Ken Ham Hits Back at Christian Geologist Who Lists 21 Reasons Why Noah's Flood Never Happened

The list is a real challenge, but what the author doesn’t note is that a lot of them depend strongly on a particular version of how the flood occurred. Given that Scripture doesn’t spell a lot of these things out in nauseating detail, we are left with the question of hypotheses and assumptions, certain things that it is at least very hard to know.

It doesn’t clear either the old earth or the young earth hypothesis, but one thing I can say with confidence; it’s not good that Ham attacks the messenger. As the old lawyer’s saw goes, “If the law is on your side, pound the law. If the facts are on your side, pound the facts. If neither, pound the table.” Ham is in effect pounding the table.

To one specific, one big weakness is the consistent assumption of consistent effects, as in the erosion of the granite at the base of the Grand Canyon. WIll it take millions of years? The engineer in me (who’s worked with lapping) responds “depends on how you’re lapping it.” Put in layman’s terms, if it takes thousands of years to erode granite, no matter what the circumstances, it’s hard to explain tombstones.

“It doesn’t clear either the old earth or the young earth hypothesis, but one thing I can say with confidence; it’s not good that Ham attacks the messenger. As the old lawyer’s saw goes, “If the law is on your side, pound the law. If the facts are on your side, pound the facts. If neither, pound the table.” Ham is in effect pounding the table.”

The article was selective as to Ham’s response and his overall presentation. Ham offers a lot more. This article portrayed him perhaps as pounding the table, but there are a lot of data that Ham (and other believers in the Biblical world-wide flood) has elsewhere presented that was excluded from this article.

“So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. So make yourself an ark…”

“I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark”

“You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you.”

“Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”

“…on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.”

“For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered. The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits. Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark. The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.”

Sure, other things were said, but it’s still a bad sign that Ham comes out swinging like that. See “ad hominem fallacy”.

Ham’s response is hardly ad hominem, given Ham was calling him out for denying the verses I posted above. If God wanted a vague flood story, He could easily have provided one to Moses to record.

It could have read “And men were evil before the sight of the LORD, so He carried them away with floodwaters, but the LORD spared Noah and his family because Noah found favor with God.” That’s a vague flood story. The one that’s actually in Genesis is full of details and repetition so the reader receives a vivid picture as to what is going on. If that account is interpreted to be something unknowable or something that did not happen, then we have no basis to trust other Scriptures that describe the way of salvation.

“…the claims made in the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry article, published in the March/April issue, which suggests that Creationists are “less imbued with scientific thinking.”

The article itself is an ad hominem attack on creationists, calling them ‘less imbued with scientific thinking.’

“Many Creationists love science, of course, and are quite knowledgeable,” Ham insisted

How is that ad hominem by Ham?

Of course the article chose to leave the geologic answers provided by AiG to a link that one had to click.

Ham did say he didn’t want to stand in Collins’ shoes in the day of judgment. You can call that ad hominem if you wish, but Ham is right, given Collins has denied the Genesis account.

Yes, AiG does respond materially to the 21 issues brought up in the article in their video linked to the CPost piece. Much of their response does discuss the presuppositions involved.