So how did the GC get laid down from a mainstream POV? Deterministic models?

I have not come across a ref that explains how the GC (= Geological column NOT Grand Canyon) arrived from a mainstream POV. I have seen a lot of ancient sedimentary environments matched with contemporary couterparts but this usually involves small formations and typically ignores the vast beds that traverse sub-continental regions. I have not seen mainstream explanations of what specifically caused the vast beds of each geological period and if this can be explained deterministically to any extent.In the mainstream literature I discovered that 'epeiric seas' which supposedly generated the vast beds that characterise the geological column no longer exist anywhere on earth (due to plate tectonics):R.C. Shelly Ancient Sedimentary Environments 4th Ed Chapman & Hall (London) 1996
p197 "It is difficult to use modern shelf seas as analogues for their ancient counter parts for two reasons. First, at the present time, the earth lacks the vast sub-horizontal shelves that existed in previous times. For example, it is possible to trace a remarkable (sic) uniform Paleozoic stratigraphy in marine formations across much of modern North america. Similarly it is possible to trace antoher uniform stratigraphy in shallow marine Mesozoic formaitons across much of Arabia. These are examples of sediments deposited on broad shelves, commonly referred to as 'epeiric seas', the like of which are absent today. This reflects the fact that the earth is now in an unstable and exciting phase of its history, in which the vast continental plates of the past have been rifted and drifted apart."Q1. So what is the mainstream explanation for all of the strata? Do epeiric seas explain it?
Q2. And what of all of the sea level fallings and risings that repeatedly covered entire continents?
Q3. Do you really think the marine deposits are ocean floor habitats? Why so flat?
Q4. How do you address the vast beds littered with land plant and animal fossils? Coal beds the size of US states?
Q5. And what is the status of deterministic models along these lines?

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-22-2002]

I think that this topic deserves treatment in it's own right. I have spent the last 6 months trying to uncover the answer to these questions and IMO it is very poorly understood from a mainstream POV. This is not a sideline to the purpose of this BBS and neither should it be tucked away in discussions on 'rapid generation of layers in the creationist model'.I want to know about YOUR model. I have done a lot of reading and I can't find out about this aspect specifically.

^ In the interest of clarity I would like this topic treated separately. Joe, if you don't wish to take part in this thread I'm disappointed but that's your right.

Sorry Edge, but I've read thousands of pages of that stuff you're talking about. The mainstream material does not answer my questions compellingly and that is why neither of you will even post a layman's summary IMO.I can give you a layman's introdution to any aspect of molecular biology or particle physics you would care to hear about. Why can't you do that for me on what should be a bread and butter geological foundation? I am truly interested in answers from geolgoists on this board.

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-22-2002]

Joe and Edge, let's forget about creation/flood for a minute - just what are the mainstream explanations, both qualitatively and deterministically, for the origin of the vast beds of the GC including the multiple inundations of continents by the sea and terrestial plant and animal fossil beds?Joe, I'm afraid your mistaken on the helium issue (and your thinnly veiled personal attacks are wearing thin BTW) - that is a well known mainstream result that 'the helium budget' is a problem. The detailed models have not been able to explain the low abundance of helium in the air. There are two main competing efects: radiogeneic helium into the air from igneous rocks and escape from the atmosphere via Boltzman (his distribution). Escape from the atmosphere has not been able to explain it. Creationist explain it easily becasue we have found where the helum is! It hasn't had time to diffuse out of the rocks. I'm not saying that there will not be a mainstream solution, but there currently isn't one and there is a creaitonist one.Refs: The RATE book (see last link) has the diffusion calc in it (I've read it), the mainstream Gentry ref records evidence of vast excess helium in zircons, the web links contain mainstream refs to the helium budget problem, and I link to the RATE site where they report that the experimental helium diffusion rate backs up their previouls argon extrapolation:R.V. Gentry, G.L. Glish and E.H. McBay (1982) Geophys Res Lett 9:1129-1130
http://www.answersingenesis.org/docs/1401.asp#r7
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/magazines/tj/docs/v8n2_helium.asp
http://www.icr.org/headlines/ratereport.htmlI have absorbed much of the basic backgound of geology although I do not deny I make mistakes of jargon and cannot compete with a real geologist. If you made even the simplest attempt to appeal to a general audiance I would be able to understand what you are saying. I have read most of Chernicoff and three sedimentology texts from cover to cover! If you can't talk to me who can you talk to!

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-22-2002]

According to AIG these 1977 and 1987 mainstream texts cover the problem:1. C.G. Walker, Evolution of the Atmosphere, Macmillan, 1977.2. J.W. Chamberlain and D.M. Hunten, Theory of Planetary Atmospheres, 2nd Ed., Academic Press, 1987.and the creationist Vardiman has discussed it in depth in a book devoted to the subject that is in print:3. The Age of the Earth’s Atmosphere: A Study of the Helium Flux through the Atmosphere, Institute for Creation Research, 1990.His on-line summary of the problem is at http://www.icr.org/pubs/imp/imp-143.htm .Note that the mainstream reseachers in ref 2 said in 1987 that the helium accumulation problem "will not go away, and it is unsolved".

MP, apart from Edge's recent post there hasn't been anything for me to try and take in yet!And MP, stating there is no problem with the helium budget and listing refs are not the same thing. i have listed 3 refs that show there is a problem. if there isn't anymore there should be refs that resoved the problem.

These are clearly mainstream books Mark. I would suspect that the books reference peer reviewed literature.

Thanks Edge.But if scientists can't talk to each other about their (very differnet) work it is a sad day for science. I truly disagree that this is necessary. I met with a PhDed climatologist a couple of months ago. We spent half an hour together on science issues and I walked away with a good feeling of the status of climatology modelling (I got a grasp of the driving forces, the time and spatial resolution, the computaitonal difficulties etc) and he the same for the protein folding problem from me.Why can't you guys summarize the status of this issue and stop worrying that 'I'll try and morph it into flood geology'?

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-22-2002]

By the way this thread I created is a 'Geological Column' thread, not a Grand Canyon thread as some believed due to my unfortunate use of the acronym 'GC'!

Wehappyfew, I don't know enough about it but I'll summarize the stuff from the RATE book tommorow for you. In the recent work they talk about helium in granites and have experimentally measured the diffusion rates. I can't deny your zircon stuff but it doesn't necessarily have anything to do with the granite work unless I'm mistaken.For the others (not you wehappy) this thread is about mainstream qualitative and deterministic mechanisms for generating the geological column strata. Any takers? Any summaries? Any books/reviews on this subject? Joe M suggested a few including geology of various US regions but I sort of mean on the world wide scale?

Edge, from your example model I can therefore assume that there is no true consensus on how the transgressions occurred or on a deterministic model that reproduces the data?

Schraf: I've hardly read any creaitonist sources. The RATE group book, some ICR IMPACT web artciles on rapid tectonics. A few creaionist stratigrphy pages. No, most of my reading has been mainstream geology (intro books & origin of sedimentology) and paleontology. I've read quite a lot - you can ask my wife .I wanted to see and understand the raw data of geology and paleontology for myself and it seems here that I am scolded for it simply becasue I was already a creationist and am not a professional geologist.How much longer are people here going to deny that there is no good deterministic mainstream model for the origin of the geolgoical column and that even the qualitative mechanisms are only proposals. If you disagree with me - tell us and show us! Isn't this what this BBS is all about?

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-22-2002]

^ I still don't know how relevant it is to the new RATE stuff. I'll let you know when I do.

Joe, something 'deterministic' might at least demonstrate correct trends - explain, at least the trend and fact of the global sea level changes for example over time.And before that, what are the qualitative mechanisms? What's the consensus? Why do you expect creatnioists to have detialed answers when thousands of you guys don't for your model?I know very well about the detailed (very nice actually) work done by geologists from Hutton to Lyell to Holmes to you guys etc. What I am, gradually (I'd do it quicker but I'm already hogging this site too much) trying to express is that I think all of that beautiful work is in fact consistent with flood geology and didn't actaully prove how the geological column got there.IMO Hutton and Lyell (and the rest of you) have primarily demonstrated that almost all features carved out of the vast beds of the column could have been done gradually over eons. I agree. We also think it could have happened rapidly out of soft sediments.I will categorically state that 99% of the books I have read on 'Origin of Sedimentary Rocks' do not actaully cover the issue of 'Origin of the Geological Column'. There are a dozen erosional/depostional environments that in great detail are linked in terms of ancient/current.On the critical issue of where did the vast beds (ie not the erosional feauteres but the alyers themselves) that characterize the continental deposits there is near silence.On a few pages of these texts (Shelley, 1996 for example - see my opening post) we find the admission that there is no modern analog for the formation of these vast beds. I have no problem with that (but boy did I have to do a lot of reading to find that out). I can appreciate that due to plate tectonics we live in a different world. It is still interesting that the vast beds of the geological column are not forming anywhere on this planet as they have previously.It is true that Lyell made all of his claims without knowing this is it not? How did he account for lack of analogs? Lyell never really did prove where the vast beds of the geolgocial column came from and I don't think that contemporary scientists have either. It is a nice theory that sounds right. I'll grant that.

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[This message has been edited by Tranquility Base, 05-23-2002]