Noahic Flood - Part Three
Bum-out note: In IE, there is a long blank space between my header and my newest post. This is not so in Mozilla. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
Another look at the Noahic Flood. Now, whether you believe the Flood DID happen is a matter of opinion. One chooses to believe the Biblical account, or one does not. The purpose of my many articles is partly to show that the Noahic Flood COULD have happened, that is, that the evidence and scientific knowledge both show that it was a plausible event. Unless, of course, you cannot conceive of the idea of a Creator God. But that is a problem specific to individuals who are limited to a naturalistic view of the world. The rest of us are willing to consider all reasonable possibilities. I happen to believe that the Flood did occur just as the Genesis narrative attests. Here we go...
SALINITY
What about the salinity of the ocean? In the Noahic Flood, how could freshwater fish survive? In fact, how is it we even have freshwater and saltwater fish now? Shouldn't one or the other have been wiped out?
So much water!!!
It should be obvious to the reader that the Bible tells of a world-wide flood. Not some local river flood some 1200 years later, not simply a flooding of the Black Sea.
Genesis 7:17-24 - "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 twenty feet. Every living thing that moved on the earth 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; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air 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."
This was no river flood. There certainly is enough water on earth to accomplish this flood. In an antediluvian world with just one continent, covering the tallest peak by twenty feet could happen with an outpouring of water that had been trapped underground and rising of sea floors, etc. In fact, were the earth flat today the water would cover the entire planet at a depth of 1.7 miles!
Water that had been underground and released to the surface would tend to be much hotter than ocean temperatures and also have little or no salinity. At the outset of the Flood, rain inundated the planet for 40 days and 40 nights. So the salinity of the ocean at that time would have been lessened at first. Yet the freshwater fishes that eventually had to transition to floodwaters would still find that the salinity had increased. Saltwater fishes would have more freshwater to deal with. How could they survive?
TODAY'S OCEAN MUCH MORE SALINE
"The ocean is essential for life on Earth, and also helps make the climate fairly moderate. However, although the ocean contains 1,370 million cubic kilometres (334 million cubic miles) of water, humans can’t survive by drinking from it—it is too salty.
To a chemist, ‘salt’ refers to a wide range of chemicals where a metal is combined with a non-metal. Ordinary common salt is a compound formed when the metal sodium combines with the non-metal chlorine—sodium chloride. This contains electrically charged atoms, called ions, that attract each other, resulting in a fairly hard crystal. When salt dissolves, these ions separate. Sodium and chloride ions are the main ions in seawater, but not the only ones. The salty seas benefit man, because the ocean provides many useful minerals for our industries.
How old is the sea?
Many processes (see below) bring salts into the sea, while they don’t leave the sea easily. So the saltiness is increasing steadily. Since we can work out how much salt there is in the sea, as well as the rates that salts go into and out of the sea, we should be able to calculate a maximum age for the sea.
In fact, this method was first proposed by Sir Isaac Newton’s colleague, Sir Edmond Halley (1656–1742), of comet fame. More recently, the geologist, physicist, and pioneer of radiation therapy, John Joly, (1857–1933) estimated that the oceans were 80–90 million years old at the most. But this was far too young for evolutionists, who believed that life evolved in the ocean billions of years ago.
More recently, the geologist Dr Steve Austin and the physicist Dr Russell Humphreys analyzed figures from secular geoscience sources for the quantity of sodium ion (Na+) in the ocean, and its input and output rates. The slower the input and faster the output, the older the ocean could be.
Every kilogram of seawater contains about 10.8 grams of dissolved Na+ (about 1% by weight). This means that there is a total of 1.47 x 1016 (14,700 million million) tonnes of Na+ in the ocean.
Sodium input
Water on the land can dissolve salt outcrops, and can weather many minerals, especially clays and feldspars, and leach the sodium out of them. This sodium can be carried into the ocean by rivers. Some salt is supplied by water through the ground directly to the sea—called submarine groundwater discharge (SGWD). Such water is often very concentrated in minerals. Ocean floor sediments release much sodium, as do hot springs on the ocean floor (hydrothermal vents). Volcanic dust also contributes some sodium.
Austin and Humphreys calculated that about 457 million tonnes of sodium now comes into the sea every year. The minimum possible rate in the past, even if the most generous assumptions are granted to evolutionists, is 356 million tonnes/year.
Actually, a more recent study shows that salt is entering the oceans even faster than Austin and Humphreys thought. Previously, the amount of SGWD was thought to be a small fraction (0.01–10%) of the water from surface runoff, mainly rivers. But this new study, measuring the radioactivity of radium in coastal water, shows that the amount of SGWD is as much as 40% of the river flow. This means that the maximum possible age of the ocean is even smaller." From Salty Seas - evidence for a young earth by Johnathan Sarfati.
Normal runoff from the land increases the salinity of the oceans. Imagine the kind of runoff that would likely have occurred in the midst of a year-long world-wide flood event that included the complete overhaul of the surface of the planet? Could fish have been expected to survive?
A Biologist speaks:
"Much attention has been given to how the animals would be brought to, fit in, and survive on Noah's Ark. But little or no concern has been voiced as to how aquatic animals could have lived outside in the Flood. Obviously, terrestrial air-breathing animals could not live through the land-covering deluge, but one would think aquatic animals would be right at home in all that water. Not so!
Water life has specific physiological and ecological requirements just like terrestrial life. A catastrophe the size of the Flood would certainly bring with it gigantic problems affecting the very survival of many species. Indeed, the fossil record indicates that many taxonomic groups became extinct during the deposition of the geologic sedimentary layers. Some organisms would have simply succumbed to the trauma of the turbulence. Others would have found suitable living space destroyed, and hence died for lack of appropriate habitat. For example, too much fresh water for obligate (bound to) marine species or vice versa would have led to death of those unable to adapt. Not only are there salt-concentration problems, but also temperature, light, oxygen, contaminants, and nutritional considerations. These must all be evaluated in discussing survival of water-dwelling creatures.
To simplify the exercise, five examples have been selected of fishes that are bound to fresh or salt water and those that can go between these major habitats. The chosen fishes (sunfish, catfish, trout, eel, and codfish) will be used to represent clear fresh water, muddy fresh water, anadromous (running up to fresh water from sea water to spawn), catadromous (the reverse) and obligate marine habitats or behavior, respectively. These categories will be discussed with reference to three main factors affecting their survival: salinity, temperature, and turbidity.
PHYSIOLOGICAL RANGES - Salinity
Fish have a problem in balancing the fluids outside their bodies with those inside. In general, freshwater fishes are constantly getting too much fresh water in their bodies from food, drinking water, and tissue transfer. On the opposite side, marine fishes get too little fresh water to maintain fluid balance due to the large input of salt in the drinking water and constant osmotic pressure to draw fresh water out of these tissues into the surrounding sea.
The kidneys and gills are the two organs used to manage this balance. If a freshwater fish gets too much water, then the kidney is called upon to dump as much water as possible while retaining the circulating salts. Marine bony fish have to get rid of the excess salts largely through the gills and conserve the internal water through resorption.
Sea-run trout move from sea water to fresh water to spawn, while eels do just the opposite. Both have to be able to reverse their removal of water and salt according to the amount of salt in their environment. Sun fishes and cod remain in fresh water and sea water, respectively, for their whole life cycle. Salt content might range from nearly zero in freshwater to 35 parts per thousand (x103 ppm or 35,000 mg/l) in sea water. Obligate freshwater fish typically have an upper lethal level of seven parts per thousand (7,000 mg/l). Obligate marine species have a very narrow limit of salt tolerance. Dromous (running/migrating) species are able to adapt to the new environments by osmotic regulation.
Temperature
The range of temperatures tolerated by fishes varies from species to species and the assorted habitats. Some fish have a very narrow range of tolerance at the cold, warm, or hot temperature parts of the heat scale. Others show a wide range of heat tolerance from freezing to hot waters (0-32° C). Developmental stages are frequently limited by narrow temperature requirements within the overall range of the adult.
Most species, including cold-water types, can tolerate at least brief exposures to 24°C and low temperatures approaching 2°C, as long as there are prolonged acclimation periods (several days to weeks). Preferred temperatures for the representative adult fish are as follows: Trout, 16-21°C; sunfish, 16-28°C; catfish, 21-29°C; eel, probably 16-28°C; codfish 12-16° C.
Turbidity
Particulate matter that is in suspension in natural waters is measured photoelectrically as turbidity. It consists of erosional silt, organic particles, bacteria, and plankton. Such materials adversely affect fish by covering the substrate with a smothering layer that kills food organisms and spawning sites. In addition, the molar action of the silt damages gills and invertebrate respiratory structures. Fish combat such materials by secreting mucus that carries the particles away. Indirectly, turbidity screens out light and decreases the photic zone for photosynthesis. The range of turbidity might be described as: clear < 10 ppm (mg/l), turbid 10 to 250 ppm, and very turbid > 250 ppm. Wallen found that many fish species survive turbidities of 100,000 ppm for one week or more.
SURVIVAL STRATEGY - Runoff to the Ocean
Heavy rainfall over the land would quickly fill the river basins with torrential flows. These in turn would empty out onto the encroaching coastline as a freshwater blanket. Odum refers to situations similar to this as a "highly stratified or `salt-wedge' estuary." Such a massive freshwater outflow from the continents would join with the oceanic rainfall to form a halocline or strong density gradient, in which fish flushed out from the land aquatic systems could continue to survive in a freshwater environment. Stratification like this might even survive strong winds, if the freshwater depth was great enough to prevent internal current mixing. Thus, a situation might be envisioned where freshwater and marine fishes could survive the deluge in spite of being temporarily displaced.
Turbidity Flows
On the other hand, large turbid particles and enormous bedloads could move into the ocean as settleable particulate rain and ground-hugging slurries. Heavier particles would fall out in the slower-moving coastal waters, and the mudflows would sediment out over the ocean floor. Although there would be turbulence at the freshwater/saltwater interface, the particle insertion would probably occur without appreciable mixing. With the range of tolerance given above, many fishes might be able to survive extended exposure to high turbidity."
Serendipity at Mount St. Helens
The biotic recovery at Mount St. Helens after the May 18, 1980 eruption demonstrates rapid and widely ranging restoration. Obviously, the Flood would have been one or more orders of magnitude greater a catastrophe than that eruption. But such an event does help us to see ways of recovery.
With regard to the three factors of interest (salinity—approximately alkalinity, in the sense of dissolved solutes—, temperature, and turbidity), significant changes were seen in the affected areas (data transformed to units used previously).
Still, a little more than a month after the eruption, the lake most exposed to the catastrophic event, Spirit Lake, had tolerable alkalinity , ambient temperature, and low turbidity. This is not to deny that all the endemic fish were killed in the event and probably could not have survived if replanted in these waters on June 30, 1980 due to large organic oxygen demands from decaying tree debris and seeps of methane and sulfur dioxide. But within ten years, the lake appears to be able to support fish, as many other aquatic species are back and well established. If the lake were connected directly to the Toutle River, then salmonids probably would have made their reentry by this time.
Perhaps the most significant observation, though, in examining the post-eruption history, is that a variety of habitats within and adjacent to the blast zone survived the event with minimal impact on the continuity of the ecosystem. Meta Lake, within the blast zone for example, had an ice cover at the time of the searing blast, which protected the dormant ecosystem from experiencing much disruption from the heat, anoxia, and air-fall tephra. Fish and support systems picked up where they left off before the onset of the winter season.
Similar experiences were observed in Swift Reservoir, in spite of massive mud and debris flows into the lake by way of Muddy Creek (personal conversation with aquatic biologist on duty at that time). Fish were displaced into the adjacent unaffected watersheds or downstream into lower reservoirs. However, within two years, massive plankton blooms had occurred and ecosystem recovery was well underway with migrant recruits.
Such a confined catastrophe (500 square miles) enables one to project expectations from a major catastrophe, such as the Flood. First, in spite of the enormous magnitude of such events, there appear to be refuges for survival even in close proximity to the most damaging action. Second, recovery can be incredibly fast—from one month to ten years. Third, recruitment from minimally affected zones can occur with normal migratory behavior of organisms. Although some animal and plant populations or even species might be annihilated in such events, remnant individuals can reestablish new populations." How Could Fish Survive the Genesis Flood? by Kenneth B. Cumming, Ph.D.
See also: How did freshwater and saltwater fish survive the Flood?
The Noahic Flood was intended to entirely wipe out the human race, other than Noah's family, and in doing this God knew he would be destroying most living things. Genesis declares that the air-breathing vertebrates on land and all birds would be killed.
Most sea-life would also die and a large part of the insect world would be destroyed. But God had no requirement to save every kind of creature. He preserved the kinds he chose to keep in the Ark and He knew enough of other kinds of creatures could survive the ordeal so that the earth would be replenished. The diversity coded into the genes of the surviving wildlife would allow for the ecosystems of every niche of the planet to eventually support life and allow man to spread across the globe.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tiktaalik
Great name, Tiktaalik. The newly-discovered fossil fish is being celebrated as a transitional form by Darwinists world-wide. Why? Who knows, because they have nothing else to do I guess...Because as Dr. David Menton and Mark Looy, CCO point out:
"There is the coelacanth fish, found in the same geological system (Devonian it is called) as this Tiktaalik discovery, that also has lobed fins. These lobed fins were once thought to enable the coelacanth to walk on the ocean floor (in fact it was, like “Tiklaalik,” once considered by evolutionists to be a type of transitional form). Later, it was determined that the coelacanth fins were used for better maneuvering through the water, and not for walking. The new creature uncovered in the Arctic might be something similar.
Also, there are other creatures (e.g., the Panderichthys) that are thought to be fish and yet appear to be similar in lobe and fin structure to Tiktaalik. In addition, the bones for Panderichthys, Tiktaalik and the coelacanth are imbedded in the muscle, and are not attached to the axial skeleton, which you would find in a reptile or amphibian (and which would be necessary for weight-bearing appendages).
As we often state on this website, keep in mind that evolutionists and creationists have the same facts (e.g., fossils), but interpret the facts uncovered today differently in regard to the past. Because evolutionists want to discover transitional forms, when they find a very old fish with leg-bone-like bones in its fins, they want to interpret this as evidence that it is some sort of transitional creature. However, other fish seem to have the same sort of structure as stated above, and these bones are not constructed as one would expect for weight-bearing legs. It may be just another example of the wonderful design of our Creator God.
All they have actually found is a fish that is another example of a lobe-finned fish (one of which still lives today—the coelacanth) that has bones similar in position to those seen in the arm and wrist of land-walking creatures—except these structures support fins with rays in them, not digits like fingers and toes (and as has been stated, they are NOT connected to the axial skeleton)."
Alas, the "arms" of the Tiktaalik fish are incapable of giving it support. The cute little cartoon fish trying to walk up on shore make for a bit of fun, but Colecanths cannot and do not do it and in fact look just as they did in fossil form. So why would anyone think that Tiktaaliks could and did? Wishful thinking. The big difference between Tiktaalik and Colecanth appears to be that one made it through the flood and one did not.
Another look at the Noahic Flood. Now, whether you believe the Flood DID happen is a matter of opinion. One chooses to believe the Biblical account, or one does not. The purpose of my many articles is partly to show that the Noahic Flood COULD have happened, that is, that the evidence and scientific knowledge both show that it was a plausible event. Unless, of course, you cannot conceive of the idea of a Creator God. But that is a problem specific to individuals who are limited to a naturalistic view of the world. The rest of us are willing to consider all reasonable possibilities. I happen to believe that the Flood did occur just as the Genesis narrative attests. Here we go...
SALINITY
What about the salinity of the ocean? In the Noahic Flood, how could freshwater fish survive? In fact, how is it we even have freshwater and saltwater fish now? Shouldn't one or the other have been wiped out?
So much water!!!
It should be obvious to the reader that the Bible tells of a world-wide flood. Not some local river flood some 1200 years later, not simply a flooding of the Black Sea.
Genesis 7:17-24 - "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 twenty feet. Every living thing that moved on the earth 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; men and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds of the air 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."
This was no river flood. There certainly is enough water on earth to accomplish this flood. In an antediluvian world with just one continent, covering the tallest peak by twenty feet could happen with an outpouring of water that had been trapped underground and rising of sea floors, etc. In fact, were the earth flat today the water would cover the entire planet at a depth of 1.7 miles!
Water that had been underground and released to the surface would tend to be much hotter than ocean temperatures and also have little or no salinity. At the outset of the Flood, rain inundated the planet for 40 days and 40 nights. So the salinity of the ocean at that time would have been lessened at first. Yet the freshwater fishes that eventually had to transition to floodwaters would still find that the salinity had increased. Saltwater fishes would have more freshwater to deal with. How could they survive?
TODAY'S OCEAN MUCH MORE SALINE
"The ocean is essential for life on Earth, and also helps make the climate fairly moderate. However, although the ocean contains 1,370 million cubic kilometres (334 million cubic miles) of water, humans can’t survive by drinking from it—it is too salty.
To a chemist, ‘salt’ refers to a wide range of chemicals where a metal is combined with a non-metal. Ordinary common salt is a compound formed when the metal sodium combines with the non-metal chlorine—sodium chloride. This contains electrically charged atoms, called ions, that attract each other, resulting in a fairly hard crystal. When salt dissolves, these ions separate. Sodium and chloride ions are the main ions in seawater, but not the only ones. The salty seas benefit man, because the ocean provides many useful minerals for our industries.
How old is the sea?
Many processes (see below) bring salts into the sea, while they don’t leave the sea easily. So the saltiness is increasing steadily. Since we can work out how much salt there is in the sea, as well as the rates that salts go into and out of the sea, we should be able to calculate a maximum age for the sea.
In fact, this method was first proposed by Sir Isaac Newton’s colleague, Sir Edmond Halley (1656–1742), of comet fame. More recently, the geologist, physicist, and pioneer of radiation therapy, John Joly, (1857–1933) estimated that the oceans were 80–90 million years old at the most. But this was far too young for evolutionists, who believed that life evolved in the ocean billions of years ago.
More recently, the geologist Dr Steve Austin and the physicist Dr Russell Humphreys analyzed figures from secular geoscience sources for the quantity of sodium ion (Na+) in the ocean, and its input and output rates. The slower the input and faster the output, the older the ocean could be.
Every kilogram of seawater contains about 10.8 grams of dissolved Na+ (about 1% by weight). This means that there is a total of 1.47 x 1016 (14,700 million million) tonnes of Na+ in the ocean.
Sodium input
Water on the land can dissolve salt outcrops, and can weather many minerals, especially clays and feldspars, and leach the sodium out of them. This sodium can be carried into the ocean by rivers. Some salt is supplied by water through the ground directly to the sea—called submarine groundwater discharge (SGWD). Such water is often very concentrated in minerals. Ocean floor sediments release much sodium, as do hot springs on the ocean floor (hydrothermal vents). Volcanic dust also contributes some sodium.
Austin and Humphreys calculated that about 457 million tonnes of sodium now comes into the sea every year. The minimum possible rate in the past, even if the most generous assumptions are granted to evolutionists, is 356 million tonnes/year.
Actually, a more recent study shows that salt is entering the oceans even faster than Austin and Humphreys thought. Previously, the amount of SGWD was thought to be a small fraction (0.01–10%) of the water from surface runoff, mainly rivers. But this new study, measuring the radioactivity of radium in coastal water, shows that the amount of SGWD is as much as 40% of the river flow. This means that the maximum possible age of the ocean is even smaller." From Salty Seas - evidence for a young earth by Johnathan Sarfati.
Normal runoff from the land increases the salinity of the oceans. Imagine the kind of runoff that would likely have occurred in the midst of a year-long world-wide flood event that included the complete overhaul of the surface of the planet? Could fish have been expected to survive?
A Biologist speaks:
"Much attention has been given to how the animals would be brought to, fit in, and survive on Noah's Ark. But little or no concern has been voiced as to how aquatic animals could have lived outside in the Flood. Obviously, terrestrial air-breathing animals could not live through the land-covering deluge, but one would think aquatic animals would be right at home in all that water. Not so!
Water life has specific physiological and ecological requirements just like terrestrial life. A catastrophe the size of the Flood would certainly bring with it gigantic problems affecting the very survival of many species. Indeed, the fossil record indicates that many taxonomic groups became extinct during the deposition of the geologic sedimentary layers. Some organisms would have simply succumbed to the trauma of the turbulence. Others would have found suitable living space destroyed, and hence died for lack of appropriate habitat. For example, too much fresh water for obligate (bound to) marine species or vice versa would have led to death of those unable to adapt. Not only are there salt-concentration problems, but also temperature, light, oxygen, contaminants, and nutritional considerations. These must all be evaluated in discussing survival of water-dwelling creatures.
To simplify the exercise, five examples have been selected of fishes that are bound to fresh or salt water and those that can go between these major habitats. The chosen fishes (sunfish, catfish, trout, eel, and codfish) will be used to represent clear fresh water, muddy fresh water, anadromous (running up to fresh water from sea water to spawn), catadromous (the reverse) and obligate marine habitats or behavior, respectively. These categories will be discussed with reference to three main factors affecting their survival: salinity, temperature, and turbidity.
PHYSIOLOGICAL RANGES - Salinity
Fish have a problem in balancing the fluids outside their bodies with those inside. In general, freshwater fishes are constantly getting too much fresh water in their bodies from food, drinking water, and tissue transfer. On the opposite side, marine fishes get too little fresh water to maintain fluid balance due to the large input of salt in the drinking water and constant osmotic pressure to draw fresh water out of these tissues into the surrounding sea.
The kidneys and gills are the two organs used to manage this balance. If a freshwater fish gets too much water, then the kidney is called upon to dump as much water as possible while retaining the circulating salts. Marine bony fish have to get rid of the excess salts largely through the gills and conserve the internal water through resorption.
Sea-run trout move from sea water to fresh water to spawn, while eels do just the opposite. Both have to be able to reverse their removal of water and salt according to the amount of salt in their environment. Sun fishes and cod remain in fresh water and sea water, respectively, for their whole life cycle. Salt content might range from nearly zero in freshwater to 35 parts per thousand (x103 ppm or 35,000 mg/l) in sea water. Obligate freshwater fish typically have an upper lethal level of seven parts per thousand (7,000 mg/l). Obligate marine species have a very narrow limit of salt tolerance. Dromous (running/migrating) species are able to adapt to the new environments by osmotic regulation.
Temperature
The range of temperatures tolerated by fishes varies from species to species and the assorted habitats. Some fish have a very narrow range of tolerance at the cold, warm, or hot temperature parts of the heat scale. Others show a wide range of heat tolerance from freezing to hot waters (0-32° C). Developmental stages are frequently limited by narrow temperature requirements within the overall range of the adult.
Most species, including cold-water types, can tolerate at least brief exposures to 24°C and low temperatures approaching 2°C, as long as there are prolonged acclimation periods (several days to weeks). Preferred temperatures for the representative adult fish are as follows: Trout, 16-21°C; sunfish, 16-28°C; catfish, 21-29°C; eel, probably 16-28°C; codfish 12-16° C.
Turbidity
Particulate matter that is in suspension in natural waters is measured photoelectrically as turbidity. It consists of erosional silt, organic particles, bacteria, and plankton. Such materials adversely affect fish by covering the substrate with a smothering layer that kills food organisms and spawning sites. In addition, the molar action of the silt damages gills and invertebrate respiratory structures. Fish combat such materials by secreting mucus that carries the particles away. Indirectly, turbidity screens out light and decreases the photic zone for photosynthesis. The range of turbidity might be described as: clear < 10 ppm (mg/l), turbid 10 to 250 ppm, and very turbid > 250 ppm. Wallen found that many fish species survive turbidities of 100,000 ppm for one week or more.
SURVIVAL STRATEGY - Runoff to the Ocean
Heavy rainfall over the land would quickly fill the river basins with torrential flows. These in turn would empty out onto the encroaching coastline as a freshwater blanket. Odum refers to situations similar to this as a "highly stratified or `salt-wedge' estuary." Such a massive freshwater outflow from the continents would join with the oceanic rainfall to form a halocline or strong density gradient, in which fish flushed out from the land aquatic systems could continue to survive in a freshwater environment. Stratification like this might even survive strong winds, if the freshwater depth was great enough to prevent internal current mixing. Thus, a situation might be envisioned where freshwater and marine fishes could survive the deluge in spite of being temporarily displaced.
Turbidity Flows
On the other hand, large turbid particles and enormous bedloads could move into the ocean as settleable particulate rain and ground-hugging slurries. Heavier particles would fall out in the slower-moving coastal waters, and the mudflows would sediment out over the ocean floor. Although there would be turbulence at the freshwater/saltwater interface, the particle insertion would probably occur without appreciable mixing. With the range of tolerance given above, many fishes might be able to survive extended exposure to high turbidity."
Serendipity at Mount St. Helens
The biotic recovery at Mount St. Helens after the May 18, 1980 eruption demonstrates rapid and widely ranging restoration. Obviously, the Flood would have been one or more orders of magnitude greater a catastrophe than that eruption. But such an event does help us to see ways of recovery.
With regard to the three factors of interest (salinity—approximately alkalinity, in the sense of dissolved solutes—, temperature, and turbidity), significant changes were seen in the affected areas (data transformed to units used previously).
Still, a little more than a month after the eruption, the lake most exposed to the catastrophic event, Spirit Lake, had tolerable alkalinity , ambient temperature, and low turbidity. This is not to deny that all the endemic fish were killed in the event and probably could not have survived if replanted in these waters on June 30, 1980 due to large organic oxygen demands from decaying tree debris and seeps of methane and sulfur dioxide. But within ten years, the lake appears to be able to support fish, as many other aquatic species are back and well established. If the lake were connected directly to the Toutle River, then salmonids probably would have made their reentry by this time.
Perhaps the most significant observation, though, in examining the post-eruption history, is that a variety of habitats within and adjacent to the blast zone survived the event with minimal impact on the continuity of the ecosystem. Meta Lake, within the blast zone for example, had an ice cover at the time of the searing blast, which protected the dormant ecosystem from experiencing much disruption from the heat, anoxia, and air-fall tephra. Fish and support systems picked up where they left off before the onset of the winter season.
Similar experiences were observed in Swift Reservoir, in spite of massive mud and debris flows into the lake by way of Muddy Creek (personal conversation with aquatic biologist on duty at that time). Fish were displaced into the adjacent unaffected watersheds or downstream into lower reservoirs. However, within two years, massive plankton blooms had occurred and ecosystem recovery was well underway with migrant recruits.
Such a confined catastrophe (500 square miles) enables one to project expectations from a major catastrophe, such as the Flood. First, in spite of the enormous magnitude of such events, there appear to be refuges for survival even in close proximity to the most damaging action. Second, recovery can be incredibly fast—from one month to ten years. Third, recruitment from minimally affected zones can occur with normal migratory behavior of organisms. Although some animal and plant populations or even species might be annihilated in such events, remnant individuals can reestablish new populations." How Could Fish Survive the Genesis Flood? by Kenneth B. Cumming, Ph.D.
See also: How did freshwater and saltwater fish survive the Flood?
The Noahic Flood was intended to entirely wipe out the human race, other than Noah's family, and in doing this God knew he would be destroying most living things. Genesis declares that the air-breathing vertebrates on land and all birds would be killed.
Most sea-life would also die and a large part of the insect world would be destroyed. But God had no requirement to save every kind of creature. He preserved the kinds he chose to keep in the Ark and He knew enough of other kinds of creatures could survive the ordeal so that the earth would be replenished. The diversity coded into the genes of the surviving wildlife would allow for the ecosystems of every niche of the planet to eventually support life and allow man to spread across the globe.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tiktaalik
Great name, Tiktaalik. The newly-discovered fossil fish is being celebrated as a transitional form by Darwinists world-wide. Why? Who knows, because they have nothing else to do I guess...Because as Dr. David Menton and Mark Looy, CCO point out:
"There is the coelacanth fish, found in the same geological system (Devonian it is called) as this Tiktaalik discovery, that also has lobed fins. These lobed fins were once thought to enable the coelacanth to walk on the ocean floor (in fact it was, like “Tiklaalik,” once considered by evolutionists to be a type of transitional form). Later, it was determined that the coelacanth fins were used for better maneuvering through the water, and not for walking. The new creature uncovered in the Arctic might be something similar.
Also, there are other creatures (e.g., the Panderichthys) that are thought to be fish and yet appear to be similar in lobe and fin structure to Tiktaalik. In addition, the bones for Panderichthys, Tiktaalik and the coelacanth are imbedded in the muscle, and are not attached to the axial skeleton, which you would find in a reptile or amphibian (and which would be necessary for weight-bearing appendages).
As we often state on this website, keep in mind that evolutionists and creationists have the same facts (e.g., fossils), but interpret the facts uncovered today differently in regard to the past. Because evolutionists want to discover transitional forms, when they find a very old fish with leg-bone-like bones in its fins, they want to interpret this as evidence that it is some sort of transitional creature. However, other fish seem to have the same sort of structure as stated above, and these bones are not constructed as one would expect for weight-bearing legs. It may be just another example of the wonderful design of our Creator God.
All they have actually found is a fish that is another example of a lobe-finned fish (one of which still lives today—the coelacanth) that has bones similar in position to those seen in the arm and wrist of land-walking creatures—except these structures support fins with rays in them, not digits like fingers and toes (and as has been stated, they are NOT connected to the axial skeleton)."
Alas, the "arms" of the Tiktaalik fish are incapable of giving it support. The cute little cartoon fish trying to walk up on shore make for a bit of fun, but Colecanths cannot and do not do it and in fact look just as they did in fossil form. So why would anyone think that Tiktaaliks could and did? Wishful thinking. The big difference between Tiktaalik and Colecanth appears to be that one made it through the flood and one did not.