How accurate is the story of Noah's ark?

Question

How could you fit two of every animal on a ship only slightly larger than a football field?
What about carnivores? Were there extra live animals brought on board for them to eat?
What about other specific animals such as the Koala that eat only fresh Eucalyptus leaves?
If you couldn't fit all the animals on board, how can you fit the animals and their food?
Where did all that extra flood water come from? Where did it go?
How did 8 (or so) people take care of all those animals?
What about all the inbreeding after the flood?
Where is the fossil evidence?
What about freshwater and saltwater fish in a mixed environment?
What about trees and plants?
What about animals that died on the ark? Did they forever become extinct?
What about the tons of animal poop?
If the ark took 100 years (or even 10) to prepare and build, wouldn't it be rotten by the time it started to rain?

The longest wooden boat ever created in modern times was only 300ft long, and had serious problems with sagging and bowing under its own weight. It was built by professional shipbuilders and modern tools and equipment. What gives?
Did Noah travel to Australia, the arctic and antarctic, the Americas, etc to get all the animals there? Did he also take them back after the flood?
If the first rainbow occurred after the flood, how did optics work before that?
Why did he require a dove to check that the water went away? Couldn't he just look?
Where did the animals for the burnt offering come from if there were only two of each still alive?4
Did all the other animals (minus two for each species) deserve to die as well as the humans?

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=90427

Answer 1

Do you honestly think anyone who literally believes in Noah's ark is even capable of reading your question, or forming a coherent response?

Answer 2

One mans idea about what reeeeally happened on noahs ark......

"Elsewhere it has been argued with success that Noah maintained the largest repository of animal DNA ever assembled in his "Ark". Researchers have concluded that Noah's greatest contribution was not the ark that he built with alien assistance but the monumental task of cloning every animal from the DNA samples which he saved and protected on the ark.

Interestingly, research has come to light in recent years that relates this cloning operation to the story of Ham and the uncovering of Noah's nakedness after Noah became drunk. Alternate theories abound. However students of scripture, archaeology, and crypto-history alike are coming to some definite conclusions about just what really happened to Noah and Ham after the flood.

Scholars working from papyrus and copper scrolls found at Qumran, Masada, and Megiddo had been able to piece together a basic account of just exactly what happened.

Noah was not cultivating grapes to get drunk. Noah was operating a sophisticated scientific operation designed to reconstitute animals from the DNA samples he posessed. Ham was a necessary participant. Through an ingenious scientific process lost to history. Ham would seed the DNA into Noah's body. Noah acted as an incubator for the animal zygotes until they reached a certain level of development. At that point they would be transferred to the uterus of a cow or antelope.

At any one time, a hundred or more zygotes were living free in Noah's abdomen. It was Ham's job to "impregnate" Noah with the cloned embryos as each batch was ready. What was unknown to Noah however was that Ham had saved DNA from a dubious source prior to the flood.

Prior to the flood, Ham had been in a homosexual relationship with a member of the Nephilim, the giants in the land for which God sent the flood in the first place. The Nephilim were fallen from heaven along with their leader Satan. Ham combined the DNA from himself and this Nephilim and produced a clone. This clone he introduced into the body of Noah. This is the sin of Ham."

Answer 3

Could Noah's Ark Hold all the Animals?

One issue that is often raised against Christianity is Noah's Ark and the Flood. Did it really happen? Did the flood really cover the whole world? Is there enough water on earth to cover all the land? Could the ark really hold two of every kind of animal in the world? Though these might be intimidating questions, the answer to each is a resounding, "Yes."

God said to Noah in Genesis 6:14-16, "So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high. Make a roof for it and finish the ark to within 18 inches of the top. Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks" (NIV). According to God's Word, Noah built the ark. Eight people entered it and all humanity died in the ensuing flood.

Did the flood really happen? Yes. Jesus said in Matt. 24:37-39 that the flood happened. If you can't trust Jesus, you can't trust anyone. As far as physical evidence goes there are numerous sedimentary deposits world wide which suggest a universal flood. There are countless fossil deposits world wide (For fossilization to occur organisms must be buried rapidly with sediment.). Every major culture has a flood legend. Of over 200 flood legends, 95% say the flood was universal; 70% say survival depended upon a boat; 66% say the wickedness of man was the cause; 88% say there was a favored family; 66% say the remnant was warned; 67% say animals were also saved; 57% say the survivors ended up on a mountain; 35% say birds were sent out; 9% say eight people were saved; and 7% mention a rainbow.

Is there enough water to flood the entire earth? Absolutely! If the earth were perfectly spherical the oceans would cover all the land by more than a mile in depth. The biblical account is that it rained for 40 days and nights in which the floodgates of the heavens were opened up as well as the fountains from the earth (Gen. 7:11;8:2). There is a theory known as the canopy theory that states it had never rained on the earth up to the time of Noah and that a mist watered the plants (Gen. 2:6-6). The theory goes on to state that there may have been a heavy cloud or water vapor layer over the entire earth and that it was this canopy of water that became torrential rains during the flood period.

Did the flood cover all the earth? Yes it did. The depth of the flood waters is described in Gen. 7:19 as covering "all the high mountains under the entire heavens." Also, there are many references in the Bible to it being global: Gen. 6:1,4-5,12,13,17,19;7:4,6,10,19;8:3;9:15. There were 40 days of rain (Gen. 7:12), 110 days of flooding (Gen. 7:24) and 221 more days of draining (Gen. 8:1-5,13-14). That is a total of 371 days of flooding that covered the mountains. That could not be a local flood.

Could the ark really contain all the animals of the world? Again the answer is "Yes." But let's look at the last question in more detail. The ark took about 120 years to build. Noah was 480 years old when he began the work and he had the help of his wife, three sons, and his son's wives. He probably hired local people to help in the construction.

The dimensions of the ark have a ratio of six to one. The Ark was six times longer than it was wide. This is the best ratio for modern ship building. Model stability tests have shown that the design is stable for waves up to 200 feet high and that the ark could have rotated 90 degrees and still righted itself.

The volume of the ark would be 450 feet long by 75 feet wide by 45 feet high. This equals 1,518,750 cubic feet and is comparable to 569 modern railroad boxcars. Therefore each boxcar, by comparison, would be 1,518,750 ÷ 569, or 2,669 cubic feet of space. The average size of an animal on the earth is smaller than a cat. But, just to keep it safe let's consider the average size of an animal to be a sheep. The average double deck stock car holds 240 sheep. The Ark capacity would be about 569 x 240 equaling 136,560 animals of that size. However, that still is not accurate for our needs. Since most birds, reptiles, and amphibians are much smaller, let's double the boxcar capacity for them. Therefore, the boxcars could each hold 480 different kinds of birds, reptiles, amphibians.

Noah had to take two or seven of every kind of animal on the earth. Though it is not really known exactly what is meant by a biblical kind, it is generally considered to be animals that are fertile within their own groups. Any dog can breed with any dog, therefore, dogs are one kind. It would only be necessary to bring representatives of each kind since the parents could produce offspring that would carry the genetic information for all variations within their kind.


Classification . . . . Number of Species . . . . Number of Kinds on the Ark
Mammals . . . . . . . . .3,700 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3,700 (a few live in water).
Birds . . . . . . . . . . . . 8,600 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60,200 (seven pairs according to
Gen. 7:3)
Reptiles. . . . . . . . . . .6,300 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6,300
Amphibians. . . . . . . .2,500 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,500
Fishes. . . . . . . . . . . .20,600. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .zero
Other marine life . . . 192,605. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .zero
Insects . . . . . . . . . . . 850,000 . . . (Since insects are very small, and a great many could be stored in a small area, calculation would be difficult.)
Total . . . . . . . . . . . .1,072,305 . . . . . . . . . . . . .72,700

The total number of mammals would be 3,700 times two pair which equals 7,400 animals. 7,400 divided by 240 = 31 boxcars used.

Since Gen. 7:3 says to take seven pairs of every bird then the total for birds would be 8,600 times two pair times 7 or 120,400 animals. 120,400 ÷ 480 = 250 boxcars. The reptiles and amphibians would be 6,300 plus 2,500 or 8,800. 8,800 times two pair equals 17,600 animals. 17,600 divided by 480 = 37 boxcars.

The total number of boxcars used would be 318 with a total number of animals at 145,400. There would be 251 boxcars left over. That means that only 56% of the ark would be used for storing the animals. Obviously, then, the rest of the space would be used for food for the people and animals and sleeping quarters. In addition, considering that insects are extremely small, it is easily conceivable that they could be housed in part of the remaining space.

It should also be considered that many animals can hibernate. Additionally, predators and prey have been known to habitat peacefully together during situations of stress like fire, flood, or earthquake. In the Ark, normal animal behavior would probably have been different from normal. Specialists in animal behavior have noted that animals can sense danger and have often migrated to escape it. Perhaps God used their migratory instincts to get them to the Ark.

Though this is only a brief analysis, it should present enough evidence that the Ark account is certainly within the realm of possibility. * (this was cut n pasted See below)

Answer 4

You and I think alike. . . If only I had the time to list every single discrepancy in the bible, I bet my list would look like yours! Personally, I believe the whole thing was just a big story made up to give people something to believe in and to keep them in line by saying "follow what the word says or else you're a sinner!" There's just too many factors that don't add up. Bravo, man.

Answer 5

Extremely accurate. There was a flood of water (water signifies truth and the opposite sense, here used, signifies falseness). So a flood of falseness affected the earth at that time. As far as learning all the symbolism around this I have never bothered.

Me bad Swedenborgian!

http://www.mechanicsburgnewchurch.org

Answer 6

It's the word of God how can you doubt it!....bwahahah- Oh man, I have seen this question before but never so well phrased, the Christian answers seem the same. I just wonder who got stuck picking up poop. I worked at a veterinary clinic when I was in college and let me tell you animals make a BUNCH of poop!

Answer 7

the word that is translated earth could just as easily mean country or land so it could have just been a regional flood not a world wide flood

Answer 8

Genesis

Answer 9

You left out a major factor: God. As simple as that answer may seem, pick out one of the questions that you asked, and answer it with that solution. Seriously. And anything not answered to your satisfaction with that answer can be easily explained anyway.

Answer 10

Totally bogus, here's my question on the same thing. You may find it interesting...

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/?qid=20060727225343AAgOrwU

Here's another good reason... If there is only 2 of any given animal, then how is inbreeding prevented?