Plan B Forum

God curbed his dramatic tendencies on Tuesday, neglecting to initiate a global flood during the figurative launching of a full-size Noah’s ark replica in Kentucky.

The Ark Encounter, based in the north of the Bluegrass state, is sculpted to proportions specified in the book of Genesis. It is 510ft long, seven storeys tall and, given its base is made of concrete, almost certain not to survive another of God’s watery caprices. (The vessel would displace – while sinking like a stone – 15,000 to 20,000 tons of water).

Answers in Genesis, a creationist religious organisation that believes God created the Earth in six days and that the world is 6,000 years old, is behind the modern-day ark, which will open to the public on 7 July. The group estimates that 1.4m people will visit the vessel in the first year and that the ark will bring $4bn to the Commonwealth of Kentucky. The ark is a non-floating exhibition offering both a glimpse into Noah’s life at sea and an opportunity to learn about Answers in Genesis’s theories on how our planet came to exist.

For those making the journey to Williamstown, 50 miles north of Lexington, a genuinely impressive structure awaits. In fact the ark’s scale is such that even Charles, the taxi driver who dropped me off there on Tuesday morning and had never heard of the Ark Encounter, despite living only twenty miles away, was impressed.

“Wow,” he said as we pulled up at the ark’s port side. “That’s neat as hell.”



The whole ship looks like something one might find at Ikea: smooth lines, minimal design and a baffling assembly method
Neat is quite a good adjective for the ark’s exterior. It looks brand new and pristine. The pale yellow wood on its long hull – Radiata pine imported from New Zealand – brings to mind Ikea’s ubiquitous birch veneer furniture collection. In fact, the whole ship looks like something one might find at Ikea: smooth lines, minimal design and a baffling assembly method.

Answers in Genesis got the details for the build from measurements written in Genesis 6, in which God tells Noah the ark should be “300 cubits long, 50 cubits wide, and 30 cubits high”. A cubit is roughly the distance from your fingers to your elbow – you can buy a “Noah’s cubit” in the gift shop.

Noah’s ark, according to Answers in Genesis, took between 55 to 75 years to build. Once it was constructed, Noah herded the world’s animals, two by two, into the bowels of his vessel, where he tended to them until the flood receded.

Creationists believe that rather than taking one of every modern species onboard the ark, Noah took ancestors of the animals we know today. According to this belief, the original ark would have held two early forms of canine, whose offspring developed into wolves, foxes, domestic dogs and other animals upon leaving the ark. As such, the model animals held on the Ark Encounter are approximations of what dogs’, cats’ and rhinos’ ancestors would have looked like.

There’s a cat-type mammal that has a head like a lion but is about the size of a big house cat. There’s something that looks like a rhino but without the horn.



Continues.

I would be more interested to see an exposition of the tap dance by local and state politicians that put public money into this wonderful tourist attraction that is purely for entertainment and has no religious significance what so ever.

MajGenl.Meade wrote:Not really, rubato. If vulgarity pleases your little ego, who am I to criticize? Good job I don't believe in anti-scientific nonsense or I might take that truckload personally.

MajGenl.Meade wrote:You kiss your momma with that mouth? (No actual relative intended)

Fuckload of stupidity.

Which is required to believe in the biblical story of the flood.

Guinevere wrote:Wasn't that your geezer post of the other week? You were asking for "guidance" on social interaction and there was discussion about waitresses/girls sitting on your lap?

And this guy flirts with every woman in the place...(the restaurant and the bar)
To the point that he's able to get young women sitting over at other tables with their SOs (not just waitresses; customers) to come and sit on his lap... So I said, " You know Hans, if I acted the way you do, I'd get beat up in the parking lot by an irate boyfriend"... To which he replied, "Jimmy, that's one the nice things about being a cute little old man...nobody feels threatened.."