The predictions of Walt Brown

Charles Knight wrote:"On another thread, Hangdawg13 offered those predictions
as "proof" that Walt Brown was right in some respect (the
numbering is that used by Hangdawg13):"One prediction that he offered was:"13: Muck on Siberian plateaus should have a wide range
of thicknesses. The greatest thickness will be in former
valleys. Preflood hilltops will have the thinnest layers
of muck. Drilling or seismic reflection techniques
should confirm this."This prediction is readily refuted because the Siberian "muck" as described by Walt Brown, Like the Alaskan "muck", exists in only the imaginations of Native American creationists, i.e. Vine Deloria; Young Earth creationists; supporters of catastrophists such as Charles Hapgood and Velikovsky; and netloons like Ted Holden.In case of the Siberian muck, a review of the primary literature describing either surface geology of Siberia or the occurrence of mummified mammoths in Siberia, a person finds that the so-called "muck" as decsribed by Walt Brown doesn't exist. For example, Figure 38 and descriptions and pages 112-119 of Budel (1982) of sediments containing the mummified mamoths demonstrate this clearly. The information provided by both Budel (1982) and Ukraintseva (1993) show that the mummified mammoths occur found in well-stratified, and often cross-bedded, river sediments that underlie narrow strips of ancient floodplains exhibiting relict channels, natural levees, and other fluvial landforms. These sediments are typically only 10 to 15 m (30 to 45 ft) thick. These deposits are restricted to narrow valleys cut into Tertiary or older bedrock.The "muck" described by older reports consists of a thin surficial layer of churned sediments locally created by landslides, debris flows, and solifluction (gelifluction) lobes. This layers forms when the permafrost that has formed in either these riverine sediments or on within hillslopes thaw causing either the local development of landslides, debris flows, solifluction lobes, or slumping river banks. When the permafrost melts, the water-saturated sands, silts, and clay liquefy. Once they liquefy, the water-saturated sediments move downslope either as landslides, debris flows, or solifluction lobes over the underlying permafrost. This movement churns everything, including modern plants, artifacts, subfossil bones and trees in the sediments, and sediments into a thin surficial layer of twisted trees, bones, and sediments that was called "muck" This process is documented within pages 112-119 of Budel (1982). The "muck" that Walt Brown talks about is only a thin 1 meter (3 foot), to at most 2 meter (6 foot), thick surficial layer of sediment created by periglacial processes that can be observed happening today and is well documented in the scientific literature.The thinness of solifluction (gelifluction) deposits, "muck", deposits refute Walt Brown's prediction by being typically thin, a meter (3 feet) of less in thickness; best developed on hillslopes; and virtually completely absent in valley fills where Walt Brown predicted it should be thickest. Also, as noted above, a person can either directly observe it formation within the modern Arctic Circle or find numerous published papers that document how it is formed by periglacial processes.References Cited:Budel, J., 1982, Climatic Geomorphology. Princeton
University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.Ukraintseva, V. V., 1993, Vegetation Cover and Environment of
the " Mammoth Epoch" in Siberia. The Mammoth Site of Hot
Springs of South Dakota, 1800 Highway 18-Truck Route, Hot
Springs, SD. 57747-0606, 309 pp.Related articles are "A Frozen Ninety Foot Tall Plum Tree with Ripe Fruit and Green Leaves Found North of the Arctic Circle?", which can be found at:http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/ce/3/part3.htmland "Remains of Warm Weather Hippos Have Been Found in the Tundra's Frozen Muck?" at:http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/ce/3/part4.htmlYours,Bill

In message 27, Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"This soil has been identified as loess103 (a German term,
pronounced "LERSE")."With this first sentence, Walt Brown shows a distinct lack of knowledge of loess. According to the way that geologists and pedologists define "soil", loess is not a "soil". Loess isn't a weathering horizon developed from the ground's surface. Thus, loess isn't a "soil" even though the modern soil is often developed in it and loess can contain fossil soils called "paleosols", buried within it. Loess is a specific type of sediment consisting of well-sorted, often calcareous, unstratified silt that, although weakly coherent, is strong enough to stand in steep or vertical faces. Technically speaking loess is sediment, not a soil as Walt Brown incorrectly stated above.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"Little is known about its origin."As far as conventional Earth Scientists in general are concerned, the origin of loess has been well established for many decades on basis of many lines of evidence and observations. The lack of any mystery about the origin of loess can be seen in the abundance of evidence found published in the scientific literature. For example, the detail to which conventional geologists understand the origin of loess is illustrated by the collection of papers concerning the "Loess and the Dust Indicators and Records of Terrestrial and Marine Palaeoenvironments (DIRTMAP) database", which are found in Volume 22, Issues 18-19, September 2003, of Quaternary Science Reviews. The table of contents for this issue can be found by clicking the "Volume 22, Issues 18-19, Pages 1813-2052 (September 2003)" link at:http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/02773791The abundance of evidence confirming the eolian origin of loess can be found in many published books on Quaternary Geology such as1. Porter, S. C., Atwater, B. F., and Porter, S. C., 2003, The
Quaternary Period in the United States, Elsiever, New York.and2. Smalley, I. J., ed, 1975, Loess; lithology and genesis.
Benchmark Papers in Geology, no. 26, Dowden, Hutchinson and
Ross, Inc., Stroudsburg, Pensylvania.The only mystery here is how a person, who claims to have research in any detail the matter of the origin of loess in any detail and claim that little is known about loess and that its origin can still be considered a mystery.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"Most believe it is a windblown deposit spread under cold,
glacial conditions over huge regions of the earth."The fact of the matter is that conventional geologists recognize at least three types of loess, glacial, desert, and volcanic loess. In glacial loess, the ultimate source of loess is silt-size sediment, called "rock flour" produced by the grinding rock by ice sheets. As observed, in modern ice sheets and glaciers, the rock flour is carried down streams and rivers carrying meltwater from the glaciers and deposited on their floodplain. As also observed in modern environments, under the right conditions, wind will erode the rock flour from the dried floodplain of a meltwater river and dump it on the uplands adjacent to the river valley to form loess.However, geologists also recognize nonglacial desert loess. It consists of silt eroded from large dune fields and dry lakes found in deserts and blown downwind of the desert areas where it settles out to accumulate as loess. The loess covering the Loess Plateau of China is an example of a desert loess The silt comprising it was derived from silt eroded from the deserts and gobis (desolate depressions filled with dry lake beds) of Central Asia northwest of the Chinese Loess Pateau. The source of the Chinese Loess is clearly shown by the decrease in grain size and overall thickness of loess deposits within the Loess Plateau downwind from the downwind edges of the Ordos Desert as illustrated by a figure in Vandenberghe et al. (1997). Along the edges of the Ordos Desert, desert sands gradually grade downwind into sandy loess. Further downwind, the sandy loess grades laterally into loess and finally into clayey loess.The loess of the Argentina Pampas represents third, nonglacial, type of loess. Detailed studies of it have shown, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that it consists of volcanic ash blown eastward from volcanoes in the Andes Mountains. The abundant evidence supporting this interpretation is discussed and documented in detail by Clapperton (1993) and Zarate (2003). In fact, historic volcanic eruption have continued to add more sediments to pile of volcanic loess that underlie the Pampas of Argentina.References Cited:Clapperton, C., 1993, Quaternary geology and geomorphology of
South America. Elsevier Science Publishers B. V., Amsterdam.Vandenberghe, J., Zhisheng, A., Nugteren, G., and others, 1997.
New absolute time scale for the Quaternary climate in the Chinese
loess region by grain-size analysis. Geology. vol. 25, no. 1,
pp. 35-38.Zarate, M. A., 2003, Loess of southern South America. Quaternary
Science Reviews. vol. 22, no. 18-19, pp. 1987-2006.An interesting web page:Dust if You Must
Loess is moreHangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"However, Siberia was scarcely glaciated, and normal winds would
deposit loess too slowly to protect so many frozen animals from
predators."Given that the mummified remains of mammoths and other animal aren't found in loess deposits, this is a totally meaningless argument. It also demonstrates that Walt Brown didn't bother to do enough research to find out that thick, continuous blankets of loess only occur in southern Siberia, far south of the areas in which ice complexes (yedomas) are found.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"Loess often blankets formerly glaciated regions, such as Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, and Alaska."In the real world, formerly glaciated regions areas are areas less likely to have a blanket of loess. Typically, thick blankets of loess occur in areas downwind of major desert regions, the uplands adjacent to major meltwater drainage systems, close to mountain ice caps, and, in case of southern South America, areas downwind of major volcanic chains. Formerly glaciated areas are less likely to be blanketed by loess, because ice sheets covered glaciated areas during the main period of loess accumulation. The ultimate source of the loess was sediments removed from these areas by the ice sheets. Loess blanket typically blanketed a former glaciated area only if it was glaciated during a glacial epoch older than the one glacial during which the loess accumulated. This can be seen in figures showing the distribution of loess in:Bettis, A. E., III , Muhs, D. R., Roberts, H. M., and Wintle,
A. G., 2003, Last Glacial loess in the conterminous USA.
Quaternary Science Reviews. vol. 22, no. 18-19, pp. 1907-1946.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"It lacks internal layering (stratification)"(Walt Brown has his facts correct, for once.) The massive nature of loess is expected because plants and animals are churning the upper surface of the ground much faster than the loess is accumulating and, thus, preventing internal stratification from forming. If loess accumulation either cease or greatly slows down, then weathering and biologic processes can modify the loess below the stable ground surface enough to form an recognizable soil horizon. When loess accumulation begins again, this soil often is buried and preserved as a "fossil soil", paleosols.Some examples of fossil soils, palesols, in loess are:Loess-Paleosol Complex
SOIL SCIENCE 100Paleoclimate Investigations
This web site has moved A good documented discussion of well-documented palesols preserved in loess can be found in:Muhs, D. R., Ager, T. A., Bettis, E. A., III, McGeehin, J.,
Been, J. M., Beget, J. E., Pavich, M. J., Stafford, T. W.,
Jr., and Stevens, D.-A. S. P., 2003,Stratigraphy andpalaeoclimatic significance of Late Quaternary loess-
palaeosol sequences of the Last Interglacial-Glacial cycle
in central Alaska. Quaternary Science Reviews. vol. 22,
no. 18-19, pp. 1947-1986Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"and is found at all elevations-from just above sea level to
hillsides at 8,000 feet elevation."This focus on elevation completely ignores an important aspect of loess, which is it lateral distribution. If a person looks at the regional distribution of loess, he or she will find that the blanket is always thickess adjacent to its source. Downwind of a source, whether it is a meltwater river or desert, the thickness of the loess blanket decreases in thickness. In addition, not only does the thickness of the loess decrease away from its source, but also the average grain size of the sediment comprising the loess decreases downwind of, away from it source. The decrease in thickness and grain size is perfectly explained by the wind-blown model of loess as described by numerous peer-reviewed papers, including ones found in:Smalley, I. J., ed, 1975, Loess; lithology and genesis.
Benchmark Papers in Geology, no. 26, Dowden, Hutchinson and
Ross, Inc., Stroudsburg, Pensylvania.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"Because loess is at many elevations and its tiny particles are
not rounded by thousands of years of exposure to water and wind,
some have proposed that loess came recently from outer space.104"Again, in the above statement, Walt Brown shows a remarkable lack of knowledge of how conventional geologists explain the origin of loess. Again, he is completely unaware of the fact that the distribution of loess in terms of elevation is completely consistent with a wind-blown origin. It is also a completely insignificant aspect of how conventional geologists explain the origin of loess. The lateral distribution of the thickness and grain size of loess relative to major deserts and river systems is far more important than relative distribution in elevation. In fact, there is nothing about the elevations of known loess deposits relative to their source areas that is inconsistent with the wind-blown origin of loess.The part of the statement about loess not being rounded by "thousands of years of exposure to water and wind" is another example of a remarkable lack of knowledge on the part of Walt Brown concerning basic principles of geology. It is basic knowledge among geologists, because of the small size and mass of silt particles, thousands of years of "exposure" and transport of them by either water or wind would have very little effect on their roundness. Conventional geologists would regard the lack of rounding in silt particles after thousand, even millions of years of "exposure" and episode transport, as being neither unusual nor anomalous observation either requiring an extraterrestrial explanation or inconsistent with the wind-blown origin of loess.Walt Brown is completely wrong in implying that the conventional theory about the origin of loess requires that the silt, which compose it is transported and "exposed" for thousands of years before being deposited as loess. In fact, conventional theories would argue that the silt particles are moved about for a period of time as short as a few months before accumulating as loess. In terms of glacial loess, the silt is released by the melting of the glacier as rock flour during the spring or summer. It is transported down a river over a period of few days to months and dumped on the floodplain by spring or summer flooding. Then the floodplain dries up as the glaciers freeze-up for the winter and meltwater from them ceases to flow for several months. During the fall and winter, wind blowing across the floodplain erodes surface silt and carries them above and outside of the floodplain where silt eventually settles on the upland surfaces adjacent to the valley walls of the floodplain.If a person checks out the citation for footnote "104" that Walt Brown cited as having proposed that loess came from outer space, he or she would find these citations to be:1. "John B. Penniston, "Note on the Origin of Loess," Popular
Astronomy , Vol. 39, 1931, pp. 429-430" and2." John B. Penniston, "Additional Note on the Origin of Loess,"
Popular Astronomy , Vol. 51, 1943, pp. 170-172"Both of the references are antiquated papers that are 61 to 73 years old and published in popular, non-peer reviewed magazine. Neither of these articles are serious scientific papers worth the attention that Walt Brown gives them. In fact, the idea of extraterrestial origin of loess has not gotten any support in conventional circles and surfaced only in one book, that I know of, published in the realm of alternative science along with books about crop circles, perpetual motion machines, and ghosts.Hangdawg13 quoted Walt Brown as stating:"Loess, a fertile soil rich in carbonates, has a yellow
tinge caused by the oxidation of iron-bearing minerals
since it was deposited.105 China's Yellow River and Yellow
Sea are so named because of the loess suspended in them."Here, Walt Brown cites a 1974 undergraduate geology textbook. In writing for the lay, non-geologist student, the author has confused the technical distinctions between soil and sediments. Instead of citing the latest scientific journals for his information, Walt Brown quote mines now antiquated textbook for his own purposes.Hangdawg13 asked:"Why is there an apparent relationship between frozen
mammoths, yedomas, and loess?"Given that this "apparent relationship", which I will elaborate on in another post, exists only in Walt Brown's imagination, no explanation is needed for it. For example, ice complexes, for which "yedomas" is somewhat of an antiquate term, lack any association with the occurrence of loess deposits. Yedomas are a specific type of permafrost that forms in areas where precipitation was too low to form ice sheets and characterized by extremely cold annual temperatures regardless of whether loess blankets the surface of an area or not. For example, the best documented ice complex, called "Mamonontovy Khayata" (Mammoth Mountain), which lies near the western shore of the Laptev Sea, is composed entirely of fine sand overlain by peat. Neither muck nor loess is present either within it or within its vicinity. Furthermore, loess occurs only as a thick, continuous blanket in an area of southern Siberia that is completely devoid of yedomas and far south of where they occur. There is no consistent association between the presence of loess and occurrence of yedomas (ice complexes).Hangdawg13, commented:"I don't think the landslide explanation accounts for all of these facts."In terms of loess, this is a meaningless complaint because neither any other geologist nor I use "landslides" to explain the formation of loess.The problem here is that you, as Walt Brown has hopelessly done, completely confused loess with "Muck". According to one definitions of "muck", muck as highly decomposed organic material containing a certain percentage of silt, loess and "muck" are two completely different types of sediment of different origin. Another definition of "muck" defines it as unconsolidated ice-rich silt. In thsi case, loess can be classified as "muck", but only if permafrost has developed in it. Even under this definition of loess, it is dishonest to classify the vast majority of loesses, i.e. the loesses of China, Mississippi River Valley, the Midwest, Washington state, Argentina, and so forth, as "muck", because these loesses all lack ice (permafrost). In addition, under this definition, silt of other origins, i.e. floodplain, slopewash, lake, marine, and other deposits, are also classified as "muck". Thus, it is impossible, without additional information, to know whether this type of "muck" consists of loess or some other type of silt.The specific definition of "muck", for which the landslide origin was discussed, is the "muck" that various catastrophists define as containing "Trees and animals, layers of peat and mosses, twisted and mangled together like some giant mixer had jumbled them some 10,000 years ago, and then froze them into a solid mass". (Please note that loess doesn't fit the description of this type of "muck".)This types of "muck" is only a surficial deposit created by landslides, solifluction lobes, debris flows, various periglacial processes and so forth. The details about the origin of this Muck" is given in my previous posts. For example, "Arctic Muck", Message 187 of Wyatt's Museum and the shape of Noah's Ark at:http://EvC Forum: Wyatt's Museum and the shape of Noah's Ark -->EvC Forum: Wyatt's Museum and the shape of Noah's ArkPlease note, that landslides are not the only process that create this type of muck as Hangdawg13 mistakenly implies. Various periglacial processes, including the formation of thermal karst in permafrost, can create this type of muck. In fact, thermal karst easily can create pools or bogs of semifluid muck (mud) on flat surfaces large and deep enough to trap large mammals such as horses and mammoths.Also, "muck" has other definitions that different people use. Depending on what definition a person, uses, the specific type of "muck" being discussed may or may not have been created by any number of processes. Before a person can dismiss a specific process as having created "muck", a person needs to specify the specific definition of "muck" they are using.Hangdawg13 asked:"BTW what are your beliefs on the origin of Loess?"I don't "believe" in a specific origin of loess as the matter of its origin isn't a religious or personal matter dependent on faith or personal intuition. Instead, I accept the wind-blown origin of loess as an explanation for its origin based on data collected from field observations and laboratory analyses that show that the lateral distribution, stratigraphy, chemistry, and physical characteristics, i.e. grain-size distributions, of loess are all completely explainable with such an origin.Accepting the wind-blown origin of loess as fact has nothing to do with personal belief, but rather the honest, scientific evaluation of hard, verifiable physical evidence and field observations along with credible published laboratory data.Yours,Bill

In from Message 27, Hangdawg13 wrote:Bill Birkeland wrote:"The information provided by both Budel (1982) and Ukraintseva
(1993) show that the mummified mammoths occur found in well-
stratified, and often cross-bedded, river sediments that
underlie narrow strips of ancient floodplains exhibiting relict
channels, natural levees, and other fluvial landforms. These
sediments are typically only 10 to 15 m (30 to 45 ft) thick.
These deposits are restricted to narrow valleys cut into
Tertiary or older bedrock."Hangdawg13 wrote:"Brown's model does not forbid stratification of the "muck" or
loess material. Some stratification would have occurred where
the soil was not immediately frozen."I am a little baffled about what either loess has to do with the above part of my post, which Mr. Hangdawg13 has quoted. First, the above quote of mine was part of the post, in which I pointed out the absence of thick "muck" within areas that Brown predicted it should be quite thick. Not only is "muck" absent, but loess also is often absent from the locations, at which mummified mammoths have been found in Siberia. In addition, if Mr. Hangdawg13 would reread the context of the text, quoted from Message 26, he will find that I clearly stated that the "river sediments" but not the loess, are "well-stratified, and often cross-bedded." By definition, i.e. Bates and Jackson (1983), loess consists of well-sorted, often calcareous, unstratified silt that, although weakly coherent, is strong enough to stand in steep or vertical faces. The well-stratified, cross-bedded and cross-laminated silt, sand, and gravel interbedded with clayey and peaty sediments that comprise typically comprise these "river sediments" clearly don't fit the accepted scientifically definition of loess. Since the above quote of mine clearly discussed river sediments, not loess, what Brown's model has to say about loess being stratified is completely meaningless in term of my discussion because river sediments aren't loess,In case of "muck", Mr. Hangdawg13 needs to specifically define what he is calling "muck" because "muck" is defined in a multitude of ways. For example, Bates and Jackson (1983), the geological definition of "muck", defines it as "dark, decomposed organic matter intermixed with a high percentage of silt". As defined here, the sediments that accumulate on the floodplains of rivers, in lakes and bogs, and in the coastal marshes of lagoons and deltas are all properly called "muck". However, by this definition, loess doesn't qualify as "muck". In Alaska and Siberia, it is also defined as unconsolidated, ice-rich silt. By this definition, "muck" can consist either of slopewash, natural levee, floodbasin, loess, solifluction, lake, marine, or other deposits as long as it consists of silt and has had permafrost developed in it. By this definition, it is totally wrong to call bulk of the "river sediments", which consist of sand and gravel, discussed in the quote from Message 26 as "muck". Also, not all "muck" consists of loess as not all silt is loess. Since the above quote of mine talks about river sediments, which consist largely of clay sand, silty sands, and gravel with very minor amounts of silt, it is quite clear that the text cited from message 26 by Mr. Hangdawg13 also doesn't talk about "muck" that is stratified. Thus, what Brown's model has to say about either "muck" or loess being stratified or not is completely meaningless in term of my discussion because I didn't wrote about sandy river sediments, neither "muck" nor loess, as being stratified in the cited quote.References cited:Bates, R. L., and Jackson, J. A., 1983, Dictionary of Geological
Terms. American Geological Institute, Washington, D.C.Hangdawg13 wrote:"However, undisturbed mammoth specimens frozen into this muck
should lie directly above, as you said: bedrock."Again, Mr. Hangdawg13 needs to reread what I said. I say this because the text, which he has quoted in message 27 clearly discusses sandy river sediments instead of "muck", however he defines it. I wrote nothing about " mammoth specimens frozen into this muck" in the text quoted from message 26.Again, a person has to define what he or she means by the term "muck." A favorite and laughably incorrect definition of "muck" used by many catastrophists. i.e. Deloria (1997), is:"The muck was simply a frozen conglomerate of trees and plants,
sand and gravel, some volcanic ask, and thousands if not millions
of bits of broken bones representing a wide variety of Late
Pleistocene and modern animals and plants."As defined above by Deloria (1997), "muck" exists largely in the imagination of both writers as the "muck" found in Alaska consists of ice-rich silt, instead of sand and gravel. [Also, the way the sentence was carelessly written and edited. As written, it refers to "broken bones" as "representing a wide variety of... animals and plants." I would be very interested in seeing the "broken bones", which belong to "Late Pleistocene and modern " plants. :-) :-) ]Similarly, the deposits of "muck" containing "Trees and animals, layers of peat and mosses, twisted and mangled together like some giant mixer had jumbled them some 10,000 years ago, and then froze them into a solid mass" as described by various catastrophists are only the surficial deposits of landslides, solifluction lobes, debris flows, and so forth. The details about the origin of this Muck" is given in my previous posts. For example, "Arctic Muck", Message 187 of Wyatt's Museum and the shape of Noah's Ark at:http://EvC Forum: Wyatt's Museum and the shape of Noah's ArkGiven the numerous ways, in which "muck" is used, it would be useful if Hangdawg13 could provide the specific definition of "muck" used by Walt Brown.References cited:Deloria, Vine, Jr., 1997, Red Earth, White Lies. Fulcrum
Publishing, Golden Colorado.Hangdawg13 stated:"This does not make mention of the Yedomas. Many remains of mammoth
and other animals and plants have been found in Yedomas."I don't mention Yedomas because the vast majority of mummified mammoths and other Pleistocene mammals weren't found in Yedomas. For example, none of the mummified mammoths and bison found in Alaska weren't found in Yedomas. At this time, I can't find any examples of mummified mammoths having been found in Yedomas. For example, both the Berezovka mammoth, which is mentioned below, and the Kirgilyakh Mammoth, also called "Dima", were found in frozen terrace deposits instead of Yedomas (Budel 1982, Ukraintseva 1993). In fact. mamy of the Siberian mummified mammoths **weren't** even found in even "muck" or loess.It is true that abundant subfossil bones have been found in Yedomas. However, abundant subfossil bones of mammoths and other Pleistocene animals, individual plant remains, and peat beds have been found in other Pleistocene deposits not associated with Yedomas. Pleistocene fossils are as abundant in other Pleistocene deposits as they are in Yedomas. An excellent example described by Ukraintseva (1993) are river sediments, which contain bone beds composed of thousands of mammoth and other bones, exposed in the banks of the Berelekh River in North-East Siberia. In this case, the largest bone bed in Siberia is associated with river sediments instead of Yedomas. In a regional context, there is nothing unusual also the fossil content of Yedomas.Budel, J., 1982, Climatic Geomorphology. Princeton University
Press, Princeton, New Jersey.Ukraintseva, V. V., 1993, Vegetation Cover and Environment of
the " Mammoth Epoch" in Siberia. The Mammoth Site of Hot
Springs of South Dakota, 1800 Highway 18-Truck Route, Hot
Springs, SD. 57747-0606, 309 pp.Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"The ice layer directly under the Berezovka mammoth contained
some hair still attached to his body. Below his right forefoot
was "the end of a very hairy tail ... of a bovine animal,
probably [a] bison."77 Also under the body were "the right
forefoot and left hind foot of a reindeer ... The whole
landslide on the Berezovka [River] was the richest
imaginable storehouse of prehistoric remains."78 In the
surrounding, loamy soil was an antelope skull,79..."This is a quite interesting quote. It provides a well-known example of one of the vast majority of mummified mammoths and other mammals, which weren't found in Yedomas. This and many other examples of mummified mammoths and mammals contradict the claim that any significant association exists between the remains of mammoth and other animals" and Yedomas.In addition, the above quote from Brown clearly states that that the mummified mammoth and associated fossils were found in "loamy soil". Loam consists of a mixture of sand, silt, and clay. Since loam isn't pure silt, Brown is also wrong about this mammoth having been found "muck". Also, an examination of the literature would demonstrate that this mammoth certainly wasn't found in "muck" defined as containing "Trees and animals, layers of peat and mosses, twisted and mangled together like some giant mixer had jumbled them some 10,000 years ago, and then froze them into a solid mass". If a person reads what has been published in the literature, these remains are found in river deposits that have nothing to do with any "muck".Hangdawg13 commented:"Now this sounds like the results of a massive EXTREMELY icy
landslide."The only "landslide" associated with the Berezovka mammoth is the very local slumping, which uncovered the Berezovka mammoth, of the cut bank of the river. In this case, the slumping of the cutbank, referred in the above quote as a "landslide", didn't bury the mammoth and other remains, but only exposed a fresh outcrop of terrace sediments containing them. Such "landslides" slumping typically occur where rivers undercut their cut banks regardless of what the climate might be. There is absolutely no relationship between this type of "landslide" any "icy" or "extremely icy" conditions.Hangdawg13 continued:"But it does not explain the similar sites found in hills called
Yedomas, nor does it explain the relationship between Yedomas,
loess, and the salty ice,"1. As discussed above, "similar sites" like the Berezovka mammoth, aren't typically found in Yedomas as Walt Brown either falsely claims or argues. Also, the occurrence of fossil bones isn't restricted to Yedomas. There isn't any relationship between fossil mammoths and Yedomas to be explained as it exists only in Walt Brown's imagination.2. Again, if a person looks at the distribution of loess in the world, they would find that there are vast areas of loess-covered landscape in China, Europe, the Midwest and along the Mississippi Valley, Argentina, and elsewhere where loess is found and Yedomas aren't found. The vast majority of the areas covered by loess don't show any relationships between the distribution of loess and the occurrence of Yedomas. For example, the best documented ice complex, called "Mamonontovy Khayata" (Mammoth Mountain), which lies near the western shore of the Laptev Sea, is composed entirely of fine sand overlain by peat insted of either loess or "muck". Neither "muck" nor loess is present either within it or within its vicinity. There is simply no special relationship or association between Yedomas, also called "ice complexes", and loess to explain. Walt Brown makes much to do about nothing.3. Finally, in terms of the "salty ice" of Yedomas, the salt content of the ice found in Yedomas is no different than the salt content of permafrost found elsewhere in northern Siberia. Again, there exists nothing to be explained.Hangdawg13 continued:"nor does it explain temperatures of -150 necessary to freeze such
specimens so quickly, nor does it explain the unique characteristics
of "rock ice" found near or at mammoth burial sites."The condition of these specimens refutes the interpretation by that they were flash frozen at 150 degrees. When these mummified remains of mammoths and other animals have been examined in any detail, paleontologists always have found signs of the carcass having decayed and been scavenged by predators prior to having been frozen. If these carcasses had been fast frozen as advocated by Walt Brown, there wouldn't have been any time for the decay and scavenging to have occurred. The only thing that needs to explain here is why Walt Brown completely overlooks facts and observations, i.e. the decayed and scavenged nature of the Mummified remain, which inconveniently contradict his arguments.Also, for additional comments on whether these mammoths were fast frozen, a person can read:1. Talk Origins Feedback for May 2004 at:
TalkOrigins Archive - Feedback for May 20042. "A4. Mammoths: Were They QuickFrozen?"and3. Woolly Mammoth Remains: Catastrophic Origins?
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mammoths.htmlHangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"Yedomas and Loess. In Siberia, frozen mammoths are frequently
found in strange hills, 30 - 200 feet high, which Russian
geologists call yedomas."As noted above, the vast majority of frozen / mummified mammoths **don't** occur in Yedomas. For example, none of the frozen / mummified mammoths and other animals found in Alaska **don't** occur in Yedomas. Neither the Berezovka mammoth, which Walt Brown discusses, nor Dima was found in a Yedomas. I would be very interested if Mr. Hangdawg13 could prove this claim by providing a list of the specific frozen / mummified mammoths, which were actually found in a Yedomas and tell me what percentage of the total number of the known frozen / mummified mammoths have been found in Yedomas. If he actually counted the number of frozen / mummified mammoths found in Yedomas, he would find that, if any at all have been found in frozen / mummified mammoths, that the claim that "frozen mammoths are frequently in" Yedomas is pure fiction unsupported by any published facts.Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"For example, the mammoth cemetery, containing remains of 156
mammoths, was in a yedoma.96 [See line 49, Table 7, page 171.]"There are two major problems with this statement that make it false. First, all of these 156 mammoths consist entirely of skeletal remains, not mummified mammoths, with only a few shreds of tissue attached. Finally, Walt Brown is wrong about, if not misrepresenting the context of tehse skeletons. The bones of these 156 mammoths weren't found in a yedoma as Walt Brown falsely claims. Rather they occur within river sediments, which are unrelated to any yedoma, exposed in the cut banks of the Berelekh River. This claim is quite interesting as the context of these mammoth remains are clearly documented in one of the citations, Ukraintseva (1993), cited by Walt Brown for this claim. Either he hasn't read Ukraintseva (1993) enough to know that it completely refutes his claims about these bones being found in a yedoma or he has completely misstated what Ukraintseva (1993) wrote about them.Ukraintseva, V. V., 1993, Vegetation Cover and Environment of
the " Mammoth Epoch" in Siberia. The Mammoth Site of Hot
Springs of South Dakota, 1800 Highway 18-Truck Route, Hot
Springs, SD. 57747-0606, 309 pp.Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"It is known that these hills were formed under cold, windy
conditions, because they are composed of a powdery,
homogeneous soil, honeycombed with thick veins of ice."However, as discussed above, the "soil" comprising a yedoma doesn't always consist of either "muck" or loess. Depending on the specific yedoma, its "soil" can consist of any of number of sediments including peat and sand.Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:Sometimes the ice, which several Russian geologists have
concluded was formed simultaneously with the soil, accounts
for 90% of the yedoma's volume.97"Actually, this has been demonstrated to not be true as discussed by Meyer (2003). Detailed dating and analysis of the ice comprising "Mamonontovy Khayata" (Mammoth Mountain), a yedoma located on the western shore of the Laptev Sea, indicated that ice comprising accumulated during various episodes between 12,000 to 60,000 years ago. Towards the east, the ice comprising yedomas is only as young as 12,000 to 18,000 years old (Meyer 2003).Reference cited:Meyer, H., 2003, Late Quaternary climate history of Northern
Siberia - evidence from ground ice. Berichte zur Polar und
Meeresforshung. no. 461. (Alfred Wegner Institute for Polar
and Marine Research (Germany)Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"Some yedomas contain many broken trees "in the wildest
disorder." 98 The natives call them "wood hills" and the
buried trees "Noah's wood." 99"There is nothing unusual about this. The melting of the permafrost creates large thermal karst sinkholes in yedomas. Any trees growing within the area that collapses into these sinkholes gets crunched, mangled, and buried by sediment slumping into them. As a result, the bottom of such sinkholes contains sediment full of mangled vegetation. This is preserved as part of the yedoma when the formation of permafrost refills the sinkhole. The syngenetic freezing of the sediment and ground ice within a yedoma at about -10 degrees centigrade results the excellent preservation of any organic material, including plant remains, insect fragments, and mammoths and other bones as noted by Meyer (2003).Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"Yedoma soil has a high salt and carbonate content,100So what? This characteristic doesn't contradict conventional ideas about yedomas, ice complexes, being result of ground ice formation in an area of low temperatures and low precipitation over a period of tens of thousands of years as discussed by Meyer (2003). Also, since the ground is permanently, what ground water exists doesn't circulate. Because the low precipitation and temperatures and lack of ground water circulation prevents the leaching of salt blown in from the adjacent Laptev Sea and carbonate within the carbonate-rich sediments that compose yedomas, they have a "high salt and carbonate content".Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:"contains tiny plant remains, and is comparable to muck.101"Since the syngenetic freezing of the sediment and ground ice within a yedoma at about -10 degrees centigrade results the excellent preservation of any organic material, there is nothing unusual about the preservation of tint plant remains and abundant organic matter within yedomas.Hangdawg13 quoted from Brown:The Berezovka mammoth was found in a similar soil.102They are similar only in that some yedomas consist of river sediments. However, the Berezovka mammoth wasn't found in a yedoma....text of loess eliminated...For the discussion of the loess part of message 27, go to message 44, Loess was "muck", at:http://EvC Forum: The predictions of Walt BrownHangdawg13 asked:"Why is there an apparent relationship between frozen
mammoths, yedomas, and loess?"Given that this "apparent relationship" exists only in Walt Brown's imagination, no explanation is needed for it. For example, ice complexes, for which "yedomas" is somewhat of an antiquate term, lack any association with the occurrence of loess deposits. Yedomas are a specific type of permafrost that forms in areas where precipitation was too low to form ice sheets and characterized by extremely cold annual temperatures regardless of whether loess blankets the surface of an area or not. For example, the best documented ice complex, called "Mamonontovy Khayata" (Mammoth Mountain), which lies near the western shore of the Laptev Sea, is composed entirely of fine sand overlain by peat. Neither muck nor loess is present either within it or within its vicinity. Furthermore, loess occurs only as a thick, continuous blanket in an area of southern Siberia that is completely devoid of yedomas and far south of where they occur. There is no consistent association between the presence of loess and occurrence of yedomas (ice complexes).Yours,Bill Birkeland