Refractory |
Noah's Ark?Noah's God: King of Inefficiency According to Judeo-Christian bible lore, god created THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE AND EVERYTHING IN IT in a mere six days (which Evangelical Christians believe to be six literal 24-hour days) by a mere act of his will. (For those who believe that those "days" might have been a different unit of measure, perhaps millions of years, my argument still applies, as the issue is one of relativity.) Again, just to be clear about this, we're talking about every speck of matter, living and inanimate, not just on this planet but also on all of the planets and stars in the entire universe. (we'll forget that new stars and planets are still forming today, because that just points to evolution still happening today) This is completely and thoroughly incomprehensible, but suffice it to say that it would have been one amazing feat. Accepting the incomprehensible enormity and complexity of the act (to the extent that a mere mortal can comprehend it) is essential to understanding the silliness of the Noah's Ark fairy tale. Okay, for sake of the argument, let's assume that the story is true and correct and that god did create everything in the entire universe in a mere 144 hours. Without recounting why his once perfect creation went bad (why is not relevant), god decided to wipe the slate clean and try again. Well, apparently, not the entire slate. He certainly didn't need to recreate the entire universe. That would have just been silly and far too inefficient for such an all-powerful and all-knowing being. I mean, even I wouldn't have done that, and I can't imagine that you would have either. He didn't even need to recreate the entire planet. That, too, would have been enormously inefficient and total overkill. All he had to do was, essentially, just get rid of all the people inhabiting the earth (just his human creations, except for Noah and his family) and replace them via procreation on their own accord. Again, why is completely irrelevant. The decision was made, and the rest was a matter of executing the plan. This was nothing more than a single act of mass-genocide. Everything else was to remain intact--albeit a bit soggy for a short while. There was no need to recreate the trees and the flowers, the mountains and the valleys, the rivers and the oceans (of course) and everything else on land and in the sea. I can't imagine what the world population was at that time, but even if it were a million people (which I can assure you it wasn't), it would have been a piece of cake for such an all-powerful being to eradicate all of them with a single wink of his eye. Remember, he created everything in the entire universe in only 144 hours. Getting rid of such a trifling speck of his creation could have and should been another simple act of his almighty will. But instead, when all he wanted to do was get rid of just the people on this teeny tiny planet in the vastness of all that he created, he certainly took his time and resorted to illogical crudity for such a relatively simple task--which makes absolutely NO SENSE for an omnipotent being. The tale of Noah and the ark was not a test of faith--such as that laid upon the narrow shoulders of Noah's biblical brethren, Lot. There's not one shred of biblical evidence that states or even suggests that the building of the ark, or anything that followed, was a test of faith for Noah and his family. And even if it was a test of faith, the entire story still doesn't hold water (no pun intended) because pieces of the story are logically in conflict with such a test. According to bible lore, Noah lived to be about 900 years old. He was born around 1056 (or 2894 BC), and the flood took place sometime in 1656 (or 2294 BC), which by computation was in the 600th year of Noah's life. (Damn. I hope he had a great medical plan.) And, just as shockingly, Noah and his family took 120 years to build the ark! Are you beginning to see the glaring inefficiency of his god's plan? On the grand scale of common sense, logic, and good judgment, the almighty couldn't have been any more off his mark. It would have made much more sense for this all-powerful being to just snap his fingers and make all of the people just go bye-bye, and then let Noah and his family start their little incestuous love-fest. And even if god were to go with the ridiculous ark idea, he could have just created the ark for Noah (I mean, that would have been nothing for the big guy) and then go from there with the 40-day and 40-night drowning party. I find it interesting that while god launched a plan that was so unreasonably and unnecessarily long with regard to building the ark, he decided to introduce—seemingly out of nowhere--just a smidgen of efficiency by bringing all of the animals to the ark and saving Noah the effort of having to trek across all of the continents and collect two of every kind. Of course, the same sudden and inconsistent act of efficiency was seen when the floods subsided. Apparently, god took care of getting all of the animals back to their respective continents and ensured that they (and several generations of their offspring) survived long enough to repopulate the entire animal kingdom. Of course, this would be thoroughly consistent with the almighty's duality of efficiency and proves that the building of the ark and all that followed wasn't a test of Noah's faith. Since we're on this topic, I wonder what all those lions and tigers and bears ate while all of their natural prey were re-populating? Remember, only two of each kind survived the flood, and the earth is a pretty big place you know. How could only one pair reproduce fast enough to not only repopulate the earth, but also to feed their predators? Did all of the carnivores turn vegan for all those years? Perhaps god turbo-charged their physiology so as to accelerate their procreation capabilities! On another semi-related long-debated note, if everyone but Noah's family was killed during the flood, how did we get all of the current races of people inhabiting the planet today? It's not like all of these races evolved from Noah's family gene pool, right? Look, if you kept breeding Chihuahuas with Chihuahuas, you'd still get Chihuahuas--not Great Danes. If you kept breeding Noah's family, you'd get people who look like Noah's family--not Ho Chi Minh's family. Likewise, if you cross bred a Chihuahua with Great Dane, you'd get a unique mix of genetics no different than if an Asian person and a black person had a child together. The Ibizan and Pharaoh hound breeds have remained the same for 5000 years, just as our five basic human races have. All human variations are a direct result of interracial breeding. Many Christian apologists argue that what appear to be multiple human races is really just one, and that all of our variations come from 5000 years of exposure to the sun! They argue that race is based on depth of skin colour: darkest at the equator, getting lighter as you move away (north or south), and then getting dark again as you get to the areas of "midnight sun." Yes, it's quite clear from all of the faces and body types around the world that everyone is indeed a direct descendant of Noah and his family! Okay, let's get back to god's abortively bad time and resource management skills. Noah took 120 years to build the ark, plus there was all the time that god needed to bring the animals to the ark (the time frame of this particular part of the project appears to be unknown), plus another 40 days and 40 nights for the flood, and then another unknown period of time to get all of the animals back to their respective continents. Even if these two unknown periods of time were instantaneous (unlikely, as that would be so thoroughly insane considering the crudity of the rest of the project), the entire event would have taken at least 120 years and about six weeks. Of course, remember that so many of the people that god wanted to eradicate by the flood probably died during the long 120 years that Noah and his family took to build the ark. In fact, I'm sure that many were born and died before the project was completed. Ultimately, the act was wholly inefficient and thoroughly inconsistent with the knowledge, power and perfection of this allegedly Supreme Being even without his precedent six-day creation feat. But for sake of the argument, even if god had a sound reason for placing the burden upon man, this story is still marred with an abortively crazy mix of efficient and inefficient acts. If no sane, prudent, fallible human would conduct business in this manner, then neither would his all-powerful, all-knowing creator. |