Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood II

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Originally posted by wmscott:
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these pictures are too dissimilar to conclude they're both of the same species of marine diatom (or even that they're both diatoms).

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I am a little bit puzzled by your response. I assume you accept that the picture on the right is of the marine diatom Asterolampra Marylandica, you can check the web site that it is taken from if you doubt it. As for similarities, you need to remember that the two pictures were taken with two different microscopes under different lighting conditions, and the samples have had dissimilar histories. Notice the tannic acid staining in the left image, and that the diatom is not laying perfectly flat as in the picture on the right. The right image is also of a diatom in very good condition while the one on the left is worn and old.

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Correct, wmscott, therefor we cannot ascertain that they are indeed the same organism... You have convinced me that the identification is completely inconclusive.

Dear Tranquility Base;On Peter 3:4, I liked your answer that the earth that is referred to as being destroyed is not the planet, but a restricted literal interpretation of just the earth's surface is destroyed. However while a step in the right direction, that interpretation is still in conflict with scripture. The fiery destruction of the 'earth' mentioned in Peter is not a literal fire or burning of the earth's surface since there are to be righteous survivers, in that the meek are to inherit the earth. Rather 'earth' in Peter and a number of other scriptures, is referring to mankind as at Genesis 11:1 where it states that all the earth continued to be of one word. The surface of the earth doesn't speak, so this verse is obviously referring to mankind. In regard to the destruction of the 'earth' Revelation 21:1 states that the old earth and heaven passed away or were destroyed and are replaced by a new heaven and a new earth. Now we know this verse doesn't refer to a literal destruction of the earth and the universe, since other scriptures speak of the earth standing forever. Now what is being referred to here is the earth of mankind, the earthly system of things and the heavens, the governments that rule over mankind. What the scripture is saying is that the wicked men who reject God and the governments that rule over them, will be destroyed. The meek inherit the earth and form a new earth or human Society reconciled with God, and over this new earth God's Kingdom will rule. Basically this verse is telling us that current human society along with it's powerful militaristic governments will be replaced by God with people reconciled to him and ruled by his Son. Since the term earth in Peter is referring to mankind alienated from God, and does not refer to the earth or its surface, this verse does not condemn modern geology.

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We unashamedly propose the entire formaiton and break up of Pangea dueing the flood period. Our scenario was the mother of all catstrophes. It was the lietral rebirth of the continents. If you stop constraining yourself to uniformitarian thinking the flood makes a lot of sense. And Baumgardner has shown that catstrophic plate movement is possible and the trigger was probably accelerated decay.

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In part one of this thread I addressed the issue of rapid plate movement and pointed out a number of impossible problems with the theory. You never responded, I had assumed it was because you had no answers, but perhaps you were just too busy. But if you would still like to answer the problems I raised with rapid plate movement, the post was number 344 and here is a link to that page. http://EvC Forum: Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood -->EvC Forum: Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood
I would still be interested in hearing your responses to the issues raised, for if these basic problems can not be addressed the entire YEC flood theory will come crashing down since it would have no foundation.

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Have you seen my thread on Lyell's catch cries of uifromitariansim?

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Yes I have, even as one who believes in the flood, I was amazed at the pounding you took. Quite frankly I thought that your opposition reduced your arguments down to the consistency of cottage cheese. Why highlight for an example a fight in which you got the snot beat out of you? I have always been highly impressed with your resilience, but that thread reads like the first half of the movie where the villain pounds the stuffing out of the hero and I didn't see any happy ending part where the hero finally prevails.

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You clearly haven't familiarised yourself with Berthault's and Julien's expereiments.

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Guilty as charged, I haven't, so I checked out their web site. I think they would have been better off playing with a Wham-O "Magic Window" toy. Did you notice the part on water deposited laminations, that the layers became less distinct with increasing water depth? That alone pretty much shoots down any using of their results for flood theory layering. For the depth of water nessecary to cover the mountains and carry such a large load of sediment, would have resulted in such a great depth that the effects they referred to would not have occurred. Also notice the use of a flume and shallow fast moving water, which is just the opposite of the expected conditions to be found in a global flood. A much more realistic demonstration would have been if they mixed sediment or ground up rocks along with some plants and dead animals in a deep pool of water and let the material settle out. If they could demonstrate creation of a mini GC complete with heavy and coarse layers above lighter silt layers and all of it turned into stone complete with sorted instantly fossilized fossils, that would be convincing.
In their conclusions section I found the following statement that I thought seriously damaged their believability.

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"Knowledge of paleohydraulic conditions should help to determine better the paleo-ecological zones (depth and site) of the species which, as with the sediments, were dragged along by the currents. It might also provide a better explanation of the layering of fossil zones in the sediments of sedimentary basins."

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It sounds like they are saying currents in the flood was responsible for sorting the layers and locations of fossils found in the GC. Considering that many fossils are not reworked, they are found where they died and on the surface on which they died, renders their above statement as nonsense. How can currents sort fossilized coral reefs? Rooted petrified tree sumps? Create the progression of life seen in the GC, frequently seen in the same area with layer on layer? Clearly even if YEC were true, a much more complicated sorting system was at work than flood currents to produce the organised patterns seen in the GC. Any other comments I could make on the problems with their theory I think has already been addressed very well in your thread on this issue.

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The ferns are distibuted in the hundreds of foot thick Hermite formation and are not rooted!

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Checking in my book on Grand Canyon Geology, the Hermite is an excellent formation to attribute to an YEC flood. My book states "Controls on deposition during Supai and Hermit time were varied and complex. They included a complicated tectonic regime, rapid rise and fall in sea level, and an influx of sand from the north." However the book also went on to state, "the trackways, burrows, impressions, resting marks, and feeding marks formed by organisms in sediment and preserved in the rock record--are ubiquitous throughout the Supai and the Hermit. . . . bioturbation caused by plant roots, . . . are distributed throughout the Supai and the Hermit Formation." How could the Hermit formation be the result of a sudden YEC flood if it contains bioturbation caused by roots throughout it, not to mention trace fossils of animal burrows and trails? These trace fossils show that it is impossible for the Hermit formation to have been deposited in the manner that YECs would like to believe.Since as thick as the Hermit formation is, it is still only a small part of the massive layers of sediments and other material that the Grand Canyon cuts through. If this, the prize pick for YEC flood evidence, is so clearly not deposited in the manner YEC claim, what does that say for the rest of the Grand Canyon and the rest of the GC?

Dear Percy;

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You *do* understand that such evidence would be huge news world-wide

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You would think so, my book sales say otherwise. The patterns in extinctions and recolonization at the end of the Ice Age point towards an 'island' of higher survival in the general area where the Ark is stated to have been, and show a radiation outwards from there. But without the foundation of general acceptance of a late ice age global flood, this pattern is not seen in its context at this time. But if a flood event was accepted, then the pattern perhaps would indeed be 'huge news'.I checked out your stats and they are same as what I have read else where. The questions were related to YEC which of course is scientifically ridiculous, and a progressive creation of life over time is what intelligent Bible readers accept anyway. The only part I was disappointed in was the large number of scientists who rejected any involvement of God. With as skeptical and open minded a scientist is suppose to be, such a rejection of the supernatural is narrow minded since such is admittedly outside the range of science and can not be totally discounted by it. That indicates their rejection is more a matter of personal bias than of scientific revelation.

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The reference diatom has seven spokes, while your photo of something appears to contain two or perhaps three or perhaps four prongs

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Look at the spacing of the spokes, not all of them are visible, judging by the spacing the original number was the same as the reference diatom. As diatoms go, this one is very clear cut, did you look at the picture of diatoms in that article you posted? My picture here is much better than theirs.Think of tea, it owns it's color and some of it's flavor to tannic acid. Tannic acid is found in a number of plants including the Oak tree, which results in a brown stain in things exposed such as in seen in a number of rivers with naturally brown water. Tannic acid is also involved in the formation of caves, rain water carries the acid from the forest above and dissolves the limestone as it flows through the rock. Length of time to stain silicon, I don't know, but it does seem to imply some age.Great article on the Antarctic Sirius Group. I like it so much, I printed off a copy. They really trashed the eolian hypothesis. In the conclusions section they stated. "For the eolian hypothesis to remain viable, the following key questions related to the Meyer Desert Formation must be addressed. How can particles >200um in diameter be carried to high elevation, against prevailing wind? How to these biogenic particles penetrate laminated strata in vertical faces without disturbing the stratigraphy? How do diatoms adhere to a near-vertical face of a compact diamicton and penetrate faster than the rate of bluff erosion? And the most important question: Where are the exposures of Pliocene, Miocene, Oligocene, and Eocene strata that provided the source of pelagic Antarctic diatoms?" On eolian transport of diatoms on page 5 they stated, "Diatoms and marine diatomite clasts in the Meyer Desert Formation are too large (>100um) to be transported by eolian processes (Fig, 3). The size distribution of eolian particles in the Antarctic ice cores has a mode a around 2um; maximum sizes (equivalent diameter) are between 10 and 24 um (Basile et al., 1997). Material transported very long distances in earth's atmosphere is mostly smaller than 10 um, and much of it is smaller than 2 um (Pre, 1987, p. 1). Empty valves of freshwater diatoms are common components in aerosol samples and can be transported around the globe, but these particles are typically

wm The precedents of Scripture tell us that this will fire will be both literal and spiritual. OI agree wth you that the 'earth' is a picture of mankind, but it really got baptised didn't it? That was literal, even for you. Agreed, but that isn't an arguement against a physical fire! I have no idea how God will protect his church but have you not heard of Shadrach, Meshack and Abednigo? I'll have a look but I a the first to admit that it is early days for accelerated decay and rapid drift/spreading. I am convinced these are the answer but I am even more convinced that, nevertheless, the flood ocurred 1500 years after creation so it must have occurred quickly. With that sort of statement I think you'll have to back it up with excerpts.If you read the thread carefully my demonstration that the 3 catch-cries are explained by the flood emerged unscathed. It was almost not even commented on becasue it is so clearly true. The flood really does generate the same features as Lyellian gradualism. No one is claiming their work proves anything! It is very suggestive hat layering could have occurred rapidly under currents. And the videotape is much, much better than the website. You can get it for peanuts. Have you really considered Austin's work at all? Do you still beleive the mainstream Yellowstone petrified forest fairytale? Those reefs could simply be compactifid transported shell material. It would be a convolution of ecology, mobility and sorting events. That's a good point, but perhaps these layers were just well mixed during depositon. You ignore much of the data which is simply documents unrooted ferns strewn throughout huge areas. Every bed will have evidecne for both points of view. The total data of the Hermite speaks of the flood.[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 12-16-2002]

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Those reefs could simply be compactifid transported shell material.

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El Capitan, the highest peak in Texas, has 1600 vertical feet of coral, with portions in growth position throughout. And the reef sits next to the Delaware Basin, with 7000 feet of laminated shales and wind-carried sands, in inch-thick and less layers. And the base of the reef is over half a mile above sea level.You are blowing smoke. Very thin smoke.

^ It's preciesely El Capitan that creationists suggest are transported and compactified marine creatures.

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Originally posted by Tranquility Base:
It's preciesely El Capitan that creationists suggest are transported and compactified marine creatures.

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In case anyone wonders what the heck TB is talking about, TC has redefined 'in situ', 'in place' and now perhaps 'in growth position' to mean 'transported.' See, every one of those coral pieces in growth position has actually been transported who knows how far, and then miraculously replanted in the proper environment so that they can continue growing.

whoops[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 12-16-2002]

Dear Tranquility Base;

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The precedents of Scripture tell us that this will fire will be both literal and spiritual. I agree with you that the 'earth' is a picture of mankind, but it really got baptised didn't it? That was literal, even for you.
Agreed, but that isn't an argument against a physical fire! I have no idea how God will protect his church but have you not heard of Shadrach, Meshack and Abednigo?

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Noah was instructed to build an ark for the preservation of the animals, Christians have not been given such a command, no doubt because such is not needed. This would indicate by itself that it is not to be expected that the day of judgement includes a literal burning of the earth's surface. The meek who inherit the earth don't get stuck with a charred cinder of a planet. The destruction in the day of judgement is selective and is not indiscriminate. There is no scriptural requirement that the surface of the earth is to be literally burned by fire. In the Bible fire is a symbol of destruction, and everlasting fire is a symbol of permanent destruction of things that will never be rebuilt. I believe you are referring to 1 Peter 3:20 on baptism and the flood, only the persons inside the ark were symbolically baptized by the waters in the same manner as the Israelites were when they went through the Red Sea. I can find no reference to the literal earth being spoken of as being baptised in the flood. So as I stated earlier, there is no support for 1 Peter 3:4 referring to the literal earth or for interpreting it as a condemnation of modern geology.

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If you read the thread carefully my demonstration that the 3 catch-cries are explained by the flood emerged unscathed. It was almost not even commented on becasue it is so clearly true. The flood really does generate the same features as Lyellian gradualism.

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There were three pages of responses, too much to quote. They had you dead to rights, and showed you to be mistaken on all the main points. For example here are some of the obvious problems I saw.

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(1) Rivers follow gorges proportional to their size.
The same catchments that drained the Flood waters, rapidly eroding soft sediments into gorges, are also the catchments that provide the source for these same rivers today.

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Incorrect, many rivers, such as those draining from formerly glaciated areas show signs of super flooding and have vastly over sized river valleys. Most rivers do have oversized river valleys which were no doubt enlarged when the flood waters drained into the seas, but the river valleys are not proportional to the drainage areas compared to rivers in once glaciated areas. The pattern seen indicates large scale water releases from glaciers followed by somewhat smaller global drainage. The impossibility of forming gorges in soft sediments was pointed out, as was the impossibility for the soft sediments to be turned into stone.

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(2) Layers only form slowly
Layers have been proven beyond doubt to form in seconds and minutes under rapid flow. (See numerous posts on this web site).

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As pointed out to you by a number of posters, geology has long accepted that layers can form very rapidly, and that rapid formation is apparent when it has occurred and that many formations do not show signs of rapid formation but instead record the passage of many years in their creation. I thought their posts in that thread on this and in several others were very clear cut, a open and shut case in that they showed conclusively that certain formations could have only been formed over very long periods of time.

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(3) The formations around the world can all be assigned to a dozen or so modern day sedimentary environments.
Firstly most of the geo-col comes from a single environment - marine inundation on to land.

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Most deposits are sedimentary, and most are probably marine, but not all, and not all of the GC is sedimentary. No one seems to have been able to reach you with the point that if the GC was all created in the flood, then all of the GC would be marine sediments. Even if 99% of the GC was, with only a single non marine layer in the middle, that alone would shoot down the theory that it was all created in the flood. Plus YECs try to cite formations that are not marine sediments as being created in the flood, which is a clear impossibility. The non marine layers are non flood formed, there is no other possible answer. It is unreasonable to attempt to attribute non marine deposits to a global flood, it is too easy to disprove, all one has to do is look for marine traces such as marine diatoms. If marine traces are not present in the formation, that precludes former contact with ocean water. A simple marine trace test of the GC will of course reveal many formations which have had no contact with the sea and thus could not have been formed in the flood. Considering the large number of formations free of marine traces that appear in the GC, YEC is shown to be completely impossible many times over.

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Have you really considered Austin's work at all? Do you still beleive the mainstream Yellowstone petrified forest fairytale? Those reefs could simply be compactifid transported shell material.

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I have a policy that I follow, on controversial issues I read a book on both sides of the issue so I can see the issue from more than one angle and can perceive it in 3D or from more than one viewpoint. I have read on YEC and have read main stream geology, I see both sides of the issue and it is very obvious that modern geology is far more correct than YEC. I am not familiar with the "Yellowstone petrified forest fairytale," what is the fairytale? There are a number of petrified forests found around the world and of course the remains of non petrified wood as well. So what is your problem with Yellowstone? As for reefs, they are a common formation and they are where they were, they have not been moved, reefs are made out of coral, not shells. Coral reefs are firmly fixed in place, and form the foundation for coral islands and much of the state of Florida. Coral reefs illustrate the inability of hurricanes to move them, coral reefs suffer wear and tear, but the whole reef isn't picked up and moved. Fragments that wash up or are broken off are obvious as such. Old coral reefs are just what they appear to be, just as old ash falls and lava flows are what they appear to be. I see that Coragyps has posted about El Capitan in Texas having over 1600 feet of coral, another formation that is impossible for YEC to realistically explain. He is right about the smoke too, you really need to either change your position entirely or at least fall back, you are too exposed and too easily disproved.

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[bioturbation caused by plant roots]-That's a good point, but perhaps these layers were just well mixed during depositon. You ignore much of the data which is simply documents unrooted ferns strewn throughout huge areas. Every bed will have evidecne for both points of view. The total data of the Hermite speaks of the flood.

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I am not ignoring any data that I am aware of, my book on the Grand Canyon doesn't mention whether the ferns were rooted or not, under geology they could be found ether way. Only YEC requires that they are unrooted, can you provide a reliable source that states that they are not? Also it seems unimportant since signs of bioturbation caused by plant roots appears throught the formation. It is impossible to create the type of pattern seen created by plant roots by currents, just as it would be impossible to create "the trackways, burrows, impressions, resting marks, and feeding marks formed by organisms in sediment and preserved in the rock record--are ubiquitous throughout the Supai and the Hermit.' In light of the trace fossils and bioturbation I don't see how you can say "The total data of the Hermite speaks of the flood" when you can't even explain a mechanism for current to create what is clearly caused by other effects. The Hermite formation does speak for itself, but what it really has to say YECs don't want to hear. You have to fact the facts sooner or later, the Hermite is not a YEC type flood layer.I am still waiting for your answers to the problems I raised with rapid plate movement in post number 344 in the old thread.

wm That is your belief that goes against the precendents of Scripture. I cna't prove it to you but the precednets of Scriptures suggest it will be a literal fire. The ark floated on top, their past was the world and unsaved below. The Israelites did walk under the level of the water and their pst life, the Egyltians wer literally washed away. God is incredibly detailed with his patterns. If you want to maintain that, although 1 Pet 3:21 identifies the waters of the flood with baptism waters, and that the earth was completely covered, that that doesn't represent a baptism of the earth you are free to do so.It is very clear that the earth was an object of reworking as was man: Both man and earth were 'baptized'. In Greek, baptism means immersion in water.The sceanrio whereby the land is birthed out of water on creaitn day 3, baptized in the flood and refined by fire all literally is incredible evidence of God's systematic mixing of natural and spiritual.You can ignore it if you want but I think you just don't like me showing the clear reasons we really think YEC is the true declaraiton of Scripture. The entire geology of earth is his and is decribed in Scripture with its timing. Are you aware that I was quoting the mainstream catch cries of Lyellian uniformitarianism? That was one of Lyell's argeuments! I was humouring him.I don't believe it is systematically true in every case!!I suspect it is largely true but not every time. My flood arguement about catchments shows why one might expect it to be true much of the time. I agree there was a recent catastrophic ice age so you may be qute right that glaciation explins the anomalies.Please, stop thinking you can trounce a YEC flood so easily Wm! I appreciate that mainstream geologists have come around to rapid layering over th elast 30 years. I have posted various mainstream excerpts myself to demonstrate that. The point is that this means most formations themselves could have been layed in a matter of days.Yes there are salt and chalk to think about. With accelerated decay heating and inorganic calicum I thnk these are all within the realms of possibility.It is not cut and dry. The YEC scenario opens up an entire new universe of possibilities that habve to be carefuly examined. Much metamorphism may even be due to rapid radioheating. We have pointed out on dozens of occasions that we agree the flood occurred in surges with even weeks and months inbetween for accelraed decay evaporaiton, metamorphisms and temporary rehabitaitons from high ground.The Scriptures talk of the 'windows of the heavens' opening up so there would have been huge fesh water beds formed in between the marine surges. You ignore these things everytime Wm. You are clearly not aware of Austin's seminal work at Mt St Helens. He has showed that the forests of floating logs on Spirit Lake are sinking vertically, rooted ends first, and settling in mud at different levels giving he appearence of multiple generations of forests. The 27 generations of Yellowstone forests at different levels are predicted by him to be the sam phenomenon.On a different topic, in support of his floating mat model of coal formtaion (dhave you read about that??), he also has found 3 or 4 feet of bark at the bottom of Spirit Lake. This is how coal formed, not in swamps. I am not claiming they moved whole! I have read that the fossil reefs look systematically diffenert to todays reefs. I have no ref for that currently but I'll keep an eye out. That is the problem with putting scientific reconstructions ahead of Scripture. Man thinks he is wise. Those trackways could have occurred between surges and the burrows could be escape burrows. I will get to it.All of these issues can be seen for wht they are. Shoehorning. Mainstream science shoe-horms the data into eons and we shoe-horn it into the flood year. Why? Becasue one of them is the right answer, it's just too difficult to tell for sure becasue it's so complicated and we don't know all of the starting conditions and dynamics. Every point you bring up can be reinterpreted via the flood and there will be some questions that neither of us can answer with certainty.[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 12-19-2002]

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Yes there are salt and chalk to think about. With accelerated decay heating and inorganic calicum I thnk these are all within the realms of possibility.

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The thread on that topic remains open.
Ca(+2) + 2(HCO3)- = (still!)CaCO3 + H2O + CO2, whether inorganic or biologically mediated.

OK Coragyps. Explain your arguement in total please.This reaction generates too much heat, is that your point?What if it the calicum was already present as a carbonate on the surface of the earth? How do you know what the pre-flood earth was like?

This thread: http://EvC Forum: General Flood Topic -->EvC Forum: General Flood Topic
Post 17 sums it up pretty well. Let's keep the discussion over on that thread - look the whole thread over before you start, please.

Interest in the topic is enormous. Your book sales are telling you something about your book. The spacing of the two visible prongs in your photograph is closer together and would yield 9 or 10 prongs, not the 7 of the reference photograph. The prongs do not have the same shape. Most of the prongs, if they were ever present, are missing. None of the other structures from the reference photo are evident in your photo, such as the narrow innter prongs. I can only make a visual comparison, and on that basis these two photos do not appear at all alike. Here they are again just so people know which photos we're talking about: Your photo is a closeup of a single something, perhaps a diatom, while theirs is a distance shot of a clast containing "abundant fragments of diatoms, as well as high numbers of Thalassionema sp. and Thalassiothrix sp." Even so, you can still make out a number of sticklike figures that must be the Thassalionema (here's the link to the article again: Page not found | Stanford School of Earth, Energy & Environmental Sciences) and which correspond very well, at least at a distance, with the reference photo you provided (shown on right), which is far more than your own photograph (shown on left): I hope you do.--Percy

Dear Tranquility Base;

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That is your belief that goes against the precendents of Scripture. I cna't prove it to you but the precednets of Scriptures suggest it will be a literal fire.

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The fact that you can't prove it should tell you something. At Gen 6:13 'earth' can indeed be taken to mean the earth or land surface, but as we both agree the destruction was not literal or total, in that the earth is still here. The destruction that the earth under went is explained in 18-19, the waters covered the earth or lands. According to the Bible that is how the destruction occurred, by flooding. There is no requirement for or mention of a major reshaping of the literal earth's surface. In fact YEC's reshaping of the earth was never a Christian doctrine until after the discovery of the GC, at which time it was invented as a way of trying to explain away the obvious great age shown in the GC. If it was really taught by the Bible, why didn't any one teach it before the discovery of the GC?

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1 Pet 3:21 identifies the waters of the flood with baptism waters, and that the earth was completely covered, that that doesn't represent a baptism of the earth you are free to do so.

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Read verse twenty, it was the people in the ark who were 'baptized' by the waters, not the earth. A baptism is a dedication, it is not just a dunking. A prior commitment to God must be made by the person under going the baptism. For example, the Israelites were 'baptized' by going through the waters of the Red Sea, but the Egyptian army who ended up being really surrounded by the waters, was not. The reason of course, is that the Egyptian army was not dedicating itself to God. Without a willful decision to commit oneself to God, there can not be a baptism. Objects or things can be dedicated to God or set aside for exclusive use in the worship of God, but we know the earth at the time of the flood was not given to the worship of God, in that after the flood wickedness once more abounded on the earth. So in no way does the Bible imply that the literal earth was baptised in the flood. YEC has no scriptural basis and the Bible doesn't condemn modern geology. YEC is strictly a fundamentalist doctrine based on an interpretation of scripture in a way that is contrary to what the Bible really states on the matter.I had posted "It is impossible to create the type of pattern seen created by plant roots by currents, just as it would be impossible to create "the trackways, burrows, impressions, resting marks, and feeding marks formed by organisms in sediment and preserved in the rock record--are ubiquitous throughout the Supai and the Hermit." to which you replied

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We have pointed out on dozens of occasions that we agree the flood occurred in surges with even weeks and months in-between for accelraed decay evaporaiton, metamorphisms and temporary rehabitaitons from high ground.
The Scriptures talk of the 'windows of the heavens' opening up so there would have been huge fesh water beds formed in between the marine surges. You ignore these things everytime Wm.

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The length of time as shown by the growth of plant roots and animal activity is far too long to fit in the time frame of the biblical flood. The flood was about a year in length, how much time can you allow for this formation and the formations below it to form, then to be exposed, then animals rush in and make traces and then the area is reflooded, and so on. So for this one formation which varies from 100 to over 900 feet thick, you will have to invoke a 'flood surge' to cover over each layer of fossils. Now let's look at this theory of yours, a layer of Hermit sandstone is laid down, the water is drained away, animals rush in and make tracks, etc, then a flood surge occurs laying down more sandstone. OK, the question is, how does the flood surge put down the next layer of sandstone without washing away the animal tracks? and how is it that we can find the tracks? for if you step in wet sand and then put more wet sand on top, your foot print disappears without a trace. How was the flood different? Now also remember that you will have to invoke a flood surge to cover each layer of tracks for the entire 100 to 900 foot sandstone formation. So you have these periodic flood surges that come in and drop a sand layer and then depart, why doesn't this hermit formation extend out into the sea floor from where the surges come from? How could the flood level retreat without depositing any hermit sand outside the area of the formation? and why is the deposit not made up of different types of material if the water keep surging in and out of the area?The second part of your answer above was a response to the fact that many formations in the GC are lacking in marine traces such as marine diatoms. I can see that this is a real problem for YEC and out of desperation you make reference to 'freshwater beds' from the waters above. As far as I know, nearly all YECs have abandoned the canopy theory because they all see the obvious impossibilities with it. It has been shown conclusively over and over again, that it would be impossible for a significant amount of water to come from the 'heavens,' outside of a miracle. You may want to reread the chapter I have in my book on this. Since the heavens could not have been a significant source of water, there no way for YEC to account for non marine formations. The absence of marine traces in these formations is fatal to YEC flood theories. And even if you could come up with another major source of freshwater, there is the problem that when rivers enter the sea, the freshwater flows over the top of the more dense saltwater. Even a large 'pocket' of freshwater would rise to the top and salt water would flow beneath it. As the sediments from the freshwater dropped to the bottom, they would pass through and be deposited in saltwater. Also YEC invokes currents powerful enough to pick up the preflood surface of the earth and keep it in suspension until it settled out. Currents would of course rapidly mix any 'pockets' of freshwater into the saltwater, mixing marine traces into them. Even a fresh water rain on exposed ground between your 'flood surges' will not work, for each flood surge will deposit a layer of marine traces on the surface when the water returns which are not found in none marine formations.Using a heavy rain on still exposed hills to wash down material onto lower also exposed elevations, also runs into problems. As pointed out above, the amount of rain that fell while large, was not a major source of flood water. This limits such erosional effects to reasonable sizes, as we would expect to find in areas that today experience extreme rain fall events. Rain of course doesn't suddenly turn rock into sand, it only washes down small material as a rule unless a landslide occurs, but such would be limited in it's effects and would fail to explain large deposits. This results in a very limited explanation that still fails to account for nearly all of the non marine deposits. Large hills of unconsolidated sediments also need to be postulated to have existed for the rain to wash down, and it needs to be explained why under YEC theories why they didn't turn into stone when the same sediments are believed to have do so later. The bases of these preflood fossil free sediment hills should also still exist, but they hae not been found. Then there is the problem of the rain, the Bible states it lasted 40 days and ended, yet most deposits show layering with a dry surfaces that recorded foot prints and plant grown, with a single 40 day rain you would at most have only one such surface when the rain ended. So there is no way YEC can account for multiple dry surfaces in non marine formations. Then we have the non marine formations that are wind blown with reworking with plant growth in-between the reworking, under YEC the wind reworking had to occur after the rain ended and before the water rose high enough to cover them. Such deposits require time for the plant growth to occur a number of times and yet are frequently found beneath many layers that YEC claims as flood deposits. Also if the flood was so erosive that it picked up so much sediments in it's waters, why weren't the areas that were affected by 'flood surge' deposits, later washed away when the flood waters covered them to later deposit the formations above them? And if the flood switched from erosion to depositing before reaching that elevation, then there should have been no erosion above that elevation, only deposition on top of what was already there including the 'sediment hills.' Yet this has not been found or even claimed by YECs. So that adds several more reasons why large scale freshwater deposits in a YEC flood are impossible.

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You are clearly not aware of Austin's seminal work at Mt St Helens. He has showed that the forests of floating logs on Spirit Lake are sinking vertically, rooted ends first, and settling in mud at different levels giving he appearence of multiple generations of forests. The 27 generations of Yellowstone forests at different levels are predicted by him to be the sam phenomenon.

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No I am not aware of his work. I should point out that even if the logs do sink vertically, they will end up with random positioning. There will be no former ground surface layer associated with the trees, as have been found with may trees found in the GC. While if correct this could account for some trees, it doesn't account for the ones with a break in the formation where the former ground layer was or grouping at specific levels. The only way YEC could try to fit in such trees is to perhaps claim they experienced super growth between a couple of your flood surges, not very believable at all. I am not familiar enough with the Yellowstone trees to know if there are also 27 former ground surface layers to go with the trees, if there are, it would be another redundant lethal blow for YEC. But since you mention 'forests' that would imply 27 grouped levels which 'sinking in sediments' is unable to account for. Additionally in such forest layers, generally just the lower portion of the trees are preserved when they were buried up to that height, under the theory you wish to use, the entire trees should be present right up to the top branches, and that is probably not the case with the Yellowstone trees for stacking 27 trees on top of each other crown to root, will create quite a thick deposit.

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On a different topic, in support of his floating mat model of coal formtaion (dhave you read about that??), he also has found 3 or 4 feet of bark at the bottom of Spirit Lake. This is how coal formed, not in swamps.

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Coal is not formed in swamps, I would suggest you read the book "Deep Hot Biosphere; The Myth of Fossil Fuels" by Thomas Gold. He puts forward a new theory on 'fossil' fuel formation that YECs will no doubt fall head over heels in love with. It does away with the need for deeply buried surface bio material for oil and coal formation. So you don't need a bark layer to make coal, which sounds ridiculous anyway.

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You can ignore it if you want but I think you just don't like me showing the clear reasons we really think YEC is the true declaraiton of Scripture. The entire geology of earth is his and is decribed in Scripture with its timing.

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Actually I prefer it since the scriptures do not support YEC, and any detailed examination of scripture will rapidly bring to light how YECs frequently twist Bible verses to try to vainly support their man-made theories. The saddest part is how many thinking people are turned off on the Bible because YECs tell them all these impossible things that they claim the Bible says when it said nothing of the kind. In this way YEC helps create more new atheists than any other organization on earth. Just look around on this web site at how many of the people who post against you claim to have once been raised believing in YEC. YEC made them what they are today, put them to sea in a flimsy boat made up of mostly man made doctrines, which sank when they encountered the hard rocks called facts that ripped their shoddy belief system to shreds. Man made doctrines are a very poor substitute for the truth of God and following them will always lead to disaster.Perhaps the biggest difference between us is, I don't claim that the Bible states my theory is how the flood happened. I accept the Bible as the inspired word of God, but I also recognise that any interpretation of that word is prone to human error. I also accept that there is much that the Bible doesn't tell us, we may make up theories about it and have ideas about what happened, but we should remember that they are not part of the Bible itself. My ideas may or may not be true, I believe that they are in harmony with a literal reading of the Bible, but they are still just my ideas and interpretations. Which is why I sometimes have to change or adjust my thinking because I don't know all the answers and still have much to learn. I look to the evidence to learn the details of how things happened, and sometimes it tells me things I didn't expect. If I am proved wrong, it is just my theory that is disproved. Whereas with YEC, since they claim that what they say is the what the Bible says, the conflicts with scientific evidence causes people to lose confidence in the reliability of God's word. The YECs like to wrap their man made theories up with the pages of the Bible to make them look scriptural, but if God was one to bother with human courts, he would probably sue the YECs for slander and misrepresentation.And we have yet to even deal with the problems I raised with rapid plate movement in post number 344 in the old thread.