Long build up of Sediments

I appreciate that you took note of my post. This issue had been brought up close to when Faith first started and we even had a Great Debate topic on it between the two of us. Unfortunatly some basic concepts never did sink in.To Faith modern geology means believing that every section of the geologic column represents millions of years and that they are all flat on top of each other except for the ones that have been disturbed by tectonics or the like. With this characture of geology she thinks she can easily be justified in calling OE principles absurd. Unfortunatly for her though there are people on this board who actually have studied geology and can quite easily point out that her understanding is wrong. Her fervent stubborness to even care to grasp basic concepts only continues to show the absolute bankrupcy of the content of her participation on this board.Even the most ferocious of opponents in a good debate will take the effort to learn about their opposition's position so that they may properly attack it. Nothing Faith has ever post suggests that this is even a fleeting desire. Faith is obviously content to simply sit back and insult the intelligence of anyone who will not immediatly positivly reinforce her fantasies of how obviously absurd OE geology and the TOE actually is.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

Thanks Asgara. I realized when I submitted that post that it may have been a little short on OP appropriateness. I am fixing that as we speak.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

On a more appropriate note, I think it is very important to do what Mallon suggested in that last thread which is explain to YEC's (that even bother to read other people's post) the difference between the old and new ways we think of uniformitarianism.This has great application for understanding sedimentation because it explains why the geologic column is so dynamic. A thousand years worth of sediment of a given type might be millimeters or meters think depending on the process that created and those processes are ones we can observe creating new sediment today. Uniformitarianism only allows us to reasonably assume that if we see a type of sediment being created today that other similar sediment was probably created a similar way in the past.YECs are constantly fed disinformation about uniformitarianism and how it relates to sedimentation. Take this site which is the first YEC site you will hit if you do a search for uniformitarianism.Uniformitarianism Emphasis mine. This is obviously total bullshit. No geologist worth half a cent would ever claim that there have been no cataclysmic events in earth's history. Cataclysmic events leave their mark in the rocks all over the earth. We can see mudslides today and what they do. We can also see meters worth of sediment all deposited in a short timeframe in the rocks. That is evidence of a similar event. The problem with this is that the YEC will take this and say, "Look at the fast depoisting sediment! It must have been the Flood!" while they completely ignore the layers above and below which do not display evidence of quick deposition.In the old GD thread we talked about the Grand Canyon quite a bit and the whole debate boiled down to the flatness of the layers. Faith continually harped on how only the flood could have left such flat layers while totally handwaving away all the layers that were not flat and all the disconformities and show blatantly and inarguably an interruption in sedimentation.Overall it is called cherry picking. YECs are masters of it and it starts right at the top with YEC sites who spread total misinformation about concepts such as sedimentation and uniformitarianism. Me, I call it lying which is why I really like my new sig.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

You are totally confusing the age the rock with how long it took to form. You could have a rock that is 10 million years old that took 1000 years to form. Alternativly you could have a 1 billion year old rock that took 5 minutes to form.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

Hi Faith,Please forgive my sharpness earlier. As I am sure you know sometimes participation on this board can get your blood boiling. I hope this explanation helps answer some of your questions and potentially pose some new ones. No it would not all be one kind of sediment. This is actually a very easy question to answer because you can go test this for yourself.The thing about erosion that is neat is that it sorts sediment and we know this because we can watch it happening today. If you go into the mountains and look at a shovel full of dirt you will see everything potentially from fist sized rocks to tiny grains of sand. On the opposite end of the spectrum you can go to a beach and look at a shovel full of dirt and see only very small rounded pebbles but mostly fine sand. In between you will run the gradient of different sizes and shapes. It will be the rare if not impossible circumstance that you are going to find a sharp and jagged granite boulder sitting on a beach where there are no mountains for miles.What sedimentary rock a bunch of sediment will create is all based on where it ends up and how much weathering the particles endured before it was buried. It wouldn't wash down in layers at all. What sedimentary rock is created is based on more than just the source. It is the source, the distance from the source, where it ended up, and how it got there. Not all beaches are sandy. Sometimes there are beaches, like in Hawaii, next to large volcanic cliffs. Here the beaches can have lots of larger rounded pebbles mixed in with sand and such. This is different from a beach, lets say in Florida, because the source is very close and the sediment didn't have to go far and thus was not weathered down to nothing. The America southwest is such a neat area because it has been preserved so well. It is unique because up until recently it had been a rather large inland sea. This gives the best case scenario for forming nice flat strata over a large area with fine grained sediment. Most other formations we see on land today are not like this because they didn't form under such unique circumstances. The reason the rock types change is because the environment changed. I know you don't accept this but it is a valid explanation because we can see this happening today all the time.I will use the Pacific islands as an example of this. The coral reefs around the islands are currently depositing limestone. On one island (forgot the name) there was mass deforestation and as a result much more large grained particles were not being held back anymore by the foliage. They made it to the rivers and the ocean killing off much of the reef. There was a shift then from limestone to sandstone and it will continue that way until the water is clear enough againt for the reef to return. This might take until the island itself is eroded to a nub in which case lots of sand will have built up before limestone could start again.This is a good example because it also shows how rock types can change so abruptly. The thing to remember though is that they don't always do so. There are plenty of places that are different from your poster child of the grand canyon where this is seen. Where they do occur abruptly there are numerous reasons why that can only be determined by the circumstances of the specific rocks.1. The easiest case is that the environment changed abruptly. The pacific island example and the example of a river changing course to capture new sediment are great examples of this. A tsunami might do it. Changes is biology might do it. Sometimes, all it takes is a few degrees temperature difference to kill off sea creatures. If earth's temperature rose or fell abruptly then you might stop seeing limestone and start seeing something else. Conversly it does not take long (geologically speaking) for life to colonise an area so that when conditions are suitable, there might be an abrupt change from some other fine grained ocean sediment into limestone.2. Sometimes there is a break in deposition. We have mentioned these before as unconformities. There are lot of these and they are easy to identify. When deposition stops this "buys" our scenario some time for a potentially more slow environment change to occur such as a change in sea level.3. Compression will make a more gradual transition seem abrupt until you look close. This is probably the case for some of the more abrupt appearing transitions in the GC that are not unconformities. You have to remember that originally these sediments were much thicker before they were buried and compressed with the weight of water and other sediments on top of them. Therefore what might have been a few feet of gradient as a transition was happening may only be represented by a few inches after it gets compressed.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

I have a great example for what you are looking for Faith! All we have to do is look at another inland sea. The one I am thinking about the best is the Black Sea in Asia. This is a neat example because not only does it show the same kinds of things you can see in the GC but because it contains a great example of a drastic change in deposition types.The Black Sea used to be an inland freshwater sea depositing sediments that were eroded from its shoreline and the rivers that fed it. There was a natural dam between it and the Mediterranean Sea that broke which drastically changed it into a saltwater sea. Now it was getting source material mostly from the Mediterranean so there was an abrupt change in the deposition.You should be able to find plenty of source information about the Black Sea because of this unique circumstance of how it became a saltwater sea and because it happened relativly recently.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)

Well of course they are. What you have at first are lake deposits. If my memory serves me right I believe there are even evaporite deposits around the rim. SO you have many layers of lake environment deposits. Then you have a sudden change to deep marine deposits such as fine grained silt. These are not very deep yet because it hasn't been a saltwater sea for very long and that was sort of the point. You wanted a modern day example of this happening. Well certainly I didn't say there were just 2 layers. Obviously the sea had its own geologic history before the dam broke and there are many layers that are different for their own reason one big one being the coming and going of the ice age that preceeded the dam breaking. I was just trying to keep it simple. Right now there are different sediments being deposited in different areas of the Black see due to depth and proximity to the shoreline just like there are in the America SW. Yes they sure are and we can even trace how the shoreline grew and shrank over time. Where I am standing right now is on the transitional boundary where sometimes it was under the ocean while others it was the beachhead. While it was a sea it had existed long enough for sea levels to rise and fall many times and we can find the shoreline at various places "times" in the geologic column.BTW. Did you like my post prior to this one that you responded. I know it was long but I am trying very hard to get you good information. Every once in awhile it feels like we get this bouts of cooperation.

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Of course, biblical creationists are committed to belief in God's written Word, the Bible, which forbids bearing false witness; --AIG (lest they forget)