HOME | POLITICS | SPORTS | LIFE | SCI/TECH | OPEDS | HELPFUL TIPS
|
Feb. 23, 2005 According to hypertext.com, the aggregate volume of all the oceans of the Earth is 1,370,000,000 cubic kilometers, which converts to about 329,000,000 cubic miles of water. My best guess is that the average elevation, or altitude, of the seven continents, which make up about 29% of the surface of the earth, is about 5000 feet, from which it can be calculated that the average elevation of the whole planet, continental and oceanic, is about 1450 feet. The latest accepted figure for the elevation of Mt. Everest, the world's tallest mountain in 29,035 feet. According to the Book of Genesis, the flood covered all the mountains of the Earth by 15 cubits, or 20 feet. Though the 15-cubit passage in Genesis is a little ambiguous, it is later made clear that all the mountains were completely submerged. So, assuming that the Bible is inerrant, we suppose that the level of the waters was 29,055 feet above ordinary sea level. Subtracting 1450 from 29,055, we see that 27,605 feet of rain, on a worldwide average, fell in 40 days, or 960 hours. Therefore, the rain fell at an average rate of 28 feet, 9 inches an hour, almost 6 inches a minute. In about 13 minutes, a man six feet tall would be completely under water. Even more interesting is the volume of water that fell, which we can calculate by subtracting the volume of a sphere with a radius of 3961 miles, like Earth, from the volume of one with a radius of 3961 miles plus 27,605 feet, which works out to about 3966.23 miles. This comes out to about 1,032,000,000 cubic miles. Thus the amount of rain that fell was about 3.14 times as great as the contents of all the oceans of the world, or to put it another way, total postdiluvian water was 4.14 times as great as total prediluvian water. Today, we believe that rainwater is condensed evaporated seawater. If this is true, condensation must have been going on more than four times as fast as evaporation, so that for an interval there was quite a bit more water than there had been, somewhat like juggling three balls so fast that for a while you have twelve balls, catching them four times as fast with your right hand as you toss them with your left. Or perhaps it's more like standing at an ATM machine, and making withdrawals four times as fast as you make deposits, a computer-age variant of check kiting. If you started with $100, you'd soon have $400, whereupon you could stop and go to another ATM and start with $400. Then you'd have $1600. Of course, in the Book of Genesis, there's no talk about the condensation-evaporation cycle. Instead, it says that the 'floodgates' of Heaven were opened, which suggests that the author or authoress of Genesis believed there were immense reservoirs of water somewhere in the sky. But I haven't heard anything about any satellites getting wet or any astronauts drowning in space flights. ------------ About the author Thomas Keyes: I have written two books: A SOJOURN IN ASIA (non-fiction) and A TALE OF UNG (fiction), neither published so far. I have studied languages for years and traveled extensively on five continents. Email: udikeyes@yahoo.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com and are not allowed to be posted on other websites. ARTICLE THIEVES WILL BE PROSECUTED! |
||||||
|
|
|||||||
|
