Theodore James Turner has been commenting at length on my pieces concerning the Exodus. One could mistake many of his comments for good counter-argumentation – they are long and exclusively quote from someone called Gerard Gertoux, whom he puts a lot of store in. Turner places an awful lot of importance on Gertoux presumably because it confirms his position. The same could be said about us skeptics and the sources we use.
How else can we assess Turner’s competence?
Well, I very quickly ran out of respect for him when he proudly admitted he was a young earth creationist.
Being a YEC is not something to be proud about because it really shows a lack in cognitive functioning. It shows a complete disregard for the proper evaluation of data and the use of rational faculties. In other words, if someone is a YEC, I have good inductive reason to believe that their reasoning in general is not quite as good as they claim.
Here was what Turner had to say:
“It is a refusal to deal with evidence in the face of ideology. Rational evidence and science is trumped by ideology,” is where you should examine your own thinking.
The evidence for a global flood is voluminous and yet you reject it, so I do not wonder about your faculties and ability to properly evaluate data. I know that you never will take the time to look at the other side.
This was quite frankly the funniest thing I have read for a while. And then I read the source he linked.
Now, THAT was funny. I posted my article “Why Normal People Believe Ridiculous Things” which lists a number of things wrong with the global flood claim, to which Turner replied as follows at the end of this piece.
I will say that Turner has a penchant for saying things like: “juvenile list of objections.” I get the feeling that this is a sort of deflection technique to make him feel better about his position and proclaim some kind of Danth’s Law scenario.
I could spend an hour or so completely debunking these rather spurious (an understatement of epic proportions) claims, but I have things to do. I might try to get that done this weekend. In the meantime, have at them readers. You may think my rhetoric hypocritical. That may be, but the reality is this: the claims below and in his links provided are shoddy. They really are shoddy. They are either bare assertions (“This is not contradiction. For the clean animals they were by seven. this is a common way of telling a story as repeat and enlarge.” and this classic: “Obviously, the water did not come from rain alone, the fountains of the great deep were broken up. This was a global catastrophe. The continents would have been broken apart.”) or he provides terrible arguments that don’t work, or worse still, provides a link that doesn’t remotely do what he claims or hopes it does (take the Smithsonian link). See here for a deconstruction of the flood claims: https://ncse.com/cej/4/1/impossible-voyage-noahs-ark.
You only have to look at the building of the ark in Kentucky to see how much effort and machinery is needed – and that wouldn’t remotely float. Whilst Turner’s link deals mainly with displacement, it then concedes:
Even if one could fit all the needed animals on the boat, and if those animals could survive the cramped cruise (the study made no estimates regarding the weight of the food or freshwater needed to sustain the ark population), building a seaworthy vessel is another factor.
A boat sunk to its max in the water while still staying afloat could easily take on water from any breaching waves. And according to Euler-Bernoulli beam theory, the strength of a wooden beam decreases with its size, so because when things get bigger they break more easily, the beams that held this huge ark together might have been extremely fragile. Else the beams were short, which would also introduce structural weaknesses due to the higher number of seams between wood planks.
Does he even read his own links?
Floating is most likely not the problem, at least not for a relatively short period of time. All floating requires is to displace a volume of water that weighs more than the boat. The problem is stability and structural integrity. A broken pile of sticks will float, even if all the ants riding on the sticks are washed overboard and drown. The problem with the ark theory posited by creationists is precisely that it is not seaworthy.
Finally, our farmer-turned-architect had to confront the gravest difficulty of all: in the words of A. M. Robb, there was an “upper limit, in the region of 300 feet, on the length of the wooden ship; beyond such a length the deformation due to the differing distributions of weight and buoyancy became excessive, with consequent difficulty in maintaining the hull watertight” (p. 355). Pollard and Robertson concur, emphasizing that “a wooden ship had great stresses as a structure. The absolute limit of its length was 300 feet, and it was liable to `hogging’ and `sagging’ ” (pp. 13-14). This is the major reason why the naval industry turned to iron and steel in the 1850s. The largest wooden ships ever built were the six-masted schooners, nine of which were launched between 1900 and 1909. These ships were so long that they required diagonal iron strapping for support; they “snaked,” or visibly undulated, as they passed through the waves, they leaked so badly that they had to be pumped constantly, and they were only used on short coastal hauls because they were unsafe in deep water.
John J. Rockwell, the designer of the first of this class, confessed that “six masters were not practical. They were too long for wood construction” (Laing, pp. 393, 403-409). Yet the ark was over 100 feet longer than the longest six-master, the 329 foot U.S.S. Wyoming, and it had to endure the most severe conditions ever encountered while transporting the most critically important cargo ever hauled. Clearly, God had to imbue this amateurishly assembled gopherwood with some very special properties to fit it for the voyage.
So it should be clear by now why “intelligent people” somehow see a “problem” in the building of the ark.
I could go on but you get the point. Turner just takes on the first thing that confirms his position and doesn’t bother to see whether it bears weight (pun intended). His theory sinks for a whole host of reasons.
This was his reply:
What is ridiculous is this juvenile list of objections.
1) Omni-God did it because we were a sinful world. We still are; therefore, it didn’t work.
What existed before the flood was only evil continually. A change did occur. Each dispensation reveals greater light. The old world was destroyed. All these happened as types, for our benefit.
2) The account is a reworking of Tablet XI of the Gilgamesh, written some 1000 years before the Bible. Some verses are verbatim, or close to.
Why would it matter how much before the Bible account the story of Gilgamesh was written. The Bible contains a long oral tradition. This is evidence of the truthfulness of the biblical account.
3) If the deluge destroyed all, why do we have the writings and journals of people before, during and after the deluge?
We do not have writings before the flood.
4) There is internal contradiction from the spliced accounts – 2 of each or 7?
This is not contradiction. For the clean animals they were by seven. this is a common way of telling a story as repeat and enlarge.
5) 8 people looking after the world’s biggest zoo is ridiculous.
Why?
6) The ark is physically bigger than a wooden vessel can be made, apparently by 50%.
This is not so. https://www.smithsonianmag….
Many other studies have been done but I thought you might like this one from the Smithsonian.
7) Clearly the gathering of all the animals is impossible – micro-organisisms, polar bears, penguins, condors, glow-worms (how did they get there?)
Obviously, only the various kinds need to be gathered. Also, they do not need to be full grown. They were not gathered by Noah but were gathered by God.
8) Ark’s reported dimensions would have to be considerably larger to fit the animals.
Only if you have ridiculous ideas about what animals need to be in the ark.
9) Population of 8 could not rebound in the fashion claimed. Simply not possible.
Why? Do you not think the God who created us could have these 8 people repopulate the earth?
10) Rainfall would have to be 6 inches per minute. Again, not possible. A category 5 hurricane gives 6 inches per hour which is impossible to sustain over 40 days.
Obviously, the water did not come from rain alone, the fountains of the great deep were broken up. This was a global catastrophe. The continents would have been broken apart.
11) The weight of the water would have disastrous consequences on the earth’s crust, emitting noxious gases and eruptions, leading to potentially, a boiling sea! In all probability, it would have imploded in some way.
Well. Yes. This is basically what happened. except, the boiling sea part. Do you know how much energy would be required to cause the sea to boil?
It takes 7.786×10^21 kJ to raise the temperature of the oceans by 1C. the means temperature of all ocean water is about 5C. To raise the ocean water to boiling would require about 7.397 x10^23 kJ or about 200 billion TW. This is the amount of sun energy that reaches the earth about every 200 years. It is a great deal of energy.
12) There is no geological evidence for any of this.
Until recently, scientists believed that the geological layers were caused by a worldwide flood. this is still the best explanation. Gradualism positied that these layers were laid down gradually. However, the evidence is that these layers were laid down by the action of water.
13) There are reefs that have been undisturbed in the world for 100,000 years. These would have been crushed and destroyed. They were not.
So goes the theory. However, there are many many assumptions that go into this theory.
14) Lots more evidence of fossil, radiometrics and isotopes etc. mean that the flood clearly never happened.
Again, you are making all kinds of assumptions.
15) How the hell did Noah actually get all the animals on the ark without them trying to eat each other / the family etc?
Really? Tou think this is an objection?
16) Asexual animals and hermaphrodites not accounted for
They are not mentioned. Again is this really an objection?
17) Ventilation / food / faeces problems on ark
This would not be a problem, since we do not know of the exact design. It would have been taken into account by God.
18) Carnivores?
I would think that many o f the animals would have been put into a state of hibernation.
19) DNA pool? no trace of this through DNA analysis (ie we know we came from Africa).
This is actually one of the strongest arguments for the flood.
20) All sea fish would have died from influx of fresh water.
Yes. A great many fish would have died. I would think that God could have preserved varieties of fish.
21) All plants that do not rely on the seeds of Noah to survive would die. There are many plants that reproduce in many ways other than seeds.
yes. i do not see know the needed seeds would not have survived.
22) Explaining it away as a local flood is contradictory to genesis, and would also not kill all the humans who were so evil. Liquids find their own level, and so a local flood of that magnitude and description is physically impossible.
Yes. It also would not explain the geological layers.
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