When Literalists have to literally lie to sell their literal truth (AKA Adventures in Ark-itecture)

[AthenaAwakened]

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/08/ark-encounter-kentucky/495707/

For self-proclaimed literalists, the ark includes a striking amount of fabrications and fictionalizations. Consider, for example, one of the most popular exhibits, where visitors can walk through the family’s living quarters. At the entrance are two placards, one entitled “Artistic License,” and the other “Why Are the Living Quarters So Nice?” In each of the following rooms, visitors can see mannequin renderings of the family and read short bios. Take Ham’s wife Kezia, who likes “dressing up and looking her best, although the Ark’s busy schedule provides few opportunities for this.” But none of these details appear in the Bible. Genesis never takes a charming detour through the family’s hobbies. It never even reveals the names of the women on the ship. And yet these details are integral to the experience of Ark Encounter. It enlivens and stabilizes the text with the incontrovertible hardness of sets, props, and mannequins.

 

[Atheos]

Wonder if they'll have an exhibit that shows Noah all sauced up lounging about with his balls hanging out and Ham taking a gander. That was one of Noah's hobbies according to the story.

 

[ideologyhunter]

Or the night Mrs. Noah surprised the family by fixing up a T. Rex egg omelet for 8. And then discovering that both of the T. Rexes on the ark were girls.

 

[AthenaAwakened]

I am just waiting for someone with more time on their hands than I have, to figure up the total mass, weight, and density of TWO of every creature on earth and then show you can't fit them all in this monstrosity (even if they were all babies).

 

[funinspace]

The Deluge fable has dozens of major problems. The typical fundagelical believer, simply uses the "its a miracle" card to pretend that those dozens of absurdities are within their God's realm. I think that the best critique is pointing out the geological history of the earth, whether it is the tree ring continuum, or the age of reefs, or the continuum of ice core samples goes back well beyond any date that these people have for their fairy tale. And those records clearly don't have any world wide deluge within them. And there is no sane way that such an event would be missed. So either the Deluge is a fairy tale, or their God is a deceiving trickster. Of course there is still "la la la...I'll just pretend reality isn't real"....

 

[Ramaraksha]

You guys don't understand

This was never about God - its all about that nice easy living that they hope to get after death

Come on, would any fool "love" a being that they have never seen, zero evidence of, don't what it or him or she looks like?

It is like the lottery winner suddenly finding out everyone "loves" him, unless he is a fool, he knows that this new-found "love" for him is for his money

People "love" God, wag their tails, hoping for the reward - the reward of heaven - a joyful place of plenty, no need to work, just sit on their lazy butts and enjoy - Sugar Daddy God will take care of everything

And that is why the book must be true! All the tall tales must be true

You are talking reason, real life - in real life a boat like the ark is nonsense, so is a magic happy land where a being separates people by religion like Hitler or ISIS and rewards people accordingly

Actually this is very sad - we laugh at kids and their fairy stories but millions of adults are happy to believe in those very such stories! Simply amazing

Only Brainwashing can explain this - i just can't find anything else to explain this behaviour

 

[AthenaAwakened]

 

[Angry Floof]

Take Ham’s wife Kezia, who likes “dressing up and looking her best, although the Ark’s busy schedule provides few opportunities for this.”

 

[C_Mucius_Scaevola]

The Deluge fable has dozens of major problems. The typical fundagelical believer, simply uses the "its a miracle" card

And the simple response is, "If it can be solved by a miracle, then why not just miraculously zap every "evil" person put of existence, sparing the innocent birds and beasts, thus removing the need to jump through all the hoops of the (plagiarised) Flood story and leaving the rest of humanity, even if it's only the 8 persons of the myth, to get on with things, certain in the knowledge tha any recurrence of the "evil"behaviour would ensure that GOD WILL FUCK THEM UP!!!!" Much more efficient than drowning everything.

You guys don't understand

This was never about God - its all about that nice easy living that they hope to get after death

No, if you hear any of the preachers who go on about this stuff, it's never got anything to do with anticipating the pleasures of the afterlife. It's all about avoiding the tortures of Hell. For every preacher selling the sweet, sweet life in Heaven after death, there's a dozen describing the torments in store for the unbeliever. They're scared shitless, every one of them that really believes, and so are their congregations. The ones who don't raeally believe? They're in it for the money, and there are enough suckers around to make sure they keep getting it.

 

[Learner]

For conversation sake. Noah and his kind back then could of been giants compared to us. Maybe the ark was much bigger than we imagined so the 'cubit' of the time could allow to fit all those creatures in the ark. (If we are to believe in this sort of thing,I do of course)

As just one of the examples of the past. Giants have been quite popular these last few years and more discoveries are being revealed that they did exist (as mentioned in the bible and god stories around the world) If this is the case then the history you have been brought up in needs rewriting.

 

[Keith&Co.]

For conversation sake. Noah and his kind back then could of been giants compared to us. Maybe the ark was much bigger than we imagined so the 'cubit' of the time could allow to fit all those creatures in the ark. (If we are to believe in this sort of thing,I do of course)

So then what would the point be in writing that the boat was X cubits long, if the value of a cubit was going to be such a mystery?
Why would Moses have recorded completely meaningless values that way?

 

[Learner]

For conversation sake. Noah and his kind back then could of been giants compared to us. Maybe the ark was much bigger than we imagined so the 'cubit' of the time could allow to fit all those creatures in the ark. (If we are to believe in this sort of thing,I do of course)

So then what would the point be in writing that the boat was X cubits long, if the value of a cubit was going to be such a mystery?
Why would Moses have recorded completely meaningless values that way?

Interesting question, I don't know really, my previous post was just a thought .



(Good to see you're on the mend. What would we do if there were no-one to keep us woohoos in check? )

 

[Keith&Co.]

There are plenty to check, really. It's what they do here.

Anyway, the Books includes a verse or two which says that every single verse in the Books is there for our instruction. It all means something. So any defense of a verse which depends on the verse being useless (because we lack the ability to translate it, for example) is unbiblical. You don't want to be unbiblical, do you?

 

[Learner]

There are plenty to check, really. It's what they do here.

Anyway, the Books includes a verse or two which says that every single verse in the Books is there for our instruction. It all means something. So any defense of a verse which depends on the verse being useless (because we lack the ability to translate it, for example) is unbiblical. You don't want to be unbiblical, do you?

Indeed.

 

[Lion IRC]

I am just waiting for someone with more time on their hands than I have, to figure up the total mass, weight, and density of TWO of every creature on earth and then show you can't fit them all in this monstrosity (even if they were all babies).

Why two of every creature on earth today?
That wouldn't necessarily be the same number as the theoretical number in Noah's Ark.
You're guessing aren't you? Artistic license?

 

[Lion IRC]

For conversation sake. Noah and his kind back then could of been giants compared to us. Maybe the ark was much bigger than we imagined so the 'cubit' of the time could allow to fit all those creatures in the ark. (If we are to believe in this sort of thing,I do of course)

So then what would the point be in writing that the boat was X cubits long, if the value of a cubit was going to be such a mystery?
Why would Moses have recorded completely meaningless values that way?

The measurements were for Noah's benefit - not Moses'
Noah knew how big a cubit was in the time he was measuring and building.
What difference would it make to Moses ? ? ?

Hey cool fact...a nautical mile is 15% longer than a standard mile.
Imagine how many more animals you could fit into an Arc that was 15% bigger?

 

[Lion IRC]

The Deluge fable has dozens of major problems.

Not for me. Not for literalists. Who is troubled by these alleged problems?

...The typical fundagelical believer, simply uses the "its a miracle" card to pretend that those dozens of absurdities are within their God's realm.

Well, no biblical theist I know claims the Flood occurred WITHOUT divine intervention.
So it's gotta be hard (and frustrating) for bible skeptics to try and find defeaters for the 'miracle' trump card.

... I think that the best critique is pointing out the geological history of the earth, whether it is the tree ring continuum, or the age of reefs, or the continuum of ice core samples goes back well beyond any date that these people have for their fairy tale.

How is the Noachian Flood inconsistent with the age of reefs or ice cores? And don't understand how tree rings would be affected. The Flood story doesn't report that all trees died.

 

[Keith&Co.]

So then what would the point be in writing that the boat was X cubits long, if the value of a cubit was going to be such a mystery?
Why would Moses have recorded completely meaningless values that way?

The measurements were for Noah's benefit - not Moses'

Um...who wrote the first five books of the Books, Lion? Traditionally? Including the measurement of the Boat's dimensions?

Noah knew how big a cubit was in the time he was measuring and building.

Yeah, sure.

What difference would it make to Moses ? ? ?

as above...

Hey cool fact...a nautical mile is 15% longer than a standard mile.

Um... You're inventing a nautical cubit? Seriously?

Imagine how many more animals you could fit into an Arc that was 15% bigger?

Fewer, really.
Wooden ships that big would need so much internal support in order to float, there'd be less room for animals or crew.

 

[Lion IRC]

The measurements were for Noah's benefit - not Moses'

Um...who wrote the first five books of the Books, Lion? Traditionally? Including the measurement of the Boat's dimensions?

God did.
Moses didn't make that story up. Moses wasn't guessing how many cubits long or wide. Neither was he in any position to argue.

...Noah knew how big a cubit was in the time he was measuring and building.

Yeah, sure.

Indeed. And that was Learner's point.

...
What difference would it make to Moses ? ? ?

as above...

I'm not sure what the measurements have to do with Moses.
Why would he care?

...Hey cool fact...a nautical mile is 15% longer than a standard mile.

Um... You're inventing a nautical cubit? Seriously?

Wut?
No. I'm pointing out that the word 'cubit' like the word 'mile' cannot be assumed to be an empirical, unchanging measurement. If a cubit in Noah's time was 15% different to some other nominal cubit then obviously that would be an interesting factor.

...
Imagine how many more animals you could fit into an Arc that was 15% bigger?

Fewer, really.
Wooden ships that big would need so much internal support in order to float, there'd be less room for animals or crew.

Floatation is a matter of buoyancy (displacement of water/volume) not internal structural support.
Plus, last time I checked, wood floats.

 

[Keith&Co.]

Um...who wrote the first five books of the Books, Lion? Traditionally? Including the measurement of the Boat's dimensions?

God did.
Moses didn't make that story up. Moses wasn't guessing how many cubits long or wide. Neither was he in any position to argue.

Ah.
Fine, if you want to play that way.
Then why did God dictate a measurement to Moses if we're unable to accurately use such information?

...
What difference would it make to Moses ? ? ?

as above...

I'm not sure what the measurements have to do with Moses.
Why would he care?

Sorry, guess it's over your head.

...Hey cool fact...a nautical mile is 15% longer than a standard mile.

Um... You're inventing a nautical cubit? Seriously?

Wut?
No. I'm pointing out that the word 'cubit' like the word 'mile' cannot be assumed to be an empirical, unchanging measurement. If a cubit in Noah's time was 15% different to some other nominal cubit then obviously that would be an interesting factor.

But one that's pure invention on your, or anyone else's part. Some apologists have tried to say that Moses, being raised in the Royal Court, used the Egyptian cubit when he wrote The Books, which was slightly bigger than the Hebrew cubit. Thus they can sneak an increase in the size of the ark into the narrative, though it's entirely unsupported by the narrative.
But that's still just people making shit up when they're trying to pretend the stories are historical.

...
Imagine how many more animals you could fit into an Arc that was 15% bigger?

Fewer, really.
Wooden ships that big would need so much internal support in order to float, there'd be less room for animals or crew.

Floatation is a matter of buoyancy (displacement of water/volume) not internal structural support.
Plus, last time I checked, wood floats.

But the structural integrity of the ark would be an important point, nu? It's not presented as a raft, but as a three-story barge. A wooden ship that big would not be terribly seaworthy. It would break apart. The gopher wood flotsam would float, but no longer as An Ark.