Picture of Mars vs. the earth. So how did Moses know?

[gnostic]

animals, too? You think cavemen figured animals came after the soil and plants??

No.

Actually animals did exist before there were plants.

According to Genesis 1, plants existed and were created (Genesis 1:11-12) on the same day (3rd day) as the dry land (1:9-10) first appeared. And that it (plants) existed before sun, moon and stars were created (4th day), and before creation of the marine life and birds (5th day), and before creation of land animals and human (6th day).

The only thing that were correct in Genesis 1’s timeline is that plants did exist before humans.

Plus, Genesis 1, also plants were created with seeds, and fruit trees were all created on the same day:

11 Then God said, “Let the earth put forth vegetation: plants yielding seed, and fruit trees of every kind on earth that bear fruit with the seed in it.” And it was so. 12 The earth brought forth vegetation: plants yielding seed of every kind, and trees of every kind bearing fruit with the seed in it. And God saw that it was good.

First, the oldest evidence showed that the earliest plants were primitive, and there were no fruit trees, and there were no seeds bearing plants.

The first land plants appeared in the Ordovician period 485 to 443 million years ago.

At this period (Ordovician), primitive plants that didn’t bear seeds. Like I said, the earliest plants, didn’t reproduce through seeds. No, they reproduce through spores, like vascular plants - eg ferns - and like non-vascular plants - eg mosses, liverworts and hornworts.

Seeds producing plants can be broadly categorized in 2 main groups:

1. gymnosperms, non-flowering plants, like conifers.
2. angiosperms, flowering plants. The seeds are produced in the flowers.

Fruit-bearing plants are species that evolved from flowering plants; here, the seeds are within the fruits themselves.

The earliest flowering plants only existed from Triassic period (Mesozoic era), around 200 million years ago.

Second.

Animals existed in oceans long before there were plants. These marine animals were largely invertebrates, from primitive sponge and corals in the Ediacaran period (last period of the Proterozoic era, Precambrian) to more diversity in the Cambrian period (Paleozoic era), that included marine arthropods, the trilobites. Modern crustaceans, like crabs, lobsters, prawns, etc, are all marine arthropods - they are segmented invertebrates with exoskeleton.

The earliest vertebrates, jawless fishes, also existed in the Cambrian. These vertebrates only have basic vertebrae, meaning their vertebrae weren’t as evolved as later vertebrates.

There weren’t any plants yet in either the Ediacaran or Cambrian. So invertebrates, like corals and arthropods, like trilobites, and the earliest vertebrates, like the jawless fishes, are animals that predated the oldest land plants.

From what I only recently found out, is that the earliest plants most likely to evolve from the green algae.

Algae, whether they are green algae, red algae or brown algae, have been around before the Cambrian period, but which period, I haven't found out yet. Green algae, have the cells with photosynthesis capability, which is to use sunlight, to convert carbon dioxide and water, into starches, which are carbohydrates, like sugar or glucose.

The carbohydrates are what provide nutrients and energy to both algae and plants. Carbohydrates are important energy sources for all organism (all life), whether it be bacteria, plants, fungi and animals.

Carbohydrates have another purpose, especially ribose sugars and deoxyribose sugars, which are essential components in nucleic acids, respectively as RNA & DNA.

I am getting sidetracked.

The points are, that animals did exist before the earliest land plants, but these animals were aquatic. The earliest invertebrates and vertebrates predated land plants, even though they started their lives in the oceans.

The earliest land animals weren't primitive amphibians; no, the earliest were land arthropods, such as the primitive arachnids (like the scorpions and spiders) and primitive insects. When the earliest arthropods appeared on land, I don't know yet, but they did predate the earliest amphibians that crawl out of the water.

There other problems, with Genesis 1's timeline, such as plants existing before the stars (including our Sun) and moon, which is also wrong.

And Genesis 1 is also wrong about there only been water covering the entire Earth (Genesis 1:2) and that lands didn't exist until the 3rd day (1:9-10). This is false too, because there can be no ocean of water, without Earth's crust, in which the molten surface began to cool and solidify.

Water needs the crust to exist to hold the bodies of water. And the Earth's crust can be divided into oceanic crust and continental crust, hence the plate tectonics.

The Earth's crust didn't form flat.

 

[gnostic]

The dating of the Exodus is a real mess archaeologically and most archaeologists want to date it to 1250 approx when there was no Jericho to conquer and the archaeology of Canaan does not fit the conquest story in the Bible. Yes I agree,,,,,,,,,,,,insane.
The Biblical date for the Exodus is about 1450 BC and Jericho was there and the archaeology of Canaan for a 1450 Exodus fits the conquest story in the Bible.
That date makes more sense to me.
However, in stead of making more sense it seems it is easier to say the Bible is wrong and that there was no conquest.
Depending on the dating you choose, the Egyptians can be seen to have been conquered shortly after the Exodus and/or be weak and unable to maintain their kingdom. But as I say, the archaeology is a mess and different theories abound.

As I have explained in the past threads, Jericho wasn't abandon in the 15th century.

If Solomon did exist (which he doesn't exist, historically), and if he did start construction of the 4th year of his reign (1 Kings 6:1), then this year would have been in 967 BCE, which would have mean that Moses didn't lead his people out of Egypt until 480 years earlier, like 1447 BCE.

6 In the four hundred eightieth year after the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt, in the fourth year of Solomon’s reign over Israel, in the month of Ziv, which is the second month, he began to build the house of the Lord.

This would have meant Jericho would not have been abandoned until 1407 BCE, Joshua succeeding Moses as leader, or in 1406 BCE.

But according to archaeological evidence, Jericho was deserted by, around 1570 BCE.

 

[Clara Tea]

So? How did Moses know that the earth was uninhabited by -- HUMANS AND animals AND fish "early on"? Did he figure that out? And yes, you're right that no man has landed on Mars-- but here's a picture of the surface of Mars, there are many. It doesn't look too hospitable for -- HUMANS and animals and vegetation. Does it? Empty -- void -- desolate -- waste --

MARS DESOLATE: It's a fixer-upper. But, I'll sell it to you really cheaply (end of the year sale).

Recently, both Mars and Venus have been re-scrutinized for life. The atmosphere of Venus has some low temperature areas.

 

[Clara Tea]

No.

Actually animals did exist before there were plants.

According to Genesis 1, plants existed and were created (Genesis 1:11-12) on the same day (3rd day) as the dry land (1:9-10) first appeared. And that it (plants) existed before sun, moon and stars were created (4th day), and before creation of the marine life and birds (5th day), and before creation of land animals and human (6th day).

The only thing that were correct in Genesis 1’s timeline is that plants did exist before humans.

Plus, Genesis 1, also plants were created with seeds, and fruit trees were all created on the same day:



First, the oldest evidence showed that the earliest plants were primitive, and there were no fruit trees, and there were no seeds bearing plants.

The first land plants appeared in the Ordovician period 485 to 443 million years ago.

At this period (Ordovician), primitive plants that didn’t bear seeds. Like I said, the earliest plants, didn’t reproduce through seeds. No, they reproduce through spores, like vascular plants - eg ferns - and like non-vascular plants - eg mosses, liverworts and hornworts.

Seeds producing plants can be broadly categorized in 2 main groups:

1. gymnosperms, non-flowering plants, like conifers.
2. angiosperms, flowering plants. The seeds are produced in the flowers.

Fruit-bearing plants are species that evolved from flowering plants; here, the seeds are within the fruits themselves.

The earliest flowering plants only existed from Triassic period (Mesozoic era), around 200 million years ago.

Second.

Animals existed in oceans long before there were plants. These marine animals were largely invertebrates, from primitive sponge and corals in the Ediacaran period (last period of the Proterozoic era, Precambrian) to more diversity in the Cambrian period (Paleozoic era), that included marine arthropods, the trilobites. Modern crustaceans, like crabs, lobsters, prawns, etc, are all marine arthropods - they are segmented invertebrates with exoskeleton.

The earliest vertebrates, jawless fishes, also existed in the Cambrian. These vertebrates only have basic vertebrae, meaning their vertebrae weren’t as evolved as later vertebrates.

There weren’t any plants yet in either the Ediacaran or Cambrian. So invertebrates, like corals and arthropods, like trilobites, and the earliest vertebrates, like the jawless fishes, are animals that predated the oldest land plants.

From what I only recently found out, is that the earliest plants most likely to evolve from the green algae.

Algae, whether they are green algae, red algae or brown algae, have been around before the Cambrian period, but which period, I haven't found out yet. Green algae, have the cells with photosynthesis capability, which is to use sunlight, to convert carbon dioxide and water, into starches, which are carbohydrates, like sugar or glucose.

The carbohydrates are what provide nutrients and energy to both algae and plants. Carbohydrates are important energy sources for all organism (all life), whether it be bacteria, plants, fungi and animals.

Carbohydrates have another purpose, especially ribose sugars and deoxyribose sugars, which are essential components in nucleic acids, respectively as RNA & DNA.

I am getting sidetracked.

The points are, that animals did exist before the earliest land plants, but these animals were aquatic. The earliest invertebrates and vertebrates predated land plants, even though they started their lives in the oceans.

The earliest land animals weren't primitive amphibians; no, the earliest were land arthropods, such as the primitive arachnids (like the scorpions and spiders) and primitive insects. When the earliest arthropods appeared on land, I don't know yet, but they did predate the earliest amphibians that crawl out of the water.

There other problems, with Genesis 1's timeline, such as plants existing before the stars (including our Sun) and moon, which is also wrong.

And Genesis 1 is also wrong about there only been water covering the entire Earth (Genesis 1:2) and that lands didn't exist until the 3rd day (1:9-10). This is false too, because there can be no ocean of water, without Earth's crust, in which the molten surface began to cool and solidify.

Water needs the crust to exist to hold the bodies of water. And the Earth's crust can be divided into oceanic crust and continental crust, hence the plate tectonics.

The Earth's crust didn't form flat.

Plant life on Earth is much older than we thought

Published February 26, 2018, this new research shows that land plants evolved 100,000 years earlier than previously thought. (source: above).

This puts them at the same time as animals.

But, sea plants very likely existed long before sea animals. Sea animals had to eat something...and that was sea plants.

 

[Clara Tea]

As I have explained in the past threads, Jericho wasn't abandon in the 15th century.

If Solomon did exist (which he doesn't exist, historically), and if he did start construction of the 4th year of his reign (1 Kings 6:1), then this year would have been in 967 BCE, which would have mean that Moses didn't lead his people out of Egypt until 480 years earlier, like 1447 BCE.



This would have meant Jericho would not have been abandoned until 1407 BCE, Joshua succeeding Moses as leader, or in 1406 BCE.

But according to archaeological evidence, Jericho was deserted by, around 1570 BCE.

Error bars are usually included with data, expressing a range of possible values. Could it be that both dates could be correct?

 

[Clara Tea]

I don't see the relevance of Mars. Even if you might use similar words to describe the surface of Mars today doesn't mean it is the same as or was any kind of reference for the description of early Earth in the Bible.

I'm not sure we know who actually authored the original text but more significantly, it has widely varying translations (the link here is to KJV for example, and worded quite differently to the ASV you quote).This makes it very difficult to know what the original author was actually trying to get across and analysing the individual English words used in the various translations less than meaningless.

The other issue is that you are assuming the author knew what they were writing was true, rather than just guessing, stating an unsupported belief or simply repeating the words of others.

In general, any of the religious writings reporting things they authors couldn't have experienced or witnessed first hand which are then presented in very poetic prose can't really be read in to any more than on their raw face value. You either believe it is essentially the word of God or you don't. Anything else is empty speculation.

The only thing that most people know about God is contained in the bible. We know that the bible contradicts itself in some areas.

Some people know God by talking to him and others know God by feeling that He is there.

Some say that the bible was written by God through psychics who were human. If so, it was written by divine ability, so it is all true. But, there have been kings and popes who have rewritten the bible many times.

There have been many versions of the bible, and many differ from each other.

 

[Clara Tea]

As I have explained in the past threads, Jericho wasn't abandon in the 15th century.

If Solomon did exist (which he doesn't exist, historically), and if he did start construction of the 4th year of his reign (1 Kings 6:1), then this year would have been in 967 BCE, which would have mean that Moses didn't lead his people out of Egypt until 480 years earlier, like 1447 BCE.

This would have meant Jericho would not have been abandoned until 1407 BCE, Joshua succeeding Moses as leader, or in 1406 BCE.

But according to archaeological evidence, Jericho was deserted by, around 1570 BCE.

Jericho - Wikipedia

I can't seem to find what I need from the wikipedia article, above, but there is a lot of info about Jericho there. (source above).

A giant space rock demolished an ancient Middle Eastern city and everyone in it – possibly inspiring the Biblical story of Sodom

September 21, 2021 (a new theory....much proof):

According to archaeologist Phil Silvia, geophysicist Allen West, geologist Ted Bunch, and space physicist Malcolm LeCompte's article, published by the University of South Carolina, Jericho was destroyed by a ice meteor impact. Rock meteors would have likely left rock debris. Pottery was melted (pottery is made by firing clay, so it melts at an extraordinarily high temperature). It occurred roughly 3,600 years ago, about the time of the destruction of Jericho. "14 miles (22 km) to the west of Tall el-Hammam, winds from the blast hit the biblical city of Jericho. Jericho’s walls came tumbling down and the city burned to the ground." "5 foot jumbled layer of charcoal, ash, melted mudbricks, and melted pottery"....dubbed destruction layer. (source above).

Perhaps Jericho was rebuilt, and it is that rebuilt city that is confusing people today?

Does the meteor theory work? Shofar sho good.

 

[Clara Tea]

What? Are you crazy? Nobody has ever been to Mars.

What we have done is send robots.

When I was working on my Masters degree in robotics, a woman in my class was dating the JPL engineer in charge of creating the Mars rover. She had interesting insights because she, too, was trained in robotics. We attended the Masters degree graduation together.

 

[YoursTrue]

I can't access your link. Where does it come from?

I'm sceptical, as I seem to recall some sensational claims a few years ago of finding chariot wheels in the Red Sea, which turned out to be hogwash. But I'll read the source if you can tell me where to find it.

P.S. Here is the hogwash I had in mind. It's from 2014: FACT CHECK: Were Chariot Wheels Found at the Bottom of the Red Sea?. Have you too been taken in by this, or are you referring to something else?

In reference to some points, I have read that many historical records have disappeared, and changed.

 

[gnostic]

Error bars are usually included with data, expressing a range of possible values. Could it be that both dates could be correct?

But that's not the only problem with the Joshua (book of), Clara, or that of Kings and Exodus.

Exodus speaks if the city of Rameses, was being built around the time of Moses' birth (Exodus 1:11), and again, when Moses led Israelites out of Rameses (12:37).

Both events (above, about Rameses) occurred before Jericho fall, Joshua 6.

These timelines don't match with the PHYSICAL & ARCHAEOLOGICAL evidence of both Rameses and Jericho.

Historically, Rameses - the city - is actually called Pi-Ramesses, which was named after Ramesses I, 1292 - 1290 BCE, founder of 19th dynasty. It was being built by Seti I (1290 - 1279 BCE), and named after his father, but the city was completed until the reign of Ramesses II (1279 - 1213 BCE), Seti's son.

Pi-Ramesses means the "House of Ramesses".

Archaeologically, what remain of the city (ruin), have been dated to the 13th century BCE. So if Jericho was being abandoned in 1570, then this would predate Pi-Ramesses.

So, it is not possible for the stories of Moses and of Joshua, to be historically and archaeological true, since the real Rameses (which is Pi-Ramesses) never existed until about 320 years after real Jericho was deserted.

The stories in Exodus and Joshua never happened.

 

[exchemist]

In reference to some points, I have read that many historical records have disappeared, and changed.

On this story of finding chariot wheels in the Red Sea? Do tell us more, with a link, if possible.

 

[exchemist]

When I was working on my Masters degree in robotics, a woman in my class was dating the JPL engineer in charge of creating the Mars rover. She had interesting insights because she, too, was trained in robotics. We attended the Masters degree graduation together.

How nice.

 

[Brian2]

I can't access your link. Where does it come from?

I'm sceptical, as I seem to recall some sensational claims a few years ago of finding chariot wheels in the Red Sea, which turned out to be hogwash. But I'll read the source if you can tell me where to find it.

P.S. Here is the hogwash I had in mind. It's from 2014: FACT CHECK: Were Chariot Wheels Found at the Bottom of the Red Sea?. Have you too been taken in by this, or are you referring to something else?

Pharos Tribune, Logansport, Indiana. It's a 2007 article by Jim Muehlhausen.
I have probably been taken in by this.
I hear of evidences for things and then refutations and am not sure which is true.
But when I look at the article you posted it is a later date and a different place and sea.
Here is a contact for the author of the article I posted: Jim Muehlhausen may be reached at [email protected]. Christian apologetics is the defense of the Christian faith.

PS. It is not a Ron Wyatt archaeological expedition but if it is true I wonder why it is not more widely known.

 

[Brian2]

As I have explained in the past threads, Jericho wasn't abandon in the 15th century.

If Solomon did exist (which he doesn't exist, historically), and if he did start construction of the 4th year of his reign (1 Kings 6:1), then this year would have been in 967 BCE, which would have mean that Moses didn't lead his people out of Egypt until 480 years earlier, like 1447 BCE.



This would have meant Jericho would not have been abandoned until 1407 BCE, Joshua succeeding Moses as leader, or in 1406 BCE.

But according to archaeological evidence, Jericho was deserted by, around 1570 BCE.

Believers Score in Battle Over the Battle of Jericho (Published 1990)
Kathleen Kenyon seems to have made mistakes about the pottery.

 

[gnostic]

Believers Score in Battle Over the Battle of Jericho (Published 1990)
Kathleen Kenyon seems to have made mistakes about the pottery.

Excuse me, I can't read the article.

Second. I don't give a damn what "Believers" (article headline) believe in.

Third, archaeological evidence required "verification", not news article from the New York Times.

In 1957, Kenyon dated the layer of its destruction to about 1550, where she had excavated part of wall and a tower.

In 1995, Hendrik Bruins and Johannes van der Plicht, did another testing that put this layer's destruction to about 1573 BCE, which verified more closely to Kenyon's date than John Garstang's 1400 BCE.

Source:

Bruins & Plicht, Tell Es-Sultan (Jericho): Radiocarbon Results Of Short-Lived Cereal And Multiyear Charcoal Samples From The End Of The Middle Bronze Age, 1995​

But regardless if we rely on Kenyon's date or Garstang's date, since Pi-Ramesses or the biblical Rameses (Exodus 1:11 & 12:37), didn't exist until the city was completed around 1250 BCE.

As I said in my previous post, Pi-Ramesses was named after Ramesses I, Seti's father and Ramesses II's grandfather. There was no Ramesses in the 15th or 17 dynasties (16th century BCE) or in the 18th dynasty (15th century BCE).

So, not only the real Jericho is at odd with the Joshua 6, the existence of Pi-Ramesses also post-dated Jericho's destruction, by hundreds of years, which make the Exodus-Joshua timeline to be wrong.

 

[exchemist]

Pharos Tribune, Logansport, Indiana. It's a 2007 article by Jim Muehlhausen.
I have probably been taken in by this.
I hear of evidences for things and then refutations and am not sure which is true.
But when I look at the article you posted it is a later date and a different place and sea.
Here is a contact for the author of the article I posted: Jim Muehlhausen may be reached at [email protected]. Christian apologetics is the defense of the Christian faith.

PS. It is not a Ron Wyatt archaeological expedition but if it is true I wonder why it is not more widely known.

Thanks but I'm not emailing some unknown character about this. If you can find a reference in a reputable archaeological source I'll be happy to read that. Until then, my scepticism remains, since there is apparently no corroborating evidence of the Egyptian Captivity or the subsequent Exodus.

 

[CrochetOverCoffee]

I'm jumping in at the end here, so I apologize if someone has already covered these points.

The Bible says that the earth was without form and void and made of water. The image I get from that is an empty bubble of water floating in space, maybe wobbling around a bit like you see water doing on the space station. That's nothing like what the earth is now, or what Mars is.

And Moses knew that the earth was without form and void because God told him so. Moses was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the first five books of the Bible. Inspired means "breathed in" (same root as respiration), so that means God breathed the words into Moses for him to write. That's also how Moses didn't put the kinds of medical errors you would see from Egyptian physicians into the Old Law, things like mixing donkey dung and worm blood as a poultice for a splinter, thereby giving their patients tetanus.

 

[exchemist]

I'm jumping in at the end here, so I apologize if someone has already covered these points.

The Bible says that the earth was without form and void and made of water. The image I get from that is an empty bubble of water floating in space, maybe wobbling around a bit like you see water doing on the space station. That's nothing like what the earth is now, or what Mars is.

And Moses knew that the earth was without form and void because God told him so. Moses was inspired by the Holy Spirit to write the first five books of the Bible. Inspired means "breathed in" (same root as respiration), so that means God breathed the words into Moses for him to write. That's also how Moses didn't put the kinds of medical errors you would see from Egyptian physicians into the Old Law, things like mixing donkey dung and worm blood as a poultice for a splinter, thereby giving their patients tetanus.

It's also nothing like the earth was when it formed, according to the widely accepted nebular hypothesis, from a cloud of dust and gas, 4.5bn years ago. It would have been far too hot for liquid water.

And Moses almost certainly did not write Genesis:

Tradition credits Moses as the author of Genesis, as well as the books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and most of Deuteronomy, but modern scholars, especially from the 19th century onward, see them as being written hundreds of years after Moses is supposed to have lived, in the 6th and 5th centuries BC.[3][4] Based on scientific interpretation of archaeological, genetic, and linguistic evidence, most scholars consider Genesis to be primarily Judeo-Christian mythology rather than historical.

From: Book of Genesis - Wikipedia

Neither science nor historical scholarship agrees with you here, I'm afraid.

 

[Watchmen]

Got any idea of what the earth looked like before it sprouted life? The surface of the moon and Mars look eerily somewhat alike. Zilch. Rocks. Barren.

Are you aware that Mars likely is not in a pre-vegetative state, but in a post-vegetative state?

Your reference to Mars really has nothing to do with the discussion.

 

[sayak83]

OK, they say water had been on Mars. But the photo of Mars I saw in a journal really showed that the words used to describe the scene might be barren, waste or void. Rocks and lots of them. So the question is -- how do you think Moses knew the earth, at the beginning, was "waste and void;"? (American Standard Version, Genesis 1:2) You think he figured it out that it might have looked that way, although he saw greenery, and animals? I'm also figuring that he couldn't see much on Mars at that point. So how did Moses know the earth's surface was just plain not filled with life as he saw it? Just general reasoning? Of course, the Bible does say that star differs from star...and we know that planets themselves differ from each other.. but so far no one has discovered a planet like the earth as it is now, not conjecture, with trees and animals.

You mean how did every creation myth in every civilization and tribal culture know this? (As it is there in every myth).
Simple...rational inference based on dependence relationship.
Earth, land, water, air etc. are NEEDED for life to exist. So any creation story written assumes these things were created before life.