http://debunkingchristianity.blogspot.com/2006/12/was-jesus-born-in-bethlehem.html

But that’s a clear fulfillment of an Old Testament prophecy. Since Matthew and Luke have completely different lead-ups to the birth, and then different follow-ups, doesn’t it make more sense to conclude that this is a midrashic retelling of the OT passage rather than a real event? Or by “facets of literature” do you mean modern literature, and we should ignore the techniques of ancient writers?

Was the water surrounding the earth salt water or fresh water? The answer will limit the ability of the survival of both amphibians and fresh water fish species, with very narrow tolerances to salinity.

When you release the animals from the ark how do you stop the lions eating the single “kind” of antelope and ruining the whole plan, repeat ad infinitum. Or do you just get them to eat the lovely damp grass.

The 4000 years that have passed since the ark is not enough time to turn the single “kind” in several species. The massive amount of dog sub species has only been created by human breeding programmes. Artificial selection was used to make already useful dogs even more useful.

I believe in evolution but if you believe in the “kind’s separate into species” idea you believe in more evolution than I do. For example if Noah took only one species of possum there is not enough time for the on “kind” of possum to split into all the kinds found today (fully 60-65 species) far to much adaptation to be explained away!

Im not actually too sure what a kind is, and I’ve looked into it! Some would assume it fits the level of Genus in the Linnaean taxonomic system others feel it resembles the Family or maybe even Order level. I tend to believe it is deliberately ambiguous in order to make my job of calling creationists to account over their figures harder. Please someone finally give me an answer what does it mean. There are 7 basic levels and several sublevels, choose one and stick to it.

Where did the water come from and go to? If it came from a canopy surrounding the earth (Kent Hovind theory) how did all the animals adapt to the change in pressure that removal of the canopy would cause. Secondly there is no peer-reviewed evidence for a canopy of water (in any form) surrounding the earth. Not in quantities enough to flood the earth deeper than Everest.

If the water came from the “fountains of the deep” (underground caverns filled with water) what filled those caverns? Magma? The resulting tectonic activity would be very dangerous and unpredictable. I do not care to think what would happen.

If the water did appear the tidal activity would destroy many plant species, as would the aforementioned salinity which would destroy many tree species. European mainland oak and beech species which I have studies are not tolerant of salt at all, as they live in areas of moving ground water i.e. steep slopes etc…

In addition, coral species require light from the sun. If the water gets too deep it damages the coral as sunlight can only permeate to certain depths. Some scientists believe that a rise in water levels of a few feet could damage corals. Not to mention the effects of increased pressure on fixed bottom species of soft bodied corals and sponges and the species that live amongst them.

Dendrochronology shows no evidence of a global flood. All wood rings of 4000 years old would show the dateline for the flood and subsequent datelines of abnormal growth worldwide. There is no such consensus among ancient tree and wood samples.

To all Christians,

There is plenty of evidence of local flooding in the bible lands. The bible was written by humans and that area is the whole world to them (they didn’t know about Madagascar which holds a full 5% of all species on earth of any of Australasia or Asia, America) our understanding of the world does not fit with theirs, it is much grander. Believe in the bible as a literal tale if you wish but many Christians believe that the local flood is more probable. Personally I think the idea of a man saving his family livestock and other belonging from a local flood is more credible. It’s better to have a belief that opens the doors to your religion to others and doesn’t shut them out if they question the validity of the documents. Your insistence for belief in archaic myth is barring the church to rational thinkers and can make people (quite rightly) question their own belief.

The above comments are hurried, I would love to talk about this more and given time I could produce a detailed destruction of the myth and the “evidence” gathered by Kent Hovind, Ted haggard, Ken Ham et al. I hope this has satisfies the anonymous who quite rightly wants us to engage in intelligent conversation.

Still, this was fun to watch.

Here’s one debunking of the show:

http://www.biblearchaeology.org/post/2006/09/debunking-the-exodus-decoded.aspx

Here’s another (lengthy and thorough) one:

http://www.heardworld.com/higgaion/?cat=86

I’m sure there is some truth in some of the stories. But a good majority of it is just fiction. And that’s fine — no big deal. But the problem is people actually think it is literally true and believe crazy things because of it.

I think it does all atheists a disservice to say the Bible is a wrong. It has some historical context. The TV show I mentioned explains even the death of the first born scientifically and anthropologically.

It seems we are told by evangelicals that God opened up the sky and Handed the Bible to one of their members. Though there is disagreement about the First Council of Nicaea (325AD), It is where the New Testament originates and re written by monks through the Dark Ages and rewritten agian by King James to solidify his power over the illiterate by giving the King authority through God.

TheOtherOne is spot on, you have just deliberately changed (or completely misunderstood) the meaning of the word ‘literal’.

To everyone other than ‘most educated evangelicals’ the word ‘literal’ means ‘without interpretation or embellishment’. You seem to be confusing ‘literal’ with ‘literary’ which is a completely different concept meaning ‘of or relating to literature’.

The Bible is certainly ‘literary’ but if you think that this means that it is ‘literal’ then you need to consult a dictionary. If being ‘literary’ made something ‘literal’ then all works of fiction would be factually correct, do you really think that ‘Lord of The Rings’ and ‘Peter Pan’ are literally true?