What did carnivores eat after the flood?

Post by **otseng** » Tue Mar 09, 2004 10:20 am

Quarkhead asked a good question. So I'm creating a new topic here to address it.

After all the animals stepped off Noah's ark, what did the carnivores eat? All the (land) animals perished in a world-wide flood. So the only animals that carnivores could eat were those that stepped off the boat. Wouldn't they have all eaten each other? And also what did the carnivores eat while they were in the ark?

unknownuser · Post by **unknownuser** » Wed Sep 15, 2004 1:52 pm

debating wether or not it happened is a separate subject, isn't it?

Oolon Colluphid · Post by **Oolon Colluphid** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 12:15 pm

unkownuser wrote:debating wether [sic] or not it happened is a separate subject, isn't it?

Yes and no. The original question was, what did carnivores eat after the flood? So firstly, yes, and do you have any ideas on what they might have eaten?

And secondly, no, whether the flood happened is a closely related subject to the matter of post-diluvian carnivore food supply. Because if the flood did not really occur, we don't need to invoke countless further miracles to 'explain' so many problems and questions that a real flood would raise: what the carnivores ate, the salinity of the water and the effects on delicate ecosystems, the lack of evidence for a global flood, and so on and on. and conversely, if there is no sensible answer to the carnivore question, it casts yet more doubt on the already pretty ludicrous claim of a global flood.

So then. What did these 'ere meat-eaters eat when they disembarked?

TTFN, Oolon

unknownuser · Post by **unknownuser** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 1:06 pm

it was a supernatural event, so they may have survived supernaturally.

but i stick to my belief that it was a region inhabited by the only humans on earth that flooded, but to their minds the world flooded.

like europeans thought of the americas as the "new" world. it was always there, they just didn't know about it.

the there were probably animals throuought the world. and the known world (the middle east) was flooded

unknownuser · Post by **unknownuser** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 1:08 pm

remember how the jews survived on mana?

in the new testament they name specific miracles that jesus performed, but not all.

just as some form of sustenance could have been given them supernaturally

Gaunt · Post by **Gaunt** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 2:47 pm

it was a supernatural event, so they may have survived supernaturally.

While it is of course possible that there were several miracles involved to allow the animals to survive afterwards, the general trend is to try to use as few supernatural events as possible to explain something. The reason for this is because miracles not only tend to be untestable (which is a problem from a scientific standpoint); they also add complications where none are necessary, and Occam's Razor tells us that the simplest answer is the most likely one.

Furthermore, it begs the question of why did some animals go extinct in a post flood world if God was throwing around miracles to ensure that some of them would survive.

Jose · Post by **Jose** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 3:34 pm

Of course, the herbivores were also out of luck. Most of the vegetation was buried under sediments like those we see in the Grand Canyon, which would put it pretty far underground by the time the water went (wherever it went). Any plants on mountainsides that might not have been covered in sediment were under water long enough, and deprived of air long enough, that they would have expired. (A flooded corn field dies after less than a week under water.) So, all there should have been would be some seeds floating around, and a lot of mud and waterlogged branches and trunks.

So let's see...if the seeds got busy right away and started growing into new plants...give a few months at least for enough forage to grow for the grazing animals, maybe a year or to for the browsing animals (guys who eat leaves of shrubs, not grass), and then the herbivores are ready to start supplying meat for the carnivores. It would have been lean pickings for everyone for quite a while.

I think we have to conclude that, if there was a flood, all of the animals survived by supernatural means. (Except the fish. A lot of them went extinct, and ended up buried in rock strata. Odd.)

unknownuser · Post by **unknownuser** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 3:41 pm

god destroyed sodom & gommorah and left only lot and his daughters

god will destroy this earth and leave only a few people

t · Post by t » Thu Sep 16, 2004 8:04 pm

Now I will give you something else to ponder. After the flood

And Noah built an altar to Jehovah. And he took of every clean animal, and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.

Now what replaced those?

2Co 5:7 for we walk by faith, not by sight;

Jose · Post by **Jose** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 9:16 pm

And Noah built an altar to Jehovah. And he took of every clean animal, and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.

Now what replaced those?

Hmmmm...it's a little vague. Did he burn the entire animal as his offering, or did he simply take a bit of fur or feather? It might mean the latter, since he took "of" these clean creatures. Without the "of" it might mean something quite different.

I wonder why we don't do this sort of thing any more. Burnt offerings used to be required. I guess that's just one of those parts of the text that we no longer follow literally.

Gaunt · Post by **Gaunt** » Thu Sep 16, 2004 10:26 pm

And Noah built an altar to Jehovah. And he took of every clean animal, and of every clean bird, and offered burnt offerings on the altar.

Now what replaced those?

As he brought seven (or seven pairs.. I forget which) of each clean animal, there really isn't anything that would need to be replaced. If the bear population could replenish itself with 2, I'm sure the cows could get by with 6.