The Great Creationist Fossil Failure

Yes, that's what I meant.Lots of currents in ocean water, yes, and there are levels of water in the ocean too, mostly characterized by temperature differences, also of course waves, although how would one know how such things worked in a worldwide Flood anyway? One would expect waves to travel far across the continents as the water got high enough for instance, but water would encroach on the land from all directions too. Nobody has seen a worldwide Flood so all we can do is imagine and guess. Just as that's really all your theory is based on too.The best evidence for the Flood is the simple facts of the strata which are known to be laid down by water, an awful lot of it one would suppose from the great depth of much of the strata, certainly no river deposits those; and the enormous number of fossils. No matter how many objections you can dream up against the Flood, and how much you prefer your own interpretations to ours, you really ought to concede that billions of dead things buried in layers of sediment under conditions ideal for fossilization really is great evidence for a worldwide Flood. You don't have to concede the whole shebang, but fairness really does require this much of you. My guess would be that circumstances did a lot of the sorting too: It's pretty clear that the land animals were caught up in the Flood later, as the water kept rising on the land, while mostly marine creatures were deposited in the earlier stages. But of course there's no way to know any of this. It's the same case with us as it is with you: there's no way to know for sure what happened and no way to prove any guesses. It's all a matter of which interpretation seems most plausible to you.

More avoidance and nonsense from you Faith.What model, mechanism, process, procedure or thingamabob in currents can sort critters in the order found in reality?Remember Faith, the fossils and the order where found are FACTS. Your flood is simply another unsupported assertion. The fossils and other evidence, the processes and procedures and methods and mechanisms we can see today are not conjecture or guess.Edited by jar, : hit wrong key

Except that you are still nowhere near describing the complexity of the actual arrangement of things. Well, no. The great flood is consistent with having billions of dead animals, just as a dead body is consistent with any person on earth having murdered someone. The problem is that if we look even trivially hard at any of the details associated with those fossils, we find that the flood does not answer our questions.Being consistent on a gross detail simply is not good enough. Given that having lots of dead animals is also completely consistent with the passage of time without a global flood, then no, fossils are not evidence for your position.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.Edited by NoNukes, : No reason given.

So your theory is that the water of the Flood was responsible, rather than the bees of the Flood or the marmalade of the Flood or the unicycling clowns of the Flood. Great, now we've got much more detail in your hypothesis, that really fleshed it out. No, real geology is based on processes we can watch. You remember how you keep claiming to have read my textbook? You really should read it some day. Where do the strata which are known not to be laid down by water fit into this?And how are strata laid down by water meant to be evidence of a worldwide flood? Are eggs laid by chickens evidence that the Earth was once entirely covered by chickens? No. Evidence that some of the Earth has at some times been covered with water is simply not evidence that all of the Earth has been covered with water at the same time. It should not be necessary to explain this to a grown-up. But that isn't what the fossil record looks like, as I pointed out in the OP. Once again you are providing an explanation for what you imagine the fossil record looks like. Not for what it actually looks like. There's an old saying to the effect that the thief thinks that everyone steals.No, not everyone is in the same case as you. For example, geologists know what the fossil record looks like.Edited by Dr Adequate, : No reason given.

As Dr A's geology points out, the various rocks on the Earth show features indicating they were placed under different conditions : e.g. deep ocean, shallow ocean, shoreline, deltas, river flats, deserts, landslides, volcanoes. The Flood has to mimic all these different environments as well as sorting the fossils, and as the Geoscience Research Institute admitted, sort the radiometric ages as well.
This is not a small problem!Any YEC/Flood model also has to account for volcanism, with literally tens of millions of cubic kilometres of flood basalts deposited above water and about as many under water, plus thousands of volcanoes of all apparent ages -some just residual magma plugs with the cones eroded away - and their ash falls etc.As an aside on volcanoes, in one of her books, Ellen White attributed volcanoes to subterranean fires, from coal deposited by the Flood, melting the rocks.
Incredibly, the GRI at one time had this prominently on their web site.

Or, those strata were laid down over millions to nearly billions of years by water in various places at various times.That's what the evidence shows. It is only your belief that leads you to other interpretations that are not supported by the evidence--and in fact, that are completely disproved by the evidence. Or, those billions of dead things buried in layers of sediment... are evidence for parts of the Earth being under water at various times in the past. There is nothing in the evidence that suggests those dead things were buried in a short time, but a huge body of evidence that shows both long time periods and change over time for those dead things.["Dead things." Is that a new technical term for fossils?]If you want to talk about fairness, it would behoove you to examine your own posts and interpretations.You start with belief and then do your best to fit the evidence into that belief. When it clearly doesn't fit, you don't question your beliefs, but try to fudge and manipulate and ignore the evidence to make it fit.When that doesn't work you do anything you can to avoid the facts of the real world, so that you can maintain your beliefs.That leads to some amazing mental and verbal gyrations that Olympic athletes would be proud of--but which scientists are not impressed by.Truly, if you had evidence for your claims you would be awarded a Nobel prize--a special one would be created as there is no prize for this category. But you don't have evidence--only belief.

Over at AIG John Baumgardner has an article on the deposition of sediment during the Flood.
I admit I only skimmed it because I did not think my stomach would stand reading it in detail.
In essence, he postulates rapid plate tectonics of 2 metre per second causing massive tsunamis which wash over the continents and erode them. There are fast ocean currents to carry the sediment load required, which gradually slow as the plate speed drops off, and the sediment is deposited.This of course would do nothing toward the sorting of fossils we have been talking about, but shows that, often in YECism, trying to explain one aspect of reality in YEC terms raises other difficulties.
Also he does nothing toward explaining volcanism.

Two metres per second ? Impressive ad hoc invention ! I take it he doesn't begin to try to calculate the energy that would be needed to do that ? Nor come up with an explanation as to where that energy came from ? Nor try to work out what the actual, real world physical effect would be of the introduction of that amount of energy into the earth's structure ?

He accepts the evidence the plates have moved. The only time they could move in a YEC paradigm is during the Flood, ergo they have to move pretty smartly. He commented on the small movements that produce tsunamis now, so seemed to hypothesise stronger plates so they can undergo further pressure before they give.
Why they should start to move and then slow down is not clear.Of course while the plates are steaming along you have to have hot spots furiously building volcanoes such as the Hawaiian -Emperor chain. Poor Noah is in for a rough ride!It is just a desperate effort to explain the facts in a YEC framework.The churning up of sediment he visualises would not even allow the ecological zonation sorting of fossils some YEC suggest.

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Nobody has seen a worldwide Flood so all we can do is imagine and guess. Just as that's really all your theory is based on too.

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Well,no. It is possible to apply scientific principles to work out limits on what the Flood could or could not do, and to consider other possible causes that might fit the evidence better. Or it is possible to ignore all that, simply assume the Flood and try to make up half-baked excuses. The first approach has obvious value in finding the truth, the second has none.

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The best evidence for the Flood is the simple facts of the strata which are known to be laid down by water, an awful lot of it one would suppose from the great depth of much of the strata, certainly no river deposits those; and the enormous number of fossils.

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And yet we do find river deposits - and desert deposits - within the strata. Not all are laid down by water. And there are numerous other problems with this simplistic assumption. This is more an attempt to hide evidence against the Flood than to present evidence for it.

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No matter how many objections you can dream up against the Flood, and how much you prefer your own interpretations to ours, you really ought to concede that billions of dead things buried in layers of sediment under conditions ideal for fossilization really is great evidence for a worldwide Flood.

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To say this in a thread dedicated to showing how the fossils contradict the Flood is just breathtakingly dishonest. Indeed, previous discussion has shown that it is doubtful that the Flood can even account for the number of fossils. So, again, more of an attempt to cover up evidence. The dishonest and superficial presentation certainly disqualifies this from being considered "great evidence" of the Flood.

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You don't have to concede the whole shebang, but fairness really does require this much of you.

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Fairness does not require any such thing. Fairness would require you to deal with the evidence honestly - which you obviously refuse to do.

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My guess would be that circumstances did a lot of the sorting too: It's pretty clear that the land animals were caught up in the Flood later, as the water kept rising on the land, while mostly marine creatures were deposited in the earlier stages. But of course there's no way to know any of this.

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It is certainly possible to know that this "explanation" is grossly inadequate. It is certainly possible to know that the mainstream scientific view explains the evidence much better. Yet you won't even admit that. Funny how your "fairness" requires us to acknowledge imaginary "strengths" of your position but does not require you to acknowledge the real strengths of ours. How unfair.

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It's all a matter of which interpretation seems most plausible to you.

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On any remotely fair assessment that would be the mainstream scientific view over yours.

I am aware that Baumgardner had proposed extra rapid sea floor spreading, but I had never encountered the tsunami term being used.Just to refresh the reality record, increased sea floor spreading rates are indeed thought to be the major cause of the major sea transgressions onto the continents. The idea is that increased rates cause the oceanic crust as a whole to be warmer, less dense, and more buoyant in floating on the mantle. Thus the sea floor rises significantly and displaces water onto the continents (and I would think that the continents would also have to subside to some degree).Somewhere in the past, I calculated that if the sea floors were brought up to what is currently sea level, the water level on the continents would (IIRC) rise several thousand feet. This is considerably more that what is found in the geologic record, which I believe to be in the ballpark of (maybe) 2000 feet maximum.There is also the consideration, that the biosphere heating by this extreme spreading rate would truly cook the planet. Which would get the largely sterilizing the planet job done. Even more extreme than the standard "flood story".Critiquing by other geologists (and non-geologists) welcome. Although this would thrash the "state of the on-topic" even worse than currently.Moose

Please provide a link to Baumgardner's article. I found a video made in 2009 but you said article and that I haven't found.

Here is a link to a series of Baumbardner articles on AIG, several of which touch on the Flood. Dr. John Baumgardner Articles | Answers in Genesis

If there truly were a global flood of the dimensions necessary to create the geological record, there would be no tsunamis. At least, there would be no record.Now, if the flood were not global nor deep, there would be all kinds of evidence for tsunamis.

Well, the distribution of the flood would have all kinds of impacts on the fossil record, so I would say that we are not toooo far off-topic.But yes, this is all true, though I'm not sure that the continents would necessarily subside.One of the simplest evidences for this is the sea level rise during the Cretaceous (giving us one of the great epeiric seas in the record and the Cretaceous Seaway in North America) contemporaneous with the excessive amount of sea floor basalt as show on sea-floor age maps. This, of course, also caused extensive continental volcanism too, due to increased subduction rates.However, there is plenty of evidence to show that this transgression was not complete and there were always land masses throughout the episode.