Noah's Ark
From EvoWiki
According to the Book of Genesis, Noah's Ark is the vessel within which the entire Earth's biosphere was preserved when God, "sorry that He had made man" (Gen 6:7), decided to "bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh" (Gen 6:17). There are of course many practical difficulties with the Noachian Flood, and Pat James identifies several difficulties specific to the Ark itself [1].
For instance, given the Ark's reported dimensions (300 cubits by 50 cubits by 30 cubits ? Gen. 6:15), its displacement would have been something like 40,000 tons. A rectangular solid of the Ark's dimensions would have a displacement of about 45,000 tons; since the Ark had curved sides rather than straight, that 45-kiloton figure is a maximum upper limit.
Why is this a problem? Because the Ark would not have been physically capable of carrying all the food necessary to keep its passengers alive during the year-plus-change of the Flood.
According to John Woodmorappe's book Noah's Ark: A Feasibility Study, published by the Institute for Creation Research, the Ark carried a total of 5,500 tons of living animals who, collectively, consumed 1/30 of their body mass worth of food every day. Very well; by Woodmorappe's scenario, the Ark's passengers ate (1/30 of 5,500 tons) a bit over 183 tons of food per day. Multiply that figure by 365 days in a year, and you get a bit over 66,910 tons of food for the year-long duration of the Flood. Add in the weight of the animals themselves, not to mention the weight of the Ark itself, and we see that the Ark's payload was something well in excess of 70,000 tons.
Exactly how does a vessel whose displacement must have been less than 45,000 tons, manage to carry cargo and animals whose aggregate weight is more than 70,000 tons? You can always invoke divine intervention to solve this problem, but the instant you do that, you're no longer dealing with science.
