And you seem to be overly sensitive. Given that, despite the title, Berzerker started this thread to discuss Sitchenite theories about how Genesis 1 is actually factually accurate and the knowledge of such was given to the Babylonians, Sumerians etc. by ancient astronauts, this has nothing to do with Christianity, per se.
What's more, even if it did and we were mocking Christianity (say, Biblical literalists), we'd be mocking Christianity, Islam and Judaism in equal measure, because this is the Abrahamic creation myth, which all three faiths have in common.
When some actual facts are brought into this, instead of Chariots of the Gods nonsense, I'll take it seriously. There is very little that's even remotely close to being accurate in Genesis. Egypt was ruled by pharaohs. I grant you, there's independent evidence for that.
How do you know? They left us evidence of their cosmological beliefs, they even left us pictures of our solar system.
Pictures of the solar system? So what brand of camera did they use, and how did they get the camera far enough away?
Been paying attention to the probes in the outer solar system these days? Pluto's an amazing little planet. And you're not going to tell me with a straight face that the ancient Babylonians knew anything about that. I hope.
You'll have to ask him, but he did travel to Egypt and Mesopotamia and report back there are more worlds than what can be seen. You have to explain why he believed in only those planets he could see when he clearly believed in unseen planets too.
Actually, I don't have to explain this. You do, since you're the one trying to convince us of this nonsense. It's one thing to suspect the existence of another planet based on (for example) oddities noted in Neptune's orbit... but that's based on observations done with a telescope. Me looking up and saying, "Y'know, I honestly believe that there's a green and purple plaid planet out there in the solar system, and it's there for no other reason than I say so" is not science. It's just nonsense.
Maybe somebody had a telescope. But their description of "Heaven" - rakia, the spread out firmament, the hammered out bracelet - is an apt description of the asteroid belt.
The asteroid belt exists in three dimensions, y'know. Not all the asteroids are in the ecliptic. As for "maybe somebody had a telescope"... nope. While various kinds of lenses were known previously, the first telescope wasn't invented until the early 1600s.
Do you have the patience to debate the science and mythology? The mythology says the world was covered in water and darkness before the creation of land and life. The science not only supports the mythology, the science says our water came from the asteroid belt. That means we came from there too and thats where Heaven is located.
The Sun is approximately half a billion years older than Earth, so nope, the "creation of land" (the planet) came after light. As Earth was coalescing into a planet, the part of it facing the Sun was lit.
What "science" says our water (and us, too) came from the asteroid belt? Source, please. As for Heaven being in the asteroid belt, it's not going to be very heavenly in another century or whenever they get around to mining the asteroids.
Our opinion of Pluto is irrelevant to people long ago - they didn't write their story of creation based on how we would one day classify Pluto.
The point is that Pluto's entire existence is 100% irrelevant to all these mythologies. While Pluto's existence was suspected in the 1800s, it wasn't actually proven until 1930. So any mention of Pluto in any ancient cosmology based on planets is just a modern retcon. The ancients had no idea Pluto existed, so there is no way that it should be showing up in any of their star/planet drawings. It wasn't ancient people who named the planet Pluto after a Roman god... it was modern people who did that.
I dont share your negative opinion of mythology, if you had read my posts you'd see I'm arguing the science supports Genesis and other creation myths. But since you seem to think myth should be mocked, aren't you doing the same thing to other peoples who gave us these myths? Here's your argument: Genesis is not myth! Stop mocking the Bible. Now those other stories that say the same thing as Genesis are myths so mock them instead.
Science does not support Genesis.
The Black Sea has been flooded many times, during the ice ages massive glacial lakes formed in Asia as ice sheets blocked rivers running north to the Arctic Sea. As these lakes eventually burst through to the south they emptied first into the Caspian and then westward into the Black Sea.
But I dont believe the Flood covered the world, not enough water and where did it go? The Mesopotamian flood myths suggest it came from the south followed by torrents of rain. I think the Persian Gulf was a river valley at the base of the 4 biblical rivers of Paradise.
When seas rose with the melting ice coastal peoples around the world had to seek higher ground and many would have died from floods as rising seas breached natural dams like the ones that gave way when the Black Sea was repeatedly flooded. Maybe a comet or asteroid struck the Indian Ocean and sent massive tsunamis onto coastal regions, or maybe something hit the northern ice sheet. Researchers believe the releases of the glacial Lake Agassiz may have triggered the Younger Dryas and other climate disasters with as much as 10ft of sea rise. If you're living in S Florida or the Sunda Shelf and seas rose 10 ft within a few days, you'd be dead unless you had a boat handy.
Well, kudos for not insisting on a world-wide flood. There is more to refuting it than just "too much water and where would it go?", however.
As for your "maybe" speculation of a comet or asteroid, do you have a source for that?
Maybe planets weren't all that important to their cosmologies? The conception of planets as equivalents of Earth is a modern one. Planets aren't all that different from stars to a naked eye observer, besides the fact that their position isn't fixed. Other celestial objects like the sun and moon are obviously more important in ancient cosmologies because they have a qualitative impact on their actual lives.
The main differences between planets and stars that someone in a pre-telescope society would notice is that A. Planet "wander"; and B. When you look at a planet, it doesn't twinkle.
