tgamble

Obviously irrelevent since the flood never happened anyway but people here might find it interesting.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/home..._ArkSafety.asp

Godot

The lengths some people will go to (not to mention the free time they must have).
Do we really *need* a safety investigation of an oversized mythical raft? As if any relevant information can be gleaned about the ark from the extrapolation of the measurements as written in the bible. And I'm sure there hasn't been the slightest improvement in structural integrity in the 3000-4000 years. Using modern technological innovations to attempt to rationalise an antiquated construction.... insulting is the best I can manage.
Sad, really.


Not to mention of course, that they HAD to determine that the ark would meet all their requirements. After all, it did happen! I read about it!

Duvenoy

Any seaman will tell you that a barge-type hull is absolutly the worst to be aboard in heavy weather. And with no steerage; forget it! It would have broached (turned sideways to the seas)as soon as it floated, The Ark, as described would never have survived launch.

doov (10 years USN, Slavage/1st Class Diver and Assault boat Coxswain)

lpetrich

And it's curious that nobody has tried to rebuild Noah's Ark, let alone re-enact Noah's voyage.

If one can construct a Bible-inspired theme park, then why not Noah's Ark?

Tenek

What a bunch of secular God-hating humanist crap. God kept the ark afloat just as He stopped reproduction and feeding on the Ark, which really had dimensional doors to other places where they could store the two of every kind, such as the Beetle Room, roughly fifty times the size of the Ark itself.

Duvenoy

Of course! Why didn't I see it all before?

The Ark was a Tardis! And Noah was/is really Dr. Who! The scales have fallen from my eyes.



doov

Blinn

I see these nutjobs are from Korea. Who'd a thought...

gallo

Duvenoy speaks from practical experience whereas my knowledge comes from books. But we agree. In rough weather the #1 priority is to maintain headway. That is why windjammers carried sail in even the worst storms. That is why men went aloft and risked their lives to replace sails shredded by high winds. It was essential to maintain headway in order to maintain steerage. In the case of wind driven craft, they were forced to keep stern to the wave front. Modern ships keep the bow to the wave front.

The problem is that if the height of the wave front exceeds the dimension of the craft, the craft will slide down the wave to the trough and then the wave will roll over it and capsize it. As Duvenoy states, without steerage, any vessel will turn broadside to the waves.

And that doesn't even take into consideration the fact that the structural capabilities of wood are exceeded at about 300 ft. All wood ships of 300 ft. or more leaked constantly. Even in calm seas the hulls were sprung beyond capabilities of any calking. Wood is too flexable, and it can't be welded like steel. Research into the fate of wood ships of 300 ft. or more will reveal that they were lost in storms, most while riding at anchor in some sheltered location in an attempt to ride out a storm.

A big box like the ark could not have survived the initial 40 days, not to mention the year following.

Conchobar

Genesis says it was 300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high.

Now was that 50 cubits of width at the top of the vessels upper deck? And how much of an angle did it slope as it dropped 30 cubits? Or was it also 50 cubits wide on the bottom?? Did it slope sharply to a sharp ridge (Keel)?

Which of those would be stable in high winds and waves? To test the hypothesis one would need to test a boat that bulges out and around like the old 17th Century sailing ships of the Royal Navy? That may have been stable.

If it narrowed sharply like a racing yacht it would not have been as stable and the lower decks would have had little storage room.

If it were flat bottomed, it would have had ample storage room. But having ridden in a skin curach, I guarantee that I could feel every wave more than 5cm high. I don't think it could have withstood the forces of waves and it would have snapped.

So a workable Ark should be the wide bulging sides that only near the botton slopes to the keel. Look at pictures of the old Swedish warship Vasa or the US Constitution in Boston. That shape was definitely stable in the waves.

However, the Noah's Flood is nonsense for many other reasons. The quantity of water to flood the Earth's highest mountains was not available. There was no reasonable way to colllect the hundreds of thousands of genera of animals from remote parts of the Earth before the flood, carry them in the Ark, and them deliver them back to their places of origin. Eg. Kangaroos had to be obtained from Australia taken to the Middle East, survived in the Ark and then delievered back across to the opposite side of the globe to Australia. We know that Kangaroos and their fossils are only found in australia and New Guinea. They are not found anywhere in the long distances along the way to the Middle East. This applies to thousands of other remote area animals. So it would have to defy natural laws to a cosmic degree, a miracle. Miracles cannot be proved since none have ever been studied and found to be genuine.

Conchobar

dangin

I've always considered the bibliography to be important to judging the quality of a paper. The more modern the sources (when available) the better the research done. (obviously this does not work with primary sources in history papers, and original interviews and things like that) Often (particularly in scientific papers) when you see older sources, it is because the older sources serve the interests of the authors more than sources written since the publication of the older books. Just take a look at the biblio on the paper this thread is about.