michaelm@3comvax.UUCP (Michael McNeil) (09/04/85)
> [*Does* the Line Eater God exist?] Unfortunately, I made a mental typo in my recent article on Ted Holden, Velikovsky, and Company. (I'll grant myself the opportunity to make a couple of short additional comments.) Key: > Me > > Ted Holden > [miscellaneous removed text] > > Catastrophe is well accepted as a factor in evolution. It is > also well accepted that large animals, indeed any living thing, > is particularly vulnerable to extinction during a catastrophe. > And a catastrophe *was* occurring at the time these large > animals became extinct -- the catastrophic end of the ice age. > > It may seem odd to talk about the *end* of an ice age as > being a catastrophe, but remember that large areas formerly > well watered (in the American West, for example) became desert. > Much forest land turned to grassland. The ocean level went > down hundreds of feet. It was an *ecological* catastrophe. ^^^^ Of course, I meant that the ocean level went *up* hundreds of feet. This is due to the melting of huge quantities of glacial ice that had formerly occupied vast areas of the continents. > > ... left-over large > > dinosaurs and mega-mammals died when the effect of gravity > > changed after the flood, making the world no longer habitable ... > > And then, when an actual catastrophe is cited, which one > does Ted mention? Not the ice age, which ended a mere > 10,000 years ago, leaving in its wake massive evidence > of its occurrence all over the world -- but the biblical > *flood*! Now, scientists have no more objection to a > catastrophic flood than they do to a catastrophic ice > age. The real question is, *where's the evidence*? The rise in sea levels drowned many coastal areas around the world. Likely, many long-settled human communities were disrupted by this. In the general catastrophe of the end of the ice age there were many floods. Perhaps ancient stories of floods reveal some such. The ocean rise, however, could not have been rapid. It's equally likely the flood stories reflect some localized floods in the Tigris-Euphrates Valley, where the Semites of the Bible originated culturally. As far as the world-enveloping, to the tops of the Himalayas, flood demanded by Bible literalists goes, I say *No*! ---------------- Michael McNeil 3Com Corporation (415) 960-9367 ..!ucbvax!hplabs!oliveb!3comvax!michaelm
pamp@bcsaic.UUCP (pam pincha) (09/06/85)
In article <206@3comvax.UUCP> michaelm@3comvax.UUCP (Michael McNeil) writes: >> >> Catastrophe is well accepted as a factor in evolution. It is >> also well accepted that large animals, indeed any living thing, >> is particularly vulnerable to extinction during a catastrophe. >> And a catastrophe *was* occurring at the time these large >> animals became extinct -- the catastrophic end of the ice age. >> >> It may seem odd to talk about the *end* of an ice age as >> being a catastrophe, but remember that large areas formerly >> well watered (in the American West, for example) became desert. >> Much forest land turned to grassland. The ocean level went >> down hundreds of feet. It was an *ecological* catastrophe. > ^^^^ >Of course, I meant that the ocean level went *up* hundreds of >feet. This is due to the melting of huge quantities of glacial >ice that had formerly occupied vast areas of the continents. > >> > ... left-over large >> > dinosaurs NOTICE TO ALL THOSE WHO HAVEN'T HEAR -DINOSAURS WERE LONG DEAD BY THE TIME THE RECENT ICE AGES *BEGAN* LET ALONE BY THE TIME THEY ENDED 10000 YEARS OR SO AGO!!!!!!!!!! (Sorry, slight flame. It's such a persistent myth that dinosaurs and mammoths and such were coexistent that it is irritating. There's 65 millions years between the groups (if you would like to believe us geologists -- if not please explain why the rocks show NO coexistnce of the to groups, or why the dinosaur fossils are always found in older rock formations?) Please remember this in the future. Thank-you.) >> >and mega-mammals died when the effect of gravity >> > changed after the flood, making the world no longer habitable ... >> >> And then, when an actual catastrophe is cited, which one >> does Ted mention? Not the ice age, which ended a mere >> 10,000 years ago, leaving in its wake massive evidence >> of its occurrence all over the world -- but the biblical >> *flood*! Now, scientists have no more objection to a >> catastrophic flood than they do to a catastrophic ice >> age. The real question is, *where's the evidence*? > >The rise in sea levels drowned many coastal areas around the world. >Likely, many long-settled human communities were disrupted by this. >In the general catastrophe of the end of the ice age there were >many floods. Perhaps ancient stories of floods reveal some such. > >The ocean rise, however, could not have been rapid. It's equally > As far as the world-enveloping, to the tops of the >Himalayas, flood demanded by Bible literalists goes, I say *No*! I agree with you. For what it's worth, none of the extensive records that the oil companies use indicate it either.(Note:Sea level changes are VERY important to oil exploration. I have worked with records that go back as far as the Triassic(220 million years or so). The record for the last 65 million years is VERY detailed, it doesn't show flooding worldwide to the extent that the fundamentalist keep trying come up with (height-wise that is)(there are definite worldwide sealevel changes some of which are ice melt changes, some with plate tectonic origins) anywhere in the worldwide correlations. The evidence is not there. ------------------------------------------------------------------- Pam Pincha-Wagener (usual disclaimer)