RE: [asa] Noah's local flood?

I just glanced at the paper. It seems crazy to me to think that someone
could calculate water outflow. The path of outflow must be very
complex, with the varying landscape. Seems to me it would take a
supercomputer to figure out, using satellite images of the topography.
I agree with this part of the article, though:

"First, this model, and the nature of the assumptions it embraces, are
crude at best."

At best- it is crude, as he says. I don't understand how this is not
obvious to anyone. For example, it says this:

"The three regions dealt with separately include: (1) the alluvial
plain, which is one of the flattest places on Earth, its gradient is
only 0.00072, over which the ark is being assumed to have traveled some
360 miles; (2) the foothills of Mount Ararat, where the gradient
increases to 0.0017, over which the ark is being assumed to have
ascended some 80 miles; and (3) a marshland delta region of some 120
miles, where the floodwaters could have escaped through marshlands to
the Persian Gulf (figure 1 of the previous paper, p. 121)."

What kind of massive over-simplification is that for a real-life
terrain? It is great for plugging numbers into an equation, but as
Einstein said something like "Break things done into their simplest
components, but never simpler." This all seems way over-simplified to
me, to the point of being worthless.

In addition, the author makes his own assumptions- how massive was the
"local flood" and how many animals on board (2500 species he says). I
suppose he has those 2,500 in a spreadsheet to calculate the weight, or
he just did a common-sense ballpark average? He says avg. weight was
250 lbs... where did that come from, and isn't it important? I think it
likely came from thin-air, as he probably didn't take time to define who
was included in the species list (how many deer, bear, lion, bird,
squirrel, rat, snake, etc.).

...Bernie

________________________________

From: philtill@aol.com [mailto:philtill@aol.com]
Sent: Friday, June 27, 2008 3:28 PM
To: Dehler, Bernie; asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: [asa] Noah's local flood?

Bernie,

you obviously haven't read Alan Hill's paper, which proves that the
water would stay in Mesopotamia as long as the Bible says it did. I
personally believe the flood was probably smaller in scope that Alan
believes. But nonetheless he did prove with valid hydrology modeling
that a Flood of the larger scope could have stayed in the Mesopotamian
basin for as long as the Bible says it did. If you "don't think" it
could be so, then you are claiming to have intuition that is more valid
then the actual hydrology equations. I gave the link to his paper
yesterday -- here it is again:

http://www.asa3.org/aSA/PSCF/2006/PSCF6-06Hill.pdf

Let nobody _ever_again_ say that it's not possible for the water to stay
in Mesopotamia as long as the Bible said it did. Anybody who wants to
say so had better come forward with math models that are better than
Alan's.

I want to add this, too: Alan did not take into account that the wind
blowing the ark inland would also have kept the water in-place. Wind
would provide a shear stress in the uphill direction, and because water
is quite viscious, and the flood plain quite shallow over most of its
extend during the flood, it would be very easy for the water to stay
indefinitely as long as the modest wind kept blowing.

Also, you need to add the effect of waves, which Alan further neglected.
Because waves in shallow waters are asymmetric in the upper versus lower
branches, they produce net transport of water. Wind that blows over
long stretches of open water cannot help but create significant waves,
and these would add to the water transported uphill through the
Mesopotamian basin.

Alan neglected these two features in his math analysis, and so therefore
he was being more conservative than was necessary. It is actually much
easier for the water to stay in Mesopotamia for as long as the Bible
says. And even though he negelected these things, he still proved that
it was easily possible via his valid mathematical solution of the
hydrology equations.

Let nobody ever again dispute this without math equations.

Phil

-----Original Message-----
From: Dehler, Bernie <bernie.dehler@intel.com>
To: asa@calvin.edu
Sent: Fri, 27 Jun 2008 12:58 pm
Subject: RE: [asa] Noah's local flood?

" I really have no idea what geological evidence would be expected given
a
full range of scenarios incorporating "dunking" with rain augmentation."
 
I think that one of the biggest problems is that for a massive flood
(one that kills all life around it), you need a geographical bowl shape
to contain the water- or else all the water will follow the river and
drain into the ocean. I don't think there's any bowl. And I don't
think the water can come down faster than it can leave via the rivers,
let alone stick around for a significant time. Sure, floods happen all
the time, but a flood of "Biblical proportions?"
 
...Bernie
 
-----Original Message-----
From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu
<mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu?> ] On
Behalf Of George Cooper
Sent: Friday, June 27, 2008 9:16 AM
To: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: RE: [asa] Noah's local flood?
 
That doesn't surprise me. Yet, as much as I like natural processes to
work
within God's plan, the Flood certainly could be an intervention event
since
judgment was upon them. This is not unlike Sodom and Gomorah (but not
like
hurricane Katrina since Bourbon Street was, essentially, missed).
 
I really have no idea what geological evidence would be expected given a
full range of scenarios incorporating "dunking" with rain augmentation.
 
Coope
 
 
 
-----Original Message-----
From: j burg [mailto:hossradbourne@gmail.com
<mailto:hossradbourne@gmail.com?> ]
Sent: Friday, June 27, 2008 10:35 AM
To: George Cooper
Cc: asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: [asa] Noah's local flood?
 
On 6/27/08, George Cooper <georgecooper@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>
> Is there any conjecture as to the possibility of the Arabian Plate
dipping
> in its NW region by, say, 0.08 deg.?This would drop that area by 2
miles.
> That dunk would only be 0.05% of its total height from Earth's center.
> Or, perhaps, the Eurasian plate rose slightly as the Arabian plate
dropped.
> I have no idea about such matters, admittedly, but am curious if this
has
> been discussed. [My apologies if I've missed it in these
discussions.]
>
> I had some discussion with Glenn Morton on this recently. He has what
looks like a convincing argument that such a dip is beyond the pale. I'm
not
expert to ay, however, if his argument is airtight.
 
> Burgy
 
 
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Received on Fri Jun 27 18:52:29 2008