The Grand Canyon Paradox

If the Grand Canyon was carved by the flood, and the geologic column was created by the flood, what created the geologic column at the grand canyon? I suppose you could say the grand canyon's column was created, but if it was, it was created with fossils, but remember, creationists need the flood to explain the order of the fossils. So just how was the geologic column and grand canyon formed?Answers in Genesis BUSTED!: Questions for Creationists{Note from Adminnemooseus - This message 1 is from message 3 of the "Questions for Creationists" "Proposed New Topic".}

This is a dilemma, not a paradox.____Edited by Archer Opterix, : html.

Technically yes. If a creationist comes along and explains it it will then become a paradox, or perhaps a misunderstanding.

I don't think that will become a paradox either.

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No need to be nave, mate. The flood lasted for 150 days, no? That's plenty enough time for the mess-up slush to settle out (creating the column). Then, as the waters receded, it carved the canyon. It might seem strange that the canyon could be carved in so short a time; but two things you must remember: (1) there was a LOT of water on the Earth, and it all soaked up/ran off VERY fast, which made the erosion quicker, and (2) the layers were SOFT right after the flood, and so it would've taken even less to wear them down. Combine #1 w/ #2 and it's pretty easy to see how the canyon could erode that quickly, right after the depositing of the column.Oh, also, I'd call this a paradox, but add that it is most certainly solved Jon

Well, most creationists assert that finely striated stratigraphy can be layed down quickly, such as a large catastrophic flood might do. For face value it makes sense. If you take an hour glass and let the sediment fall, it tends to make fine layers. Could you extrapolate that towards the Grand Canyon? I can't say for sure.As well, another part of their argument points to radical curves in the formation of rock. Obviously, that can't happen to solid rock through slow erosion because the rock would snap. But if you, however, have soft, pliable mud after, say, its been immersed in large volumes of water, after the water dries, the sediment will pack and harden, and thus, might explain why there are such curves in solid rock. Creationists don't categorize fossilized organisms age estimates via the geologic column. In fact, they tend to vehemently oppose it as being credible to begin with. Rather, they tend to point out places where clustering of fossils have been found in basins. Obviously, a mass graveyard can only accumulate in a few ways naturally. Most notably would be a flood that swept the animals in to a run-off, they died, then fossilized.Are they right, even in part? I don't know. I'm not much of an advocate for geological arguments or age estimate arguments. But what you are presenting is not unique and they have offered rebuttals to the paradoxes you describe. Edited by nemesis_juggernaut, : No reason given.

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"It is better to shun the bait, than struggle in the snare." -Ravi Zacharias

OK, it is solved and I will remove it from my site. Now, about the bent strata, this is explained because slow, steady pressure can bend rock (and expand it) over time. I'm not sure about your proposal that the canyon could be carved out in a short time, but I'd like to see the evidence that it was.

Well, actually it can. First off it isn't erosion (that is the wearing away of rock). It is called deformation and rock under enough pressure and heat can deform.If you disagree you need to explain fossils in the rock that are deformed with it. That is impossible if the rock is mud.I think you should read:
Message 5That seems to cover, as Bills great posts always did, it.

First of all, erosion does not cause deformation.Second of all, if you don't want to wade through Bill's most excellent yet technical description, the issue with deformed rock is that we KNOW it was solid when it deformed because of the evidence.The main evidence is call "strain" and that is where the internal structure of the rock is bent in the same direction and curvature of the rock itself.Trying to bend the internal structure of the rock (the grains, the intrusions, fossils, etc.) is akin to the task of bending a metal rod that is under water by only manipulating the water. It just cannot be done. It is physically impossible.The poster child for this is of course fossil strain. There are rocks where fossils themselves are bent in the direction that the rock is. How could this be if the rock was "soft, pliable mud"? Anwer, it was not "soft, pliable mud".Moreover, we can go into the lab and put rock under pressure, heat, and mechanical manipulation and see that it behaves plasticly without fracturing. It leaves behind distinct characteristics that we can compare to rock we find outside the lab. When these characteristics match, we can know with confidence that the rocks were bent under enormous pressure, heat and mechanical manipulation.And that they were HARD when they were bent. They absolutly had to be. That IS the evidence.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

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Obviously, that can't happen to solid rock through slow erosion because the rock would snap.

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Agreed, that was a poor choice of words. What I was alluding to was that solid rocks can't bend, because of, say, the earth's plates shifting. I'm sure they can. But how would that happen in an area where no volcanic activity takes place? I'm fairly certain that extraordinary heat would be required to melt rock faces the size of large buildings. What was the heat source? I first have to see evidence that fossils were deformed in it before I can make any kind of assessment. I clicked on the link. It looked pretty long considering the OP has several links contained in an already lengthy post. I only skimmed the page. I suppose for the sake of the argument that I will eventually read it, but perhaps in the meantime, you can summarize. Where did this "Bill" go? Anyone know? Or did he just stop posting one day? Edited by nemesis_juggernaut, : No reason given.

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"It is better to shun the bait, than struggle in the snare." -Ravi Zacharias

Actually, an area like that wouldn't have enought heat and pressure to bend rock.Go lower. Way lower. Try the asthenosphere. That would, actually, bend rocks. See, there are more boundary types than just what you have in California (San Andreas Fault). You know, like India. Sliding underneath asia. Where else did you think the Himalayas came from?

I want to post something started by our former member, Faith. She took the time to write it, and it seems to parallel our current conversation. Perhaps she can live vicariously through our conversation.

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The supposed problem of unconformities for a young earth is that it doesn't seem possible they could have occurred in a short period of time. A series of strata supposedly has to be laid down and then upended and eroded flat before the upper often horizontal group was laid down, which supposedly had to accumulate over a long period of time. But it's possible to explain them without assuming all that time. Of course the order of superposition applies, but the creation of an unconformity can occur after all the strata are in place.

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The following pictures give a clue how that could happen. Here previously horizontally laid strata have obviously been twisted in one cataclysmic event. To get the typical configuration of the kind of unconformity that YEC's supposedly can't account for, the tilted strata beneath the horizontal, all that need have happened is, if instead of bending as occurred here, the bent strata had broken, and the upper more horizontal portion had then slid over the lower angled portion. The friction would certainly have eroded the interface all in the same action. In fact there are broken off pieces of strata in the upper picture, to the upper left for instance, which had to have occurred as part of the single event. In the lower picture, had the rock completely broken instead of holding together under the pressure well enough to form the S shape, you'd have had the formation of horizontal strata over upright or angled strata that is said to be inexplicable from the young earth point of view. Not at all inexplicable.

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However, there is also the kind of un/nonconformity at the base of the Grand Canyon, which is the one Paul K says I couldn't explain well enough to please him, but here's the idea: A north-south cross section of the Grand Canyon region shows the unconformity beneath the Canyon that was supposedly laid down and then tilted and then eroded before the upper layers were laid down, tilted strata overlaid by the horizontal strata of the canyon proper. There are a couple of fingers of magma intrusions up through that area, that terminate below the lowest horizontal layer of the canyon. If you have a wide angle view of the region you can see that the canyon area has been uplifted in a sort of mound, and the canyon cuts through this mound a little to the south of its highest point. You can also see that the strata through which the canyon cuts follow the curvature of this mound quite neatly, retaining their parallel relation to each other, which shows that they were already in place when the mound was formed. Had they been laid down afterward, they could not have maintained their parallel condition over the curve, but gravity would have laid them down horizontally and the mound would have looked like an intrusion into the strata.

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Clearly all the strata were in place before the canyon was formed, and my theory is that the canyon itself was caused by the same force that formed the mound, an underground volcanic eruption, which is evidenced by the magma intrusions always shown at the base of the canyon. The eruption caused the whole column of strata to uplift into the mound shape, and the canyon itself was formed as a crack through the mounded strata brought about by the force of the action, which of course would have put tremendous horizontal stress on the strata at the higher levels.

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Assuming there were still large bodies of water left over from the Flood, or even that this area was still largely covered in water itself, the cracking of the earth provided an outlet for a lot of it, which tore away an enormous quantity of the stacked sediments as it rushed in to fill the gap. If you have a view of the entire region including the Grand Staircase to the North of the Grand Canyon, you can see canyons formed in that region as well, and the famous cliffs that form the steps of the staircase are the north sides of what were cracks or canyons from which the south side of each simply washed away in a great rush of water, leaving the plateaus of the staircase. If it hadn't been for the underground volcano the entire region would probably have remained a quiet stack of unexposed sediments up at least to the highest level of the Grand Staircase and perhaps higher. There may also have been an intrusion of magma under the north end of the staircase too though -- some diagrams seem to show that possibility, and the land appears slightly tilted upward to that point too. At least there's a fault line there.

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"It is better to shun the bait, than struggle in the snare." -Ravi Zacharias

hmmmmmm. Faith's storybook description is no less credible then saying God waved his hand and the unconformity's formed out of the void. It is so ridiculous that i hesitate to respond to it.What is always ignored is the simple fact that the bottom layer is often metamorphosed. The A/U at the bottom of Grand Canyon is high grade metamorphic rock - requiring high temperature/pressure/time. The temperature of that massive formation would have to be several hundred degrees!. The lower and upper layer rock are typically of completely different composition since they were often formed millions of years apart.Also the bottom layer often contain erosional horizons with the weathered and eroded and rounded components of the lower layer present in a matrix with the upper layer.Checkout these wonderful pictures of Siccar point. They are hi-res so I did not link them in here. Look closely at the contact and you will see that what Faith proposed is proposed out of ignorance.No such page | The University of Edinburgh Not at all inexplicable!!!!! Ya if you ignore reality and the data. There is not one single piece of evidence to indicate such a fairy tale has every occurred. This is great hypothesis for a YEC to go look for confirmation. For example, find one identifiable strata (ie thickness or trace materials or fossils) and see if one can find a single AU in the world where you can find a strata match between upper and lower layer. Good luckI am not even going waste time on her Alice in Wonderland fairy tale on the formation of the Great Unconformity with inventions like "underground volcanic explosions"Further all this activity and somehow there are fossilized sand dunes demonstrating huge aeolian crossbedding complete with animal tracks. The Hakatai Shale contains frequent mud cracks, raindrop impressions and ripple rock.Mud cracks, animal tracks and ripple rock!!! during a world wide flood!!! combined with massive cataclysmic events proposed!!! is absurd. YEC attempts of explaining the Grand Canyon as a product of the flood serves to demonstrate willful and purposeful deceit.

The theme of the topic is how a single flood event both deposited the geologic column at the Grand Canyon location and also cut the canyon.I think that angular unconformity considerations a pretty marginal to the topic. I think it best that material go to the Young earth explanations for Angular Unconformities topic.I am also concerned about having indirect input from Faith, when she is not herself permitted to post at .AdminnemooseusEdited by Adminnemooseus, : Added final sentence.

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Perhaps you are right. However the Great Unconformity is the first argument against a single world wide flood deposition of the Grand.However it is only one of many, so let me refocus the topic....The Grand Canyon contains fossilized sand dunes consisting of aeolian crossbedding formations complete with animal tracks. The Hakatai Shale consists of rock with mud cracks, raindrop impressions and ripple rock. Sea shell and sea plant fossils are at the top in the Kiabab formation.Mud cracks, animal tracks and ripple rock!!! oh my.... during a world wide flood!!! combined with massive cataclysmic events proposed!!! it is absurd.YEC attempts of explaining the Grand Canyon as a product of the flood serves to demonstrate willful and purposeful deceit and/or ignorance of the facts. All I can say is take a hike... It will be worth your while