, he may allow her to be bought back again. But he is not allowed to sell her to foreigners, since he is the one who broke the contract with her. And if the slave girl’s owner arranges for her to marry his son, he may no longer treat her as a slave girl, but he must treat her as his daughter. If he himself marries her and then takes another wife, he may not reduce her food or clothing or fail to sleep with her as his wife. If he fails in any of these three ways, she may leave as a free woman without making any payment. Exodus 21:7-11
If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her. Deuteronomy 2:28-29
When a man strikes his male or female slave with a rod so hard that the slave dies under his hand, he shall be punished. If, however, the slave survives for a day or two, he is not to be punished, since the slave is his own property. Exodus 21:20-21
“Kathy, do you think all of the priests in the ancient world who collected tithes from the commoners were nice guys or was it just the priests of yahweh that were trustworthy?”
I wonder who she thinks had all of the worship centers throughout Israel shut down, and made it mandatory that all Jews come only to Jerusalem for Passover? The Jerusalem religious establishment, of course!
Your waffling is below – in your own words. This is just one topic. Please read and clarify your question, because it looks like you’ve been trying to change it.”
William, I see zero “waffling”.. can you be more specific? How was I trying to change it?
““what scientific data backs that up??”
What scientific data backs up the fact that there was no universal flood that covered the entire earth 15 cubits (22.5 feet) above the highest mountains? Well, let’s see — ”
You misunderstood my comment again..
What scientific evidence backs up the atheist belief that if there is a fictional story about a flood
that means it couldn’t actually happen.. because according to atheists, it already was written about. Makes no sense.
Finding Truth 
“Well, at least you are using the word creator instead of God which has a lot attached to it. We also could have been created by accident, like unintentionally created by a deity. Or there could be eternal Creators plural.” – dave
or the creator(s) could be very different than what we expect, and while powerful, may not be intelligent. the possibilities are endless and are not limited by our limited imaginations.
but kathy, pretending that you have a definite answer to an unknown and unknowable issue, does not make it right.
…and you’re basing your beliefs off of claims in a book that said virgins give birth, dead people rise from the graves, the sun moves backwards, that rabbits chew cuds, that the medes destroyed babylon, that a perfect god ordered the genocide of several tribal nations and the capture of virgin girls, that says it’s wrong to eat meat offered to idols, but that it’s okay to eat meat offered to idols, and that claimed god was father and son to himself, who had to be scarified because of his own rules…
what credentials, again, does the bible have for truth, or whatever?
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I’d like to address the claim that Christianity has more evidence than any other religion.
To be fair, we should not just look at the amount of evidence, but also the amount of claims being made. More claims require more evidence.
Deism, for example, only makes the claim that there is a creative force greater than humans. I don’t have a graph chart, but you could try and visualize one: Line up all of the religions and first make a bar that represents the number of claims being made. Then make a second bar that represents the amount of evidence for each religion. I think this is a better way of comparing them.
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“what scientific data backs that up??”
BUT WAIT – there’s more!
The Earth is an oblate ellipsoid – a sphere slightly flattened at the poles and bulging at the equator. The distance around the Earth at the equator is 24,901.55 miles (40,075 kilometers). The distance around the Earth through the poles is 24,859.82 miles (40,008 kilometers). Let’s average that for the sake of simplicity, and say the average circumference is 24,880.685 miles.
Mount Everest is the highest mountain in the world. Its elevation of 29,035 feet (8,850 meters/5.499053 miles) was determined using GPS satellite equipment on May 5, 1999, as confirmed by the National Geographic Society.
Mount Ararat is located in Eastern Turkey on the borders of Iran, Armenia, and Nakchivan. This volcanic mountain rises 5,165 meters or 16,945 feet (3.21 miles) high.
Since the circumference of a sphere can be determined by multiplying the diameter of the sphere by pi (3.1416), and since we know the circumference to be 24,880.685 miles, we can find the diameter by doing the opposite – dividing the circumference by pi, which gives us: 7,919.75 miles.
To summarize:
• Average diameter of Earth: 7,919.75 miles.
• The elevation of Mount Everest is 5.499053 miles.
• The elevation of Mount Ararat is 3.21 miles.
If I drew a sphere, to scale, whereby a certain fraction of an inch represented a mile, the sphere would be of a certain diameter – let’s call that the diameter of the Earth, or 7,919.75 miles.
If I were to draw another sphere, using the same scale, that would include the diameter of the Earth as well as the height of Mount Ararat on all sides (we would have to make it equal on all sides, for the water to be of an equal depth globally), that sphere, of course, would be larger. The diameter of the Earth (7,919.75 miles) plus twice the height of Mount Ararat (3.21 miles X 2) would give us the figure of 7,926.17 miles.
And larger still would be a sphere including the diameter of the Earth as well as twice the height of Mount Everest. We would have to add the height of Everest – 5.499 miles – to each radius, which would give us 7,919.75 miles for Earth, plus 10.998 extra miles for Everest, or 7930.748 miles.
Below we have such a sphere, representing both the Earth (green), the mountain in question (brown), and the water it would take to cover both the Earth and the mountain (blue).
Now the volume of a sphere – how much of anything that the sphere can hold – may be found by using the formula: (4/3)(pi)(radius, cubed) = cubic units.
First we need to cube the radius of the sphere. Since the average diameter of Earth was 7,919.75 miles, to find the radius, we would divide that figure in half, giving us 3,959.875 miles. To cube that figure, multiply it times itself three times, or 3,959.875, times 3,959.875, times 3,959.875, which gives us 62,093,255,524 – (62+ billion) – cubic miles.
Next we need to multiply that figure by pi (3.1416), the product of which is 195,072,171,554.
Finally, we need to multiply that figure by 4/3, which can be expressed as the decimal fraction 1.3333 – that process tells us that the volume of the Earth is approximately 260,089,726,333 – (260+ billion) – cubic miles in volume.
Applying the same process, we find the volume of a sphere to include Mount Everest, to be 261,174,777,009 – (261+ billion) – cubic miles, while the volume of a sphere to include Mount Ararat, as would be expected, is somewhat less, or 260,722,755,051 – (260+ billion) – cubic miles,
Are we having fun yet?
So how much water would it take to flood the entire Earth to such a depth that it would cover Mount Everest, with an additional 15 cubits (22.5 ft.) of H20?
Now that means either that the water covered all of the Earth, to a height of 15 additional cubits above the highest mountains, or it simply means the flood was only 22.5 feet in total height, as it was in the original, factual,attested, historical Mesopotamian flood of the Euphrates River in 2900 B.C.E., from which Noah’s flood was blatantly plagiarised, in which case, it couldn’t even have covered a three-story building — you decide.
Since we’re only looking to find the volume of water it would take to cover the Earth to the height of Mounts Everest and Ararat, respectively, we’ll need to subtract the volume of the Earth from the two figures above.
We find the volume of the area from the surface of the Earth to the top of Mount Everest – (261,174,777,009 cubic miles, minus Earth’s volume, 260,089,726,333 cubic miles) – to be 1,085,051,676 – (1+ billion) – cubic miles.
And the volume of the area from the surface of the planet to the top of Mount Ararat, is 633,028,718 – (633+ million) – cubic miles.
Next, we need to convert the cubic miles to cubic feet. One cubic mile contains 147,197,952,000 – (147+ billion) – cubic feet, – i.e., 5,280, times 5,280, times 5,280 – we can do the math right here, but I’m kinda hoping you’ll just take my word for it, or do it on a rainy day, when there’s absolutely nothing on TV – you’ll thank me later.
The volume of a sphere, to include Mount Everest, would involve 159,717,384,521,367,552,000 – (159+ quintillion) – cubic feet, and Mount Ararat, a bit less, weighing in at 93,180,530,846,785,536,000 – (93+ quintillion) cubic feet – we’ll just do old Yahweh a favor and forget about the extra 15 cubits.
OK, we’re coming down the home stretch.
One US gallon is 0.133681 cubic feet, or 7.481 gallons per cubic foot. Using that figure, we learn that the number of gallons of water required to cover the Earth from its surface to the top of Mount Everest is – drumroll please – 1,194,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (1+ sextillion) – gallons of water! And for Ararat, a mere 697,083,551,264,802,594,816 – (697+ quintillion) gallons of water!* – **
Whew!
And from the National Geological Survey, we know that there are (approximately) 326,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (326 quintillion) – gallons of water – roughly 1,260,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (1+ septillian liters) – on, in, under, and above, our planet.
A little simple subtraction (the amount there is, minus the amount we need) clearly indicates that there’s a bit of a shortage – some 868,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (868+ quintillion) – gallons more water than Earth possesses, would be required to cover the Earth to the top of Mount Everest. But I saw a TV commercial last week that said there was 358,000,000,000,000,000,000 – (358 quintillion) – gallons of water on Earth, and we all know that TV commercials, much like Bibles, are noted for their honesty, don’t we? Anyway, let’s go with the higher amount just to give old Yahweh one more benefit of the doubt.
Using the larger figure leaves us only 836,845,753,604,350,656,512 – (836+ quintillion) – gallons short – I believe it was Mr. Spock who once said, “A difference that makes no difference, is no difference.” Sounds logical to me —
But what about Mount Ararat? Surely there’s enough water to cover Mount Ararat! Even using the higher, unsubstantiated number, Jehova would have to come up with an additional 339,083,551,264,802,594,816 – (339+ quintillion) – gallons of water – clearly twice as much water as there is on the entire planet – if he had any intention of soaking the peak of Mount Ararat!
*[Note: if any of you reading this can find and point out a mathematical error in my calculations – other than “It happened just like the Bible says, because the Bible says it did!” – please point it out to me, and if I’ve erred, I will promptly make corrections.]
**[I would like to personally thank Mr. Arnold Reinhold of diceware.com for creating and freely providing for public use, his Big Number Calculator – http://world.std.com/~reinhold/BigNumCalc.html – without which, I’d still be scrounging through my desk, looking for extra erasers!]
BUT WAIT, there’s STILL more —
We’ve done all of our mathematical calculations (well, I have, while you were off doing who knows what with who knows whom) based on the premise that the Earth is a solid, smooth ball, which it isn’t. We didn’t even factor in the oceans, and that’s where the vast majority of Earth’s water lies.
This too, is from How Stuff Works – http://www.howstuffworks.com/ –
So we’ve already determined that there isn’t enough water in, on, under, or above this planet to have flooded the Earth to the extent the Bible says actually happened, yet with 98% of the 326-358 quintillion gallons – which was way too short as it was, to have caused a global flood – locked into the oceans, if a world-wide flood looked impossible before, it appears absolutely ridiculous, now that we’ve been reduced by the water in oceans, to an even smaller fraction of the original amount needed.
“But,” you may well say, “that’s not necessarily all of the water there was – Gen. 7:11 says, ‘…the same day were all of the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of heaven were opened.’”
I prefer simply to present, rather than interpret the contents of the Bible, otherwise I would sound too much like a preacher steering you in the direction he wants you to go, but in this particular instance, I’ll set that approach aside to explain to you this mysterious “deep” we’ve heard so much about (I have what I’m about to explain, from several reliable sources, it’s not just coming off the top of my head).
Pure water is actually clear – a body of water appears blue to us simply because it’s reflecting to our eyes, the blue of the sky – on a cloudy day, for example, it no longer looks blue. Early Man didn’t quite grasp this concept, in fact, he believed something closely approaching the converse to be true. Recognizing air to be invisible – transparent – He believed the blue of the sky to be due to “space” (as we know it today) consisting of a large body of (blue) water, which, seen through the transparent air, leaves us with the impression that the sky is actually blue. In other words, this planet, to some early civilizations, was covered by bubble of air, surrounded by a vast ocean of water above. Genesis, then, is telling us that “…the windows of heaven were opened,” allowing that water surrounding our little planetary bubble, to fall to Earth. An omniscient god, creator of both the heaven and the Earth (Gen. 1:1), would have known better, and would never have inspired Man to say otherwise.
Now, Kathy, if you’d please be so kind as to provide us with some scientific evidence that it happened as your Bible says it did —
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https://findingtruth.wordpress.com/2014/10/09/open-conversation-part-3/#comment-22032
Arch, thanks for taking the time to write that comment. Very interesting.
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“Genesis, then, is telling us that “…the windows of heaven were opened,” allowing that water surrounding our little planetary bubble, to fall to Earth. An omniscient god, creator of both the heaven and the Earth (Gen. 1:1), would have known better, and would never have inspired Man to say otherwise.” arch
and gen 1 also says that god separated the waters from below with the waters above with the firmament (sky). when you read gen 1 carefully, it’s easy to see that it was written by ancient man, who had no idea about the solar system or space, but saw a blue “gulf” where water (rain) came from. they were making assumptions, trying to explain their surroundings.
it’s easy for man to be wrong, especially ancient man… but for a god who created all to not know what the blue sky was?
or not know where he brought birds from (gen 1 and 2)?
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“BUT WAIT – there’s more!”
Wow, you’ve been busy.
Or for fun we could try explaining how the Akkadians, Sumerians, Egyptians, Babylonians, Assyrians, Chinese, Aztecs, Incans, Mayans, Aboriginal Australians, etc. must have all descended from Noah’s three sons in such a short period of time.
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“Your list of possibilities of our origins ALL fall under one of two possible choices.. a Creator or accident.</em"
No, no, Kathy – we covered that, remember?
1. invisible magic spirit that lives beyond space and time,
2. accident,
3. explanation we haven't found yet.
I vote for 3, with a little bit of 2 thrown in for good measure. Your number 1 is a REAL "number 2," if you know what I mean —
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The buildings found at Gobekli Tepe are dated as far back as 9500 BC, I wonder how those survived the flood.
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The animals that left the ark would have had to survive in the barren flood lands that would have followed the great deluge. They must have all made quite a run for it after being released from their cages on the ark. Perhaps Noah gave the herbivores a head start.
Kangaroos must have left the ark and headed straight for Australia since they are found nowhere else on the planet (including fossil remains). The same goes for the Koala, the Tasmanian Devil, the Platypus and the Echidna (to name a few) that all high-tailed it for Australia. Lemurs decided to go directly to Madagascar and are found nowhere else. Armadillos on the other hand headed directly to South / Central America and are found nowhere else.
Also, in the post-flood world there were animals that had to get back to their natural habitats without dying on the way there. Try to picture the penguin family making their way from the middle east back to Antarctica. Or the rain forest animals waiting around for their ecosystem to grow back.
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kathy, and many other believers will toss out bionically un-supportive evidence as being “wrong” or “just trying to find reasons to live sinful lives” because to them, the bible is the only “known truth.”
when they talk about evidence, they’re talking about things that support the bible, not because those things lend credence to the bible, but because the bible lends credence to them.
so with the above discovered site, they may acknowledge that such a town was real, but they’d dispute the dating methods without even knowing anything about them.
and at the same time, if anything gets dated that aligns with the bible, using the same dating methods, well then it’s true then, since the bible confirms it.
it’s a position that they would never take with any other book or source, yet they say they’er being objective, when they are blatantly biased.
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and the flood details, like with the unique animals, only proves there was a miracle worked by god to the believers.
“see, god must have done this, how else can you explain how koalas are only found in australia after leaving the ark?”
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“it’s a simple question that requires a simple answer.. which religion has the most evidence aka credentials to support it’s truth or claimed truth?”
“I didn’t ask which you believed to be the most true”
Sounds to me like you DID!
It always helps in a debate, Kathy, to remember what you’ve previously said, but then since you don’t know the meaning of the word, debate, I suppose you could be excused on the grounds of ignorance.
(Thanks, William, I know how painstakingly laborious that must have been.)
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It didn’t take that much time, the two pieces came from the saved files of my original website, “in His own image,” which, much like the Phoenix, will one day rise from its own ashes.
I have another one on cow farts, but it’s a bit long. The ark was afloat for 10.5 months, with only one, 1.5 cubit window, and it was closed til the doves were released – any idea how much methane can build up from an arkful of animals in 10.5 months? I do!
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I think I’ve read that offal one before. . .:)
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For the REAL answer to where we come from, I suggest a series of five, hour-long videos, “The Incredible Human Journey,” superbly done by the BBC, featuring Dr. Alice Roberts, who has enough credentials to please even Kathy – the first of which I’ll offer here, the rest can be found on Youtube:
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Carmen, everybody farts – even Jesus (if he ever existed) farted, but his smelled good.
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neuro, thanks, it’s true, gay male brains are different. delightfully so.
Well, gay men do not compete with straight men for one thing, but they understand many, if not most, uniquely male concerns, because they are men.
And they share enough in common with women that they understand women’s concerns, too. Many lesbians are a bit taken aback by how indifferent many gay men are to feminist political concerns, but those aren’t the women’s concerns I mean. I’m talking about such things as ‘cognitive style’, ‘linguistic patterns’ and other things that you need a special dictionary to get.
I think most gay men can think both as a man and a woman, just as the author says. I know I do. I believe we can see both sides of the coin.
this is what i had referred to earlier as “gay male privilege”.
also, knowing first hand, I was born gay.
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“I was born gay.”
Actually, Paul, you have no way of knowing that, any more than I do that I was born straight. As a science teacher of mine once said, heredity and environment are so intertwined, they can never be separated.
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In the news: 3300 year old cult complex discovered in Israel.
A massive cult complex has been discovered at the site of Tel Burna in Israel. The site contains burnt animal bones indicating animal sacrifice. They are not certain which god was worshiped at the complex although it possibly was Baal or Anat.
I was going to link to a news article, but I could not decide on which news website had the least amount of ads.
Kathy, do you think all of the priests in the ancient world who collected tithes from the commoners were nice guys or was it just the priests of yahweh that were trustworthy? Considering some of the laws these guys came up with were pretty foul:
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For anyone interested in the discussion on polytheism to monotheism, here is a book on the subject: The Origins of Biblical Monotheism: Israel’s Polytheistic Background and the Ugaritic Texts by Mark S. Smith, Skirball Professor of Bible and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at New York University.
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“Kathy, do you think all of the priests in the ancient world who collected tithes from the commoners were nice guys or was it just the priests of yahweh that were trustworthy?”
I wonder who she thinks had all of the worship centers throughout Israel shut down, and made it mandatory that all Jews come only to Jerusalem for Passover? The Jerusalem religious establishment, of course!
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William,
“Hi Kathy,
Your waffling is below – in your own words. This is just one topic. Please read and clarify your question, because it looks like you’ve been trying to change it.”
William, I see zero “waffling”.. can you be more specific? How was I trying to change it?
And what exactly does this prove anyway?
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““what scientific data backs that up??”
What scientific data backs up the fact that there was no universal flood that covered the entire earth 15 cubits (22.5 feet) above the highest mountains? Well, let’s see — ”
You misunderstood my comment again..
What scientific evidence backs up the atheist belief that if there is a fictional story about a flood
that means it couldn’t actually happen.. because according to atheists, it already was written about. Makes no sense.
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Ruth,
“There are 2.. God or accident.
And neither one is a logical starting point. -Kathy
If you’re trying to point out how “crazy” it is.. no kidding.. – Kathy
How can you make this statement and then remain so indignant towardt those who don’t believe in your God?”
Because the alternate theory makes LESS sense. You don’t seem to “hear” anything I write Ruth..
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