The search for Sodom and Gomorrah: Scientists drill beneath Dead Sea seeking priceless data



By Batsheva Sobelman

	Share on facebookShare on twitterShare on print Share on email More Sharing Services4

Rock samples underwater for eons are likely to be better preserved, researchers say. Expectations are high that the lowest place on Earth can answer questions --- on climate change and other key matters
JewishWorldReview.com |


EAD SEA — (MCT) If you thought you couldn't get any lower than the Dead Sea, think again. You can go under it.

Scientists here are drilling 1,640 feet beneath the bottom of the Dead Sea, to a depth of more than 2,600 feet below sea level.

Rock samples that have been underwater for eons are likely to be better preserved, they say, than samples taken from under an exposed surface, which can be damaged by aridity and erosion.

As a result, the Dead Sea bore hole is expected to contain priceless information about the planet's past and to offer insight on its future. Expectations are high that the lowest place on Earth can answer questions on climate change, earthquake risk and untapped natural resources.

Since the region was mentioned in biblical contexts that include Sodom and Gomorrah, the ruins of which some scholars believe are submerged under the Dead Sea, the $2.5-million project might also crack an ancient mystery or two.

It's a massive undertaking. A unique rig was constructed and then towed more than 4 miles into the salty sea, where drilling will go on for 40 days and nights, perhaps appropriate for the region.

Forty scientists from six countries are taking part in the deep-drilling program, sponsored by the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the German-based International Continental Scientific Drilling Program, which conducts deep sea and lake drilling worldwide.

The samples are expected to provide a sort of tree-ring-style annual log that will enable experts to say, for example, that year X "was a very rainy year," says Zvi Ben-Avraham, head of the Minerva Dead Sea Research Center at Tel-Aviv University.

At a nearby laboratory, the rings are clearly visible through Plexiglas tubes containing the first samples. A pair of layers, brown and white, represent a normal year with a wet season and a dry one. Variations bear witness to drought, flood and trauma. "These are the pages of our history," says Amotz Agnon of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

The Dead Sea — a lake, really — is what has remained of the series of ancient bodies of water in the Jordan Valley. It fills one of Earth's deepest holes, located in a depression on the border between two tectonic plates forming part of the long Syro-African fault line. The plates are still moving. Small tremors are not infrequent, but Ben-Avraham says the region is relatively calm. The last big quake occurred in 1927.

Experts say the Dead Sea should provide invaluable historical data because the region served as a corridor through which humankind migrated from Africa.

Filled tubes are kept in a freezer outside an unassuming lab in Kibbutz Ein Gedi, in the hills above the water. Early batches have been passed through a scanner that buzzes and beeps while sending data to a computer.

More tubes lie on the floor of the lab, soon to be put through the machine. In one, a 4-inch stretch of mud reflects a century-long wet period around 400 years ago, in what is known as the Little Ice Age. Deeper samples should corroborate other documented events such as the volcanic eruption of Santorini about 3,500 years ago.

Data contained in these "archives," as Moti Stein of the Geological Survey of Israel puts it, are of global importance. The data of past relations between two climate belts, the Mediterranean and the desert, will help prepare climate models in times of global warming and desertification, Stein says.

The Dead Sea itself is as unusual as the drilling project.

Fresh water flowing into the sea is trapped; with no outflow, the only way out is up. High evaporation rates in this hot, arid zone result in extreme hyper-salinity.

The buoyancy draws tourists who come for a float. Others are attracted by the purported cosmetic and healing properties of the minerals, fabled since antiquity, or simply for the striking landscape.

But the Dead Sea is in trouble. Receding about 3 feet a year, the water, pessimists warn, could soon vanish. Stein says the lake has naturally recovered from catastrophic aridity before.

But humans are playing a role. "We're not helping," says Michael Lazar, the marine geophysicist from the University of Haifa who manages the project.

Tectonic plates aren't the only things grating against each other. There's regional politics too. The Dead Sea fills an area shared by Israel, Jordan and the Palestinians. The site's nomination for the Seven Wonders of the World competition was almost undone by conflicting political claims.

Though no Jordanian or Palestinian scientists were to be seen during a recent media tour of the site, organizers said the multinational project includes both. A project official said Arab scientists were keeping a low profile because of political sensitivities.

"The Dead Sea doesn't belong to Israel, Jordan or the Palestinians," Lazar said. "They're in, and we're happy to have them."

....

Taken from: http://www.jewishworldreview.com/1210/dead_sea_drilling.php3

Science Supports Proverb of Jesus

.... Posted on February 4, 2013 in Bible and Theology, Health, Human Body, Mind and Brain, Philosophy of Science, Politics and Ethics

It is more blessed to give than to receive, said Jesus and a team of psychologists.

The psychologists in New York were not setting out to confirm Jesus’ words, but the headline on Medical Xpress stated, almost with surprise, “Study finds it actually is better (and healthier) to give than to receive.” Two decades of prior research had not found that recipients of help got the same benefits as the givers. Now, a five-year study involving 846 individuals linked decreased mortality with the stress-releasing pleasure of giving.

 

“These findings go beyond past analyses to indicate that the health benefits of helping behavior derive specifically from stress-buffering processes,” Poulin says, “and provide important guidance for understanding why helping behavior specifically may promote health and, potentially, for how social processes in general may influence health.”

The words of Jesus, “It is more blessed to give than to receive,” do not appear in the four gospels of the New Testament, but instead were quoted by Paul to the Ephesian elders in the book of Acts of the Apostles, chapter 20, verse 35. This indicates that many of Jesus’ teachings were remembered decades later by other eyewitnesses besides Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. This should not be surprising, because many thousands heard Jesus teach. As John ended his gospel (21:25), “Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.”

 

It’s nice when science finally catches up to the Master Planner’s truths two millennia later, but once again, the thinking of scientists (if that’s what you can call psychologists) is orthogonal to the intent of Jesus’ words. Jesus was not saying, “Behave this way for your own health and happiness.” He was encouraging the disciples to forget themselves and focus on others. Not every selfless deed results in personal reward; look at soldiers who fell on grenades to protect their comrades. When health and happiness do accrue from acts of helping others, fine; but anyone who engages in helping others for his own health misses the point. Psychology can only look at the “what,” not the “why,” the “is” not the “ought.”

 

Wouldn’t it be something if the Creator built our brains so that righteous behavior would usually result in health and happiness as a by-product? That would be like intelligent design. (It doesn’t work with impure motives, though—that’s part of the design, too.)

....

Taken from: http://crev.info/2013/02/science-supports-proverb-of-jesus/