Re: diatoms and the global flood

Karen G. Jensen (kjensen@calweb.com)
Sun, 27 Sep 1998 13:38:07 -0600

>At 11:00 AM 9/27/98 -0600, Karen G. Jensen wrote:
>>
>>Fri, 25 Sep 1998 20:14:59 -0500 Glenn Morton wrote:
>>
>>>[snip -- see below].
>>>
>>>I will accept that as a global flood possibility. But then the problem
>>>comes that most freshwater creatures can't handle the salt in the ocean and
>>>die. One must almost believe in evolution to have this occur.
>>>glenn
>>
>>
>>I accept adaptation as clearly demonstrated. It could be that the preflood
>>oceans were less salty than today's seas (perhaps isotonic?) and only those
>>diatoms which could survive salty water lived to multiply and diversify
>>there.
>
>But Karen, we are not talking about preflood waters we are talking about
>FLOOD waters. Remember that during the flood, the chemical mix of the
>ocean waters would have been saltier.

Yes.

How do I know this? According to
>the scenario that the global flood advocates propose, the entire geologic
>column was laid down in one year.

Most of it, anyway.

That means that every bit of salt in the
>sedimentary rocks would be dissolved in the oceans prior to the deposition
>of the first and lowest flood layer, the Cambrian.

Why? The "fountains of the deep" (some of which I believe contributed
mineral-rich waters) were not closed till the 150th day (Gen 8:1-4). They
all may have opened on the first day (Gen 7:11), but that doesn't mean that
they discharged everything they had all at once.

There are huge salt
>deposits found in the middle of the sedimentary column and this MUST
>represent the removal of salt from the flood waters, which means that prior
>to their removal the oceans were saltier. Huge salt deposts are found in
>Kansas, Texas, Northern Europe (Rotliegendes), throughout the Himalayas,
>along the east coast of the United States and Canada (the Argo Salt) and
>many many other places. There are also other salts (other than NaCl) which
>would dissolved in the flood waters.

Yes. And that removal was probably not by evaporation (the deposits are
too pure) but by vast precipitation from supersaturated solution in those
areas.

So, if you are going to choose
>adapatation, you must have instantaneous adaptability from the preflood,
>supposedly freshwater diatoms.

Not necessarily. We don't know the exact salinity of all the ancient
upland lakes -- we needn't assume that they were all freshwater.

They must have been able to immediately
>live in waters much saltier than the present oceans, AND handle strongly
>acidic, mercury-laden waters.

We can't assume uniform rates of addition of toxins, or their uniform
mixing. Distribution of ores shows that these things were localized both
geographically and stratigraphically. So I don't believe that the whole
ocean was poisoned. Billions of diatoms died, presumably because they hit
conditions they could not live in. But others evidently have survived.

> You are actually suggesting a miracle.

That any of us is here is a miracle.

K