The Flood - Animals and their minimum food requirement

So, if we accept the rather unlikely sounding idea that whole ecosystems of animals would survive a year on floating mats AND end up sorted out to specific areas AND that there were enough of each to not create genetic bottlenecks you are ALSO asking us to believe that the animals on these mats also just happpened, by chance and good luck to be sorted by their genetic relatedness too? (abe) That separate from their size, form, eating habits etc. they were sorted onto these mats by genetics?Is this the hypothosis you want considered?Edited by NosyNed, : just added a little for clarification

Not without distorting the Bible beyond all recognition, he couldn't. It clearly says one ark, not a fleet.You might as well have him resupply the ark by parachute drops.

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Bible Backer Well, seeing as this is not mentioned in the bible, there is no record for it but let us play the devil's advocate and allow for such. Now can you explain how the people on baord the Ark were to transport the food requirements of all the animals from the barges to the ark itself each and every day and several times a day? How do they do it during the deluge of rain that was occuring?What means of preserving the food would they have to allow the food {in 100% humidity} to remain edible for the animals? Most animals cannot exist in 100% humidity as there is no means by which they can cool down since sweat will not evaporate off the skin. They have no means of refrigeration and no way off cooling off nor of preserving meat and vegetables.The laws of physics cannot be accomodated to provide for the neccesary fundemental breakdown of laws that are entailed in a worldwide flood scenario, so this point is moot regardless of how much you would like it to be so. In fact, I think I will start a thread soon on the laws of physics that prevent the possibilty of the flood occuring.

No! Its only said it rained 40 days not 365 days but agree that these eco-systems of trees, seeds, creatures would of been quite an oasis of life. But agree that some would of these floating oasis perished as the waters washed off the earth. No! These mats floated above the flood waters, not like the creatures that perished within the surface of the earth that became the fossil record.The reason it took 365 days before Noahs animals left the ark was the earth needed this time for the herbs and grasses to grow for the creatures of the ark to survive apart from the ark.

You seem to have misunderstood the question entirely.I am asking :
1) Are you saying that these mats floated to particular places like Australia, south america, antarctica etc. and that this floating of mats with PARTICULAR groups of animals explains the location of groups of animals that we see today. Yes or no?
2) If that is what you are saying then explain how the animals happened to be grouped the way they are. Is this because they were on one or more mats that happened to float to the specific places? Yes or No?
3)If yes to both are you saying that the sorting was done based on the genetics of the animals? yes or no?My question did not mention the fossil record at all. Why did you introduce it?

I love these "floating mat" stories. If the Biblical account is correct, no animals survived on floating mats of vegetation. By proposing that Australian animals survived on floating mats, you are agreeing that the Biblical report of the flood is false.If you accept that the biblical account is false, why bother with these absurd contortions involving floating mats?

Not at all, but your interpretation is in error. Your saying it says that every living substance which was above the surface of the earth was destroyed. This is not what the verse is implying in fact later it says the olive branch survived. This is not an error because it floated (meaning not destroyed by the earth) thus was exempt from destruction from the earth.I agree in respect to surviving humanity it does say only Noah and his clan survived the flood.

My comment was explicitely about animals. I took the text to not be counting plants as "living substance."You cannot have the Australian vertebrates surviving on mats of vegetation, without contradicting Genesis.

No. The implication is not that the olive branch "survived" the flood.The ark was at rest for several months before Noah sent out the raven and the dove. If the olive branch had "survived", the dove could have brought it back any time. Genesis 8:9 says specifically that she found no veggie mats to rest her feet.The implication of the olive branch is that the vegetation had regenerated - i.e. there was food for the animals.

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Except the problem with that notion is receding flood waters would have salted the Earth. The number of salt tolerant plants is comparatively low, and very few of them are useful as feed. Plus such a flood would have wiped out the top soil, leaving conditions very poor for growing anything but weeds.

There's a serious problem with that notion. As already calculated on this site, the release of such water through rain would have raised temperatures significantly. Not to mention that any glacier bobbing in trillions of gallons of water started to melt instantly. It is simply a big ice cube in a cup. So unless it was magical ice, that didn't happen. How did these vegetation mats survive 6 inches of water falling every minute for 40 days and nights? Not to mention the massive waves, storms and associates flood issues? Not to mention that they need to eat in the first place. Furthermore, species that live in the desert cannot tolerate such humidity levels. So unless they were magical mats, it didn't happen. Come again? What fossil record agrees with that? The fossil record shows that the period before the Triassic had a massive die off as well as the one following the Cretaceous. There are a few others, but nothing supporting a 6,000-4,000 year ago die off.Granted some species their yearling do have such capacity, but that still has to deal with the glacier problem with warm seas, massive friction and the problem of instant melting.Few insects actually have the ability to go into statis, and the vast majority of them live in high mountains. Which means the vast majority of insects would have died. And it still hast he same problem as the fish.

Of course. I was only correcting johnfolton's Biblical error.

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What your suggesting is not biblical but actually the opposite of what the bible conotates. The bible is quite clear that all living substances were destroyed that were upon the ground. The olive branch regeneration was from mats floating coming to rest upon the Mountains of Ararat as the fresh waters of the flood receeded.I agree that the mineral rich sediments and the fresh waters of the Flood would of Resprouted (regenerate) the Food supply even before the Flood waters had washed off the continents to mix with the salt in the oceans.psalm 104:9 God decreed that the waters would never again cover the entire earth.

Nonsense. The Bible says quite clearly that there were no floating mats:

quote:

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Gen 8:9 But the dove found no rest for the sole of her foot, and she returned unto him into the ark, for the waters were on the face of the whole earth:

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There was nothing floating on the water for the dove to rest on. Also nonsense. The oceans covered the whole earth. It was all salt water, so nothing would grow.

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Not how it works, In the natural Heat rises so what was coming back to the earth was not heated waters but waters cooled in the upper atmosphere extending thousands of miles upward and thus returning to the earth in the form of rain.The atmosphere acts as a gigantic airconditioner, because heat rises and the bible is clear in that it rained 40 days thus the heat rose and rain returned in the form of rain, snow, for those 40 days. There was not a humidity problem because no steam problem existed during the deluge.It then says after the rain stopped God caused a wind to blow over the earth. There would not been a wind problem after the initial tusami, which was why Noah was mocked for building a ship thousands of miles from the ocean.He would of been sheltered from an initial tusami wave thats explains the massive fossil deposits found in Alaska and Siberia.If the sun was blocked by the massive deluge no easterly winds could of been a problem until after the deluge stopped.he Glaciers from a creationist point of view happened during the biblical deluge, it was winter in the northern hemisphere. The insects, fish, frogs, trees, would of been temporarily frozen as summer came to be the glaciers would of started melting in the northern hemisphere.All these creatures (and seeds) thawing out from the ice would of multiplied rapidly after the flood waters abated. The evidence is pretty conclusive that the glaciers happened quite suddenly, to a creationists reseeding (regenerating) the earth food supply for the creatures coming forth from the Noah's ark.http://www.atlantisquest.com/Paleontology.htmlThe evidence of the violence of nature combined with the stench of rotting carcasses was staggering. The ice fields containing these remains stretched for hundred of miles in every direction (Hibben, 1946). Trees and animals, layers of peat and mosses, twisted and mangled together like some giant mixer had jumbled them some 10,000 years ago, and then froze them into a solid mass. The evidence immediately suggests an enormous tidal wave which raged over the land, tumbling animals and vegetation within its mass, which was then quick-frozen (Sanderson, 1960). But the extinction is not limited to the Arctic. Edited by johnfolton, : No reason given.