Noah's flood, as described in Genesis, was a real historical event.

Thank you for your impressive opening arguments. I look forward to an excellent exchange. As this round is for opening arguments only, I will not respond to his opening arguments until the next round. There are numerous ways in which I can show that the Global Flood, as described in Genesis did not and could not have happened. However, since this debate focuses solely on scientific evidence, and that is the approach that I will be using. 1. Genetics Had a Global Flood occurred, we should expect to see evidence of this in our genome A population bottleneck is defined as “an event that drastically reduces the size of a population. The bottleneck may be caused by various events, such as an environmental disaster, the hunting of a species to the point of extinction, or habitat destruction that results in the deaths of organisms.” (1) One famous example of a genetic bottleneck is within the Ashkenazi Jewish population (of which I am part of). Genetic analysis of Ashkenazi Jews shows that we are descendants of about 350 people that lived roughly 600 years ago (2). There is also strong evidence that two other genetic bottleneck events shaped modern human genetics. According to genetic studies, modern humans originated in Africa and moved out to colonize the rest of the world approximately 50,000 years ago. During the expansion, variability was lost that created a linear gradient of decreasing diversity with increasing distance from Africa. Genetic research have found evidence of two primary events, one ‘out of Africa’ and one placed around the Bering Strait, where an ancient land bridge allowed passage into the Americas (3). An event such as a Global Flood that killed all but 8 humans and two pairs of every living species would have certainly left a trace within our genome. We simply do not find it. Here is an image that diagrams such an event (4): To further the issue of genetics, harmful recessive alleles occurs in significant numbers in humans and most species. When close relatives breed, the offspring are far more likely to have genetic deformities. Going back to the Ashkenazi Jewish population, we see that because they are so closely related, they are far more susceptible to harmful diseases. Outside of humans, we see this occurring in cheetahs today. Stephen O’Brien found that they have 1/6th of the number of motile spermatozoa as domestic cats, and of those, almost 80% show morphological abnormalities (5). Finally, because of the loss of genetic diversity, extinction often becomes inevitable long before the last surviving member of the species dies. Isolated populations with fewer than twenty individuals are usually doomed, even when extraordinary precautions are taken (6). To conclude, there is simply no way a global flood could have occurred without leaving a trace in the genome. Because we do not find such evidence, we can conclude that the Global Flood is most likely unhistorical. 2. Species Survival The Bible states that “every living substance was destroyed which was upon the face of the ground, both man, and cattle, and the creeping things, and the fowl of the heaven; and they were destroyed from the earth: and Noah only remained alive, and they that were with him in the ark.” (Genesis 7:23 KJV) If the Flood actually occurred, this was certainly an understatement! Diseases There are many diseases that cannot survive outside of humans. Diseases like typhus, measles, smallpox, polio, and syphilis cannot survive without a human host. For example, Matt Kneeling has found that measles cannot survive in a community less than 250,000 to 400,000 for more than three weeks (7). This is because it needs non-immune hosts to infect. Since there were only 8 humans on the ark, many diseases should have gone extinct. Animals Since only two of every unclean animal were on the ark, how did predators and the prey survive? The traditional interpretation of the Flood narrative is that before the Flood, all humans and animals were essentially vegans, and upon leaving the Ark, meat became permissible (8). This leaves us with a problem. Upon leaving the Ark, should a predator kill one of the pairs of animals that were on the Ark, the species would effectively become extinct. How did the animals survive being preyed on and how did the predators survive by not over killing the animals? Conclusion In light of genetics, and the impossibility of species survival, it is far more likely than not that the Flood never occurred. Over to pro! [1] http://www.nature.com... [2] Carmi, S. (2014, 09 09). Sequencing an Ashkenazi reference panel supports population-targeted personal genomics and illuminates Jewish and European origins. Nature Communications. http://tinyurl.com... [3] Amos, W., & Hoffman, J. I. (2009, 10 07). Evidence that two main bottleneck events shaped modern human genetic diversity. Biological Science. http://tinyurl.com... [4] Image credit: University of California Museum of Paleontology. Understanding Evolution. http://evolution.berkeley.edu... [5] O'Brien, S. (1987). East African cheetahs: Evidence for two population bottlenecks? Genetics, 84, 508-511. http://www.pnas.org... [6] Simberloff, Daniel, 1988. The contribution of population and community biology to conservation science. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 19: 473-511. [7] Keeling, M.J. & B.T. Grenfell, 1997. Disease extinction and community size: modeling the persistence of measles. Science 275: 65-67. http://science.sciencemag.org... [8] https://answersingenesis.org...