The Ice Age: An Introduction

Description of the Ice Age
The Ice Age was a time when much of the northern hemisphere was covered with ice. In North America there was the Laurentide Ice Sheet. The Laurentide Ice Sheet covered most of Canada and parts of the United States. This ice sheet was probably 1-2 miles thick. The Cordelleran Ice Sheet covered the western coast of Alaska, and Canada. In Europe there were the Scandinavian Ice Sheet and the Barents Ice Sheet and the Kara Ice Sheet. The Antarctic was covered with its own ice sheet. Over the Arctic Ocean and the North Atlantic, ice covered the water. The high mountains were capped with ice and glaciers came down their sides. Even in the tropics this was true. Most of the world was drier than today, but some places were wetter. These included southern California and North Africa.

Evidence for an Ice Age
So how do scientists know where the ice was? Today, glaciers are remnants of the great ice sheets of the past. Glaciers and ice sheets leave behind similar geophysical characteristics. These include seven different items. Striations are scratches left behind by the rocks that are carried along under the ice as it moves. Moraines are the rocks that are pushed ahead of the ice and left behind when the ice retreats. Erratics are boulders that are carried on top of the ice and left behind on high ledges when the ice melts. Drumlins are places where the ice pressed the ground down and the hole remains after the ice leaves. Eskers are formed by dirt that was carried along by water melting off the ice. Drumlins are piles of dirt that were deformed by the moving ice into a teardrop shape. U-shaped valleys are flat bottomed valleys formed by the moving ice.
There are also hints in the ice cores of Greenland and Antarctica and in the sediment cores of the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

Cause of the Ice Age
Evolutionists have a difficult time explaining the Ice Age. The problem is that there are two conflicting conditions for an Ice Age. First you need cool summers so that the snow and ice from the winter does not melt. Secondly, you need warm weather so that the water will evaporate and give lots of snowfall. With uniformitarian ideas, this is almost impossible.
However, the Flood of Noah’s day explains this well. The volcanoes during and after the Flood would have left much dust in the atmosphere. The earth’s surface would have been almost bare of vegetation. The wind which dried the surface of the earth would also have cooled it off. Together these three things would make the land much cooler than today.
At the same time, the volcanoes and the tectonic activity would have greatly warmed the oceans. The warm oceans would create a great deal of moisture which would be blown over the cold land. Warm moisture over cold land would fall as snow or ice. This could cause the Ice Age. Probably the Ice Age began soon after the Flood and reached its maximum in 500 years. It then began to melt and was basically at today’s levels in 50 years.

Impact of the Ice Age
Job lived about 300 years after the Flood. This would probably have been during the Ice Age. In Job 38:22-30, God talks about hail, snow, ice, and the freezing of the deep (ocean). If Job lived during the Ice Age, he might have known people who had seen the great walls of ice in Northern Europe
As the people traveled away from Babel, anyone traveling northward would have soon found the climate becoming inhospitable. The cold would have made it difficult for plants to grow, and the animals would probably migrate making hunting hard. Lack of sunlight combined with a shortage of fruit would have caused rickets, the disease that shaped Neandertal’s body.
The water in the ice sheets would have come out of the oceans, lowering their level and forming a land bridge between Siberia and Alaska. This would have allowed the Native Americans to travel from Babel to North America. It is possible it also made migration throughout the Pacific islands easier also.
The area around Babel, Mesopotamia, Palestine and Egypt for example, would have had excellent climate for rapid growth, as is seen in the early civilizations in this area.

Gospel of Q

I picked up The Secrets of Judas by James M. Robinson. It was one dollar at Dollar Tree and worth every penny. From what I can tell, Robinson is a Gnostic scholar -- a scholar of Gnostic writings and a scholar who is a Gnostic. I will probably share more later, but this really stood out to me.

According to Robinson, the only thing the apostles gave us is the Sayings Gospel Q. This contained sayings of Jesus without any narrative. There are no document copies of this Gospel, not even a single scrap. The only evidence for it is that Matthew and Luke both contain sayings that are not in Mark. They had to get those sayings from somewhere. Scholars call that "somewhere" Q. I call it "Jesus"

Maybe some background is needed. Robinson claims that both Matthew and Luke took Mark (the first written gospel in his theory) and Q and combined them with their own ideas to write their two Gospels. He denies that either of them were eyewitnesses of Jesus and even that they were honest in their accounts. However, he was interested in discovering the Q document which they used. In 2000 he and others published The Critical Edition of Q. How do they know what Q contained? Anything that Matthew and Luke agree on, that they did not get from Mark, came from Q.

But listen to these quotes.

Since Q itself does not have chapter and verse numbers, we make use of Luke's chapter and verse numbers when quoting Q. This is because Luke follows Q's sequence more faithfully than does Matthew. Since there is no birth narrative in Q....

How do we know Luke followed Q "faithfully" if we are making up Q from Matthew and Luke?! I think Matthew was more faithful. (No, I think they were both divinely inspired. Just making a point.) How do we know Q didn't have a birth narrative? Maybe Matthew like the one in Q and Luke thought he could make up a better one.

My point is if the Gospels are not inspired, anyone can make up any theory about why this story or quote is here but not there. We can make an undiscovered, theoretical document say anything we want. It proves nothing.

Steve aka Jubal

Welcome

This week someone suggested that I needed to write a book because it is hard too process all the information in one message. Also, I have wanted to start a website, but I don't have the time to design and maintain one. At least not yet. So this blog will be my way to start a webpage and a book at the same time.

My topics will be organized, Lord willing, around the following theme.

CREATION

Design -- the design we see in our world points back to the great Designer of Genesis 1-2

Decay -- the decay we see in our world (science points to the Second Law of Thermodynamics) directs us back to the fall and curse in Genesis 3

Destruction -- God destroyed the world and sinful man with a worldwide, yearlong flood. This can still be seen in rocks and fossils. I like talking about the Ark also.

Dispersion -- The Tower of Babel led to the dispersion of mankind around the world. The Echoes of Babel can still be heard. I include a study of Chinese language and the Ice Age in this topic.

Dinos -- Dinosaurs are cool. They also point to almost all the topics from Design to Dispersion.

Digs -- Archaeology gives support for God's Word but it also fills in some of the background about the Bible stories.

Diversions -- Jokes, Fake ads, Short Stories

APOLOGETICS

Divinity -- Jesus was God-man. That fact is under vicious attack today. The evidence, however, is still there.

Documents -- Another fact under attack is the reliability of the New Testament. This is an extremely exciting topic to me. The evidence is overwhelming.

HOLINESS WORLDVIEW

Downstairs/Upstairs -- Both the world and the church have accepted the concept that truth is established by science, observation, experience while religion is just an experience.

Worldview -- Being a Christian is not just adding a new background to your screen, or adding a new piece of software, it is changing your operating system (hopefully from Microsoft to Mac). Being a Christian affects our view of every topic in our lives.

I need a "D" word for that last one. I also need your comments, especially as my blogs get started. That will help me refine my writing and thinking before I publish it as a book.

Welcome

Steve aka Jubal