center of the earth

Tough question. As I said, I've learned a few interesting things (that I might not have learned otherwise) in researching my answers in this and other threads, and that's a good thing. But doing it with less aggravation from ill-considered and ludicrous flights of fancy would be more fun.And there's always the fight for Truth, Justice, and the Way of whatever country in which you happen to reside. As The Straight Dope puts it, "fighting ignorance since 1973 (it's taking longer than we thought)".When you get right down to it, all creationist claims in the arena of science are devoid of evidence and reason. If you are going to host science forums on EvC, you're going to have to put up with a level of time-wasting. Walt's worse than many, and simple/cosmo is worse than most Waltophiles ... but where the rubber meets the road it's your forum and you and the admin crew have to decide how much of this cr*p you're going to allow in the cause of free and meaningful discussions. It's a job I'd rather not have.

Well, here is my view:We can both learn about the issues and supply a small finger in the dike around the sea of ignorance if we do discuss the widley deseminated idea (e.g., Walt). However, we do not have to waste time on the lunacy of those with very appropriate ids like the case here.Once someone has demonsrated an unwillingness to stop making stuff up they should be suspended.When Simple/Cosmo makes one more such post (and he will) he will recieve a suspension. More will, I'm sure follow. I'll be back in a few hours to lookin.AsThis message has been edited by AdminNosy, 02-07-2005 16:12 AM

That one didn't last long!

Mercury is very dense. So, putting aside flood musings of where the water came from, there is a liquid, or combination of cooler liquids that could match density for the outer core. So, what in the waves, tell us it must be hot?

Hi Simple,The objection you quoted was this: This objection is referring to the combination of hydrogen with oxygen to form water plus heat. It is not referring to the production of hydrogen and oxygen from water through electrolysis.If you have the transformer (power supply) from a model train or electric car set, you can perform electrolysis yourself. In a deep bowl of salty water turn two beakers upside down. Make sure they're filled with water. Take the two wires from your transformer and connect the negative to a strip of copper, and the positive to a strip of zinc. Place the copper strip under one beaker and the zinc strip under the other. Turn the transformer on.Bubbles will form on the zinc and copper strips, and over time gas will collect and fill the beakers, forcing the water out. Hydrogen gas collects in the copper beaker, and oxygen in the zinc beaker.Light a match, carefully lift the oxygen beaker up from the salt bath, slip the match under the beaker and watch it flare brightly, then burn out.Now light another match, carefully lift the hydrogen beaker, slip the match under the beaker, and you'll get a small explosion as the hydrogen combines with oxygen in the air to form water.Multiply the explosion 10 zilliony zilliony times to recreate your scenario of hydrogen escaping from the deep to react with the oxygen in the air and form water. The surface of the earth would be incinerated, including all life.Of course, God could perform a miracle to allow the hydrogren to react with the water without exploding. In fact, God could have done it in innumerable other ways through any number of miraculous approaches. Just as he once said, "Let there be light," he could as easily have said, "Let there be water." If you're going to invoke miracles, does it really matter which particular miracles you invoke? What leads you to believe that the water that fell from the sky and erupted from the deep pre-existed the flood? God could have created it as he needed it, and he could have made it disappear as easily while the flood was receding. Since you're willing to consider proposals that have no evidence, all things are possible to you. Why gold or diamond at the center of the earth? Why not manna from heaven? Why an acqueous outer core, why not heavenly clouds upon which angels strum their harps? Once you've abandoned evidence and reason, you may as well go all the way!--Percy

Is there no idea that's too moronic for you to spew out without thinking?You have years and years of study ahead of you before you will be able to come up with ideas that are merely wrong. What you're coming up with now must require the aid of powerful hallucinogens. Yes, at a temperature of well over 1,000°F. It said something about being similar to other forms of liquid hydrogen which are liquid near absolute zero and at low pressure. As I've written many a time in this thread:Any liquid at the pressure found in Earth's core is much hotter than Earth's surface temperature. You're missing a lot. Over and over agian. Nope. Electrolysis is a method of splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen. Although the reaction can be run backward, it can't be run backward by electrolysis.(Were you really setting up to have batteries the size of the Moon running billions of amperes throught this hydrogen as it erupted?)Hydrogen combining with oxygen is an exothermic reaction; it releases energy, the same amount of energy, no matter how it's carried out. Sorry, no. The heat of combining hydrogen with oxygen gets released no matter how you do it ... and, as I showed, you use up far more than all the oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere doing it.This message has been edited by Admin, 02-07-2005 16:52 AM

Mercury is too dense to be the liquid at the Earth's core.At the pressure of the Earth's core, mercury is a solid unless it is very hot.At the pressure of the Earth's core, the only liquid that matches all the evidence is iron with a touch of nickel ... and very, very, very hot.

So it couldn't be a snowcone?(as more of a lurker than anything - many thanks to Jon F, Dr.Jones* and others for their highly informative posts).

Looks like I'm plumb running out of possibilities here that would fit the evidence! Only last straw I can think of might be. Could any other substance fool the waves into thinking it was a liquid, by keeping s waves out? Or, how about a combination of liquids, that would make for a cooler temperature. Even if the density may be off, as long as the overall package averages out?

No, no substance that has the right density could do that. Nope, any substance or substances that is (are) liquid at that pressure are hot. Nope, we have pretty detailed maps of exactly how the density varies with depth; I posted one earlier. You need to have the right density at the right point for all points below the surface of the Earth.

I think I need some looking up now, I'm getting a sore neck looking down. --the hot side wins the day here! thanks

Going by the message from Simple, we've spent nearly 300 posts and reinvented the wheel. I'm sorry, but not being involved in this debate and just lurking has led me to the conclusion that we've been trolled by a practiced troller.

Congratulations on a willingness to admit that the current view is correct; that is rather rare.However, do not use such tactics again. The very next irrational, made up post will earn you a suspension.

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Congratulations on a willingness to admit that the current view is correct; that is rather rare

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Thanks. But actually I am not admitting the current view is correct! I still like the concept of a cool center. It's just no use argueing, until, and unless I can come up with a liquid that would be cool at that density. All the rest, (surface heat), (core that's solid, matching the overall expected density, with cool materials)- (basic concept a created earth could have different materials) and a few things like that - are still interesting.I have seen most of what science can throw up as a defense, and learned in the process. Now I see the problem, in essence. I hope I helped shed some light on this area, having a look around, and seeing what we do know, and don't.
So thanks for the quick education!

Actually you are right there.The current geophyisical view is the best explanation and model that we have is a more correct statment of the situation.However, it is so well founded that "correct" in the colloquial sense is also not far off.But you might have learned a bit about science in all this. Various models are proposed, the evidence is used to batter at them, the one(s) remaining standing are the current champions.You have no idea how much scrutiny that the current views have undergone. It is a very very safe bet that you will not beging to be able to find anything that comes close. After you get your PhD in the field you might know enough to make a small change somewhere.