Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Elphick, Michael Apr 25, 2005

Dear Amiel,

I did enjoy reading your account of genesis "A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies": - http://www.nctimes.net/~mark/bibl_science/bible-science.htm

I have recently gone thought exactly the same process. I find the early chapters in Genesis fascinating and quite lovely. It's the first time in 45 years that I have read them, thanks to the challenge of a Creation Scientist!

I wonder if you have read the creation story of Haggadah, one of the books that did not make it into the Bible? This is a bible story with some real fun in it! The Epic of Gilgamesh is also worth reading for its similarities to the Noah Flood story.

Why am I writing? It's because your calculations regarding the mass of animals in the Ark are flawed. You take the horse as a representative of all animals, which is quite wrong! I was following the same reasoning - how many animals could you get into the Ark? - when I can across your essay. From internet searches I found that there are 4000-5000 species of mammal, 3,500 of amphibian, 6,500 of reptiles and 10,000 species of bird.

From that, excluding insects, I have calculated an approximate mass not in excess of 5,000 tons (assuming each *mammal* was equivalent to a horse, and there were two of them, male and female). You need to put this right before a Creationist discovers and ridicules it! Actually, the quantity of food required at 5% of body weight per day over a period of a year (90,000 tons), greatly exceeds the mass of animals, so your conclusions are correct.

The Noah story does not mention plants, presumably these were kept on board as seeds, so it's strange that the dove could come back with a freshly plucked olive leaf when the earth had been wiped clean of all living
creatures.

Sincerely yours,

Michael Elphick.

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Rossow, Amiel Apr 25, 2005

Dear Michael:

Thanks for your message. Regarding the total mass of all animals supposedly taken by Noah into the Ark, I think only a rough estimate is possible. Indeed, new species are being discovered day in and day out, so the total number of species is not really known. I don't know how exactly you got your number of about 5,000 ton, so I can't discuss this number. Likewise I don't know why you have discarded insects (there are millions of species, so, despite most of them being small, their total mass should have been substantial). As to the possible derision from creos, I am
sure they will honor me with such anyway, regardless of what my arguments can be (or, more probably, they will continue ignoring my posts). I assumed the average mass of an animal being that of a horse simply because a horse seems to have a mass somewhere near the mean value (the maximum mass being that of a whale and the minimum, say, that of a tiny worm). It seems to be a reasonable assumption insofar as the rough estimate is the goal. Even if my estimate is changed ten times either way, the conclusion still will be the same - the utter implausibility of the biblical story. Your comment about the amount of food in the Ark sounds reasonable, And, again, remember that we discuss only a rough estimate. I am familiar both with the Hagadah and with the Gilgamesh story.

Best wishes,

AR.

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Elphick, Michael Apr 25, 2005

Hello Amiel,

Thanks for your reply.

>Subject: RE: Noah's Ark

... Regarding the total mass of all animals supposedly taken by Noah into the Ark, I think only a rough estimate is possible.

Of course.

... Likewise I don't know why you have discarded insects (there are millions of species..

The mass of other animals and their food exceeded the buoyancy of the Ark, so I didn't bother including them.

... I assumed the average mass of an animal being that of a horse simply because a horse seems to have a mass somewhere near the mean value (the maximum mass being that of a whale and the minimum, say, that of a tiny
worm).

That is your mistake. There is a (roughly linear) relationship between body mass and number of species (3 species of elephant --> millions of insects), so it is incorrect to take the mean value.

Best wishes,

Michael Elphick.

P.S. No objections to this being posted elsewhere. M.

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Rossow, Amiel Apr 25, 2005

Hi, Mike:

Thanks for taking time to reply. I have never been a biologist (and never petended to be one) and had no idea of the distribuition of
animals' body mass you described. Oddly, first you wrote that it is (roughly) a linear dependence, but now you say it is "a quarter-square power law." I must admit that I don't understand your expression. What do you
mean by a "quarter-square power"? Please keep in mind that you owe me no reply and I feel uncomfortable taking your time, so if you will pass this messasge without a reply, I'll understand.

Cheers,

AR

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Elphick, Michael Apr 25, 2005

Hi Amiel,

I too have searched the internet and the "quarter-square power" relationship I found was in some internet college biology notes.
Unfortunately I'm not on that computer anymore, so can't give you the reference, but I'm now back on the original one and can give you this link: http://faculty.plattsburgh.edu/thomas.wolosz/howmanysp.htm.

When I stated that there was an approximate linear relationship, I was wrong. You can see on this site that they have made a log/log plot, which is a typical biologist's trick to get a straight line out of anything ;-) !!

As Wesley states, biology does not have the precise relationships implied by the "quarter-square power". A similar (and interesting!) relationship exists between body surface area, mass and metabolic rate: http://webusers.xula.edu/cdoumen/CAP/Metabolism3.html.

Wesley has included microorganisms in his grouping of species (no one knows how many species of bacteria there are - anything between one million and half a million) so this would skew the relationship for the very smallest organisms. With regard to Noah's Ark, I was talking specifically about beasts of the field and animals that creepeth along the ground etc. God didn't tell Noah he had to save the microbes!

I think you can see that, whatever the *exact* mathematical relationship might be, there are many more species of smaller animals than larger ones - so my argument stands. A horse is definitely not representative!

Regards to you both,

Michael.

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Noah's Ark Rossow, Amiel Apr 25, 2005

Dear Mike,

I must apologize - my curiosity has led to that exchange of messages - not the first time - and I had no intention to argue against your
horse-related comment. You are probably right in that the mean mass of an animal is somewhere to the left of the horse's mass on the "number of species vs body mass" plot. However, as you said, this can't change the overall conclusion regarding the implausibiliity of the bibliical story if all the food mass is accounted for, etc, so if creos will try to dispute my
conclusion based on the argument you have offered, I'll be able to counter it. None of them ever mentioned my essay since its posting in 1999 and most probably they will not do so in the future. Anyway, thanks for your messages
and best wishes.

AR.

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies

Title Author Date

Power law Elsberry, Wesley R. Apr 25, 2005

There are certainly some general scaling trends in biology concerning size and metabolism that may be described in terms of "power law" or
"power function". But these are not exact relations. Biology is usually a lot messier than people coming from physics or chemistry like to admit.

So far as I know, there is no simple relation between "body size" and "number of species", and certainly not a generally known result with
scaling of the sort stated by your correspondent.

Wesley

Related Articles: A Masterpiece Chockfull of Inconsistencies