> > Right. But *are* there any third-party (meaning, outside of religious texts) sources of eye-witness accounts of any of the miracles of the Bible? If there are, that'd go a heck of a long way for me in convincing me that the Bible is something I should at least look at more closely.
>
> Eyewitness, I don't know. Here's an anecdotal something that may be relevant, however. It's totally random that I know this:
>
> Josephus was an ancient historian who lived from A.D. 37 to about 100. He was a close friend of emperors Vespasian and Titus, to the point of taking their family name, Flavius. He was a greatly respected historian whose writings have been considered reliable, not to mention expansive, and these writings, or at least much of them, survive.
>
> An excerpt of his work, as translated by William Wheaton on page 39 of "The Works of Josephus" corroborates the turning of Lot's wife into salt:
>
> "But Lot's wife continually turning back to view the city as she went from it, and being too nicely inquisitive what would become of it, although God had forbidden her to do so, was changed into a pillar of salt; for I have seen it, and it remains at this day."
>
> In the second century, Irenaeus, the Bishop of Lyons, also verified that Lot's wife remained "a pillar of salt unto this day."
>
> Unfortunately we can't verify this today, as the area where Sodom used to be was the Vale of the Siddim, now filled with water and known as the Dead Sea.

The dead Sea has been filled since long before the 2nd Century. Between 1.6 million and 10,000 years ago, the Dead Sea was actually 200m higher and covered a much wider area than it does today. As the water evaporated faster than it was being replaced by rainwater, the lake shrunk to its present size.

Today it is about 60km long and 14km across at its widest point.

The future of the lake is uncertain and geologists believe the evaporation process is being speeded up due to increased industrialization along the lake's banks, with water being used for industrial processes.

Water diversion projects along the River Jordan, which feeds into the Dead Sea, are swallowing up more of this water.

These factors may ultimately result in the Dead Sea eventually evolving into a giant sandy hollow, at wich point archaeology of the area (and presumably the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah) will become quite easy.

winter"Unless they turn out to be elsewhere"mute