Searching for Noah's Flood in the Black Sea

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Tolls
"...which were found on a stone older than the Bible almost verbatim."

Ooh...you got anything on that?
A reference of some sort...I'm interested in all this stuff.

Let me see if I can find a source on the web, it's been a while.

[Traianvs]

Originally posted by Sikander
Jack has it right, the Bible has a lot of stuff ripped right from the Babylonians. This incudes the flood myth as well as a lot of those hfksdjfhdsjk begat sladkjsalkjd things, which were found on a stone older than the Bible almost verbatim.

The U.S. military is one institution that uses metric measurements regularly. Stupidity isn't the answer as to why we don't use the metric system generally, IMO it's merely laziness + critical mass.

You're right, many myths and stories have similar symbolism or the same message where it doesn't really matter what religion it is written for.
The famous story wherein Mozes was thrown in a stream when he was still a baby has about 80 other versions... going back to Sargon, which was a very important and mighty leader of Akkad more than 4000 years ago... Same thing with the flood. It's not necessarily so that every civilization has suffered from a flood... Civs take over myths and stories from eachother all the time. But seeing the myth is known worldwide means it will probably have happened though

[Tolls]

"But seeing the myth is known worldwide means it will probably have happened though."

But seeing as the myth isn't world wide....there are myths involving floods all over the world, but they are most definitely not the same myth.

[Boris Godunov]

Re: Searching for Noah's Flood in the Black Sea

Originally posted by Gatekeeper
If these scientists really do uncover drowned settlements hundreds of feet beneath the waters of the Black Sea, it will really upset the established historical record, IMO.

How so? We've known for sometime that there was a huge flood in the area of the Black Sea c. 9,000 BC. The fact that there are ancient settlements doesn't change any history--such ancient settlements were all over the ME at the time. Whether or not the flood was a sudden catastrophe or gradual is interesting, but it will hardly change the historical record significantly.

[Lung]

I love it how creationists are salivating at this prospect, as though somehow the flood at the heart of the Noah myth will prove the myth, hence the ark, hence the bible, hence god

And they dare criticise scientists of using circular reasoning!

In any case, lies usually are originally based in truth. The happenstance of a flood proves nothing more than that there was... a flood

[Giancarlo]

I don´t see how this proves anything, lung. The creationists are going up the wrong tree. They already know they are wrong. The world isn´t 6,000 years old.. they are trying so hard to prove it.. lol... there is solid evidence to disprove their reasoning.

And as you said, there probably was a flood... but that is all it was. There are floods all the time. It is called climate, not some supernatural force called god...

[Gatekeeper]

Re: Re: Searching for Noah's Flood in the Black Sea

Originally posted by Boris Godunov
How so? We've known for sometime that there was a huge flood in the area of the Black Sea c. 9,000 BC. The fact that there are ancient settlements doesn't change any history--such ancient settlements were all over the ME at the time. Whether or not the flood was a sudden catastrophe or gradual is interesting, but it will hardly change the historical record significantly.

Actually, it was quite controversial to even suggest — until the last few years, anyway — that the seabed of the Black Sea might contain the remnants of indunated home, villages and whatnot.

Furthermore, it's fascinating that what they suspect they're finding is often *hundreds* of feet beneath the waters of the Black Sea. This isn't some podunk settlement washed out beneath 30 feet of water 2000 years ago. This could be settlements — advanced settlements, given the timeframe — that were wiped out between 7,000 and 9,000 years ago by a rapidly-rising sea. Who knows? Maybe these lost civilizations were the true source of the Atlantis myth, hmm? Perhaps Noah's Flood and Atlantis are entertwined, and now we're just beginning to uncover this commonality.

Gatekeeper

[Gatekeeper]

Originally posted by Lung
I love it how creationists are salivating at this prospect, as though somehow the flood at the heart of the Noah myth will prove the myth, hence the ark, hence the bible, hence god

And they dare criticise scientists of using circular reasoning!

In any case, lies usually are originally based in truth. The happenstance of a flood proves nothing more than that there was... a flood

Insofar as I can tell, Lung, there's not a single creationist quoted in the article I posted. It's all about scientists who are using ancient source material to see if there's anything to events such as the Great Flood other than mythology or legend.

I am certainly not a creationist, nor a Bible-thumping religious person. But that doesn't mean you simply disregard everything that's written in these ancient tomes. They're often decent *starting* points for serious archaeological exploration (although that has been abused in the past by, ahem, religous-minded "researchers").

Ballard, et al., are hardly ones to go after something like this on a whim. It's a serious effort to ascertain if the Black Sea is hiding ancient secrets about our common past. Hell, if they find anything, they'll start looking all over the Med next (recently, an ancient Egyptian city ... Alexandria, I think ... was found offshore, sunken beneath water). And off the coast of Cuba, there's supposed to be a mysterious alleged city sitting on the sea bottom.

Gatekeeper

[Chemical Ollie]

Homo Sapiens has been around for 100.000 years and had settlements in Europe for a good part of it. This means we must have walked through Middle East to get here, which mean there must have been settlements all over the place. The people 10.000 years ago had the same brain and intelligence as us (but not the same collected knowledge), which means they were just like us in many ways. I assume they had a lot of skills we lack today because we don't need it, skills that are long forgotten.

I think it is a very amazing thought that pre-historic people that we know very little about were as smart and social as us. I wonder how much of their traces that has been destroyed by the ice and how much left there is to learn from hidden caves and excavations. Perhaps I should start to read some Jean M Auel?

[St Leo]

Olaf, settlements usually require agriculture. I might be on crack here, but I think that only goes back 15 kiloyears at most and that's not a good part of 100 kiloyears.

[Chemical Ollie]

Originally posted by St Leo
Olaf, settlements usually require agriculture. I might be on crack here, but I think that only goes back 15 kiloyears at most and that's not a good part of 100 kiloyears.

Did I say that? I said Homo Sapiens have been around for 100 ky, not agriculture. But you can have a rough settlement without agriculture, can't you? A base from were you hunt, then when the area is low on game you move on to another.

[Lord Merciless]

Originally posted by Olaf HÃ¥rfagre
I think it is a very amazing thought that pre-historic people that we know very little about were as smart and social as us.

Smart and ignorant. Without knowledge, you are still a moron regardless how well your brain is built.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Sikander
Jack has it right, the Bible has a lot of stuff ripped right from the Babylonians.

Including their God.

[chequita guevara]

Re: Re: Re: Searching for Noah's Flood in the Black Sea

Originally posted by Gatekeeper
Actually, it was quite controversial to even suggest — until the last few years, anyway — that the seabed of the Black Sea might contain the remnants of indunated home, villages and whatnot.

There's no maybe about it. Last year they had on PBS Ballad's expidition to the Black sea in which they discovered a pre-flood settlement. They were weirdly upset, because that's not what they were looking for, and the importance of their discovery couldn't be ignored. They were actually trying to find ancient ships (they found a 1500 year old ship on the last day).

[Chemical Ollie]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless

Smart and ignorant. Without knowledge, you are still a moron regardless how well your brain is built.

Yeah, at least we know much more about them than they knew about us.

But we don't know all the things that filled their clever minds instead of the things we know today. Accurate astronomy without technology, philosophy, herbal medicine, Greek fire (a later invention, I know, but still lost), etc.

A little off topic - Excavations may also lead to very wrong conclusions. Anyone excavating a Christian church in the far future may come to the conclusion that Christians practiced human sacrifice, because we were so obsessed by people hanging at a cross.