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Author Topic:   The Geological Timescale is Fiction whose only reality is stacks of rock
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 211 of 1257 (788297)
07-29-2016 12:28 AM
Reply to: Message 210 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:20 PM


Re: temporary sidetrack
Couldn't possibly be that they were living there at the time, right?
Dinosaurs were definitely land animals.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 210 by Faith, posted 07-28-2016 7:20 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 220 by Faith, posted 07-29-2016 7:23 AM Dr Adequate has replied

  
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 212 of 1257 (788298)
07-29-2016 12:34 AM
Reply to: Message 208 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:02 PM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
Soil on top of soil?
Yes.
No landscape?
Obviously a landscape.
Were they lithified? Clearly the strata that represent separate time periods had to have lithified long before the next layer did, or possibly even got deposited — because of the many millions of years between the time periods you know.
There is no time between two consecutive time periods.
After the soil/rock of the previous time period has been laid down, how long are we talking about before the soil of the next layer starts accumulating?
0.0 seconds.
ome trees put down incredibly deep roots for instance. How come such root systems aren’t common in the rocks that supposedly once supported a whole time period of living things in a landscape? (Don’t try to tell me they’re common; I know they’re not).
Well, a lot of the time tree roots rot, you know. Most things do, which is why most things aren't fossilized. But in conditions in which tree stumps are preserved, the tree roots are often found attached to them.
The thing is we DO have to think in terms of rock-landscape-rock, and in terms of not a shred of that landscape remaining on the surface of the rock either, just some fossilized flora and fauna in the rock.
Nothing anyone has said gives a reasonable explanation of this that I can see.
We have said clearly, distinctly, and repeatedly that the scenario you have just sketched out didn't happen, couldn't happen, wouldn't happen, and is directly contradicted by all the evidence. We are not obliged to produce a "reasonable explanation" for imaginary things in your head.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.
Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 208 by Faith, posted 07-28-2016 7:02 PM Faith has replied

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Boof
Member (Idle past 246 days)
Posts: 99
From: Australia
Joined: 08-02-2010


Message 213 of 1257 (788300)
07-29-2016 12:42 AM
Reply to: Message 208 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:02 PM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
Faith writes:
But if it wasn’t lithified it’s hard to see how it could ever maintain any semblance of flatness as we see in the strata now. It also hard to suppose that a whole landscape formed on it with trees and rivers and waterfalls and so on because all those should have left their mark in it, but didn’t. Some trees put down incredibly deep roots for instance. How come such root systems aren’t common in the rocks that supposedly once supported a whole time period of living things in a landscape? (Don’t try to tell me they’re common; I know they’re not).
But that’s just one of many problems. The thing is we DO have to think in terms of rock-landscape-rock, and in terms of not a shred of that landscape remaining on the surface of the rock either, just some fossilized flora and fauna in the rock.
Nothing anyone has said gives a reasonable explanation of this that I can see.
The idea that there aren't landscapes, hills, mountains, rivers found within sedimentary sequences is simply incorrect. Just do a google image search on 'seismic section' and you can see all sorts of preserved features.
Geological studies show us that most major sedimentary deposits occur either as a result of rising sea levels (such as often happens after significant glaciation events) or due to land subsidence (as might occur due to crustal thinning during rifting). As the water level rises in a marine transgression a characteristic sequence of rocks is often deposited - check out this site to see one way geologists might identify transgressive sequences in outcrop. Marine transgressions at specific locations can often be correlated with other locations using biostratigraphy and isotopic analyses to create curves of global sea level changes. Here is an example of calculated sea level change for the last 350,000 years:
(source: http://lirrf.org/posts/paleo-reefs-last-126000-years/).
The key is that these transgressions normally take tens of thousands of years for the sea level to change from its minimum to its maximum (eg in the diagram above kya on the x axis = tens of thousands of years before present). As the sea level rises the shoreline moves gradually further ‘inwards’ depositing coarse beach sands overlain by silts then shales etc. So the reason that you don’t normally see tree roots still ‘in place’ in the lithified rocks is because the tree ecosystems retreat inwards as the sea level gradually rises. You don’t often see trees living beyond the waterline in a coastal beach environment do you?
Interesting where we do (as you pointed out, quite rarely) see tree roots and sometimes tree stumps preserved 'in-situ' in the geological record it’s normally in locations where the vegetation has been rapidly inundated by mud or ash flows, ie more of a catastrophic scenario (ie Biblical flood perhaps).
So the geological evidence supports relatively slow marine incursions and basin development and not wholesale catastrophic indundation.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 208 by Faith, posted 07-28-2016 7:02 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
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vimesey
Member
Posts: 1398
From: Birmingham, England
Joined: 09-21-2011


(5)
Message 214 of 1257 (788302)
07-29-2016 1:41 AM
Reply to: Message 208 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:02 PM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
So I’m trying to make sense of this, vinesey. I can’t.
Soil on top of soil? No landscape? What?
Ok, this is where my original example of Roman ruins in Britain is so useful.
So the Roman buildings in question were (obviously enough) built on top of the the British landscape as it was 2000 odd years ago. They get abandoned, and over time, they end up getting buried under more and more soil and assorted other sediments. (We know that this is the case, because we have to dig down, under a couple of feet of soil, to unearth them).
So we have a picture of a landscape, where more and more soil is being deposited, certainly on parts of it, over 2000 years. It remains a landscape - it retains a surface, which gets forested, or farmed, or built on or whatever - but parts of it are having more and more soil accreted on top of them.
And as they do, stuff (Roman villas, dead animals) gets buried in the accreted soil.
Eventually, in certain areas of the planet, accretion, tectonic and volcanic activity, and other geological activity, will mean that the accreted soil will get pushed far enough down below the surface, that it will be subjected to such pressure and temperature, that it gets lithified. And if the conditions are also such that the buried stuff (Roman villas, dead animals) didn't rot away in the meantime, they'll get lithified too, and turned into fossils.
Now, the only piece to add to this picture, is why the layers of lithified soil (ie layers of rock) look different - in other words, they look such obvious layers. And this is because, over time, conditions on the accreting surface of the landscape, which is gradually building up this eventually-to-be-lithified pile of soil, change. And whereas in one century or millennium, it might be good arable soil which is being deposited, in another, it might become sand or clay or ash (because of an encroaching shoreline, or a meandering river, or a volcano, or whatever). The sediment which then starts accreting looks different from the previous sediment, and when the whole lot gets lithified, the rock that it lithifies into looks different too - which is why you get layers of different looking rock, one on top,of the other.
The key thing to grasp, is that every grain of that sedimentary rock, at one time formed part of the surface of some of the landscape on the planet.

Could there be any greater conceit, than for someone to believe that the universe has to be simple enough for them to be able to understand it ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 208 by Faith, posted 07-28-2016 7:02 PM Faith has replied

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mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 215 of 1257 (788303)
07-29-2016 6:25 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Faith
07-21-2016 6:53 PM


But if the global flood story is true, we should see highly organized sediments and fossil sequences that are structured into discrete, systematic units
I'm not sure who said this but it is a prime example of an untested conditional probably based on an strawman version of the flood. The flood had an inundatory and recessional stage. The recessional stage consisted of an abative phase and a dispersive phase. We can explain geomorphology by expounding the abative phase, and we can explain the creation of strata during the inundatory stage.
The placement of fossils would be dependent on the particular circumstances of their burial, based on whether they had been trawled and dumped, etc...flume experiments have proven than no matter which strata a fossil was in, because strata is laid down simultaneously when there is a current, the fossils would all be the same age if the strata was created by a current . This would mean that the fossil patterns would only represent the ecological zones that existed at the time of the catastrophism.
I see untested conditionals a LOT with conspiracy theorists, they go something like this;
"If we had gone to the moon the radiation would have killed the astronauts".
Unless we can go to the moon to test if that is true under the original apollo conditions, then the conditional implication only remains a speculation like if we can't test a flood it only remains speculation, because conditional implications are characterized by consequents that MUST and indeed 100% always follow the antecedent, as proven by experimentation or testing. So speculative attempts to argue, "if the flood had happened then X, Y and Z would exist", are usually silly attempts to flippantly dismiss the flood when in reality the person arguing the conditional, is not arguing from a place of knowledge for they couldn't possibly predict the full outcome of a global flood, nobody could. We can only state what would reasonably follow had there been a flood, as a reasonable assumption.
What we actually see from experimental testing with flumes, is that uniform principles do not apply to flowing currents which provably show that facies can be created quickly, and they break both the principle of superposition and continuity.
IOW, when strata, under experimental conditions, are formed quickly, it can be shown that they are created by direction of the current and are laid down vertically and laterally, SIMULTANEOUSLY.
(of course the flip-side of conditionals, is we can also use our own, and say, "if long ages are true then we would see less scarcity of plant fossils in many formations containing abundant animal fossils of herbivores"
The Coconino sandstone in the Grand Canyon has many track-ways (animals), but is almost devoid of plants. Implication: these rocks are not ecosystems but are evidence of catastrophic transportation.
Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.
Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 1 by Faith, posted 07-21-2016 6:53 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
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mike the wiz
Member
Posts: 4752
From: u.k
Joined: 05-24-2003


Message 216 of 1257 (788304)
07-29-2016 7:03 AM
Reply to: Message 214 by vimesey
07-29-2016 1:41 AM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
Your post makes sense to a degree, but not when we consider the actual fossils that exist, a lot of them in the middle of fighting, giving birth, or their necks thrown back in the suffocation position. When we consider the fossilization of soft-tissued fossils such as jellyfish or whatever..and what about the diving-Ichthyosaur that had it's head buried in one million years worth of rock. The explanation for that, through gradual process, by the scientist that explained it, was basically SILLY. And would the roman-mud have marine forms in it later on, like all the strata on earth do? Be them micro-marine forms or forms such as nautiloids in the grand canyon
While your explanation is plausible, it isn't based on real science, only assumptions of uniformity.
It's easy to say that in time the roman remains and animal remains will become fossils, but that's only an extrapolation. The flume experiments for stratification being created by large water-flow, explains the segregation of lamination, explains the homogeneously separated strata, and explains the particle-placement of the strata. Experiments have shown it can all happen quickly so just from my own personal position, why would I accept your extrapolation that over time there will be fossilisation and stratification, rather than accepted direct experimental evidence?
The pressure caused by a large body of water would lead to many bizarre instances of fossilisation.
So question: you propose a plausible scenario but you can't wait to see if your prediction comes true, meanwhile actual operational science that proves stratification can happen quickly, is conducted actually proving strata isn't laid down by slow superposition. Are you going to accept science or are you going to go with uniformity-assumptions which are not tested?
If you would like to have an understanding of some of the actual science conducted, I recommend you watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWlNTLPozMo
Edited by mike the wiz, : No reason given.

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Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 217 of 1257 (788305)
07-29-2016 7:15 AM
Reply to: Message 215 by mike the wiz
07-29-2016 6:25 AM


But if the global flood story is true, we should see highly organized sediments and fossil sequences that are structured into discrete, systematic units
I'm not sure who said this
Hi Mike,
Sorry if the reference wasn't clear but I didn't say it so please change your post so it doesn't look like I did. It was written by herebedragons (HBD).
Thanks.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
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Tangle
Member
Posts: 9489
From: UK
Joined: 10-07-2011
Member Rating: 4.9


Message 218 of 1257 (788306)
07-29-2016 7:17 AM
Reply to: Message 216 by mike the wiz
07-29-2016 7:03 AM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
MtW writes:
and what about the diving-Ichthyosaur that had it's head buried in one million years worth of rock. The explanation for that, through gradual process, by the scientist that explained it, was basically SILLY.
You didn't read the scientific explanation did you? You just took what the creationist said as correct without trying to find out what the science actually said. Basically, they lied and misrepresented what the science says.
You can not read what the fossil's describer says about these claims again here if you don't want to. Which you won't, because it spoils your silly story.
http://plesiosaur.com/creationism/analysis.php?artiID=20

Je suis Charlie. Je suis Ahmed. Je suis Juif. Je suis Parisien.
Life, don't talk to me about life - Marvin the Paranoid Android
"Science adjusts it's views based on what's observed.
Faith is the denial of observation so that Belief can be preserved."
- Tim Minchin, in his beat poem, Storm.

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vimesey
Member
Posts: 1398
From: Birmingham, England
Joined: 09-21-2011


(1)
Message 219 of 1257 (788307)
07-29-2016 7:18 AM
Reply to: Message 208 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:02 PM


Re: How we get from rock to landscape to rock, that's the question
Clearly the strata that represent separate time periods had to have lithified long before the next layer did, or possibly even got deposited — because of the many millions of years between the time periods you know.
One more thing, which may assist - when we say (possibly a little loosely) that there are millions of years between sedimentary rock layers, we generally don't mean "in between" the layers - ie separating them. We mean that the layers represent a continuous aggregation, which between them account for millions of years' worth of deposition. Kind of like saying some sportsmen or women have got 200 international appearances between them. We're not specifying anything about a gap in between them - rather referring to a shared period of time. (With the top layers being deposited at the end of that period and the bottom ones at the start of it).
And references to geological ages are just shorthand for saying "the period between x and y million years ago". They're not references to specific rock layers. (We do refer to rock layers as being Cambrian etc, but this is just a convenient way of saying that the layers in question were formed in the period between x and y million years ago).

Could there be any greater conceit, than for someone to believe that the universe has to be simple enough for them to be able to understand it ?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 208 by Faith, posted 07-28-2016 7:02 PM Faith has replied

Replies to this message:
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Faith 
Suspended Member (Idle past 1444 days)
Posts: 35298
From: Nevada, USA
Joined: 10-06-2001


Message 220 of 1257 (788308)
07-29-2016 7:23 AM
Reply to: Message 211 by Dr Adequate
07-29-2016 12:28 AM


Re: temporary sidetrack
Couldn't possibly be that they were living there at the time, right?
Dinosaurs were definitely land animals.
This is typical Dr. A oh-so-cutesy-clever obfuscation I'm going to try to ignore. The problem is some people probably think he's saying something meaningful so I feel obliged to correct it.
My point, which ought to be obvious in the context of this discussion, is that I'd expect to find land animals fossilized in an area supposed to have been covered by water, because I expect that ALL the fossils were the result of the Flood. They may or may not have lived in the area where they died but they died when it was covered by water in any case. Claiming that the dinosaurs died and their corpses drifted into the seaway where they were ultimately buried and fossilized is just a clever interpretation designed to deny the Flood. Not terribly likely either since the corpses would have been severely scavenged and probably not buried or fossilized at all, the conditions not being conducive to that scenario. I wonder how many of these corpses they're talking about.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 211 by Dr Adequate, posted 07-29-2016 12:28 AM Dr Adequate has replied

Replies to this message:
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PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 221 of 1257 (788309)
07-29-2016 7:30 AM
Reply to: Message 220 by Faith
07-29-2016 7:23 AM


Re: temporary sidetrack
Of course, I already pointed out that it was possible for bodies to drift out to sea - without any knowledge of these fossils.
And if we only find a few such remains amidst large amounts of fossilised sea life that would be the sensible explanation.
This is why I asked for large numbers of dinosaur remains in marine strata - because if you are trying to show that there is no relation between the environment inferred from the geologic record and the fossil life found there a few expected anomalies are simply not good enough.

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Pressie
Member
Posts: 2103
From: Pretoria, SA
Joined: 06-18-2010


Message 222 of 1257 (788310)
07-29-2016 8:10 AM
Reply to: Message 215 by mike the wiz
07-29-2016 6:25 AM


mike the wiz writes:
I'm not sure who said this but it is a prime example of an untested conditional probably based on an strawman version of the flood.
Which magic flood? There's absolutely no evidence for magic global floods on earth during the last 4.5 billion years. But, the evidence left from magic floods could have any magic properties, I guess.

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jar
Member (Idle past 394 days)
Posts: 34026
From: Texas!!
Joined: 04-20-2004


Message 223 of 1257 (788311)
07-29-2016 9:55 AM
Reply to: Message 208 by Faith
07-28-2016 7:02 PM


It really is pretty simple Faith.
Faith writes:
While one of the layers was resting on top of another, both apparently loose sediment according to you, what was going on in the strata below? Were they lithified? Clearly the strata that represent separate time periods had to have lithified long before the next layer did, or possibly even got deposited — because of the many millions of years between the time periods you know.
Utter nonsense Faith. Just plain silly.
If you open your eyes you can see exactly what was going on; it is exactly the same thing that is going on today.
Of course the layer below did not have to be lithified before the next layer was deposited, just like today, but sometimes it was, also just like today. Where new material is deposited on much older lithified material a new unconformity is being created. We can see such unconformities being created today where older layers are exposed and being covered by new layers of material.
A great example is the soil being farmed in the Appalachians. There old old material, the roots of great mountain ranges that have weathered and eroded down to the stubs that still exist today are being covered by new material that in turn someday may also get lithified. When that happens the geologists of that far in the future time will find lithified rock from the Ordovician time period covered by lithified rock from the Cenozoic Era. They will note that there is a gap of about 500 million years between the two layers.
Faith writes:
Some idea of the timeline you have in mind might help. After the soil/rock of the previous time period has been laid down, how long are we talking about before the soil of the next layer starts accumulating?
That really varies Faith. In most cases there is not much time between layers getting put down but as shown in the paragraphs above, there can also be millions of years. That does not mean the surface sat untouched for those millions of years but rather just the opposite. As shown in the example of the Appalachians what happened is that for millions of years the layer first raised up and then was weathered down; tall mountains getting worn down to minor stubs.
That process is what creates the unconformities and why they are different than the norm.
Faith writes:
The understanding I get of the geological interpretation of these rocks is that the fossilized living things inside them, as well as the qualities of the rock itself, tell us about a landscape with living things in it that once lived on that very spot. Sketches of such landscapes aren’t hard to find, they show whatever flora and fauna are found fossilized in the rock living in this makebelieve landscape. On that very spot means on top of the slab of rock beneath I assume, which may or may not have been lithified at the time. Somehow or other a landscape had to occur on that surface, had to grow up after that rock slab was already there, whether lithified or not
In most cases what is living is not living on the lithified surface except as noted above. They are living on surfaces just like those we see today. The conclusive evidence for that is the stuff that died and got buried in material that was not yet lithified. If the surface had already been lithified the things like leaves and bones and tree trunks and spores and seed cones and tracks and insects and scales could not get inside the rock but would just be on the rock.
Again, we are all living on a surface that rests on some lithified layers today but the surface we live on is not yet lithified. And the landscapes in the past also lived on surfaces that were above some lithified layers but not yet lithified themselves.

My Sister's Website: Rose Hill Studios

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Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


Message 224 of 1257 (788314)
07-29-2016 11:05 AM
Reply to: Message 215 by mike the wiz
07-29-2016 6:25 AM


I'm not sure who said this but it is a prime example of an untested conditional probably based on an strawman version of the flood.
Who said it would be, implicitly, every creationist who attributes the geological and fossil record to the Flood.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 215 by mike the wiz, posted 07-29-2016 6:25 AM mike the wiz has not replied

  
Dr Adequate
Member (Idle past 284 days)
Posts: 16113
Joined: 07-20-2006


(1)
Message 225 of 1257 (788316)
07-29-2016 11:09 AM
Reply to: Message 220 by Faith
07-29-2016 7:23 AM


Re: temporary sidetrack
My point, which ought to be obvious in the context of this discussion, is that I'd expect to find land animals fossilized in an area supposed to have been covered by water ...
And so would I, though for sane reasons. But also you should expect to find marine life in deserts, since you deny they were deserts. Good luck with that.
Claiming that the dinosaurs died and their corpses drifted into the seaway where they were ultimately buried and fossilized is just a clever interpretation designed to deny the Flood.
I should point out that it's not always about you.

This message is a reply to:
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