I meant to mention that too, Ammonite, but ran out of space.

You addressed Saltpetre as follows:

>>Your comments that people become atheists "so as not to be bound to do the right thing, as long as one stays within man's law (or at least not get caught)", is one of the silliest and spurious of claims.<<

Very true.

But the sentence that caught my eye was this one:

>>The "not being caught" limitation on personal freedoms has of course not worked all that well - else we probably wouldn't have GFC's or Storm Financial's etc.<<

The strong suggestion from Saltpetre appears to be that these events were caused by atheists.

It makes a change from the usual claims - atheists kill more people than Christians ever have etc. - but is equally spurious.

Pericles

How does Saltpetre 'know' if s/he is dealing with an atheist, if they continue to behave like decent human beings? Must be a scary thought - there are atheists in SP's life s/he doesn't even know about.

Saltpetre

Do you assume that all the kindly compassionate decent folk you encounter in your daily life are Christians?

And, as Pericles has noted, that bad things like the GFC are only caused by non-religious?

I guess this is the time we ask for some evidence of such claims.

Saltpetre has divined that we are one and the same---each the other's sock puppet!....Oh dont stop there:) I just brought my super-sized POP-CORN and Large coke..
Absolutely. I suspect this is the single most compelling reason why some people become "religious". They have, as we all do, a basic incomprehension of the "why" of our existence. Faced with this unsolvable mystery, they choose to go along with the idea that there is some form of father figure looking after them.

Priceless:)

LEA

Poirot,
As AJ has crudely put it, Noah would not have needed to manage millions of species, as only a certain number would have been needed as a representation of each kind on the ark. 

Diversification or speciation can at times be quite rapid. These are processes that are observable (refer back to our defn of science) and in fact have been observed. We also observe that there are limits to diversification. For example, through special breeding programs over many decades farmers have managed to significantly increase the sugar content of certain crops, yet that sugar level eventually plateaus out at an upper limit, once all the sugar producing genes have been selected.

Not knowing the exact boundaries for a biblical 'kind' is not a sin. Knowing everything is the domain of God. Not knowing something gives reason for further research, which is healthy. (A biblical 'kind' often equates roughly in taxonomy to something near a genus or family level.)    

Ammonite,
The diversification of fish into salt and fresh water varieties can be explained by the processes of adaptation, especially in the new ecological niches and environments created by the post flood conditions. Yet as I said above, there are limits. We don't observe fish rearranging their essential structures. Fish remain fish, etc.

Where did the water go? Into the oceans (note the very deep ocean trenches, which probably opened up relating to the seismic activity of the flood, see Gen. 7:11, 'the underground waters erupted.') 

Olive trees I've heard are pretty hardy, and could possibly have sprouted from a cutting from drift debris without miraculous intervention after the Flood.

Dug,
Sorry for my insensitive comment. I was trying to give you a compliment. I noticed, even before you said anything about your background, that you have a definite clarity of thought, which i found appealing.  

What you said about trilobites does make sense. For even if most were killed in the flood, we might expect the numbers to recover from the small number that remained. 

A key phrase is found in what you said, 'There are a few theories going around.' Indeed there always are. You've put forward the idea of increased salinity of the sea. It's likely that post flood conditions for the earth became significantly different to preflood conditions, including increased salinity over time. Other changed conditions (desertification and deforestation) may explain the disappearance of the larger animals that you were asking about.

Why have creationists gone quiet? Maybe the're happy sitting back watching atheists discuss a 'fable' in such detail; at least half a dozen atheists willing to be sidetracked from a discussion about school education to defend their version of truth against a 'fable'.        

We could debate the ark much more, if we wanted. But others elsewhere have gone into far more detail than we ever will here. I just wanted to say that Christians are more than willing to explain and defend our beliefs. Not that we can ever prove our faith through science, but we can uphold it as reasonable and rational, and even increasingly so through these modern times. 

"Not that we can ever prove our faith through science, but we can uphold it as reasonable and rational, and even increasingly so through these modern times."

Sorry but you do realize just how ridiculous that comment is ?

The overwhelming weight of evidence, massive collections, thousands of universities and museums, hundreds of thousands of skilled researchers, millions of hours of research have gone in to the theory of evolution and the fossil record.

As yet not one single solitary piece of evidence has been discovered that supports a global flood theory. There just is no evidence of this myth being true yet people cling to it because it is written in an ancient book.

If the creationists here could answer my questions and shoot my hypothesis down in flames, if they could point to good scientific research that backed their theory do you really think they would be silent about it ?

it is not just trilobites it is my other questions and so many others that just make the story you are desperate to believe impossible.

Face the awful truth, the ark myth is just that, a pretty universal flood myth that has grown over time into a cultural memory.

Just for once take the blindfold of religion off and look honestly at the facts of the matter. Please.