On Apr 15, 1:58?am, johac <jhachm...@remove.sbcglobal.net> wrote:
<snip>

In this thread I have been arguing against the Black Sea flood as a
likely source of the Noah story. The Sumerian and Babylonian legends
based on river floods seem far more credible.

From my reading, I understand the the Pitman - Ryan catastrophic flood
hypothesis is ?still controversial at this time. If you have references
showing that the argument has been finally settled, I would appreciate
seeing them.

?Regardless of what happened, I think the Black Sea is not the source of
the bible myth for reasons I outlined earlier in this thread.

John #1782:
There is not now an easily-accessible copy of this article
on the Web, so you'll have to trust me to have quoted accurately.
This is Ryan's attempt to salvage the idea of a catastrophic
flood in the Black Sea basin from the contradictory evidence:

William B.F. Ryan, ?Candace O. Major, ?Gilles Lericolais, and
?Steven L. Goldstein
2003
CATASTROPHIC FLOODING OF THE BLACK SEA
Annual Review of Earth and Planetary Sciences
Vol. 31: 525-554 (Volume publication date May 2003)
(doi:10.1146/annurev.earth.31.100901.141249)


In there you'll find this (note that the dates given are
apparently uncalibrated adiocarbon years, the
"7.14 ky BP" having been calibrated to
about 7550 years ago elsewhere):

"
Criticisms of Catastrophic Flooding
The hypothesis of a rapid terminal flooding of the Black Sea
has been criticized
(Aksu et al. 2002a, b, G?r?r et al. 2001).
The initial objection (G?r?r et al. 2001) noted the presence
of 8.1-ky BP peat and 7.2-ky BP wood associated with
brackish fauna (Dreissena polymorpha and Monodacna caspia)
in cores from the Sakarya River and adjacent shelf.
Deposits with these components at a depth of -22 m
conflicted with a lake d[r]owned at 7.14 ky BP as originally
proposed.
However, a recognition from the strontium isotopes that
the salinization was initiated earlier at 8.4 ky BP
and that
the 7.14 ky BP [event] only reflected a threshold in salinity
resolves the apparent conflict.
"

Here's a diagram from elsewhere showing the situation,
in which (at long last)
enough salty water had infiltrated
along the floor of the Bosphorus
down to the bottom of the Black Sea that
the top of the lower salty layer
rose up to the Continental shelf,
where marine mollusks could finally
colonise the sea bed after about 7600 years ago:

http://biblicalgeology.net/images/stories/featured_articles/shelf-section.gif

"
Figure 2. According to the international research team,
the observed change from freshwater mollusc to marine mollusc
on the Black Sea shelf was not due to a sudden filling with
Mediterranean water. Rather, the level of the Black Sea
remained constant and the change was because the interface
between the fresh surface water and the salty deep water
rose above shelf level.
"

I.e., Ryan abandoned the idea of a flood occurring
7500 years ago,
which would have raised the Black Sea level
from -105 m to -15 m.
Instead, he substituted an earlier, less-dramatic flood
_about_ 8400 years ago
(the dating of that other flood event is unclear, and has
been described by others as taking place 9400 years ago),
raising the Black Sea level
from -85 m to -35 m,
without any mention of a blockage in the Bosphorus,
but rather implying a slow seepage over
the Bosphorus sill (-35 m), when Mediterranean sea level
rose above it as global sea level slowly rose due to addition
of melted glacial ice.
The data he presented could be interpreted as allowing
three centuries for that 50 m rise of the level of the Black Sea.

That's the most conclusive source, because
included in that document is a figure that explicitly shows
the Black Sea level rising to the level of the Bosphorus sill
at about 8.4 ky BP, and then remaining at global sea level
through the supposed 7.14 ky Bp event to the present day,
with no change in Black Sea level at all at that time.


A few refutational abstracts are quoted here, by
one who would have liked to have seen some proof of
a real Noachian flood event:

http://home.entouch.net/dmd/bseaflod.htm


You might also look at this thread in
sci.archaeology :
Controversy over the great flood hypotheses in the Black Sea in light
of geological, paleontological, and archaeological evidence

Here's a link to it that might work:

http://groups.google.com/group/sci.archaeology/browse_frm/thread/d736c10003111
346/ce3080c77ec37cbd?lnk=st&q=%22Flood+Myth.+Recently%2C+the+story+of+the+bibl
ical+deluge+was+connected+%22&rnum=1&hl=en#ce3080c77ec37cbd

OR

http://tinyurl.com/28ky76

There's a big book on the Black Sea that has recently
been published, edited by Valentina Yanko-Hombach
and others, but it does not discuss Ryan's and Pitman's
first version of a flood hypothesis, except to dismiss it.

No serious professional person is seriously discussing
the original Black Sea Floode (Mk. I) hypothesis anymore.
Is that enough, or would you like more?

- Daryl Krupa

On Sun, 15 Apr 2007 00:58:22 -0700, johac
<jhachmann@remove.sbcglobal.net> wrote:

From my reading, I understand the the Pitman - Ryan catastrophic flood
hypothesis is still controversial at this time. If you have references
showing that the argument has been finally settled, I would appreciate
seeing them.

Speculations linking geological evidence for the Black Sea flood to
the biblical tale aside, the scientific argument is far from settled,
and even its more arduous and flashy detractors refrain from claiming
the debate has outlived its usefulness. See for example the Preface to
the very recent

Yanko-Hombach, V., Gilbert, A.S., Panin, N. and Dolukhanov, P.M.
(Eds)(2007) The Black Sea Flood Question: Changes in Coastline,
Climate, and Human Settlement. Springer, 971 pp.

in which the editors--who, without exception, are not supporters of
the cataclysmic Black Sea flood--acknowledge that "No final answer to
the Black Sea flood question appears here [i.e., within the 2007
edited volume].

For those whose attention span might be seriously challenged by the
length of the volume, an interesting and entertaining review signed by
Tom van Loon has been published in the Journal of Sedimentary
Research. Here is an excerpt that answers johac's question:

"Was the Black Sea flooded suddenly, and - if so - was this flooding
the event that gave rise to the numerous legends about a worldwide
catastrophic flooding (like the Biblical Flood)? [...] So much is
known about the post-glacial sea-level rise in general, and so much
experience in dating Late Pleistocene and Holocene sediments exist,
that it sounds strange that there is still so much controversy about
the velocity of the sea-level rise in the Black Sea. I had hoped that,
after reading this ~1000-page book, I would know the answers to the
questions. Unfortunately, I did not. The many contributions, from a
wide spectrum of authors in East and West, do not allow a conclusion,
so that the Black Sea has kept some of its secrets."

Regards,

Mircea

On Sun, 15 Apr 2007 00:58:22 -0700, johac
<jhachmann@remove.sbcglobal.net> wrote:

From my reading, I understand the the Pitman - Ryan catastrophic flood
hypothesis is still controversial at this time. If you have references
showing that the argument has been finally settled, I would appreciate
seeing them.

Speculations linking geological evidence for the Black Sea flood to
the biblical tale aside, the scientific argument is far from settled,
and even its more arduous and flashy detractors refrain from claiming
the debate has outlived its usefulness. See for example the Preface to
the very recent

Yanko-Hombach, V., Gilbert, A.S., Panin, N. and Dolukhanov, P.M.
(Eds)(2007) The Black Sea Flood Question: Changes in Coastline,
Climate, and Human Settlement. Springer, 971 pp.

in which the editors--who, without exception, are not supporters of
the cataclysmic Black Sea flood--acknowledge that "No final answer to
the Black Sea flood question appears here [i.e., within the 2007
edited volume].

For those whose attention span might be seriously challenged by the
length of the volume, an interesting and entertaining review signed by
Tom van Loon has been published in the Journal of Sedimentary
Research. Here is an excerpt that answers johac's question:

"Was the Black Sea flooded suddenly, and - if so - was this flooding
the event that gave rise to the numerous legends about a worldwide
catastrophic flooding (like the Biblical Flood)? [...] So much is
known about the post-glacial sea-level rise in general, and so much
experience in dating Late Pleistocene and Holocene sediments exist,
that it sounds strange that there is still so much controversy about
the velocity of the sea-level rise in the Black Sea. I had hoped that,
after reading this ~1000-page book, I would know the answers to the
questions. Unfortunately, I did not. The many contributions, from a
wide spectrum of authors in East and West, do not allow a conclusion,
so that the Black Sea has kept some of its secrets."

Regards,

Mircea