How big would the Ark have to be to hold all the animals?

Question

2 of each species, right? Assume they have a little space and are not totally jammed in, how big an Ark would Noah have had to build? Also assume that there is no need for food or water storage etc. Just the animals.

Answer 1

I dunno, but I can't imagine how horrible it must've been with all the bugs!

Answer 2

Not two of each species. There were seven of each "clean " species, two of each of the "unclean ones". Even if you omitted food and water, the ark would have to be much larger than described just to hold the animals (and what about the plants?). If the ark had the design generally shown, with the entranceway also serving as a ramp, it would be very unseaworthy, not that it would have been designed well without that feature. Noah would have had to harvest all the gopher trees in the area, if not the world, in order to construct a seaworthy craft of a suitable size and would probably still be building it today. And today he'd have to add a holding tank for more than a year's worth of manure from all those animals. And there's another problem. Start with two rabbits and how many do you think there would be by the end of the voyage?

Answer 3

Assume that this story is just an allegory about obedience to God.

Even so, the Bible lists the dimensions of the supposed Ark in cubits. This unit varies but it is often thought to be about a foot and a half. But keep in mind how many times the Bible has been (mis)translated.

Answer 4

Let's see....

How about if we start out with a planet about 4000-miles in diameter. This planet should have a molten iron-nickel core covered by a viscous "mantle" that is warmed to thousands of degrees C by radioactive decay. On top of this mantle let's put solid plate-like structures that are free to "float" upon the mantle. Add an ocean of liquid water deposited by eons of bombardment by comets. This ocean should cover about 70% or so of the surface. The rest of the surface will be made up of large structures called continents made of hardened material that is constantly extruded from the mantle. Scattered in the oceans are many smaller land structures we will call islands.

Let's surround the planet with a thin layer or atmosphere of a mixture of gasses. Most of the atmosphere will be made up of just two gasses, Nitrogen and Oxygen with the former making up nearly 78% of the total. Throw in tiny amounts of CO2 just for fun. Let's make this atmosphere something like 100-miles thick.

This planet ought to be in an orbit of radius 93-million miles about a medium sized yellow star. Add a large moon to orbit the planet at a distance of some 240-thousand miles. To make it interesting let's have the planet spin on an axis that is tilted 23-degrees to the plane of its orbit.

It would be helpful to have this planet and star "mature " for some 4.5-billion years just to make sure the system could support all of the life you have described.

That ought to do it!

Answer 5

Most people telling the story say two elephants, two hippos, two rhinos, two turtles, two . . .

But each "kind" which is probably each species, so you need two African elephants, two Indian elephants, 10 rhinos (5 species), 6 giraffes, 10 zebras, 12 wild asses, 2 okapis, 2 hippos, 2 pigmy hippos, then all the apes, monkeys, antelope, goats, sheep, buffalo, hundreds of rodents, not to mention the cat family, dog family, bears, weasel family, bats, insectivores (moles, shrews, etc.), other mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, invertebrates.

Either it is an allegory or you have to admit to evolution.

Answer 6

Actually the bible states two of each "kind", not two of each species. A wolf would represent all dog-like animals, and a tiger would represent all cat-like animals, etc. so it may not have had to be a big as most people think.

Answer 7

The size of the ark is listed in the bible.