Summations Only

Look, it's obviously futile for me to continue to try to argue this and I did say I wanted to feel I'd DONE this argument before exiting the thread, and I think that point has come.I wish I had something indisputable to make my case, but that doesn't happen in an argument which is based only on imaginative speculations about a past we didn't witness. I think the facts I've given make a strong dent in the OE theory of how the Southwest formed but I also see how easily it's possible to rationalize it away, even though the rationalizations hit me as absurd. It's just me versus all of you after all.I think the preservation of the neatly parallel (originally horizontal) form of layers of sediments a mile deep and hundreds of miles long, which is illustrated on both those cross-sections, simply defies OE interpretation of millions to billions of years, and rather strongly supports Flood interpretation, but I can't PROVE it against those who are practiced in and invested in the OE viewpoint.I think the degree of erosion that can be seen between some of the layers, in otherwise undisturbed sections of the stack of layers, as exposed in the Grand Canyon, is not deep enough or ragged enough erosion to have occurred during any period of exposure on the surface of the earth, but as long as you all insist it did there's no way to PROVE it.I still think all the big disturbances, tectonic, volcanic, earthquakes, etc., occurred only after all the strata were laid down, and that this is strong evidence against OE theory and for the Flood, and Percy even agrees with some of that, but he nevertheless came up with OE interpretations of it all, and although I think they are unrealistic or impossible I can't PROVE it. Me against Geologists, even me against nonGeologist EvC regulars, nope.I still think the Great Unconformity was most likely formed at the same time as all the large scale disturbances that occurred after all the strata were in place; I think the kind of erosion at that boundary, including the quartzite boulder embedded in the Tapeats sandstone, are evidence of that, but I can't PROVE it. It's an interpretation, it has to be seen it can't be proved.So I think I've finally DONE this argument. I may still come back and answer stuff, I'm not sure, but I do think it's done.
Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Faith I understand why you're leaving now. The obvious desperation in your recent posts, your inability to dent the mainstream view of how the canyon was cut, and the lack of any sensible alternative that fit with your beliefs are all too obvious.

The idea that an uplift would "force" a river to cut deeply into rock just strikes ME as daft, speaking of daft. Like you live on some other planet than Planet Earth. THIS is what strikes ME as daft. I can't even figure out what on earth you think you are saying. You get meanders in a river following a particular course. It isn't going to keep that course for millions of years while at the same time it supposedly cuts out a canyon miles wide a mile deep and hundreds of miles long.Oh well, have it your way.

What you appear to be describing isn't what happens, and it isn't what my diagram shows. Take another look at it: Look at the first line. It shows just a normal river with barely any riverbanks.Now look at the second line. It shows just the slightest uplift and just the slightest erosion down to the same level it occupied on the first line. It didn't have "already formed banks." The riverbanks grew in height as the river eroded its way through the gradually uplifting landscape.This gradual process of simultaneous uplift and erosion continues on subsequent lines, and the riverbanks grow higher and higher as the river erodes downward to maintain the same level, eventually becoming the cliffs of a deep canyon. Those cliffs formed gradually over time and were never "already formed."It would be an error to interpret people as saying that the Colorado River never changed its course over millions of years. That's not what people are saying. What we're saying is that the Colorado River gradually eroded into a gradually uplifting landscape. Undoubtedly it did change course during the earliest stages of uplift, but once the channel became sufficiently deep any significant diversion would have become very unlikely.You're also working under the misimpression that only the area beneath the Grand Canyon was uplifted, but if you examine this topographical map of Arizona you'll see that there was an enormous area of uplift stretching all the way from the northern border down through Flagstaff and then continuing further south and east toward New Mexico. It was a huge area that was uplifted. The Grand Canyon is where the Colorado eroded its way down through the gradually uplifting region (the image is huge, you'll have to scroll around): --Percy

Take your time.Those ugly facts that show your "imaginative speculations about [the] past" are horribly wrong will still be here.

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The idea that an uplift would "force" a river to cut deeply into rock just strikes ME as daft, speaking of daft. Like you live on some other planet than Planet Earth.

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It's already been explained in this thread. And it's pretty easy to see that flowing water - and whatever it is carrying - is going to hit an upward slope in its path, so erosion would naturally follow. A little thought is all it takes.

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THIS is what strikes ME as daft. I can't even figure out what on earth you think you are saying. You get meanders in a river following a particular course. It isn't going to keep that course for millions of years while at the same time it supposedly cuts out a canyon miles wide a mile deep and hundreds of miles long.

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But I note that you don't offer a more sensible alternative that fits the evidence. So I'm going to ask the obvious question again. If the canyon was cut before the meanders formed, where is the original canyon ? You don't just lose a stretch of canyon that deep !Anyway, it's again pretty obvious that solid rock is a more substantial barrier than the average riverbank.

When JonF said that "the meanders were formed before the uplift" he assumed you understood that this was before the canyon was there. Meanders only form on a very slow flowing river on a very level landscape. Imagine a river flowing across a very flat plain and you'll get something like this image of the Rio Cauto from the Wikipedia article on Meader: The course of a meandering river is very changeable, but in a gradually uplifting region a meandering river can gradually erode down through rock, forever etching the last meandering pattern into the landscape like RAZD's image, or like this one: --Percy

I don't disagree with Percy. You are misunderstanding again.The meanders existed, as meanders do in many rivers, before the uplift started. But they weren't a mile deep. They were whatever the depth of the water in the river was, plus the height of whatever banks the river had. They were just meanders, not incised meanders.As the uplift started, the meanders got cut a little deeper by erosion. Then there was a little more uplift and erosion cut the meanders deeper. After millions of years of very slow uplift and erosion cutting through hard rock (we can tell that they weren't cut through soft rock) the meanders were a mile deep and are no incised meanders.The canyon was cut in the uplift. SO were the incised meanders. But an ordinary river with no canyon but many ordinary meanders existed before the uplift.

Faith, the cognitive dissonance meter is climbing ... Yes trying to fit nasty facts into fantasy is a challenge, forget that violent cascade erosion is like the scablands and pretend that it somehow aligns with an uplifted area and somehow pours in from the sides that slope away from the uplifted area AND that it zigzags back and forth as if it couldn't decide where to flow next ... How much does a river erode in a year -- a few millimeters or moreHom much uplift can we document today -- a few millimetes/year ... it is very easy for one to balance the other and if they do, then there is no need to jump the banks.The uplift would present no bigger problem for a river than a boulder falling in from the bank. Nope, all you have indicated is your inability to accept concepts that demonstrate your fantasy is false. Again.Why does the canyon get wider and then narrower Faith? Why are there islands of sedimentary rock left in many parts -- ... catastrophic cascade does not explain this, they would have been eroded away ...What causes all those flat areas Faith? Different layers have different erosion susceptibility ... and the soft breakable ones have a much lower angle of repose than the harder rocks, so they make those angled walls above and below hard layers ... The canyon is still eroding, and the water erodes the outside of curves and can leave sandbars on the inside. Eventually that teardrop peninsula will be eroded through at the narrow point and you will have another island.But just for good measure ... there is another component to uplift, and it is called rebound: as material (glaciers, rocks, whatever) is removed the bottom will tend to rise ... so the erosion of the canyon could actually result in uplift concentrating under the river.This is like when you get off your bed the mattress rebounds (and the analogy would be best if it were a water bed ... )Are there other rivers that demonstrate this pattern? Yes.And again, it doesn't have to be much of an effect per year.Tectonic uplift - Wikipedia

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Tectonic uplift is the portion of the total geologic uplift of the mean earth surface that is not attributable to an isostatic response to unloading. ... Within the scope of this topic, uplift relates to denudation in that denudation brings buried rocks closer to the surface. This process can redistribute large loads from an elevated region to a topographically lower area as well - thus promoting isostatic response in the region of denudation (which can cause local bedrock uplift). The timing, magnitude, and rate of denudation can be estimated using pressure-temperature studies.

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So as the river removes material the ground under it can rise in compensation ... and you have the uplift (combining tectonic and isostatic rebound) becoming locally higher under the river. Which is why the canyon gets wider and narrower and there are large areas where river water could spread out over harder rock and then flow on both sides of an island before one side cut deeper than the other leaving an island of rock with a high and dry channel on one side and the river on the other. What we can do is look at ALL the evidence, the evidence of microscopic fossils to the view from space, the evidence of river erosion vs the evidence of cascade erosion, the evidence from other places of similar effects and their causes ... and then we look for the explanation that fits ALL the evidence.And that means

• the spires and islands
• the horseshoe bend and other meanders
• the general meandering path of the whole canyon
• the speleothems,
• the fossils of footprints, and
• the flow from the tributaries from less uplifted areas north and south,
  • rivers\creeks that also cut as deep as the canyon
  • through those sides of the uplifted alignment to get to the Colorado
  • even though they are perpendicular to the Colorado.
• etcetera etcetera etcetera

As well as basic erosion 101.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : youanders tooEdited by RAZD, : ...Edited by RAZD, : uplift versus boulderEdited by RAZD, : islandEdited by RAZD, : ... moreEdited by RAZD, : ..Edited by RAZD, : added horseshoe

Except that we aren't all guessing. That's just you. We're making inferences based on observation of how current weathering and erosion takes place and the signs left by various depositional regimes. You have started with the assumption that the Flood did it all and are imagining scenarios based on that without any grounding in any observation of weathering processes.

As I am probably way too fond of saying, things that have actually happened leave evidence behind. We have, literally, trillions of tons of evidence. We have here-and-now observations of rivers and canyon formation, we observe the types of evidence they leave behind, and we find that evidence of what happened in the past buried in the ground. Well, I'm sure this comes as a surprise to everyone, especially me. First, geological disturbances that occurred during their formation *are* found in the strata. And second, a layer might form in just 10 million years, and so there are only 10 millions years of whatever the odds are of a major geological event during it's formation. But then the layer sits beneath the ground for 300 million years, which is 30 times greater odds of a major geological event after it forms than during.You would make as much sense expressing suspicion that most things seem to happen to people after they're born instead of before. A more accurate characterization might be made-up stuff against knowledge built upon a foundation of centuries of evidence and study.--Percy

It's puzzling that you describe this idea as daft, because it's something very simple. Did you ever play with making dams as a child? Maybe at a tiny creek, or in the springtime as the snow melted? Do you remember what happened as the tiny dam filled up and eventually overflowed? Do you remember the water overrunning the top at one point, then eroding a notch that quickly grew ever wider and deeper as the water rushed through with increasing force and speed?It's the same with a river flowing through a region that has recently uplifted a small amount, say a few inches after an earthquake. The river will form a pool behind the uplifted region, because the uplift acts like a partial dam. But because just as much water must flow to sea as before, the water must flow through the uplifted region with greater speed and force, and at the end of the uplifted region the water will flow with even greater speed and force because of the drop off from the greater height of the uplift.You can demonstrate this to yourself with the device I showed before: You don't need a real one like this, just construct a simple one in your garden. Create a downward slope with a drop of a few inches over 4 or 5 feet, then put a garden house at the upper end and turn on the water. A river will gradually form.Now fake an uplift by slipping a trowel beneath the river somewhere around the halfway point, and leverage the trowel up slightly to lift the riverbed a half inch or so. Observe the river erode through the uplift.If you instead leverage the trowel up a great deal to create the effect of an insurmountable uplift then the river will change course and go off in another direction, which is the other scenario you've mentioned a number of times. This can happen too, no one denies this, but you can't grasp onto it as if it were the only thing that can happen. It is only one of things that can happen, and in the case of the Colorado, where it is now is where it was successful in eroding through the uplift. But a river doesn't have to keep a course for millions of years to cut deeply. Most rivers do not begin by flowing through rock, as we see the Colorado do today in the Grand Canyon. In its earliest days it flowed along through much softer material, namely soil.So initially the topmost layers of any gradually uplifting region are going to be soil. After enough time passes with continued uplift a meandering river will erode down through the soil to create deep banks from which it is very unlikely to escape. If the uplift continues long enough eventually the river will erode to the bottom of the soil and be into rock, with banks now so deep as to be a very persistent feature on the landscape, and once the river erodes deeply enough into the rock its meandering course will be permanently etched.The catastrophic flow of water you think is needed to create the Grand Canyon could not have created the meanders, and certainly not the tightly meandering canyons of the San Juan River.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Clarify.

Funny how you keep reaching that point whenever yet another fact your Flood fantasy can't explain is presented. Most recently you're trying your best to avoid understanding that gradual uplift is not going to cause a river to flow off the sides. You've also tried to ignore the fact that according to all observations, catastrophic cataracts of water do not produce meandering channels. Add to this the speleothems, the aeolian bedding angles, the in situ dinosaur and all the myriad other objections you've either handwaved away or ignored entirely and your position becomes even more laughably shaky. You're trying to wrap it all up with a desperate attempt at establishing a false equivalency between your imaginings and our evidence-based inferences. Good to see you recognize that you have no hope of refuting the arguments of trained geologists with your completely untrained fabrications. The fact that we can keep producing "OE interpretations" is a good indication that we are right and you are wrong. We can keep pointing to modern processes that produce the same results as we observe in the GC and are thus most likely analogous to the processes that formed the GC. The mainstream theory of geology accounts again and again for what we observe. Every objection you have raised can be accounted for by non-Deluvian processes. In contrast, you have been forced over and over and OVER to ignore the points raised here for which your Flood model cannot account. I've said it before but I'll say it again: if your model fails again and again to account for the evidence, then your model is obviously wrong. You tell yourself over and over that you needn't look at any given piece of evidence because it is insignificant and if you really looked into it you would find yourself vindicated. This is a comforting fantasy, but nothing more. You really seem to believe that your utterly unsubstantiated beliefs about what must have happened are on equal footing with the observation-based inferences of what happened provided in this thread. This is quite absurd but I will reserve my pity because, as I said before, I know you are very happy with your ignorance.And just a reminder: you have as yet failed to disprove uniformitarianism. This is the only way you could refute the points raised in this thread. But obviously this isn't going to happen now that you've once again given yourself permission to run away and bury your head in the sand.Edited by Atheos canadensis, : more shtuff

Nope, it's fairly common. Lots of rivers in the world, lots of uplift. Imaqes of incised meanders.The GC may be the best known and most impressive example, but it's far from alone.

Could you look in the bumper book of Creationist Science Facts and tell us where the Colorado River was a hundred years ago? Thanks to you and all your fabulous brain knowledge, we know know that it can't have been in ... y'know ... the bed of the Colorado River. But then where the dickens was it?