Civilization before Noah?

Question

[ Only serious answers please ]

We all know and there is much evidence (Search Wikipedia.com) that there was once a great flood that wiped out all civilization from earth. (Now assume a few things without getting into a religious debate)
Are there any archeological findings, proofs or sites that can give some idea about the civilization that was wiped out or the civilization that was there before the time of Noah? If there were human (assume it is true) there must have been some traces.

Answer 1

What do you mean, "We all know?" And here's what wikipedia says about the great Noahic flood:

"The Flood, the great Universal Deluge of myth and perhaps of history is treated at Deluge (in mythology)."

The words, "perhaps of history" imply nothing about a flood of biblical proportions. There may have been a flood that the myth evolved from. That's all it means.
How can one avoid the religious view, here? That's the only source of your claim. Your whole argument is precedented on religious myth.
There is no archaeological evidence that Noah ever existed. So any question related to Noah will have no answer. The history of human civilization, and pre-civilization, reveals no evidence of a world-wide deluge. The geological record reveals no such evidence. Ocean levels have risen and fallen many times during the lifetime of our genus, but these take thousands of years and do not wipe out whole civilizations, or groups of whatever kind before civilizations existed.
The biblical chronology puts Noah's flood at about 3000 BC. We know of several civilizations before that and there are lots of artifacts. Some of these civilizations have an unbroken record right through the period when the flood was supposed to have occurred. And humans existed for 2 million years before that.

Answer 2

There is no proof of a "great flood that wiped out all civilization from earth". The Gilgamesh (that the Jews call Noah) Epic was a localized flooding event. My question to anyone holding this myth serious is where did all the water go after the flood? The volume of water needed to cover the highest mountains (over five miles high) cannot be found on Earth. It didn't go into the oceans and it didn't go into the lands. It must have vanished as mysteriously as it appeared. Ergo, it never occurred, it is just a Babylonian Myth.

Answer 3

Believing in the bible account of Noah is not what some people like to do. Not believing what the bible says frees you up from having to face responsibility to God. It is so easy to deny the evidence or credibility of an account of something that reportedly happened thousands of years in the past. Who can refute your astute observations? There are no survivors around to refute your astute observations. On the other hand, one just might entertain the concept of faith. The question asked includes the idea: "There must have been some traces." Who laid down that requirement? If the Creator decided to remove all traces, would it be beyond the Creator's capability to remove all traces? If the Creator decided to flood the world because of nonacceptance of the direction the world was going, does it not follow reason that the Creator would want to remove all traces of that civilization? I do not offer this in a spirit of argument but just as a suggestion of a flow of logical thought. What is the evidence that some civilization has an unbroken record running through the period when the flood was supposed to have occurred. I would like to see that unbroken record. I don't believe it exists.

Answer 4

1/ There are no evidence of major simultaneous flood world wide.
2/ Wherever there is some localized flood in the prehistorical time, it is possible to find human culture before
3/ Where did Noah keep the sea fauna in his ark ? And by the way, the 5 millions species presently on the earth. If the earth is completly covered with water, it might turn the ocean in fresh water places. And it does not solve the problem of the plants.

This is a mythology, a legend or take it as you want. Avoid putting fairy stories in science questions

Answer 5

Yes. Scripture says Noah, his wife, his three sons and their wives. Eight people. Prior to the flood the earth apparently enjoyed a uniform sub-tropical climate everywhere. There were apparently no storms (hence no rainbows, Gen. 9:13), no wind (Gen. 8:1b), no snow, ice, floods. Water from springs prior to the flood was evidently abundant (Gen. 1:10) and a generous nightly mist, or very heavy dew watered the ground (Gen. 2:5). Fossils of tropical plants can be found in Alaska today, great coal beds have been discovered in Antarctica, and hundreds thousands of suddenly quick-frozen warm-weather mammoth elephants in Siberia. The surface of the earth has been drastically altered as a result of the flood. The Grand Canyon of the Colorado River was evidently the result of a sudden catastrophic draining of a huge inland lake, etc. Most of the great mountain ranges we see today were probably build up after the flood by isostatic rebound, and by collision of the continental plates after rapid breakup and accelerated "drift." Before the flood the earth seems to have had just one continent. Division of the continents may have occurred rapidly "in the days of Peleg" (Gen. 10:25)---which was about 150 years after the flood. This can not be strongly supported from the Bible except for the fact that the root PLG (Peleg) is found in modern words such a "pelagic" and "archipelago." All that Genesis 10 actually says about Peleg is "in his days the earth was divided." This could mean a division and migration of peoples rather than referring to continental breakup. Rapid continental drift would have been so disastrous in terms of earthquakes, tidal waves, vulcanism and other upheavals that many scientifically-oriented Bible scholars believe the splitting of earth's original continent ("pangea") occurred during the year of the flood. Technical papers on the subject are available from the Ist, IInd and IIIrd International Conferences on Creationism. Some people studying this subject seem to date the event far earlier than when you reference the Chinese sailors and explorers. Since there had never been rain before, nor where there oceans to sail on, no one else would have had boats or ships.

Answer 6

There are lots of separate folklore stories of floods around the world. Much as one would expect to see. However, there is no evidence that these all point to the same cataclysmic event, rather they are most likely based upon local floods.

It is understandable that a primitive culture would imagine that an angry god of somekind brought the various floods down upon them to teach them some kind of lesson.

There is no known geological data to support those who defend a universal flood.

Also, how would Noah have kept fresh water and salt water fish on the ark? The all the fresh water fish would have perished with contaminated salt water and vice-versa. Would you have me believe that he had an elaborate system of aquaria to keep these alive??

Based on the above your question is irrelevant. Sorry.