Should intellectually honest fundamentalists live like the Amish?

Another string of assertions and just as obscure as the first. What are you talking about? What does it have to do with methods of finding oil or anything I've said?

The OE paradigm has nothing to do with it. One thing academics and scientists often fail to realize, when people quote them, is that their work often has little to do with how people conduct their business.Oil prospectors have learned to look for clues and base drilling on those clues. The theory overlays but does not determine the clues. If there was another theory, the process would still be the same, only they might give another explanation for why the clues are correct.Same often with other areas. The business-man that relies on reason alone and ignored his gut feelings is not a wise businessman.

You have the following sequence:1. conglomerate (fossils of land animals)
2. sandstone (shallow marine fossils)
3. limestone (shallow marine / reef fossils)
4. siltstone (deep marine fossils)
5. limestone (shallow marine fossils)
6. ??Number 4 is dated as a Permian deposit. If I see this sequence without any OE geology theory what can I hypothesize about Number 6?If I was just using old data points about the ordering of types of sediments I can make absolutly no conclusions. There are pleny of places that just go siltstone, limestone, siltstone, limestone, etc....If I use the concept of a depositional environment I immediatly can recognize this as a transgressional/regressional sequence of a shoreline. I know that if I invest in drilling down to Number 6 that I have a good chance of seeing land based deposits which are older than Permian (Carboniferous, Pennsylvanian, Mississippian). These just so happen to be some of the best strata to look at to find coal. If other indicators had led me to believe that Number 6 was going to be a marine deposit then why would I waste my time looking for carbon in what was an underwater environment. I need coal so therefore I need ancient peat bogs and therefore I need land.Here I am directly using the concept of a depositional environment. Heck, I am even relying on the fact that my carbon deposits are going to be present in "land based" deposits. Therefore I am looking for shorelines, ancient deltas, the "Florida" of the time. Without these concepts I am still only guessing. These concepts all would not exist without OE theory. The whole concept of a depositional environment is destroyed if there is not time for it to deposit anything. The whole concept of a land deposit is destroyed if all strata are presumed to be desposited by a catastrophic water event.So much of actual, useful geology is driven by the context of the strata. Someone who has never studied geology in any depth will have a very hard time understanding this and without OE these contexts make absoultly no sense. This is why geologists before Darwin's day were able to reject YE and why practical applicaions in geology depend on OE principles.

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They are only obscure when you have no education on the matter. This is not meant as an insult. I guess I have to be careful about that because things like calling an algorithm stupid might piss you off.The point is, I can be more successful that you at locating particular strata due to my acceptance of OE concepts such as depositional environements because I can indentify them by their context rather than some old list of trials and errors.See my previous message for an example.This message has been edited by Jazzns, 08-09-2005 04:03 PM

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Exactly right.And obvious I might add.And dishonest of people to deny it.And make all sorts of personal accusations against someone who is describing the simple reality of it.Maybe eventually I'll learn to turn the other cheek. Not doing that great at it yet.

Again you have merely made an unsupported assertion. What "context" are you identifying that any practical explorer for oil would not identify? What does your context have to do with OE theory?

I didn't see this post and will get back to it.

Pure BS.Oil prospectors have learned to pay very well trained geologists lots and lots of money to go out and find potential drill sites for them. I knew many of them personally in my days in the geology department. It is not as simple as getting a funny feeling about a rock over there yonder.

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I didn't say "feelings" were the clues.

Whatever. The point is that it is professionally trained geologists using principles based on an old earth who are going out there and rigerously diagnosing a site for its oil potential. If it did not require these concepts then any average statitician with a list of data from old oil finds would be just as successful. Oil companies are still paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to individual geologists to go do this work so I guess either they haven't figured it out yet or your point is baloney.

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The geologists are needed, they know what they are doing, but what I am contesting is the idea that the OE theory is needed. Their expertise is needed and I never said a word for statisticians or anybody else, never claimed anybody but a geologist could do it. They recognize the structures. But the AGE of those structures is irrelevant. It's part of what they carry around with them but not involved in the making of their determinations.

Then dispute the example. How without using the concepts of a depositional environment and the intent of finding "land based" ancient swamp environments can you asses the potential of strata Number 6?Because without an OE those concepts are dead.

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Wrong since geologists are trained to assess the evidence. But you are right that a technician with the same skills as geologists could use those skills to do the same job with or without relying on OE beliefs.

I "have the following sequence?" What does that mean? I have it on paper? I have drilled through level 5? What are you talking about? And why are you asking me? I don't claim to be a geologist. Why date it at all? Why not just identify it as "Permian" by its characteristics? It is by its characteristics that you date it, of course, what else? But the dating is superfluous, the characteristics are what matter. Whatever you would hypothesize WITH it. You are assuming things I have not said. I've eliminated nothing from geology except the idea of old age. Everything else applies, all the observations of the strata and their fossil contents and their arrangements etc etc etc. I have no idea what you are talking about. What does "old data points" mean? What I have been talking about is using ALL the knowledge that is available to geologists now about the configurations of strata and rocks and fossils. I ASSUME that the explorers have the knowledge of ordering of types of sediments in the geo column (to the extent that it is in fact consistent enough for that purpose of course). In fact the links I gave describe exactly the sorts of physical properties and characteristics they are looking for.Again, you have been misreading me in some way. I have not excluded ANY knowledge of the actual physical layout in anything I've said. I insist on it, all of it. That's what geology does, I assume it's all needed. It's the AGE theory that's not. I see no need to recognize a "transgressional/regressional sequence of a shoreline," simply a need to recognize that this particular sequence of rock is likely to be followed by a particular type commonly associated with coal, if that is indeed the case and if coal is what you are interested in, all based on previous experience that these strata are often found in this order. Those are the important things. The idea of the "depositional environment" is interpretation and superfluous to the actual facts needed. I'm sure it appears that way, and in fact this may be how geologists customarily think, I really don't know, but I would doubt it, and I don't see that it is at all necessary. Simply recognizing that this particular sequence is commonly associated with what you are looking for is quite sufficient without any notion of land-based or marine-based anything. I really don't think so. You may habitually think in this fashion as I said, but in fact what you are looking for is merely a particular kind of rock with particular characteristics, particular fossil contents perhaps, etc. Just as the links I posted describe. The physical characteristics are what is important. The actual oil seekers don't give the slightest nod to such interpretative scenarios as "depositional environments" that I've seen so far. Obviously they don't consider them important. Not at all, not if you truly understand how the strata are frequently associated with each other where coal is likely to be found. I'm sure that is so, but they aren't necessary to finding the coal you are looking for. They may help as a mnemonic device I suppose, but substantively they are unnecessary. Again, only a knowledge of the types of rocks and the configurations that tend to be associated with coal is needed. Well, 1) I'm not offering an explanation for the strata, merely recognizing that they are often found in some predictable patterns and configurations which are useful to know, and 2) the concept of a depositional environment is superfluous. I know you are convinced of its importance, but it seems to me that it's merely a fanciful handle on the strata, quite inessential. If it were essential, don't you think the oil explorers would emphasize these supposed environments? But they don't mention anything except the actual physical properties, the rocks and fossils etc, their hardness or softness and other characteristics, not a word about how or why they are that way. OE has no doubt motivated the investigations into the geo column that do have practical use in oil and other explorations, but OE itself (including the notion of depositional environments) has no utility in itself that I can see despite your allegiance to it.This message has been edited by Faith, 08-09-2005 08:42 PM

Simply by knowing that the previous five are often associated with coal at the next depth.