Should intellectually honest fundamentalists live like the Amish?

The fact is that it was not about DATING at all, but about radioactivitiy as a means of identifying physical characteristics of the rocks, which is the kind of knowledge I have been saying is all that is needed to find oil, whereas age is not, and in fact age is not mentioned, precisely BECAUSE it is irrelevant. Again, AGE IS IRRELEVANT!

Are you kidding me? You must be kidding me.By "other" techniques, I was simply refering to techniques besides stratigraphic tools, which means current techniques. I thought I was being helpful by showing a difference between the different techniques as mentioned in your own source article.The first two listed were about finding or detecting the presence of oil or formations likely to hold oil. They were based on detection apparatus that did not require much if any stratigraphic geological knowledge and only geochemical or litho/mineralogical knowledge. The third method listed was stratigraphy and was not about detecting or finding deposits based on existing data on specific areas, but rather projecting potential sites through mapmaking techniques.Thus my post contained absolutely no strawmen. As it stands there was a hell of a lot more to my post than that one sentence.You have nothing more to say on that entire post, than to incorrectly label that one sentence as a strawman? The rest of that post was not dependent at all on what other techniques I might have thought you were refering to.I'm going to give you a second crack at being honest and reading my post full through, and answering my questions to you. If you wish to be dishonest, by all means let me know.Annafun and 100% of oil exploration geologists get it... why don't you?

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

This one is very simple. We know lots of coal are in rocks of a certain "age" therefore if I know there are rocks of a "younger age" on top I can reasonable presume that the ones I am looking for of an "older age" are below them. The radiometric age of a rock is an EXTREMELY important diagnostic feature if you can get it.

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My error. You are correct that the handbook was in fact referring to a type of rock testing which used radioactivity, rather than radioactive dating of rock specimens with results entered into the log.Age would be irrelevant to that test.So now deal with the rest of the post.Geologists do date rock samples, and I even allowed you to skate on absolute (radioactive) dating to just deal with issues resulting from relative dating which your own source describes. For example there is no such thing as mapping old shorelines without at least relative dating.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

If you want to bail out that is fine. I don't care. Just don't go around to other threads and pretend to know a darn about geology. Don't you feel that you should at least know what mainstream geology really thinks before you can begin to understand how to attack it? Honestly Faith, even to someone like me with an extremely mild background in geology can tell easily when you are faking it. I am/was still willing to try and explain things to you. You don't have to agree with them but it is hubris to go around pretending you know more about geology then those who have actually studied it.

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You, like jazzns, are simply not getting it. I understand that the habitual mental association of depositional environments with the data makes you think that this idea is essential, but nothing you have said does anything but convince me that you are wrong, and that it is merely an extraneous element, and that the physical factors are all that is necessary. And the links I gave bear out this observation, in that they make NO mention whatever of "depositional environments." Obviously because those imaginative constructs are in fact irrelevant to their purposes, while the physical characteristics of the rock formations are the whole point. These physical characteristics LEAD TO the depositional environments idea TOO, but that idea is just a little side trip and not necessary to the finding of oil, only the physical characteristics are. But of course as usual I am only repeating myself and you will only too likely not get it now either. [b] ONCE AGAIN, NOBODY HAS SAID WORD ONE ABOUT ANY OTHER MODEL THAN THOSE THAT ARE IN USE AS DESCRIBED AT THE LINKS I GAVE!!!!!!!!SHEESH!!![/qs]We do not NEED to discuss shoreline recession and advancement in order to find oil, just as those oil exploration companies do not discuss it. They are focused EXCLUSIVELY on the physical characteristics of the rock formations involved in finding oil and the theories about what *caused* those characteristics are IRRELEVANT TO THEIR CONCERNS. In fact those theories are constructed AFTER THE FACT, after recognizing the characteristics. The notions about how oil was formed were ALSO constructed after the fact, based on observations of the characteristics of the strata. These explanations are extraneous byproducts, in no way essential to any part of the process of finding oil or anything else of a practical nature that involves knowledge of geological characteristics. Again, who needs to? And again, the alleged HISTORY of the formation of the rocks in question is IRRELEVANT. All that is relevant is the formations themselves. The facts that are important are the physical ones that these fanciful scenarios attempt to explain, but the explanations themselves are useless, purely academic side trips. The TILTING itself is a physical fact that is important. The rest is useless because it's all interpretation, but whatever facts they are attempting to explain are no doubt useful, whatever those might be, which you do not say because you are focused on the useless explanations/interpretations/imaginative historical scenarios (the alleged "burial" and the alleged "aerial" erosion) rather than the facts themselves. It's been answered over and over. YOU have failed to recognize what we have been saying all along. NOBODY IS USING A YEC MODEL!!!! Are you reading at ALL? Anything I or Randman has said here? We have no INTEREST in using a YEC model, or any model other than the ones that are in use SANS THE OE HOOHA.We have no interest in "EXPLAINING" any of those things because EXPLAINING them is NOT NEEDED FOR FINDING OIL. Merely the PHENOMENA THEMSELVES are needed, the physical characteristics themselves. Very likely the OE LED scientists to the investigations that make the identification of these characteristics possible, so it had some instrumental utility, but the OE *in itself* is not of use. The idea of depositional environments is just an extra step in the thought process that is not of practical value in finding oil, and you have said not one thing to show otherwise, and it appears that oil explorers make no reference to it for that very reason.

I'm not PRETENDING a damned thing. You and holmes merely cannot read.

That's the whole point. WE ARE TALKING ABOUT CURRENT TECHNIQUES, ONLY DIVORCING THEM FROM THE FANCIFUL "EXPLANATIONS" THAT CURRENTLY SURROUND THEM, AND WHICH IN FACT ARE OF NO PRACTICAL USE IN THE FINDING OF OIL. We are talking ABOUT those stratigraphic tools, meaning current techniques.I understood what my source article was saying just fine.And don't you dare accuse me of dishonesty. The problem here is that you cannot read!I'm going to leave for a while to simmer down.

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I would love to live like the Amish. The only thing extra I would request would be some liquor and cigarettes. And books

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You don't have to request the liquor or the tobacco, the Amish already drink and smoke plenty.They certainly read books, probably mush more than the average american, but I imagine your choice would be fairly limited.The thing I think most people would miss the most regarding their life and choices would be modern birth control.

I showed you where it said that, and gave you links to discussions on stratigraphy which explained that reality.What is your problem? Your own citation sure as hell discussed it, and I pointed it out to you. Are you now going to deny it is one of the things that it said was among the important features stratigraphers find for use in oil exploration?I think that pretty would reach the level of lying. Not when making maps, jackass. That is what I have been hammering away on. Maps, mapmaking, map building, the third tool used according to your own citation which was stratigraphy and which included a whole discussion of MAP MAKING!You cannot build a map from separate well logs, without some sort of theory regarding depositional environment to allow you to connect dots and predict as yet unseen structures.If you can do this without a paradigm of any kind on structure formation, then I would like to have a description of that process.I might add I would like you to find me one oil exploration geologist who believes and can get away with YE beliefs. Perhaps you should try reading. Jazz and I were not discussing OE models to explain features just for there to be an explanation of why they look as they do. The model allows one to PREDICT structures or shapes of structures. That is of PRACTICAL use.If you are not using a modelling process based on OE mechanisms, then please explain to a geologist who needs to fill in his map, what rules he should be using to estimate structures? If you reject OE, and are YE then my guess is it has to be some rules derived from or consistent with YE modelling.Now I can get fucking short with you and state that the concept of a shoreline does not come from OE "theory" but the fact that we see shorelines. You do agree we have those right? And as they advance and recede we get different depositional environments at (below) those shorelines. Get it? Now why do you think a geologist would interpret a similar depositional environment near the surface as one way down below? Just to stick it to the author of Genesis?Oil itself is not a product of OE models. Oil exploration in general is not a product of OE models (your own citation suggests geology itself wasn't really used until the 1920s). However stratigraphic map making for use in oil exploration sure as shit uses OE models of structure formation. It has to use some model or the maps could not be made.And by the way, how do you think geologists determine the difference between aerial and aquatic erosion of a structure?

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)

Oh I can read just fine. It is just that what I do read ammounts to gibberish with regards to real geology. You don't even understand the concepts you are trying to dismiss out of hand and the only reason for your casual treatment of concepts that are at the foundation of modern geology is that you simply do not like the conclusion that the earth really is old.You never answered my question by the way. Don't you feel that you
should at least know what mainstream geology really thinks before you can begin to understand how to attack it?Here is another one, what if I came up to you and said that Jesus was a tall east-asian roman soldier and I listed as my reference the Gospel of Brian which is right after Luke. Wouldn't I be completely betrying my complete ignorance about what is actually in the Bible?You have no idea what the concept of a depositional environment really is, how it came about, how it is used, or how important it is to real geologists. If you did you would see that your ranting assumtions that it is not important are extremely silly.The fact of the matter is that oil companies pay people with advanced degrees in geology a lot of money to go find oil for a reason. If it were as simple as you are characterizing it to be then anyone with a moderate intelligence and a 'How To Find Oil' handbook could do it. Either you or randman should go and tell all those oil big wigs that they really are wasting their money.What is even more convincing for me is the accounts of YECs who took jobs as geologists who simply could not proceed without abandoning their YEC beliefs. Why would that be if they didn't need any of those OE concepts to do their job appropriatly? If all it is is diagnosing layers and their characteristics then surely one could do that while still keeping the question of age aside.

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Let them use anything we discover. If they choose not to use the results then unless it's endangering a minor, fine, but in general, carry them. It's the Christian thing to do.

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I agree, Jar, but rather because it is the humane thing to do.Instead of wanting fundamentalists to act like the Amish, I'd like to see them act like Jesus, just a little bit.Many fundies seem to be awfully hate-filled, and their piety appears to have an unexpressed term:"Do unto (fundamentalist) others as you would have (fundamentalist) others do unto you.""Love your (fundamentalist) neighbor as your (fundamentalist) self."Outside of that, their relish at consigning everyone else to hell smacks of the pornograpic.Fortunately, only the Islamic world and the U.S. seem to be badly infected with this willful, hypocritical ignorance, and the Islamic world is waking up to what centuries of self-imposed theocracy have done to their culture; Europe has been there and already understands. Some day contemporary creationism will be viewed like the mass hysterias of witch burning and McCarthyism. Of course, if we taught "Intelligently Directed History," we could ascribe all that wickedness to God's will--and why not? As much warrant for that as ID in the science classroom...Since I am not especially concerned that the U.S. remain a dominant power (rather believing that multiple centers of power would be a good thing), I feel comfortable with China, Korea, India, China, Pakistan, etc. leaving us in their research dust in the decades to come.It is a hard lesson but fair.This message has been edited by Omnivorous, 08-10-2005 12:09 PM

Message 62 and Message 64

You have not described this process in any way a person could visualize, but I venture to guess that "depositional environments" have nothing to do with it, merely knowledge of predictable stratigraphic formations -- PHYSICAL configurations, not fairy tale explanations of how they got that way.

I DIDN'T SAY IT WAS SIMPLE!!! You are just making stuff up. You can't read, you think you know what you are talking about but you haven't addressed a thing I've actually said, you just keep babbling about your own fantasies. Well fine, continue to babble to yourself.