For example, it seems clear in the account that the flood is a cosmos-
deconstructing affair, in which the waters which the ancients believed
surrounded the earth were loosed and the universe (as they knew it)
dissolved back into primordial chaos, with the Ark a bubble of salvation.
(It also seems clear that their notion of what the universe consisted
of was limited to their own 'land' and did not encompass the whole planet.)
Triage on the historical facts destroys the mythological significance.
I suppose it is up to everyone to decide which is the meat of the story.
Looking at the stories of other cultures, it seems inescapable that
the mythological aspect of the story is the primary message.
Another part of the debate is the recent (post-Enlightenment) use of
analogy to talk about God (and spiritual matters generally). Previously,
analogy was taken as revealing, but not definitive. That is, for
example, being the ancestor of someone was an analogy that need not be
literalized. Now, we tend more to insist that our religious analogies
are factually definitive, and one becomes the father of another by
participating in conception and physical birth resulting. (This is
developed in more detail in Placher's book _The Domestication of
Transcendence_, which I'm reading now.)
-Greg