Deposition and Erosion of Sediments

Simple topic: Sticking to the Grand Canyon at least for starters, because it is easy to visualize, it appears obvious to me that the individual strata are not eroded as roxrcool and others claim they are, as erosion over the millions of years designated for each of the layers would obliterate them, not leave them as neatly parallel/horizontal as they are. I'm sure some erosion can be demonstrated, but nothing like what should be expected from the millions of years assumed.And no, when I say neatly I don't mean some kind of perfection. They LOOK parallel/horizontal to the naked eye.This should be a pretty limited topic, sticking to the specifics of the creation of a single layer of the Geo Column for the most part as suggested by Admin, but including how a given layer started from sediment and built up from the bottom to become rock and stayed relatively flat and horizontal over millions of years, which I claim is impossible. {Edit note: I have changed the proposed topic title from "Objections to Evo Time Frame Deposition of Strata #2" to "Deposition and Erosion of Sediments". I have also removed Faith's previous "edited by" messages. - Adminnemooseus}

Oh for crying out loud. This new thread is off to a RIDICULOUS start for you to say something that stupid. Over and over I have said that the ONLY VISIBLE erosion that we can all see with our own eyes happened AFTER the layers had built up over their supposed millions of years, the canyon itself. Good grief. What is the point if people can't follow that much of an argument. We're talking about the INDIVIDUAL layers, or ONE individual layer for simplicity's sake. I am saying there is NO EVIDENCE OF EROSION on a single layer, which would certainly have obliterated it in its sedimentary form if it had been built up on DRY land over 20 million years. If you can't follow the argument get off the topic.

"Erosive events" that occurred over millions of years would have obliterated any layer in its formative stage. This is elementary logic. There would not be merely minuscule evidences of "erosive events" you'd have to examine the rocks to discover over such a period of ages, there would simply be not much of a layer left at all. As I've repeatedly said, what actual real erosion obviously does in the Grand Canyon area, is create the Grand Canyon itself. Such minuscule observations of the strata are not required for the obvious effects real erosion would have caused during a period of twenty million years or so. That geologists take such evidences as in any way representing the actions of erosive processes during the building-up period of sediment-to-rock of a single layer over such long ranges of time is evidence only that geologists are in thrall to the false evolutionistic theory, and not thinking about the reality at all.If you require posters to take geology field trips and speak geologese here, it should be posted up front at this site so that we can stay away and you won't have to deal with mere logical thinkers without a degree in Geology. Or just don't post to us. So what? What would that prove that they aren't perfect? By my understanding of the supposed great times involved in their formation they should not have even the SLIGHTEST appearance of horizontal parallel rocks distinct from each other, except perhaps if they formed under water, and even then I have to ask how ONLY one kind of sediment was laid down over 20 million years and then ONLY another kind after that and so on. Here's where you can bring in your claim that Oh but there was tons of stuff on top of it once upon a time that got eroded away, and I can answer that there is no evidence of that and if that stuff got completely eroded away so would the RELATIVELY even strata beneath it, certainly before it became rock and how long does that take under water? Numbers please. Has this been observed? And wouldn't rock itself wear down visibly by normal weathering on dry land over so many millions of years? Remember it's exposed for that long a time, it's the surface of the column for that long a time given the aging method of the Geo Column hypothesis, and after all aren't you the one who insisted on the notion that the very rocky Rockies were completely eroded away twice? What is your point? Which theory are you giving for the formation of a single layer of the Grand Canyon? Only it's lowest layers were tilted so why mention that at all? See above. This is a straw man representation of what I've been trying to say. It does not MATTER to what I'm saying that there are exceptions and imperfections. The OVERALL OBVIOUS VISIBLE IMPRESSION, certainly of the Grand Canyon, and in fact of all the extant portions of the Geol. Column throughout the world, is of NEAT HORIZONTAL LAYERS.How else would the evolutionistic idea of successive development of life forms through the fossil contents have occurred to anyone at all ever without this visible horizontal stratification? It's the very observation that STARTED the whole notion.And I read somebody's link at the other thread about the history of geology -- oh, no, it was a link on another thread that somebody resurrected, that gives "Steno's law" or something like that, in which he lays down generalizations that supposedly the field of geology still operates from, very common sense observations such as that an entire layer is a horizontal deposit over a large area, that the layers built up from the bottom over time etc. etc. etc. He also shows a layer in which erosion is considered to have occurred and "clasts" are supposedly the evidence of it. But it apparently involves the movement of one layer over the other in some unusual order rather than having been built up from the bottom in the usual fashion, and the erosion is minuscule compared to what one would normally reasonably logically expect would happen to any not-yet-rock sedimentary deposit over millions of years, at least in the atmosphere and not under water.I hope you can follow me. It is getting wearisome simply trying to get across what I'm talking about. Again, it would be nice if a forum allowed drawing pictures to illustrate. SO much quicker.

Drat. Unfortunately I have a busy day today and tomorrow. Already there are posts to me I want to answer but I have to put it off. Sorry. And unfortunately I know there will be an overwhelming number more by the time I get back. Oh well. I have to leave for now. At least until late tonight.

Such as for instance Crashfrog's outburst "Grand F-ing Canyon" etc., which is the post to which I was responding although apparently you didn't catch that one.

Dunno if I have in any way that affects what I'm trying to say which to me seems pretty straightforward and obvious. I was in fact reading a site on the subject a earlier this evening and it didn't contradict anything I've been thinking though it was really quite fascinating to read about all the different kinds. I saved a bunch of sites on sedimentation, rock formation, the mineral content of everything whatever, and the chemical contents of each type of mineral to read when I have more time. Side question for a topic that doesn't exist here, Ask The Geologist: How do you KNOW what is at the center of the earth pray tell? (For this question at least I'm sure there is a clear trustworthy answer). My problem is with the enormous time frame. The idea that ANYTHING could sit still for 50 million years is simply preposterous to my mind. How can ANYTHING "subtle" happen in a 50-million year period? Hurricanes alter seacoasts and beaches, tornados move tons of stuff from here to there, one good rain causes mudslides all over California that rearrange local landscapes drastically, not subtly, and destroy houses; all in one year; but the redwall limestone stays in place for 50 million years even in the phase where it's quietly sedimenting away and not yet lithifying?How long did it take for the sediment to accumulate during that 50 million years before the next layer of completely different sediment started accumulating? You guys are all talking about geological processes that you see occurring in human time, such as sedimentation in rivers, and extrapolating to millions of years of time as if it made sense to do that. How deep is the sedimentation in a river? can it possibly compare to the thicknesses of the strata? And since you say below that those same sediments are re-eroded and re-deposited, how can THAT be extrapolated to the neat thick layers of the canyon walls? (Yes I looked ahead and saw the diagrams of the whole area -- VERY much appreciate those pictures. Those strata are nice and parallel, even where they have sunk down at some distance from the canyon, but I'll get to that when I get to it). And yet you ignore other processes such as big changes in the landscape within a year or certainly a human lifetime, and apparently don't extrapolate THOSE things to the millions of years. Such processes would certainly obliterate a layer of sediment over millions of years (if not underwater). Somebody says oh but it was covered up (underwater or not underwater?). But with what? And how soon (how long did it take the limestone to accumulate, as obviously it had to be all there before the covering accumulated)? And where's the evidence of the covering? And how come when the covering got so conveniently removed the strata is so (relatively) nice and neat and horizontal over such a huge distance?If the idea is that the Grand Canyon formed in water, that helps deal with the questions about erosion to a great extent anyway as presumably the sediment just falls to the bottom and stays there. But even in that case FIFTY MILLION YEARS? Again, these strata are different from each other, made up of different hardened sediments, a limestone here, a different limestone on top of it, a shale, etc etc. Are you guys REALLY thinking about FIFTY MILLION YEARS when you are trying to explain to me how Oh well a bunch of stuff WAS on top of it but it got eroded away?Were these layers formed under water or not? You have to make up your mind. If you're talking about erosion apparently you aren't talking about an underwater environment where you all seem to be saying that sediments settle to the bottom and stay put, and harden as the bottom drops or something along those lines. If it got eroded it must have NOT been under water. But then you all agree the canyon layers were formed under water. This does get hard to follow. I answered some of this above. I'm getting very tired and maybe shouldn't even be trying to post right now. The Geo Column idea assumes that each layer is a "landscape" taht endured for a very long period of time. I keep coming to the Mississippian period because it seems simplest: Only one kind of sediment, redwall limestone, and the period is said to have lasted some 50 million years. ONLY redwall limestone made up that "environment," that "landscape" for fifty million years? How long was it in the sedimentary form? Was this underwater? Did it lithify during those 50 million years before the next layer / era began?Oh, and over what extent of planet earth did this Mississippian era stretch, and is that "era" all characterized by limestone everywhere on earth? I gather there were some different limestones in different areas, but it was all limestones? Great swaths of the whole earth covered in sedimentary limestone for how long? before it became lithified limestone, and for how long? before the next stratum began to accumulate?I am too sleepy to continue this. Maybe I'll have some time in the morning before the day gets busy.This message has been edited by Faith, 03-17-2005 04:15 AMThis message has been edited by Faith, 03-17-2005 04:16 AMThis message has been edited by Faith, 03-17-2005 04:22 AM

I am again busy today and very tired as well, and am reviewing what I wrote in response to Moose's post, #5, thinking I'd like to answer it again in a different way when I'm up to it, before I move on to jar's post, #6. I have the general plan of plodding through this thread post by post and attempting to answer all of it in order. Meanwhile new posts are accumulating and I have not yet been able to read past the first page.There have been proposals by some on other threads that only one or two of you answer me at once. Could you somehow agree among each other who should have the job of taking down the crazy creationist and the rest just not post on this topic until some further point to be decided on later? I simply can't handle it all.Thanks.

I don't want to be JUDGED on my arguments in this place though, which I thought was the point of the Great Debate. If not, I can consider the possibility. I would never deny anything on THAT level, observations about how sediments are laid down and so on. I'm trying to absorb the technical stuff about those things as it comes up, but none of it contradicts my basic impressions so far, just adds technical information, details, terminology. It's really very interesting. But I'm still "incredulous" about the extrapolations that are made from that kind of perfectly valid daily work of geology to historical events over a putative hundreds of millions of years. Those aren't observations, those are conceptual leaps. This would make sense except that the main problem I keep running into is the sense that what I'm TRYING to say isn't being grasped so not really answered, and that other things are being answered instead (straw man) and that real communication just isn't happening. A few seem to get the picture I'm trying to paint better than others but unfortunately I don't remember who in particular -- whoever they are should be the candidates for your "champion" as they answer the points I'm actually raising. But for instance Crashfrog SEEMED to be answering what I was saying just fine on the previous thread about the Evo Timeframe, and yet here he starts out acting as if I'd never mentioned the canyon itself as THE obvious evidence of erosion. That's just a basic communication problem and it's pretty discouraging. Again, I'm not disputing "what geology actually says about sedimentation and erosion" at all, but only how it is applied to the strata, or the Geological Time scale idea. Yes, roughly speaking I'm working from the assumption that evolution has blinded geologists, but it's more like my own shock at discovering that evolution is false made me actually LOOK at something like the Grand Canyon with new eyes and actually start THINKING about it. I know you think I need a sophisticated education in geology to think clearly about it but so far it doesn't seem that way to me, although I'm happy to pick up whatever knowledge relates to the topic. COMMUNICATING about it may turn out to require that education of course. I read some creationist books years ago and have recently read through some creationist websites as well, and they certainly give me a lot of food for thought, but it's my own ponderings about how the strata could have been formed based on the assumptions of the Geo Column -- or actually Geo Time scale -- that I keep coming back to. All the explanations that are being offered here just don't explain what is assumed by the Geo time scale notion of enormous time in relation to the actual strata it is built on. Again, it's the extrapolations, the explanations, not the basic science of sedimentation processes, not "what geology actually says about sedimentation and erosion" and so on, but how it doesn't convincingly explain what is actually there in the strata in the context of the assumptions of huge periods of time. Yes, I am learning to slow down. First I NEED to slow down. I shouldn't be taking this much time to answer you as I still have things to do and am still badly in need of sleep as well. But second, yes, since there is no pressure here to rush, it would be far better to take my time. I'm used to debate sites where there are various forms of time pressure but it's a habit I will happily break.Drat. I really didn't have plans to spend the rest of my life on geology but at least I'm finding what I AM learning to be extremely interesting. Rocks ARE cool.

That entire post was simply rude, and thank you for sitting the rest out.

It's fine by me if it's you who do the debating, only I still want to answer some or all of the posts on this thread and that should come first. It was very frustrating that the other thread came to an end when it did, as it left comments in many posts unanswered and now too much effort to retrieve.

Thank you, Crashfrog, that was gracious of you. I really did think we were doing a better job of communicating on the other thread though. Very surprised to find out you had such a different idea of what I was trying to say.

You'd have to negotiate it with the others on your side, but it looks like Moose has some support at this point.But as I mentioned to Moose, I'd really like to make my way through this thread first in any case -- from the top rather than the end as I'm doing now -- before any Great Debate happens, hoping that I don't generate too many new rebuttals in the process, although that's probably not to be expected.

I just took a break to answer some of the latest posts briefly. Still don't have time to get back to the serious posts earlier in the thread. Hope to do that tomorrow or Saturday.But at this point I'd like to venture a guess based on Percy's saying that posters are jumping in to inform me that "Geology doesn't think those things" or some such, that I most likely have NOT said that Geology thinks those things and have been misunderstood.I think I may not be clear enough that mostly what I am doing is making inferences from what I know of geological presuppositions, not saying geologists make these same inferences but proposing that they are reasonable inferences that should be made.That is, for instance, I'm making inferences from what I believe ARE accepted facts, for instancefrom the Geological Time Table,
from the idea of great ages,
from the correspondence of specific sedimentary rocks with specific time periods,
from the specific length of time posited for a given stratum such as the redwall limestone (identified as co-extensive with the Mississippian Period on the chart of the Grand Canyon),
from the horizontal presentation of the strata in the Grand Canyon (we can get to the nonhorizontal cases later),
from the statements that the Grand Canyon was formed under water,
from the remarks about erosion in individual strata despite the fact that the canyon was formed under water,
etc etc etcAre any of the above NOT facts? From those facts and others I have been drawing inferences about how such horizontal strata could not have been laid down as supposed by the Geological Time Table.I'm certainly not claiming geologists are saying any of this. I think I've stuck pretty close to ONLY what I KNOW geologists have said, including what all of you have said, and the rest is my own inferences.I noticed on the other thread that it seemed people were objecting to what they thought I believe geology teaches when I was only saying what I infer from the Geo Time Table and other information that has been given, and certainly know geology doesn't teach it as I'm using it to dispute some geological conclusions, foolish as I am and all that.In at least one case on this thread, Nosy Ned's post I believe, the same misapprehension of what I'm saying was again made, thinking I'm imputing ideas to geologists when what I'm really doing is making inferences of my own that I think SHOULD be considered but aren't.I hope that clarifies something. If it doesn't, oh well.I have to take off again.[edited to improve clarity. I hope]This message has been edited by Faith, 03-17-2005 11:51 PM

OK. I'm not sure what happens now that this has been transferred to the Great Debate forum, but I was planning to post answers to many unanswered posts here. I did intend to start from the beginning but as usual found myself answering a more recent one first, Ned's latest. THEN since nobody can answer right away I'll probably be able after this one to get back to the beginning of the thread. Yes, which is why I gave a list of the facts from which I'm drawing my inferences, to show that what I think are facts ARE in fact held by Geologists. Clearly they are accepted as facts by Geologists except for two you objected to -- the statements about formation underwater and about erosion, so I'll get to those eventually.But meanwhile I'd like to remind you that the rest of my list does contain facts accepted by geologists. Very basic stuff. Geologists do subscribe to the Geo Time table, Geologists do believe that the strata of the Geo Column reflect great ages of time, and that specific time periods are marked by specific sedimentary rocks. Geologists do accept ballpark estimates of time such as the 40 million years allotted to the Mississippian period / redwall limestone deposition on the Grand Canyon chart. Geologists believe that the layers of the earth represent long time periods which would show up all over the planet except that they've been disrupted here and there, and that there is a complete column that would exist except for those disruptions, and that the strata themselves represent actual landscapes that existed in their particular time periods etc etc. Any of that you want to dispute?I believe these are the main facts I've been working from in everything I've said, though I guess I might be forgetting some, but again, you only take issue with the last two statements on the list, about formation under water and about erosion of individual strata. I'm aware that there have been confusions caused by my lack of knowledge of the theories held by Geologists about these two factors, and in fact I think they should now become the focus of discussion, but my impression is they don't materially affect anything I've been inferring, although a better knowledge would no doubt improve clarity a great deal. OK, I hope we will get to filling in this information since you consider it to be so important. I've been aware of some such ideas being the case but have been dealing with it by giving general answers to both underwater AND above water formation ideas, since it doesn't make a LOT of difference to my argument which it is as neither makes sense in terms of millions of years. I respectfully submit that you have not proven this. So far I have the impression that it isn't at all clear in anybody's mind what I'm even trying to argue, far from its having been defeated. Yes, so you've said, and of course you think I'm an idiot, at least very foolish, and insulting to geologists too, which I really don't mean to be, but I do believe that it is possible to refute aspects of the claims made about the Geo Time table without much more in the way of facts than I have in hand. That's not arrogance, merely an assessment of the circumscribed nature of my focus.For instance, about sedimentation I'm mostly concerned with the RATES involved, the TIME factor involved for the buildup of any particular stratum from the Geo Time table model, but you will all take the subject off into various ways sedimentation is observed to occur in current time frames instead and insist that this knowledge is needed when I don't think it really is. If a given layer was supposedly formed in water, and that layer reflects a particular time period of say 40 million years, I'm trying to get at what all happened in that forty million years. If you want to bring in examples from current observation they have to apply to that context to answer me, and as long as you aren't pulling a snow job with terminology you know is unfamiliar to me I can certainly follow that kind of reasoning. But so far I haven't seen anything that clearly addresses my thoughts about the huge time periods involved in light of the distinct kinds of strata that supposedly represent them.Oh plenty of ASSERTIONS that tens of millions of years make no difference, sure, end of subject, right?As for erosion, although I may not have been careful enough in all my statements, I really DON'T dispute what is said about observation of erosion on individual strata as some think I'm doing, I just dispute that it could have occurred in the time frame of millions of years, during which huge time span it seems to me erosion occurring at a normal rate would obliterate any beginning sedimentation process. I said this pretty clearly in my very first post I think. Erosion is only a factor out of water, as I understand it. Under water erosion wouldn't occur at all in a flat sediment bed. If I'm wrong please correct. Let me make it a question, or in fact more than one question:

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1) Is erosion observed on many or most of the strata?

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2) Is it observed mostly or exclusively on the uppermost surface of a given layer or deeper in the layer? In other words is this erosion pretty much always found BETWEEN the strata?

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3) Are you talking about what you observe after a stratum has been exposed in some way so that you know the erosion existed prior to the recent exposure?

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4) Is it assumed that this erosion occurred in the time period assigned to the stratum, that is, if you are talking about erosion of the redwall limestone of the Mississippian are you assuming that erosion occurred within the 40 million year time frame of the Mississippian period?

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5) And a corollary to that, is it assumed that the erosion occurred while the formation itself was still forming, that is, while it was still the surface of the Geo Column in its own time period, before the rest of the Geo Column was formed above it?

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6) I gather that erosion would only occur out of water, correct? So that it would be evidence that wherever it is found the stratum was not underwater at the time of the erosion? Perhaps the layer had formed under water but then erosion occurred after the water subsided or the land rose? That is because I think it is best tackled from the angle I AM going at it, at least by me, because although I'm aware of some creationist refutations of methods of dating from fossils and particularly radiometric dating, that is a technical area where I definitely WOULD need more knowledge than I will ever have. There are many factors geologists point to that supposedly support the great ages idea. Trying to refute any one of them should be a reasonable enough place to start, I would think, and I've chosen to focus on what I think are absurdities in the time concept based on the appearance of the strata in relation to some few assumptions I'm sure are held by Geologists, which I believe is a topic suited to my peculiar abilities and limited knowledge. Again, the only facts you have questioned on my list of the assumptions I'm sure are held by Geologists are about the exclusively underwater formation of the strata of the Grand Canyon and the erosion of the individual layers, correct? Or do you want to dispute anything else on my list? This is irrelevant and nitpicky. You are imputing some idea of perfection to my statements which I haven't claimed. It ought to be sufficient that geologists themselves remark on the horizontal disposition of the strata in such places as the Grand Canyon. Why do you nitpick about something so obvious? In fact you can go read a link Arkansas Banana Boy posted on another thread he just bumped in the last few days, titled simply "Geologic Column" I believe, which includes among the established principles of Geology the horizontal disposition of the strata. This likewise is irrelevant to the points I'm trying to make. It is sufficient for what I'm trying to say that they are roughly horizontal to the naked eye in some places like the Grand Canyon, and that they are treated as roughly uniform in descriptions of the time periods that are attached to them, and that altogether, considering all the layers found all over the earth in various states of disruption or supposed incompleteness, they are thought to imply a perfect column with all layers intact despite the fact that this perfect column does not exist in reality, because the layers are assumed to represent particular time periods. From this assumption it is inferred that various layers are missing in different parts of the world. Please correct any of this that I have wrong. But I try not to make claims to know more than I know and I do believe for the limits of the topic I've taken I don't need to know much more -- just because my focus IS so limited. Everybody here keeps bringing in other things and I try to learn at least something about them as they come up, but while I find the information interesting, for the most part none of it really affects the points I'm trying to make. If I could get across better just what it is I'm trying to say I think that would become clearer. I'm sure there would still be many objections based on OTHER factors, but as for the points I'm trying to stick to, those don't really bear on it. (I also doubt that even if I were a practicing geologist you'd take my conjectures appreciably more seriously, just because a creationist is considered on this site to be mentally compromised one way or another a priori, so that knowledge isn't really the huge factor you keep trying to make of it.)But about the underwater factor and the erosion factor, I've answered much that's come up about that in general terms. But it would be good to be more precise at least for the sake of communication I'm sure. In fact that should probably be the main focus at this point, and the questions I've asked above could be a start.(Also, I do have questions about the Geo Column itself as it is found around the world, which I'd like to have answered in the proper venue, but mostly out of personal curiosity, as again I don't think any of it would bear appreciably on the argument I'm trying to float.)Bunch of run-on sentences in this post, sorry. I'm too tired to correct them. To be continued tomorrow.This message has been edited by Faith, 03-19-2005 01:05 AM

Ned got it right in his answer to you, I'm only talking about any layer that is claimed to have been built up on dry land over the millions of years allotted to the formation of each rock layer.As I understand it SOME of the layers are supposed to have been formed not underwater, and I guess this is the time to get more specific about just what the theories are about how each layer formed. This is a question for the geologists here.As for formation under water, it appears to be accepted with ease that a layer of sediment can slowly form that way over millions of years to the mere depth of the rock layer in the canyon and be built upon by another layer of completely different sediment in exactly the same way also over millions of years.In the underwater scenario, what are the theories about the change from one kind of sediment to another? (Redwall limestone on top of Temple Butte limestone on top of Mauv limestone on top of Bright Angel Shale)? How is it that deposition over millions of years only amounted to a depth of a few feet of one single kind of sediment?Also, if it is assumed the sediment accumulated to a much greater depth than the layer in the canyon, was each layer somehow exposed to the air after its formation to be eroded down to its current thickness and then submerged again while the next layer quietly deposited on top of it for more millions of years? Was this process repeated for each layer? How was it so (relatively) evenly eroded is one question I've asked before.Are we to believe that there was ever a "landscape" over much of the earth composed of mostly or exclusively limestone that lasted for millions of years? That it was one kind of limestone for some millions of years and then another kind for more millions and then sandstone for millions and shale for millions and so on? Isn't this implied by the idea of the Geological Column's being a fractured former perfect stack of layers throughout the earth?