Fresh Problem with the Ark

Doesn't the Bible say that God put a rainbow in the sky after Noah came out of the ark? And don't rainbows typically only form where there is rain or water vapor in the air? If so, that seems to indicate that it was raining when Noah came out of the ark, and so why wouldn't it have been raining the whole time he was on the ark? The initial deluge may have lasted for 40 days but certainly you can't expect that suddenly it then completely stopped raining and not a single drop fell for the rest of the voyage. Unless, of course you believe in a God and that he miraculously stopped all rain on the earth during that time. If the flood story is true, then scientifcally speaking, you would expect a lot of the flood waters to evaporate into the atmosphere and return to earth as rain during this period. Disbelieve the flood story all you want, but your arguement that there would have been a lack of fresh water just doesn't seem to hold any water.

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You need both rain and sunlight to get rainbows. I'd imagine that the clouds pretty much covered the 40 days.

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Yes, you do need both sunlight and rain to get a rainbow. And yes, clouds must have pretty much covered the earth for 40 days. But that wasn't my point. My point was that after the 40 days it must have still been raining or else the lack of rain in and of itself would have been a miracle. If it rained AFTER the 40 days, then there was a supply of fresh water for Noah and the occupants of the ark. The rainbow described in the Bible didn't happen until after Noah came out of the ark.

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at the end of the 40 days the rains ceased.

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Yes, they ceased. But after that it has rained. That certainly doesn't mean it never rained anymore after that or it would be a total lie. I think what the Bible is saying is that it rained continous for 40 days, and then the continous rain stopped and perhaps the sun came out. But obviously rain showers still occured after that. So if after the 40 days, there was a daily rain shower, followed by seveal hours of sunshine, then there was ample opportunity to collect fresh rain water for drinking.

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a the rain you could get while the sun was out for the rainbow would hardly be sufficient for all the water needs of all the inhabitants.

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I guess I must have been misunderstood. First, the rainbow happened AFTER Noah came out of the ark. I thought you were referring to the fresh water supply while they were ON the ark. But in either case, the significance of my mentioning the rainbow was only to show that the Bible seems to indicate that it was raining at that time. So there was rain after the initial 40 days. It probably rained a lot on that day of the rainbow. It may have rained for hours and then a few minutes of a rainbow. The rain happening while the rainbow is in the sky has no significance. The only thing of significance, with relation to your argument, is whether or not there was significant enough rainfall after the 40 days to sustain a fresh water supply for the inhabitants. I say there had to be unless God somehow created another miracle and ended all rainfall of any sort at that time.

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You frequently see the literalist/YEC claim that it never rained at all before the Big Wet.

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Yes, they do say that frequently, but what does that have to do with anything? We are discussing water supply and rain after the event, not before it.

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And in any case, you must stack "miracles" up to the ceiling to explain the Flood anyway, so what's one more?

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I wasn't trying to prove or disprove any of the other points of the flood. Only the point that there wasn't a supply of fresh water. Obviously if God created a miracle in making the flood, He could have created as many more during the flood as he wanted to. But both scientists and creationists try to explain everything in scientific terms, of which this argument that there wasn't enough fresh water was an attempt to disprove the flood story by means of lack of a scientific explanation. I was merely pointing out that there was no miracle needed to explain fresh water.

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And I think this is the point. We are talking about at least 10,000 animals, realistically 10 times that. That's a lot of water. It strains my credulity that it rained enough after the initial 40 days to water that many animals.

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Most animals in the wild are very well adapted to drinking water that is of a lesser standard than what humans need to remain healthy. In some parts of the world, the rains only come once a year and yet the animals survive just fine drinking water that has been stagnant for a long time. Thus most of the animals would not have a problem drinking water that was collected and stored for a long period of time. Humans likely would have a problem with that water, but there would likely have been ample rain to supply their needs and a few animals that may have had similar needs for fresh water.

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And then you also need water to get rid of the massive amounts of animal waste.

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What is wrong with ocean water for doing that? Why the need for fresh water to wash away the waste?

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I see nothing about intermittent rain during the 150 days after the rain was restrained (and not partially restrained).

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It rained. the rain stopped. the water abated. dry land appeared.

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no water supply.

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Well, we will just have to disagree then on this point. Where I am located, it rained just the other day. I have seen many days of rain in my life, as have everyone I've ever spoken to. In other words, it has rained many times since the flood. When the Bible says the rains stopped, they did just that. They stopped. It does not say they stopped permanently, or how long they stopped. There is absolutely nothing to indicate that it abssolutely didn't rain anymore during the remainder of their time on the ark. Because the waters started to abate, there had to be less rain than previous, but there almost certainly was still rain.