I guess I'd like to address those here who appear to "believe" that the flood did occur, but that it was not global.
Catholics fit...
I would like to address the issue for those Christians here who do not believe it was a global flood. Why?
Because the entire planet has not been covered in water since the dawn of mankind. Case closed. The Flood could not have been global.
A clear reading of Genesis and the NT apostle Paul all indicate that this was a global flood.
If it just had to have been a global flood, then the Bible is wrong.
But its not necessarily global. The intended audience of Genesis did not have the concept of the whole planet like we do so their understanding would be quite different. When they talked about the earth they were not talking about the planet in its entirety. The story could have been talking about a local flood. Similiarly, there's arguments on the wiping out of mankind not being every single person on the planet, but a local group of men instead.
As far as the New Testament referencing the Flood... A reference is not necessarily a claim of actualness. For example, if I wrote a letter to some fellow nerds that reference the Prime Directive from Star Trek they would all understand my point. Now, that doesn't mean that any one of us actually thinks that Star Trek was real. Similiarly, even if it was something that our culture considered real (or didn't know), say something like Paul Revere's Ride, our mention of it as if it were a real thing doesn't necessitate that it really did happen.
So like when Jesus said that just like Jonah was in the whale for 3 days...yada yada, that doesn't necessarily mean that a man really lived in a big fish for 3 days. He could have been reference a known fiction, or referenceing something his audience considered real all the while not endorsing it as actually happening.
Make sense?
Just one small point I'll make and I'll address your other evidences to this as you post them: If, as Genesis states, God gave Noah 120 years to prepare a monstrous "boat" for this event, did Noah waste is time doing so??? Wouldn't the average man of any sort of intelligence just gathered his belongings and walked away, like to Asia or somewhere, instead of building a boat to float around on during a localized flood????
The story of Noah borrows a lot from the earlier surrounding cultures. It has been heavily influenced. Are you familiar with the
Epic of Gilgamesh? I don't think what we have for Noah's story is exactly the way things went down. It might not have happened at all. But assuming it did happen, I doubt the specifics are accurate. There's no way he had 2 of every single kind of animal on a boat... Maybe some guy did make a boat for a flood and put a bunch of different animals on it. As the story got passed down, it must have gotten embelished.
If you care to read about the Catholic's take on it, here's a link to the Catholic Encyclopedia's entry on the Deluge:
CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA: Deluge
Science fails to recognize the single most potent element of human existence.
Letting the reigns go to the unfolding is faith, faith, faith, faith.
Science has failed our world.
Science has failed our Mother Earth.
-System of a Down, "Science"
He who makes a beast out of himself, gets rid of the pain of being a man.
-Avenged Sevenfold, "Bat Country"
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