Noahs Flood

You can get a fairly detailed article that directly refutes the Ryan & Pitman flood theory here:ftp://rock.geosociety.org/pub/GSAToday/gt0205.pdfThe title is "Persistent Holocene Outflow from the Black Sea to the Eastern Mediterranean Contradicts Noah’s Flood Hypothesis", and the authors are Aksu, Hiscott, Mudie, Rochon, Kaminski, Abrajano and Yasar.Their basic points are based on core samples of delta deposits at the mouth of the Bosporus Strait in the Marmara Sea, and measurements of salinity and flow in the water column of the Bosporus and the two seas that it connects.This is not an area of science that I'm at all familiar with, but I was able to get the gist of the article. As indicated by the title, the evidence points to a steady outflow of fresh water from the Black Sea into the Marmara and Aegean, going back 10 to 12 k years ago -- long before the 7.5 k.y.a. date proposed by Ryan and Pitman for a catastrophic break of a land barrier that they say blocked the Bosporus.The appearance of salt-water mollusks in the Black Sea at about 7.5 k.y.a. (the main basis for the Ryan/Pitman flood hypothesis) is explained by Aksu et al. as being the result of a "stratified" flow in the Bosporus, such that heavier saline water from the Aegean flows into the Black Sea below the lighter fresh water that flows out from the Black Sea.There's nothing there about presence/absence/movement of people during this period. Given the gradual nature of the water transfer process, any notable cultural phenomena would most likely have had other causes.

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.

When you read material being presented by scientists, the point isn't to "believe" what they say; the point is to review and comprehend (to the best of your ability) the evidence they present and the conclusions they draw from the evidence. And when the material is more than a decade old, it's worthwhile to check for more recent work, especially stuff that specifically cites that older material, to see whether new evidence has led to different conclusions (which is what happened with the Ryan & Pitman material you cited).If you've learned enough about the given area of research being reported in a given book or article, you can assess whether the evidence was gathered and handled with adequate care to guard against inaccuracy or bias. And even with a lesser amount of knowledge about the specific field, you may be able to assess whether the evidence actually warrants the conclusions.That's hard work. Lots of people don't have the time, interest or education to do it, and for them, it becomes a matter of getting someone else's boiled-down, sound-bite summary of the material, and either accepting it or not. But the point of having a good, well-rounded education is, at least in part, to allow people to get beyond sound-bite-level comprehension, and make good use of their innate skills for critical thinking.

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autotelic adj. (of an entity or event) having within itself the purpose of its existence or happening.