pineappleupsidedown -
'Then the LORD said, "My Spirit will not contend with man forever, for he is mortal; his days will be a hundred and
tewnty years."' (Genesis 6:3)
Another way to read that is that God gave the world another 120 years before his judgement was passed and the world cleansed. Seems to make more sense
anyway since man's life span wasn't immediately limited to this number (it took some centuries), and since 120 doesn't quite agree with the
majority of lifespans seen today.
ME -
'And the LORD God said, "The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand
and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.' (Genesis 3:22)
Since humanity was forbiden to eat from the tree of life after their fall, any effects of longevity it had would have had to have been residual and
passed through Adam and Eve. Which doesn't really fit the way man's life span remained more or less constant for about 1,500 years and suddenly
began to decrese conveniently coinciding with the flood.
marg6043 - I know plenty vegeterians and a few vegans. No tremendous life expectancies here. Actually, if a vegan diet is not looked after
properly, a deficit of certain nutrients can go as far as cause brain damage. Kind of the opposite effect huh?
(Of course pree flood vegetation
could have been far more nutritions than what we have now.)
Kata - The gradual DNA degradation idea doesn't explain why life spans did not change for over a millennium and then suddenly fell. So I guess
that's not it :-/
Jamuhn - Animals store energy in higher concentrations than do plants. On the down side animals can't obtain that energy directly from the
sun.
Btw, the Bible nowhere states that Noah built the Ark in 7 days.
lostinspace - H202 is a bleaching agent. Highly oxidising, pretty nasty stuff as far as the body's structures are concerned... especially
DNA.
GriBiT - Junk DNA is a myth that was widely accepted for a long time... I don't really know why, I guess when scientists don't know how
something works they like to think it's because it has no function. So pride might be the reason. There has been much research in the last few years
showing "junk" DNA is not junk at all. In the words of one scientist, Junk DNA is much like an operating system that runs everything. Makes sense,
Coding DNA codes for protein... proteins are like the bricks (and mortar) of a house, but bricks aren't going to arrange themselves into a mansion
are they?
To answer the question of where the Bible implies water above the atmosphere:
'And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water. So God made the expanse and separated the water under
the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning - the second day."
(Genesis 1:6-8)
---
Ok, now that all this business is covered, let me mention a theory by some guy I have on video tapes stashed away somewhere. Forget the guys name but
he has an institute/museum in USA somewhere so I'm sure he wouldn't be too hard to find.
The idea goes like this. The waters above the atmosphere were (as already mentioned by someone) compressed liquid hydrogen. I guess when Moses wrote
Genesis, hydrogen was not a familiar substance which justifies it being reference as water (the word "hydrogen" means "water maker" anyway, so I
guess even the modern word isn't that different.)
Highly compressed hydrogen posesses metalic properties, which fits with one of the Hebrew words used in Genesis 1 to desribe the sky in the same way
as thin sheet metal is pounded onto wood (for example see the construction of the Ark of Covenant.)
The following text is also of interest:
'can you join him in spreading out the skies, hard as a mirror of cast bronze?' (Job 37:18) - Though
this is more likely a poetic reference to great relentless heat, as it is used int Deuteronomy 28:23.
Anyway, this seethrough hydrogen would have the effect of pressing down on the atmospheric gasses hence increasing atmospheric pressure. According to
this guy, the preeflood atmosphere had a pressure of 2 Atm. Which is also his reason why the dinosaurs died out after the flood, because they were so
massive that it wouldn't have been possible for their lungs to supply enough oxygen to their bodies. Of course smaller dinosaurs died out too so I
guess other environmental changes would have been the cause for their extinction. However the reference in Job 40 to a dinosaur like creature would
indicate they did survived for a little while after the flood.
Apparently increased atmospheric pressure is great for organisms. An example was quoted of some deep see divers, diving in a submarine for many days
at a time to perform scientific research. During such dives, the pressure inside the cabin is also often raised for technical reasons. During one such
dive one of the divers cut his hand open rather nastilly, control was radioed and informed of the situation... however the diver decided that despite
how seriou it looked, it didn't really hurt much so that they would continue their task (ascent takes in such dives can take a while). Interestingly
enough the cut had almost completely healed only several days later.
Such examples are used to indicate we really were meant to operate under 2 atmospheres of pressure and not 1. Not only do wounds heal very well under
such conditions, but the blood plasma is saturated with oxygen allowing one to run great distances non-stop (no build up of lactic acid due to ample
supply of oxygen to muscles), and even the brain works better because of the better oxygen supply.
Now, the other benefit of the liquid hydrogen is what you're after here. His explanation for the longevity. Just like optical fibre or even several
metres of ordinary water, the liquid hydrogen is meant to have blocked out UV and other highly energetic radiation coming from the sun. These rays
create free radicals (highly energised molecules) both in the atmosphere, whence we breathe them in, and also in our very bodies when the UV rays hit
our skin (melanin in the skin has the purpose of mopping up the free radicals). Free radicals have a highly destructive nature, and things get
particularly nasty when it comes to DNA because they can introduce errors and mistakes into DNA. This is why too much UV can give you cancer... it
degrades DNA in certain cells causing them to start multiplying uncotrollably.
So, no free radicals means there's nothing to screw around with our internals and we get to live a lot longer than we would otherwise. Hence the
lifespans of 900 odd years before the flood. Apparently tomatoes grown under such conditions (double atmospheric pressure, sligh increase in CO2
levels, and elimination of all radiation and the free radicals created thence) have managed tremendous sizes and don't die after the usual 5 months
they normally would die after in the open. Indeed, the tomatoe exposed to these conditions attained the size of a small tree!
Hence we also have an explanation as to why everything grew a lot bigger before the flood (the fossile record attests to this).
Other examples I can remember quoted to support this guys theory included archeological finds of iron implements containing Iron (I) Oxide, a compound
that can not be created in our atmosphere, but can in his theoretical antediluvian atmosphere.
There is also meant to be a valley in the Andes somewhere which experiences total cloud coverage 100% of the time. The water vapour in the clouds also
filters out some UV rays, and interestingly enough, the people that live in said valley can comfortably achieve life spans in excess of 150 years.
Anyway, what happened during the flood? The events were to proceede as follows.
First, let's set up the initial conditions. The earth had natural heating from well tuned radioactive rocks deep below the earth, which heated the
waters that were found below the ground (this apparently also gave plants a comfortable environment due to warm water washing their roots). Presumably
this would have been linked to the periodic mists which watered the earth.
As per the following:
'And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.'
(Genesis 1:9), before the flood there was only one continent (think Pangea).
So what happened next? The order of events stated in the Bible is used as a clue:
'on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and
the floodgates of the heavens were opened.' (Genesis 7:11)
Now God reportedly upset the balance in this nuclear cetral heating we had below the ground. This caused great pressure to build up in the
subterranean waters untill suddenly things burst. The pressure was immense, and its release spectacular. Jets of water (we're talking immense speeds
here) burst kilometres into the sky. The earth's crust was shattered (whence we get todays tectonic plates), think egg in microwave here. These jest
were powerful enough to puncture through the hydrogen canopy above causing them to begin to desintegrate, combine with oxygen to form water, and begin
to fall to the ground as rain.
Now after the flood, there was still a layer of water mist left above the atmosphere which continued to provide protection from UV radiation, this
desintegrated over time. Likewise the air pressure did not insantly half, but instead the gasses no longer bound by the hydrogen, began to drift into
space until a new equilibrium was formed. And so we have an explanation as to why life span after the flood did not fall instantly, but instead
suffered exponential decay over time.
That basically sums it all up. Hard to say how much of that is factual, but if nothing else, there are some interesting ideas in that theory, and it
seems to cover not just individual aspects of what might have happened, but tries to address the overall picture (and does so with some success).
[edit on 6-6-2004 by hetman]
