Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood

Patrick;Read your papers, it will take me awhile to look this stuff up anyway, I hope to go to the library this weekend, and I will check out the references you have posted."for the record if the you associate the freshwater-brackish transition in the Baltic Sea with the Black Sea flood?" Yes, I do." impact origin for the Carolina Bay lakes" I would agree with you that a standard direct impact is eliminated by the evidence. However, occurrence from a secondary impact event under unusual circumstances has not been, and is probably the best answer for most of the Carolina Bay lakes. Some possibilities for the shallowness of the disturbance could be the ground was frozen, or an unfrozen layer above permafrost, or the impacts occurred underwater, or a combination of these effects and others may be responsible for the form of the CBls, and some may date to earlier events. Its easy to tear down, harder to built. Any one can find fault, what I would like to hear is a better theory on the formation of the CBls.Edge;"references showing that filled oceans offer more support to continental mountains than shallow oceans" In reference to island mountains and sea level. "During each Glacial stage, a weight of water scores of meters deep was removed from a wide area of the crust around each island. That lowering of water pressure removed some support for the volcanic mass. Hence, the island tended to sink" (The Changing World of the Ice Age by Reginald Aldworth Daly 1934, p.155) Mountains along the edge of a continent would also be effected in the same way, but to a lesser degree.On flexing the entire earth, "evidence that there was this sudden shift . . . has happened?" We do have extensive evidence that there has been wide scale and large shifts in elevations in connection with departure of the ice age glaciers. "The occurrence of a canyon, incised into thick deposits of till and fluvial conglomerates, shows that in Quaternary time the Himalayas underwent a powerful tectonic uplift, which approached 3000 m in axial parts (Xitao 1975)." (The Pleistocene; pages 315-316) The downward subsidence of the land during the ice age and it's subsequent rise at the end of the Wisconsin Ice Age is also affirmed by the pattern of river erosion. When an area of a river sinks, reducing the slope or grade of the river, sediments settle out in the slow moving water and build up. When the area is later uplifted, the grade is increased and the water flows faster, rapidly eroding down into the sediments and into the raised bedrock beneath the river bed. This pattern of sedimentation and later erosion is noted to have occurred in connection with the end of the Ice Age. "many streams filled part of their valleys with sediment during the ice age, and now they are cutting through that sediment fill to form stream terraces." (The Earth's Dynamic Systems; A Textbook in Physical Geology, fifth edition by W. Kenneth Hamblin 1989, p.208) This uplift and later erosion happened not once but a number of times in pulses through out the two million year long Pleistocene ice advances. A computer model of the erosion of the Colorado river revealed that most of the erosion had occurred in pulses. "Erosion of the canyon was not uniformly fast or slow, but occurred in a series of pulses. Downcutting of the main stream was extremely rapid and was largely a function of the rates of uplift." (The Earth's Dynamic Systems; p.200) What has been happening is simple, as the sea beds rebounded with the removal of water to the ice caps, the land subsided under this effect and the weight of glacial ice in the form of ice sheets and mountain glaciers."Can you tell us about coral that can survive thousands of feet of submergence for a year? Where are the extinct coral reefs that the flood undoubtedly killed?" As to what species if any were able to survive the flood submergence, I have no idea, probably few if any. As I said earlier, much of the coral we have today could be regrowth. Areas that had coral before the flood and don't now due to greatly increased water depth are the submerged former reef islands. Deep beneath the waves lay drowned islands called seamounts. Many of these seamounts are over 5,900 feet under water and are called guyots because they have flat tops which were once cut by waves. On some of these guyots coral remains have been found. On areas like these that ended up deeply submerged, there the coral died. In areas that ended up again in a depth of water suitable for coral, the coral was restarted and grew over the old coral, if the original coral didn't survive.King David;The flood waters would have contained much floating debris which would have provided plenty of landing places for insects and held fresh water in small traps. On mammals, maybe that was why God had Noah build an ark, plus many survived outside the ark by rafting or on floating ice in some areas. Your points on poor chances mankind would have of surviving such an event are correct, and an explanation is given at Genesis chapters 6-9 on how man was able to survive along with a core population of animals. As to where the water went. The ice age had pulled enormous quantities of water out of the oceans, causing them to shrink and their floors to rebound upward, this in turn also caused the adjoining land to sink. Then at the end of the ice age, a sudden collapse of the ice sheets put water and ice back into the oceans much faster than the ocean floors could sink back down. This resulted in a global flood as the sea level was temporally above the level of the land. Then as the sea floor sank down under the increased weight of the deeper waters, the water drained off the land into the deepening oceans. As the oceans were pushed down, the land now freed of much of the weight of glacial ice, rose upward above the waters. On your comment. "cant be in the glaciers, b/c this is a biblical story." Why not?

King David:Odd screen name for someone arguing against the flood, could you please state your viewpoint, would save time. Secondly, this post started about a book I have written on the flood, the basic type questions are all addressed in the book. If you want quick answers, I would suggest reading it. Some issues have been addressed in lesser or greater length on this page. I don't think we have talked much about the ark here. First off, Noah could have only had a small cross section of animals on the ark. The rest survived on their own, that view is compatible with scripture by the way. On the geology, we have been talking about that at some length, and is on just about all of the proceeding pages. All of the points you raise are also in the book, which presents it in a logical way that is much easier to follow than our postings.quicksink;I have been busy flooding the world, so I haven't had time to predict the effects on each and every living thing. Coral regrows much faster than "millions" of years, many areas that have extensive coral reefs have geological ages less than a million years. The salinity problem, isn't a problem, the amount of freshwater on the earth compared to salt water, is much too small to be a problem. Even if the earth had ice caps as large as the high end of my theory, the water would have for the most part, have been released progressively as the ice melted and not all at once. The length of deep submergence for most areas would have had to had been months with the biblical flood having a duration of close to a year. I doubt most coral could survive such, but with all the difference types of coral, I hesitate to say that none could have survived. So, perhaps some did survive, the rest regrew from their larval 'seeds'. As for a salt water flood preventing agriculture, talk to the Dutch. Actual sea bed can be turned into farm land, and rather good farm land at that. Post flood rains would have flushed the salt off the land in a fairly short time. Occurring in the northern winter, combined with the global nuclear winter effects predicted wide spread freezing of the ground which could have prevented salt entry. The flood occurred at the end of the last ice, which I believe happened at the date the bible gives for the flood, or perhaps earlier. No civilizations predate the end of the last ice age. If the bible date is correct, the ages of these civilizations has been over estimated just as the timing of the last ice age may have been as well. And as I have been posting, not all the animals were on the ark, many survived outside on their own.doctrbill;The biblical date for the flood is 2370 BC. The date is arrived at by adding up the generations and working back from later dated events in the bible. I allow for the possibility that the bibles we have today could be missing some names, maybe even a lot of names, and the flood possibly occurred earlier. But considering what a huge omission that would be, I strongly favor the biblical date. On screwing up the bible, the writers were inspired and God has seen to it that his word has survived intact, the question is how intact, do we now know every textual error that has creeped in over the years, or are there a few left? Any errors left would have to be small, but a small string of omission in one of the genealogies would have a big impact on dating the flood. On errors in interpreting the Bible, those errors are so wide spread and common, it is a profession. But the bible speaks for itself if you are willing to lisen.

doctrbill;You misunderstand the word 'earth' in the scripture, the earth that is being referred to is the earth or dry ground we walk on, not the entire planet. Which is why no mention of fish or other marine life is made, they don't live on the 'earth'. Notice also the reference at Genesis 7:22. "All in whose nostrils was the breath of life, of all that was in the dry land, died" this verse clarifies what died in the flood, everything that breathe air and was on the dry land or 'earth', drowned because the earth was covered by water. They were wiped off the surface of the earth, some of those air breathing animals survived by rafting, they were no longer on the 'earth'. they were adrift, and survived along with air breathing marine mammals which were also in the flood waters. This pattern of survival is a tested to by the survival through the Pleistocene extinction of rare animal species in remote locations with no sign of migration to or from other parts of the earth.quicksink;On tree " ring sequences extend back through the supposed date of the Flood," yes they do, the flood was never meant to kill off the trees. A brief submergence in the winter time when the trees were dormant would not kill most trees. It does disprove the YEC type flood entirely.

doctrbill;"I claim no expertise in botany but am aware that trees breathe air" Not when they are dormant. A submergence of a few months in an ice age winter when the ground is frozen hard and ending before spring, would pass almost unnoticed by the plant kingdom. Spring rains could have washed any salt traces away before the ground thawed. no major erosion is expected from a flood caused by a progressive rise and then lowering of sea level. On hills where the tree record is unbroken at the time of the biblical flood, the submergence was short enough not to be much of a problem, lower elevations may have taken longer to drain, resulting in a progressively higher die off rate in plants. Lower areas were recolonized as they came above water by plants which had survived at higher locations. There are many areas of land that have spent considerable lengths of time underwater, that are now productive land. Rain flushes out the salt fairly quickly.The "earth" in genesis refers to all the land. An ark would not be necessary for a limited area flood. Noah knew what a mountain was, the ark is reported as grounding on one. The reference to the temple of Jehovah as a mountain refers to mount Zion that it was built on and that God's worship would be lifted up above all others and over all mankind like a tall mountain. The building itself, to the best of my knowledge is not referred to as a mountain.
Psalm 48:1-2 "Jehovah is great and much to be praised
In the city of our God, [in] his holy mountain.
2 Pretty for loftiness, the exultation of the whole earth,
Is Mount Zion on the remote sides of the north,
The town of the grand King."
Isaiah 2:3 "And many peoples will certainly go and say: "Come, YOU people, and let us go up to the mountain of Jehovah, to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will instruct us about his ways, and we will walk in his paths." For out of Zion law will go forth, and the word of Jehovah out of Jerusalem."
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no2creationYou are new here, I believe all of your objections have already been addressed earlier in this posting. Plus they are answered in my book as well. The problem is you keep thinking YEC, have to start by thinking at least OEC and go from there. This new flood theory is outlined in the earlier postings, look at the first one for a brief overview.edge;"1934? Really, I'd hoped you'd come up with something better than that." Just what I had handy and it does show how long this has been known, this part of my theory is not new."You have shown only that there have been fluctuations on the order of a kilometer or so." Then we are making tremendous progress. Think of the stream erosion cutting down into the ice age stream material. Think of how much the area of the headwaters would have to be raised to increase the grade along the entire river length. Much of the uplift would have been in the form of an arch like up lift of the continents, with a localized uplift concentrated in some areas. Once you trace the stream back to its origin from the sea, the total elevation rise would be quite large in some cases."I don't suppose this had anything to do with plate tectonics..." Very good, yes it did. Think of forces that act together, sometimes they reinforce each other, like two wave patterns. This post ice age uplift would have magnified the uplift caused by plate tectonics. The deep acting uplift would have been most pronounced in areas were the crust was already softened or open to the movement of magma from below.

doctrbill:You are of course correct on the word 'mountain' referring to governments. However in connection with the temple, the word doesn't refer to the building, to the mountain it sat on yes, and the scriptures you cited referred to the government it represented, but not the building itself. At most you could say that the mountain referred to was the great spiritual temple which symbolizes God's government. But we digress anyway, since the main point you were making was that ziggurats were referred to as mountains, which is not answered in the bible. But perhaps they were called mountains by some. The first one mentioned in the bible was the tower of Babel, but it was built after the flood and is referred to as a tower. It is thought that part of the reason in building it, was to provide a means of escape in case God flooded the world once again. Near the base of one, an inscription was found that read. "The building of this temple offended the gods. In a night they threw down what had been built. They scattered them abroad, and made strange their speech. The progress they impeded." (Bible and Spade, by S. L. Caiger, 1938, p. 29) If fear of a flood was the motivation behind building ziggurats, the pre flood people probably didn't build any since they are recorded as taking no note of the coming flood. So there probably weren't any ziggurats to be referred to as mountains covered by the deluge.On submergence in the flood causing erosion, look at the flooding of the Black Sea, the original shoreline and beach dunes from the former freshwater lake remain intact to this day submerged deep beneath the sea. Core samples taken from below the salt transition are still free of salt intrusion. If this area had not remained flooded, plants would be growing there today and you wouldn't even be aware of what had happened. On a completely flooded earth there would be no tidal surges since it requires a coast line to concentrate the force of the tides to create a tidal surge. Only normal mid ocean type tides would be expected, which would do nothing to the submerged former land areas beneath the waves.On 'earth' not referring to all the land you used Genesis 4:14 "Here you are actually driving me this day from off the surface of the ground" In this scripture Cain is speaking, not God. Cain is using an exaggeration to complain. Cain implied that God was driving him off the surface of the ground, apparently referring to all land and not just a local area. God answered Cain's complaint by providing the "mark of Cain" which wasn't an actual mark, just a command on not killing Cain.As for people along the Mississippi needing an ark, no they didn't, boats for sure, but no ark. Even in the last great flood along that river, there was no need for an ark, no animals species went extinct. Only in a global flood would an ark for preserving animal species be required. Why would God have Noah build a 450 foot long ark, if the flood was limited to the valley plain, a hike into the hills would have been a far better investment of his time.In the bible the global flood is a real event that wiped out an entire world. Matthew 24:37 "For just as the days of Noah were, so the presence of the Son of man will be. 38 For as they were in those days before the flood, eating and drinking, men marrying and women being given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark; 39 and they took no note until the flood came and swept them all away, so the presence of the Son of man will be". Jesus is the one speaking here, and he refers to the flood as a real event and compares his return with it. If one believes Jesus was the son of God, one really should believe in the flood, he did.

doctrbill;If you reject all the indications in the bible that the flood was global, yes you are correct that I am unable to prove to you that the word 'land' means more than a local area, since you are already ignoring all of the scriptural evidence I would use. Your interpretation is certainly different from most. In light of 1 Timothy 6:3-4, I see no point in continuing to argue over the interpretation of a single word, let's proceed to look at evidence in science in support of a global flood. (see below) On appealing to faith to support the flood, when having a discussion with someone, it is wise to build on what the person already knows and accepts. I had assumed from your background that you had a faith that could serve as a foundation to build on, I apparently was mistaken. Below is a post I have written for Patrick which covers some of the more technical points of finding a recent global flood in the geological record. Your objection to the flood based on lack of wave erosion from rising and retreating waters overlooks the fact that we have a number of submerged areas today with hills and dunes that were submerged without wave erosion. Mountains make poor constriction points since the water flows around peaks quite well. In areas that are true constriction points, we do see extensive streamlined erosion from a massive movement of water. All of the world's rivers have huge river valleys far larger than the river. A number of these valleys are believed to have been created by super floods of glacial meltwaters, a very large flood of water that went into the sea and raised the sealevel. The more basic points are covered in earlier posts. Here is a link to site with information on fossil whale bones found in the state of Michigan, which are hard to explain without a global flood.http://sentex.net/~tcc/michwls.html

Patrick;I read over the journal articles you recommended. Have you read them yourself? I found some of them very interesting. Also picked up a bunch of others and discovered some very interesting details. In picking a time for the flood in the geological record, I had a choice of two times, the H0 event at the end of the Younger Dryas or the much larger event after the LGM (H1). I have decided to use the earlier time period, dispite the larger gap this creates with the biblical date for the flood. The later event appears to have been smaller and the size of the ice sheets at that time appears to be constrained by isostatic rebound evidence to too small of a size to have caused the biblical flood.We had been discussing oxygen isotopes 18/16 ratios, and the use of that ratio in determining the size of the Pleistocene ice sheets. Your argument was that the sheets could not have been above a certain size due to the ratio of O18/O16 found in ocean sediment bottom cores in foraminiferal from the ice age. Reference A, dealt with oxygen isotope ratios and pointed out that laboratory culturing of foraminiferal has only extended down to 15C with the result that the paleotemperature equations were all calibrated at significantly higher temperatures than would have occurred in much of the ice age ocean surface water. I have been checking, but so far have not found any later articles describing the results of the low temperature culturing needed for proper calibration, I have to assume they have not yet been done. Due to this hole in the most important part of the calibration temperature range, oxygen isotope ratios may not be entirely reliable for predicting the maxim volume of the former ice sheets. Because of this problem, it is not possible to accurately remove the temperature component from oxygen isotope ratio evidence. Therefor, arguments in favor of larger ice sheets in the past, can not be excluded by O18/O16 ratios.There are arguments in favor of larger ice sheets, and the drop in sea level in the ice age is noted to be larger than the volume estimated for the ice sheets based on isostatic rebound. Reference B pointed out the difference is harmonized by the fact that there was a very major collapse of the ice sheets about 16-19K, which reduced the size of the ice sheets down to the sizes predicted by isostatic rebound. The smaller ice sheets lasted mostly intact until the end of the Younger Dryas when there was a second large reduction. The isostatic rebound records the size of the latter ice sheets and not the size of the earlier ice sheets. They stated "Ice volumes during the GLM and earliest part of the Lateglacial period can therefore be substantially increased without affecting the predictions of lateglacial and Postglacial sea level in a significant manner, provided that a rapid reduction in ice volume occurred in early Lateglacial time. New far-field data for LGM and Lateglacial sea-level change indicates that a rapid rise in sea level of about 15m occurred at about 16500-16000 C ( or 19200-18700 calibrated ) years ago. This leads to in inference that during the LGM the ice sheet volumes of the major ice sheets were greater than inferred from regional rebound analyses and that rapid reductions in volume occurred at the termination of the LGM." [REF B] They also went on to state that the timing of this event doesn't match any known Heinrich event, I have more on this point, or Meltwater pulse 1A. However another journal article [REF C] pointed out a variation found in the apparent age of surface waters. In ocean sediment cores covering the two surge events mentioned above, an extreme off set was noted in the carbon dating. The first event came up nearly 2K older than the sediments above it. The second event also had an absolute date of about 1K older than the sediments above it. The off set in age has to do with the carbon content of the ocean. Modern ocean water has a carbon date of about 400 years old due to the time it takes for the mixing of ocean currents. What has created these brief shifts in dating at these two periods, is a massive influx of old carbon carried by a huge surge of meltwater. The reason the glacial meltwater carried so much old carbon is simple, as explained in reference D, that the glacial firn traps gas bubbles with a preference for heavier gases from the atmosphere as the firn turns into ice. Thus a fair amount of CO2 was trapped inside glacial ice. The release of meltwater after the GLM is believed to have been largely from the bottom melt lake beneath the glacier which of course contained the oldest carbon. Once this carbonated meltwater hit the oceans, it created the 2K dating shift to the past. This old carbon surge is not fully recognized nor was the influx evenly mixed over the entire earth, this has resulted in shifting the dating on various samples taken from various places by varying amounts. This has created the effect that a number of events which all happened at the same time, appear to have happened at different times depending on how much old carbon the sample area was exposed to. Some of the effects of this shows up in conflicts in chronology between different core records covering the same period. [REF E] & [REF I] Due to this effect, it is apparent that meltwater event 1A and Heinrich event H1 occurred at about the same time and are connected with the post LGM collapse. It should also be noted, that in a global flood model, the old carbon contaminated meltwaters could have effected large areas of the earth's surface and could be part of the reason for the apparent extreme age in pre flood dating of some human remains.After the Late Glacial Maximum there was a huge reduction in the volume of glacial ice. But how big the ice sheets were is not known, we will next look at some estimates based on the rise in sea level that occurred at that time. Reference B stated "But in North America and Fennoscandia, locations of the largest latest Pleistocene ice cover, no mountains peaks stood out above the ice domes and these cases, only minimum estimates of ice thickness can be inferred." Basically the GLM ice sheets could have been much larger than what is currently believed. References F & G relate the documentation of a rise in global sea level seen in Australia of over 15m that occurred in less than 500 years This sudden rise is also supported by coral evidence in other parts of the world. "these rocks represent beach to eolian deposits, cemented under early meteoric conditions and quickly drowned by a sea-level rise rapid enough to transgress the dune ridge faster than physical or bioerosian processes could destroy it."[REF H] Sounds just like the description of the flooding which occurred in the Black Sea. On examining this sudden rise in sea level, it is important to remember that it occurred in <500 K] indicate the removal of possibly an additional 20m from the oceans, and that is assuming a low level of exchange between the Red Sea and the ocean. If the exchange rate was higher, the amount of water removed to create the high salt levels would be higher too. The general land subsidence associated with the wide spread rebounding of ocean floors would have prevented complete isolation of the Red Sea even if a much greater amount of water was removed from the oceans at the GLM. If this surge of meltwater and ice, was truly huge and flooded the world, it could have triggered a deep flexing of the earth's surface as I have theorized, which would have resulted in a sudden change in the relative elevations of land and sea floor. The effect would be a sudden flood that drops to a level only a bit higher than the sea had before the flood. This matches the pattern we see after the GLM, a sudden abrupt rise in sea level. Such a deep flexing of the earth would be expected to create a surge of volcanic activity around the earth, and ice core records of volcanic dust trapped in glacial ice confirms that this has happened. [REF J] (see also the references for J) With the shifting of the weight from glaciers back into the oceans, the earth's crust is flexed and volcanoes erupt. The last deglaiation was particularly strong in associated volcanic activity indicating the magnitude of the flexing the earth under went. The other evidence we have been discussing such as marine traces found far inland at high elevations indicates that this sudden flooding event occurred and was large enough to flood most or all of the world.At the LGM the glaciers covered an area 13 times greater then the present area of about 14,800,000 sqkm. [REF F] So if the glaciers at the LGM covered an area of 192,400,000 sqkm, and then underwent a dramatic thinning of 1km, the resulting flood would have flooded the earth to a depth of 606m or 1,988 feet. Allowing for the volume of land, a 1km thinning of the LGM glaciers would have created a flood over 2,000 feet deep. If the thinning was 2 km the flood depth could have been about 4,000 ft. The rising flood waters only had to reach the edges of the glaciers to flood the entire world since ice floats and no amount of flooding could submerge an ice sheet. Thus any topographical features above the maximum water level would have been covered by a thick covering of glacial ice at the LGM and hence still would have been below the water, even if it was in the solid form instead of the liquid form. Hence at the GLM, the sudden reduction in glacial ice volume could have very conceivably flooded the world.[REF A] Galacial-interglacial changes in Subantantarctic sea surface temperature and O18-water using forminiferal Mg, Mashiotta, Lea, Spero, Earth and Planetary Science Letters 170 (1999) 417-432.[REF B] Global ice volumes at the Last Glacial Maximum and early Lateglacial, lambeck, Yokoyama, Johnston, Purcell, Earth and Plantary Science Letters 181 (2000) 513-527.[REF C] The timing of the last deglaciation in North Atlantic climate records, Waelbroreck, Duplessy, Michel, Laberyri, Pallard, Durprat, Nature, Vol 412, 724-427 & 470, 16 August 2001.[REF D] Timing of abrupt climate change at the end of the Younger Dryas interval from thermally fractionated gases in polar ice, Severinghaus, Sowers, Brook, Alley, Bender, Nature, Vol 391, 141-146, 8 January 1998[REF E] Variations of Younger Dryas atmospheric radiocarbon explicable without ocean circulation changes, Goslar, Arnold, Tsnerat-Laborde, Czernik, Wieckowski, Nature, Vol 403, 877-880, 24 February 2000.[REF F] Ice sheets by volume, Clark, Mix, Nature, Vol 406, 689-690, 17 August 2000.[REF G] Timing of the Last Glacial Maximum from observed sea-level minima, Yokoyama, Lambeck, Deckker, Johnston, Fifield, Nature, Vol 406, 713-716, August 2000.[REF H ] Magnitude and timing of episodic sea-level rise during the last deglaiation. Locker, Hine, Tedesco, Shinn, Geology, September 1996; v.24; no. 9; p. 827-830.[REF I] Deglacial changes in ocean circulation from an extended radiocarbon calibration, Hughen, Overpeck, Lehman, Kashgarian, Southon, Peterson, Alley, Siman, Nature, Vol 391, 65-68, 1 January 1998.[REF J] Correlation between rate of sea-level change and frequency of explosive volcanism in the Mediterranean, McGuire, Howarth, Firth, Solow, Pullen, Saunders, Stewart, Vita-Finzi, Nature, Vol 389, 473-476, 2 October 1997.[REF K] Magnitudes of sea-level lowstands of the past 500,000 years, Rohling, Fenton, Jorissen, Bertrand, Ganssen, Caulet. Nature, Vol 394, 162-165, 9 July 1998.

doctrbill;Since you make no reference to the science side of the flood issue, it would seem that my previous post answered your questions in that area. As for not showing evidence for use of the word land as referring to more than a local area, I didn't see the point in bothering since you are already aware of it and interpret it differently. But if you insist, the description of the flood in genesis 6:1-11:9 is describing a global flood. From the reason given in chapter 6, to wipe out an evil world of men to the description of the repopulating of the earth in chapters 10 & 11, the bible is describing much more than a local flood. We also have the reference in 11:4 "for fear we may be scattered over all the surface of the earth." which is hard to believe they were afraid of being scattered over a local area. We also have the rainbow covenant in chapter 9, which was a promise by God not to flood the world again. Now if the deluge was just a local flood, then each local flood in history would be a breaking of this covenant. Clearly this convent only makes any sense if it refers to a global flood and not a local flood. Now I know that some one of your background is obviously aware of this information, other than learning what your interpretation is, I saw no benefit in discussing what you already know and chose to interpret differently. As for 1 Timothy 6:3-4, I did not mean to insult, I was referring to the part about not arguing over words. But it you see a larger application in that scripture perhaps you should heed it.PercipientYes exactly, each person has a different outlook and not every one sees things in the same light.It is best to be some what flexible in Biblical interpretations, if one takes a overly rigid view and sticks with it even in the face of overwhelming contrary evidence, one ends up looking like the YECs. Yet on the other hand one doesn't want to be too flexible and chase after ever changing interpretations blowing in the wind. I covered some of the reasons the bible shows the flood to have been a global event above. The six creative days were time periods of untold length, as shown by the bible itself, such as later referring to the creation as one day, and that the seventh day, God's rest day has yet to end. Interpreting the bible is an art, not a science.As for wide spread flood evidence, it is global, it is just misinterpreted or ignored. The trace of marine diatoms and forminifera left by the flood is no doubt global. A flood caused by a progressive rise and then fall in global sea levels would leave little if any sediment. A local flood from swollen rivers carrying sediment will leave extensive sediment deposits, but ocean water is nearly sediment free. A global flood is different than a local flood, hence the evidence left behind is different as well. On the dating problems, I favor the biblical date but allow for the possibility that the flood occurred much earlier. Plus as show by the radiocarbon dating of ocean floor sediments from the time period affected by meltwater pulse 1A, there was a very large amount of old carbon dumped into the sea at that time which has affected the accuracy of dating events associated with that time period. The overly young dates on the Michigan whales bones were also discussed as to the reason the dates are off, rainwater intrusion of new carbon. Absolute dating is very useful, but I believe it is not always right and the errors are often far greater than many would want to believe. On having a workable hypothesis consistent with existing evidence, I would suggest looking at the earlier posting on the sudden reduction in glacial volume at the LGM. I know Patrick is right now looking for holes in it and I will be disappointed if he can't find at least one. I think it is a very good theory using the available evidence. Look it over, show me where it is wrong. I want to know where the problems are so I can correct them.edgeBy the way one of the meanings of Quixotic is visionary. If you are accustomed to dealing with data and hard evidence, how about dealing with the evidence in my posting on the sudden reduction in glacial volume at the LGM. You have been good for a lot of one liners and cheap shots, let's see you hit the books and come up with some real answers or questions.Patrick;It is obvious from your posting that you haven't read the references I cited yet, most of your objections will be answered by them. On the Mg-temperature calibration, even extending it down to 10C is stil above estimated SST in the ice age. If the SST was that high, the ice caps would have been truly huge to create the oxygen isotopes 18/16 ratios seen at that time. Once you read the references you should be able to see that there are some problems with pore water measurements in ocean sediment cores. I am very interested in the paleosalinity measurements of pore-fluid samples from ocean cores that you mentioned, but the low level you stated would seem to imply as the information on pore water oxygen isotopes, that the pore water may not be as accurate as other methods. I look forward to reading your next post.

doctrbill;I agree with you on the word land being used with different means, in the cases you like to cite, such as "Nebuchadnezzar is said to be the destroyer of "all the earth"" it refers to the known world at the time or the known civilized world. Your argument then is that at the time of the flood the known world consisted of an area in the Mesopotamian valley. You have also made reference to the flood layer found by C. Leonard Wooley as being evidence of this flooding event that inspired the Genesis story.This in an old viewpoint long discredited by the archaeological evidence. "A number of other sites in Mesopotamia, of equal or greater antiquity, have been excavated down to virgin soil, and no evidence of flooding came to light at them. Perhaps the most important of these is Eridu, located only about seven miles away from Ur." (Noah The Person and the Story in History and Tradition by Lloyd R. Bailey, p32.) The lack of a flood deposit at Eridu limits the great Ur flood to a very limited extent indeed, far to small to have been the great deluge of bible history. In fact the flood layer at Ur was created by a river flood that failed to even flood the entire city. "In the case of the most Publicized and substantial of the deposits ( at Ur ), it became clear from several "trail pits" that the flooding had not overflowed the entire city. The excavator concluded that the city had been situated on an elevation in a marshy area, and that the rising water had caught it most heavily on the side area, and that was exposed to the flow: ". . . the mud was heaped up against the north slope of the town mound which, rising above the plain, broke the force of the flood waters; on the plain east and west of the mound we should probably have found nothing"" (same source, p32-35.) The great flood deposit at Ur is from a common river flood that was not that impressive. Since it failed to even flood the entire city of Ur, it is hard to believe it could be described as flooding the earth even using your limited definition. Even if tallest mountain the flood covered was merely a ziggurat as you suggest, this flood fails to fit the bill since it failed to even flood the whole city, let alone cover the tallest building in town to a depth of 15 cubits. From the description of the archaeologists, this river flood may not have even been 15 cubits deep. Other than claiming that this was a small flood that inspired a very exaggerated tall tail, there is no way to match the description found in genesis with the archaeological evidence of the flood deposits in Mesopotamia.Due to the small size of the Ur flood and the other conflicting details, it is necessary to look elsewhere for the biblical flood. Since we find no evidence in the Mesopotamian valley of a regional river type flood event that can reasonably be matched with the deluge, I see no support for limiting the genesis word 'land' to that area to support a local flood theory.Percipient;I would suggest reading the earlier postings, we have been discussing the points you brought up for some time. To sum it up, the flood was not the way many assume, and the evidence hence doesn't match their preconceived ideas. We also have evidence in the form of marine traces, relict lakes, super flood erosion and other things, that there has been a global flood in recent geological history.

doctrbill;You have stated that your primary assertion is that nowhere in the Bible is the word Earth used in the sense of a global i.e. spherical, planetoid reality. Do you still mean the Hebrew word 'erets' is never used to refer to the entire planet, or are you now restricting you assertion that it lacks a reference to just the earth being a sphere? The sphere question is a bit off course from the flood issue itself. There is plenty of evidence that the Hebrew word 'erets' can be used to refer to the entire earth. On the Hebrew words for earth and land, here is what one of my reference books stated. "In the Hebrew Scriptures, the word used for earth as a planet is e'rets. E'rets refers to (1) earth, as opposed to heaven, or sky (Ge 1:2); (2) land, country, territory (Ge 10:10); (3) ground, surface of the ground (Ge 1:26); (4) people of all the globe (Ge 18:25).
The word adhamah' is translated "ground," "soil," or "land." Adhamah' refers to (1) ground as tilled, yielding sustenance (Ge 3:23); (2) piece of ground, landed property (Ge 47:18); (3) earth as material substance, soil, dirt (Jer 14:4; 1Sa 4:12); (4) ground as earth's visible surface (Ge 1:25); (5) land, territory, country (Le 20:24); (6) whole earth, inhabited earth (Ge 12:3). Adhamah' seems to be related etymologically to the word adham', the first man Adam having been made from the dust of the ground.Ge 2:7." Insight on the Scriptures, Vol 1, p667. The Hebrew word "Erets" can mean a land or the entire planet, the meaning is inferred from the context, the way the word is used. The fact that this word can refer to the entire planet earth is also supported by the definition found in Strong's Hebrew dictionary as well.
Strong's Number: 776 Transliterated: 'erets Phonetic: eh'-rets
Text: from an unused root probably meaning to be firm; the earth (at large, or partitively a land): --X common, country, earth, field, ground, land, X natins, way, + wilderness, world.The only way the usage of these two Hebrew words could supply any support for the theory that the Bible is describing a limited flood, is if only the Hebrew word 'adhamah' was used in describing the extent of the deluge and the word 'erets' was not used. but a quick check of the flood account shows the word 'erets' was used as well. Hence there is no linguistic support for the belief the flood account was mean to be description of a partial flooding of the earth.We do a number of verses throughout the bible where the entire earth is obviously being referred to, here are a few of them.Genesis 1:29-30 "29 And God went on to say: "Here I have given to YOU all vegetation bearing seed which is on the surface of the whole earth and every tree on which there is the fruit of a tree bearing seed. To YOU let it serve as food. 30 And to every wild beast of the earth and to every flying creature of the heavens and to everything moving upon the earth in which there is life as a soul I have given all green vegetation for food." And it came to be so."Exodus 19:5 "the whole earth belongs to me"Joshua 3:11"The ark of the covenant of the Lord of the whole earth"Psalm 72:19 "19 And blessed be his glorious name to time indefinite,
And let his glory fill the whole earth."Psalm 97:3-6 "4 His lightnings lighted up the productive land;
The earth saw and came to be in severe pains.
5 The mountains themselves proceeded to melt just like wax on account of Jehovah,
On account of the Lord of the whole earth.
6 The heavens have told forth his righteousness"Isaiah 40:22 "22 There is One who is dwelling above the circle of the earth, the dwellers in which are as grasshoppers, the One who is stretching out the heavens just as a fine gauze, who spreads them out like a tent in which to dwell," Note the expression 'circle of the earth'.Isaiah 51:13 "And that you should forget Jehovah your Maker, the One stretching out the heavens and laying the foundation of the earth,"Daniel 2:35 "And as for the stone that struck the image, it became a large mountain and filled the whole earth."Since you referred to the bible as a whole in your statement, here are three verses in Matthew where the entire earthly globe is referred to. (Mt 5:18, 35; 6:19) Considering what the reference works state, and the context of the above verses, it is very obvious that the bible makes references to the entire earth. One of them even referring to the circle of the earth, or sphere as some bibles translate it. So I see no restriction in the use of the Hebrew language for the flood description not to refer to the entire planet.You made reference to the flood layer found by C. Leonard Wooley in the link you posted in your earlier post. The lack of a river flood deposit does equal evidence of absence. A huge valley wide flood of the type you infer, would have left a valley wide layer of river sediment, that layer is absent form the city of Eridu only seven miles from Ur. If as you have now posted, that the layer of mud predates the City of Ur, is incorrect. As you yourself quoted "pre-Sumerian objects" are found below the layer you referred to. The site was occupied at the time of the river flood, and that flood failed to flood the entire city. Now if you mean your flood may have occurred much earlier than the flood layer found, then you can not refer to the Mesopotamian flood deposits as evidence since the ones archaeologists refer to have occurred too late in time to be from your flood and do not date from a single event anyway.I found a site that has a theory very much like yours, only I thought it better in a number of details. Perhaps you may want to check it out.Climate, Culture, and Catastrophe in the Ancient Worldedge & Percipient;You two seem to be on the same page today. Here are some links with evidence relating to a sudden flooding event in connection with the ice sheets.
"According to some scholars, catastrophic walls of ice broke off from the receding glaciers and joined a massive run-off of melt-water, scouring out the contours of the Mississippi River. It is envisioned that a sudden collapse of the NA ice cap produced a massive sea-level rise with the speed of a tidal wave around the world. It is likely that the river valley in the upper Mississippi was once 500 feet deeper than it is now, filled as it is with gravel and sand deposited by that melt-water. The accumulated Gulf of Mexico organisms have provided compelling evidence of a vast flood of fresh water about 11,600 years ago"
Glacial Lakes and Rivers form the Mississippi River Valley"these features are inferred to support the hypothesis that subglacial outburst floods beneath the Laurentide ice sheet crossed Georgian Bay and strongly sculpted the Bruce Peninsula"
http://cgrg.geog.uvic.ca/abstracts/KorEvidenceThe1998.htmlAnd evidence of a comet impact event associated with the Carolina bays. "the unique orbital and physical characteristics of a comet favor a model in which a high velocity retrograde comet or a low velocity prograde comet collided with the Earth. The incoming nucleus approached from the northwest and fragmented. The fragments, diverging from the main trajectory, volatized and subsequently exploded in the atmosphere near the surface. The resultant shock waves created shallow elliptical depressions which are best displayed in the sandy sediments of the Coastal Plain".
A RE-EVALUATION OF THE EXTRATERRESTRIAL ORIGIN OF THE CAROLINA BAYSThis link is interesting. "Evidence is growing that a huge comet smashed into the Earth about 4,000 years ago. Scientists are pointing to studies of tree-rings in Ireland which have revealed that about 2,354-2,345 BC there was an abrupt change to a colder climate" I would expect tree ring dating to agree with bible chronology, and this date is just about right on. If correct this could be climate evidence of the impact event, but this would have to be reconciled with the dates for the ice age ending much earlier in time. But if the flood occurred at the biblical date, this could be part of the evidence you wanted of an impact event.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/...h/sci/tech/newsid_100000/100101.stmThese are just some of the parts and pieces of the event that happened. I have more in the book of course, but what I am currently pursuing is marine foraminifera. I hope to obtain soil samples this summer from high elevations out west and identify marine foraminifera as traces left by the flood. This would answer most of your questions in this area and would be impressive evidence of the deluge.

doctrbill;You have admitted that your interpretation is in conflict with two bible reference works that clearly contradict what you say. Plus as the scriptures I posted showed, the whole earth is referred to at times in the bible. For our point of debate, it doesn't matter if the ancient Hebrews didn't know how big the earth was or if it was flat or round, the point is in each case is whether or not they were only referring to a part or all of it. The words used, according to bible references can mean all of the earth. The context in the scriptures I posted was also clear in referring to all the earth. The Hebrews didn't need to know the size or shape of the earth to say all the earth or the whole earth. Just as today we can make statements referring to the entire universe even if we don't know the size of the universe or comprehend it fully. The scripture in Daniel 2:35 "And as for the stone that struck the image, it became a large mountain and filled the whole earth." is referring to the Messianic Kingdom that according to bible prophecy will one day destroy the governments of the world and will extend its ruler ship to cover the entire earth. The fact that the Kingdom is to rule over the whole planet is shown by statements such as 'all nations' referring to all the nations on earth everywhere. Revelation 7:9 "After these things I saw, and, look! a great crowd, which no man was able to number, out of all nations" The great crowd here referred to, comes out of all nations everywhere, not just from nations in one area or part of the earth. The whole point of Jesus' message was that salvation was available to all, so restricting 'whole earth' in Daniel would be in conflict with the basic message of Christianity. Galatians 3:8 Plus your thought that 'earth' can never include the sea is unreasonable, for it would require that the Hebrews believed that Jehovah's rulership of the earth ended at the sea shore. Rather we find that they believed Jehovah had mastery over the sea, even parting one for them to walk through it. I find your idea of limiting all bible references to the earth to strictly a portion there of, in complete conflict with scripture, bible references and common sense.I didn't miss the graphic of the Karun River diversion on that web page, I wanted you to see it. The theory they are suggesting was that a rise in sea level flooded the area and created the diversion of the Karun river, possible they are referring to the delta a river forms when it enters standing flood water. This makes much better sense than a river flood, for rivers carry sediment and leave a layer of it behind after a flood. Sea water like lake water, doesn't have much of a sediment load, the sediment settles out in deltas as the river water enters the still water of the ocean or a large lake. Thus a brief marine flood would not leave behind a sediment layer, which as the archeology evidence shows, there is not a universal flood sediment layer to be found in the Mesopotamian valley. The sudden temporary jump in sea level caused by a sudden release of glacial melt waters is also very reasonable. What I differ on is that I believe the rise was much greater, and the timing earlier than they fix the date in respect to some events. But like I said, it is a better theory than a regional river flood and much more workable.PercipientOn glacial flows, if you take the sum, the total equals a deluge. The one site I listed described the result being a sudden large rise in sea level spreading around the world with the speed of a tidal wave. The idea of a comet induced release of glacial meltwater is that many noted releases may have happened at the same time, which would have resulted in a sudden and very large rise in sea level. Other releases of course have occurred over the comings and goings of the various stages of the ice age.On the Carolina bays being formed by impacts, I highly recommend the book "The Mysterious Carolina Bays" by Henry Savage Jr. 1982. The book is out of print and a bit hard to get hold of, but well worth it. It covers the history of the controversy on how the Bays were formed and covers all of the technical points very nicely. It is true that the Bays were not formed by meteors, but by comet fragments. A comet exploded over the Ohio river valley in the Midwest, allowing for various effects, all of the Bays point to this area. The individual impacting comet fragments exploded on contact blasting open a shallow depression. The Siberian event blast occurred at about 10,000 ft and the area of knocked down trees is the same shape as a Carolina Bay. If the blast had occurred at ground level, a depression in that shape would have been created in an area with a sandy soil like the area the bays are found in. The author even mentions "Near Camden South Carolina is a long farm drainage ditch with a depth of about fourteen feet. Exposed at the bottom of the ditch are masses of prostrate timbers, many of considerable size, indicating a massive blow-down." page 96, the similarity with the Siberian event is obvious. Inside the Bays, coring the ground has revealed that the original surface was removed and a raised rim formed. This action occurred very quickly, for the bottom of the bays show no sign of gradual action in that the next layer is lake bottom which then filled in over time. The rims also contain fractured shells and pebbles, and these same shells and pebbles are unbroken when found in other areas. The Bays are also found in a patter of over lapping and in rows that only a bombardment pattern of comet fragments could create. The Bays are eroding away, they are not being formed by processes in action today. There are no new ones forming and no other answer for their creation that makes more sense then comet impacts has been put forward. Any theory can be attacked, but let us see if you can find a better one, otherwise if by nothing else, the impact theory wins by default."If foraminifera, like diatoms, can be wind borne, then finding them anywhere is not evidence of a flood." No they are too large to be wind carried, so it will be interesting to see what happens when I hopefully find them. Beautiful picture of Barringer Crater by the way.

LudvanBYes you are probably right that the Hebrews had no idea how absolutely ENORMOUS the world really is. I am not arguing that they knew the size or even shape of the world, just that they could and did make statements encompassing the whole earth. Such as the one you referred to "a flat disk shaped earth" would be one such where the entire planet was referred to even if the shape may have been wrong. Let's skip the whole circle/sphere debate, no need to go into that here. As a side point, the tree you referred to was the tree in the book of Daniel, was seen in a dream, it was a symbol and not a real tree. On seeing the earth from a mountain top, I believe you are referring to Satan showing Jesus all the cities of the earth and offering them to him. The showing was done by miraculous means, a vision, even the Jews of that day knew they couldn't climb a mountain and literally see Rome. Any one when they write, assumes the reader knows certain things. The bible is no different, the readers are expected to know many things that unfortunately most people today no longer seem to know.On "mesopotamian flood,which left much evidence BTW" what evidence? The river flood deposits found in various cities there date to different floods. What evidence are you referring to?edge"impacts. . . How does this support your thesis" The Carolina Bays are evidence of a massive comet air blast of just the type that could have trigger the collapse of the ice sheets and caused the 40 days of rain, and this impact occurred towards the end of the ice age. This is the right type of event at the right time. Now if this comet was part of an even larger comet that had broken into pieces, which hit the earth at the same time. Image if the destruction power that created the Carolina Bays hit the Laurentide ice sheet. Huge amounts of glacial ice would have been blasted into the sky to fall back to earth as rain all over the planet. Huge amounts of ice would have been melted and flowed into the sea. The shocks of the impacts would have been like hammer blows that broke the ice dams holding back the ocean of meltwater trapped beneath the ice sheet melted by the heat of the earth, which then suddenly flowed out into the sea creating the effects seen there and causing the strong shift in the carbon ratio in the ocean as shown by the reference in an earlier post.(post 142 REF C)On evidence that this resulted in a global flood, we could go back and revisit our discussions on the Michigan whale bones and Wisconsin marine diatoms and drop stones that we had in earlier posts.doctrbill;"Why would evidence of your "universal flood" fail to be found in that valley?" (Mesopotamian valley) Like I stated in my last post. "Sea water like lake water, doesn't have much of a sediment load, the sediment settles out in deltas as the river water enters the still water of the ocean or a large lake. Thus a brief marine flood would not leave behind a sediment layer, which as the archeology evidence shows, there is not a universal flood sediment layer to be found in the Mesopotamian valley." Which is why a global flood or a large regional flood would have had to have been caused by flood waters basically free of river borne sediment, since a wide spread sediment layer of this type is not found.As for your belief that the word earth in the bible only refers to a portion there of, I respect your right to believe what ever you want to, but you have not supplied any reasonable reasons why I should accept your unique interpretation. I am afraid my common sense is very common.Percipient"there's no evidence that a global flood ever took place" On the evidence there was a global flood, we could go back and revisit our discussions on the Michigan whale bones and Wisconsin marine diatoms and drop stones that we had in earlier posts. A non flood geology has no reasonable answers to explain these. On "only microscopic diatoms and foraminifera onto land, but nothing larger." we could go back and revisit our discussions on the Michigan whale bones."Your dates never match, forcing you to generally denigrate dating methods without any specific cause" A possible reason for problems associated with carbon dating events at the end of the ice age was put forward in an earlier post. The trapping of carbon dioxide gas by the firn, resulting in glacial meltwater from beneath the ice sheet containing large amounts of very old carbon. A sudden release of large amounts of such old carbon would confuse carbon dates for this time period.. This effect was shown in a reference in that earlier post, where the sediment layer for this event came up 2K older than the sediment layer above it. (post 142 REF C)On the comet element in my flood theory, for the very reasons you cited, I hate having it and if it wasn't for the fact that the evidence points towards it so strongly, I would throw it out in a heart beat.On "The strongest argument against your global flood thesis is that nearly all land life didn't disappear 10,000 years ago." ever hear of Noah's ark? or the Pleistocene extinction event?

edge"How do you know there were 40 days of rain, anyway?" That is what the historical account in the bible reports. Whether you accept the bible as the being inspired or not, in archaeology the bible has proven itself it to be an accurate recorder of past events. And climate effects of a major impact event would cause a lengthy period rain just as the bible describes."can you show that a cometary impact would really melt or vaporize a significant part of the ice sheets?" Surprisingly yes, I can. If for the moment we assume that the comet that created the Carolina Bays was a twin. There are believed to be 500,000 Carolina Bays, with estimates that there once were 2,500,000 at one time before erosion erased many of them. If you consider the effects of creating two and half million impact craters spread out across the Laurentide ice sheet, each one the size of a lake. That is a lot of water, and it is possible that it was a case of triplets or more. Several of the large ice sheets could have been hit or even hit more than once. Until I read Savage's book on the Carolina Bays I didn't realize just how powerful the event that created the Bays was. I have built my theory on the premise that most of the flood waters came from the huge trapped ocean of meltwater trapped beneath the ice sheets that a comet impact released which in turn destabilized other ice sheets in a chain reaction. But the size of the Carolina Bay event, points towards a large amount of water possibly being hurled into the atmosphere and near orbital space to rain back all over the globe."is possible that all of that material in the atmosphere would cause cooling that would result in more ice locked up in the ice sheets. Have you ruled this out?" No on the contrary it is an expected effect. This is commonly called a nuclear winter. The after effects would be short lived, probably a few months or years at the most. The effect would be a drop in global temperature and disruption of weather patterns earth wide. The effects would probably wear off after a while, although there are theories that an ice age can be started by a major comet impact. It takes many many years to built an ice sheet, a brief impact winter of even a few years would not have a large effect as long as it didn't start an ice age climate change. During the period of the flood, there would not have been enough time for any built up in snow on the glaciers to significantly reduce the depth of the flood waters. The fact that huge amounts of ice and glacial melt water flowed into the sea at this time is shown by the results of deep sea coring of the ocean floor. Both heinrich event 1 and melt water surge 1A occurred at this time and are evidence of this event. (see posting 142) As for "raised the sea level many thousands of feet" the depth of the flood is unknown and may have been less or greater than a thousand feet. We do have drop stones and marine traces at 1,000 feet elevation and other signs at higher elevation, allowing for the isostatic displacement the flood waters caused on the ocean floors, these locations may have been at a somewhat lower elevation at the time, but it does show the extent of a global deluge.On the ocean of meltwater trapped beneath the ice sheet you asked, "Wait, how do you know there were such things? Evidence, man, evidence" The existence of these former subglacial oceans of meltwater are a common accepted theory in glaciology. The existence and sudden release of this water is shown by the mega sub glacial flood evidence.
http://cgrg.geog.uvic.ca/abstracts/KorEvidenceThe1998.htmlOn the surge of glacial ice and water into the sea you asked, "Wait, again! Who saw these effects?" These effects show up in the sediment cores as meltwater event 1a and the heinrich drop stone layer. The surge of freshwater also shows up in the sediments in the gulf of Mexico.
Glacial Lakes and Rivers form the Mississippi River ValleyLudvanBThe purpose of this posting is to show that there has been a recent global flood as described in the bible. The question of "The Bible God's word or man's?" is best answered by the book with that question as its title. I would suggest you consult such since it is digressing to discuss it here.Percipient" we'd be going in circles" yes that was my point. On the early carbon dates for the Michigan whale bones, I thought we had talked about that, but perhaps it was another board. The early dates are due to newer carbon infiltration carried by rain water. All of the Champlain sea fossils buried shallow in sand an gravel also have too recent dates due to this same effect. the Michigan whale bones were all found near the surface beneath sand and gravel deposits with would have permitted the passage of rainwater. The carbon clock only starts to run once the sample is isolated from the environment. The Champlain fossils with the older dates were all found buried in clay which prevents infiltration of newer carbon carried by rainwater or ground water."Diatoms are often wind-borne" not when you find them underneath a glacial drop stone."Drop stones in Wisconsin are not evidence of a world wide flood, but only of local submergence" the Driftless area in SW Wisconsin was not glaciated in the last ice age and the surrounding terrain is not high enough to contain flood waters deep enough to float ice over the hills where these are found. the area adjoins the Mississippi river and would necessitate a global rise in sea level. And as I have been saying, melting ice carries little or no sediment load, and we do have the heinrich drop stones on the ocean floor and other such as the ones in the Driftless area. Others are undoubtedly laying all over the continents in areas far from the former ice sheets, and have been mistaken as local stones."The bays are almost exclusively oval while impact craters are uniformly circular regardless of impact angle (just look at the moon). This is because the crater forms from the explosive reaction to the impact and not to the impact itself." Of course the moon craters are round, the moon has no atmosphere. The passage of a comet or meteor through the atmosphere creates a pressure cone that creates the oval shape when the trajectory is at shallow angle to the ground surface. All of this was dealt with in Savage's book "The Mysterious Carolina Bays" fascinating reading. I also had a problem with the oval shape for the same reason you do, until I read Savage's book, explained it very nicely and also explained the short coming of the terrestrial explanations for the Bays."Carbon reservoir issues are well understood, and I'm sure this article only makes clear how very excellently well that is. You cannot conclude from this article that you always have a few thousand years of wiggle room. The changing carbon reservoir is a source of error only if you don't know about it." That was my point, they don't seem to know about it, I figured it out by reading two different papers and putting them together, I don't know if this carbon source is recognized for the large effect it would of had, I have seen no mention of it all. If you allow for bioturbation of the core sample, the magnitude of the carbon 'shift' was probably far larger than just 2K and is probably THE reason for dating discrepancies in connection with the late ice age. I suggest you read the articles for yourself and see what I mean."The mechanisms behind gathering all the animals of the world and then returning them to their original habitats can only be miraculous, not scientific." Absolutely, most undoubtedly survived locally by rafting etc.doctrbillSea water like lake water, doesn't have much of a sediment load, to which you stated. "I worked for a mining company which exploits lake sediments. Some of our pits exceeded 30 meters in depth." Lake sediments are carried into the lake by rivers or wind and settle out on the bottom of the lake because still water carries far less sediment then moving water. The sediments you refer to wouldn't be there if still lake water carried high sediment loads, if lake water could, the sediments would have been carried right through the lake and out the other side. Oceans are the same, incoming rivers dump their sediment load as the water slows forming a delta or submarine delta fan."A flood without turbidity? A flood free of wave action? Gently rising water which drops giant boulders but stirs up no silt?" Think of it as a tide that just keeps coming in for a few months and then goes out the same way. The Black Sea flooded in this manner without wave action destroying the fragile beach dunes. The boulders were carried by icebergs not currents."Are you saying that the rivers did not participate in the flood?" Of course not. Many perhaps even all of the worlds rivers show signs of former super floods in their having giant flood plains. It is believed that these huge flood plains were created by the river changing course back and forth creating a wide flood valley plain. The other possibility is that the valley was created all at once in a huge flood. A number have been show to have been created just this way such as the Mississippi river valley. These rivers would have been carrying an immense amount of sediment as they ripped huge cuts in the earth. But as the river water hit the rising ocean, the water slowed and the sediment dropped out. Some of these sediments have been found and are attributed to wind or sometimes floods. With most of the water coming from the oceans like a rising tide, what little sediment there was settled out near the rivers where then entered the rising flood waters and was not carried far. Some of the finer traces that were are possibly the source of some of the 'wind' deposited glacial loss.quicksink"why is it that the surface of the planet is not covered in randomly deposited boulders" It is, they are called erratics. They occur near where the former ice sheets were and most are explainable without a flood, but not all. Plus the tracing back of boulder trails has sometimes yielded results as if the boulders were dropped randomly by floating ice rather than in a flow line pattern typical of moving glacial ice, and some occur in areas glacial ice never reached. As for your paranoia try some prozac.

quicksink"we should see bpuulders covering all parts of the planet" No, that is not to be expected in a global flood due to the fact that the boulders had to be carried by icebergs which only could have come from glaciated areas. Due to the short duration of the flood and the melting away of the floating ice, a global distribution of glacial drop stones is not expected. We would expect to see them in the Driftless area because this non glaciated area was actually like an island surrounded by glaciers, so it is to expected a flood event would have caused at least some to have been dropped here and that is the case. The drop stones in the Driftless area are an anomaly difficult to explain without a global flood since some are found at elevations too high for the Mississippi river to reach without flooding the rest of the world." leave at least SOMETHING for the scientists to work with" The flood left plenty of evidence, that is what my book is all about. Many times to find something you have to know what you are looking for, and I doubt the scientific community is looking for something they believed was disproved long ago. The evidence is overlooked, viewed as caused by something else or written off as an anomaly."can you tell me how the flood could have fossilized only primitive creatures in a flawless strata (one where the most primitive animals are found deeper?) please don't use the old "the intelligent animals ran to higher ground" argument..." You must be new here. You may want to read the first post, I accept the fossil record along with the great age of the earth and the universe. I agree with you on the ridiculousness of YEC and their silly flood theories.LudvanBMy book is a scientific discussion of the flood and the evidence for it. I do refer to the bible a few times to show that what I am saying is not in conflict with scripture, and I show how the YEC and their flood theories are all wet. So a few citations were necessary. Then in the last chapter called the 'Author's soapbox' I refer to the bible a lot to show that many are following words of man rather than the word of God. You might even enjoy the last chapter because of the many errors it points out between what many religions teach and what the bible actually states. But perhaps you can save yourself some money, I am very happy with post 142 in which I put forward a technical theory of how the flood happened which is more detailed in some respects than the description in the book which is written more for the average reader. The book does have a much broader consideration of the flood and is much easier to follow then what I have been able to post on this board.edge"how much rain fell during these forty days?" Good question, the amount of rain fall is unknown. The majority of water came from the release of sub glacial meltwater and glacial surging into rising seas. The rain was probably a minor contributor.On comet impacts you asked "Where are the calculations of heat generated, etc.?" See post 73 which has some calculations for a single impact on an ice sheet. In the case of a Carolina Bay type of event on an ice sheet, you could probably multiply those numbers by the number of individual hits which could number in the millions. A lot of the heat would be absorbed by the ice and the following impact winter."there are no oceans beneath any ice cap." No, not a real saltwater ocean, an ocean sized body of freshwater melted beneath the ice sheet by the heat of the earth. The sheet remains frozen on the thinner edges which traps the water beneath the ice. It is believed that as the sheet grows thicker the trapped sub glacial water continues to grow in volume until the margin of the ice sheet gives way and the trapped water is released. There are sub glacial lakes beneath the ice sheets in Antarctica.

edgeOn former existence of large sub glacial lakes beneath the Laurentide ice sheet you stated. "don't you see that this is no evidence at all? You make up a story about something that has never been observed, then make up a mechanism and call it evidence! This is absolute silliness." This absolute silliness as you call it, happens to be main stream orthodox geology. The former existence of large sub glacial lakes beneath the Laurentide ice sheet and others, is an accepted fact in geology. I know that if I said the sky was blue you wouldn't believe me, so here are some links with references to the former sub glacial lakes..
http://cgrg.geog.uvic.ca/...cts/Munro-StasiukDynamicsIt.html
http://cgrg.geog.uvic.ca/.../ShoemakerSubglacialThe1999.html
This link also mentions sub glacial water flow and a possible impact crater on lake bottom of lake Ontario. Perhaps one of the impacters left a mark after all.
http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/...0/jan00/noaa00r301.htmlThe sub glacial lakes, like the ones in Antarctica don't need to be above sea level to drain into the ocean. If the glacial ice above it is above the level it would float at in the ocean, the water below the ice is under enough pressure to force it out. It is believed the lakes become connected through under ice channels which if one becomes open to the sea, the whole inter connected water system can drain. Under my theory, I am saying that this was about to happen when a comet impact trigged a pressure wave in the trapped water that caused the retaining ice dam to burst. Resulting in a very abrupt and very large draining event from multiple points all broken open at once. The heat beneath the ice sheet is uniform, aside from the increase with depth due to the center of the sheet being thicker and is more deeply pressed into the earth, which results in the center being much warmer than the thinner edges which are not as deeply depressed. The thinner edges are also colder on the bottom and remain frozen at the base due to the cold temperatures above the ice sheet, which is less of a factor in areas where the ice is thicker and acts as more of an insulator. The sudden release of these former trapped lakes is witnessed by the land forms they created. Here is the link on this I posted last time.
http://cgrg.geog.uvic.ca/abstracts/KorEvidenceThe1998.htmldoctrbillThis really is a silly debate. I am surprised that someone that considers themselves a bible scholar would even argue it at all. Your point on Genesis 1:10 is a no brainer, "The earth was 'formed out of the water' (2Pe 3:5) and 'founded . . . upon the seas' (Ps 24:2)" footnote on Genesis 1:10, The NIV Study Bible, and as one bible translates this verse "And God began calling the dry land Earth" What I disagree with is that this some how locks all other usages of the word earth to mean just the land areas. I mean this is ridiculous, to think this word now has only one meaning regardless of the context it is found in. For example, what 'earth' is being referred to in Genesis 1:2 before the creation of land? Then at Genesis 26:15 "As for all the wells that the servants of his father had dug in the days of Abraham his father, these the Philis'tines stopped up and they would fill them with dry earth." obviously 'earth' here refers to a small quantity of dirt. As the bible reference that I quoted earlier stated. "In the Hebrew Scriptures, the word used for earth as a planet is e'rets. E'rets refers to (1) earth, as opposed to heaven, or sky (Ge 1:2); (2) land, country, territory (Ge 10:10); (3) ground, surface of the ground (Ge 1:26); (4) people of all the globe (Ge 18:25)." The word has more than one meaning, and that meaning is determined by the context of the usage. It can mean the planet, the land or the soil, etc. When confronted by the fact that your restriction on the meaning of this word is in conflict with bible references and Hebrew dictionaries, you claim that they are biased and wrong. Yet you fail to cite a single reference that supports your unusual interpretation. Frankly, I don't think you have a leg to stand on. Like I said before, you are free to believe what every you want to, but if you want to convince me, you are going to have to come up with some facts, and so far I haven't seen one that supports your argument. Despite what you may think, you failed to successfully rebut any of the scriptures I posted, you made some cute one liners and that was it. You didn't do any reasoning or supply any information on why they could only be interpreted in the restricted manner you suggest. You have even failed to explain why you feel that "earth" applies to only a limited land area, when in Genesis 1:10 it is referring to all the land. In short, you have failed to even explain the basic reasoning behind your idea, let alone support it.