Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood

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Wmscott writes:
I would suggest reading the earlier postings, we have been discussing the points you brought up for some time. To sum it up, the flood was not the way many assume, and the evidence hence doesn't match their preconceived ideas. We also have evidence in the form of marine traces, relict lakes, super flood erosion and other things, that there has been a global flood in recent geological history.

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I have read the earlier postings, and what I've noticed is a tendency to ignore the significant issues in favor of ambiguous details. Had there been a worldwide flood around 10,000 years ago it would have wiped out almost all land life, an extinction event greater than any other in earth history. It would have left its evidence everywhere. If ends of ice ages were really associated with world-wide floods then we would have evidence of repeated inundations and extinctions. If a flood had really swept across Antarctica we wouldn't be finding just diatoms, which are wind-borne anyway, but entire fish.In order to have a workable hypothesis you have to address the rather conspicuous conflicts with existing evidence. You need to deal forthrightly with the evidence instead of just claiming error, misinterpretation and preconceived notions.When the absence of evidence for a flood was recognized in the first half of the 19th century the preconceived notion at that time was that Noah's flood had been a real event. Since then the lack of evidence for a world-wide flood has only become more and more clear.--Percy

About glacial run-off, since you advocate a world-wide flood at the end of the last glacial period, you should be seeking evidence of a world-wide flood, not evidence of glacial flows. We already know about glacial flows, and no one doubts that there were large glacial flows at the ends of ice ages. What you lack is evidence of a world-wide flood.About the comet impacts, even if they actually happened you still have no evidence of a world-wide flood.Once again your dates are in conflict. The end of the last glacial period and the date for when the "huge comet smashed into the Earth" are about 8000 years apart. Dr. Victor Clube is a catastrophist in the mold of Immanuel Velikovsky, ie, he believes that the events of the Bible correlate with astronomical events like close approaches of and collisions with asteroids and comets. Incredibly, Dr. Clube is at Oxford University. Go figure!The other article about comets or asteroids forming the Carolina bays is from 1975. It is scholarly but was probably considered "out there" even then. It goes against common sense that the 500,000 Carolina bays were formed relatively recently by impacts of extraterrestrial origin. The Siberian event, which the article mentions by way of example, was just a single body exploding in the earth's atmosphere, yet it downed all trees in an enormous radius. But if 500,000 little planetoids had impacted the earth's surface in the last 20,000 years knocking out bays on the Carolina coast with sizes ranging from 200 feet to 7 miles there'd be copious evidence, such as meteor fragments everywhere, the typical impact shape of raised perimeter ridge, major flora/fauna extinctions, dramatic world-wide climatic effects (the kind that would return the world to an ice age), etc. Plus there's the mystery of somehow hitting only the coastline, never inland.Here's a picture of the 50,000 year old Barringer Crater in Arizona. It's less than a mile in diameter and the meteor is estimated to have been about 150 feet across:This is fairly distinctive and even after 10,000 years on a coastline would still be very evident as a crater, particularly if 7-miles across.Your proposal of a world-wide flood in the last 10,000 years has a very simple test: was nearly all land-life wiped out about 10,000 years ago? The answer is no.If foraminifera, like diatoms, can be windborne, then finding them anywhere is not evidence of a flood. If you find relatively young remains of non-microscopic sea life on your trip out west then you've got something.--Percy

We all understand that glacial melts cause glacial flows that raise sea levels. We also all understand that by adding sufficient water you can raise flood levels to any height. Did glacial melts raise sea levels to the point where there was a global flood? While you can't prove a negative, there's no evidence that a global flood ever took place, not 10,000 years ago, not ever.We're not trying to convince you, at least I'm not, that you're wrong about a world wide flood. We're just trying to help you see that your evidence does not support your theory.You do not appear to be distinguishing between evidence that is merely consistent with your hypothesis, such as the glacial evidence, and evidence that actually supports your hypothesis, like 10,000 year old sea-floor sediments world-wide. You have only the former and none of the latter.No one understands why you think a global flood could wash only microscopic diatoms and foraminifera onto land, but nothing larger.Your dates never match, forcing you to generally denigrate dating methods without any specific cause.The addition of cometary evidence to your scenario makes it begin to resemble an Eric von Danniken approach (with a dash of Velikovsky), who in the 1970s cited all manner of terrestrial mysteries in support of his thesis of alien visitations.All that's really happening is that you're projecting your Biblical faith in a flood onto the available evidence.The strongest argument against your global flood thesis is that nearly all land life didn't disappear 10,000 years ago.--Percy

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Wmscott writes:
On evidence that this resulted in a global flood, we could go back and revisit our discussions on the Michigan whale bones and Wisconsin marine diatoms and drop stones that we had in earlier posts.

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But then we'd be going in circles, because unless there's something you haven't told us this evidence doesn't support your thesis. The whale bones have been dated to less than 1,000 years old. This not only conflicts with your thesis that Noah's Flood was 10,000 years ago, but younger dates are also incompatible with your frequent taking refuge in the flow of old carbon into the seas as a source of error. But since this only causes older dating (which is a known phenomena and compensated for in the final assignment of dates) it cannot explain your younger whale bones.Diatoms are often wind-borne and can be found anywhere. You need the remains or fossils of creatures that were sizable enough to require flood water to transport them and that date to about 10,000 years ago.Drop stones in Wisconsin are not evidence of a world wide flood, but only of local submergence. Local submergence is incredibly common at the margins of retreating glaciers. The weight of the glacier deforms the land-table downwards. As the glacier retreats and before the land has time to rebound lakes form at the glacial margins. Where the lake meets the glacier huge icebergs break off, float out into the lake, melt, and drop their sedimentary content. To support your thesis you need to find evidence of submergence in places where there were no glaciers, you have to do that in many places around the world, and you have to date them to roughly 10,000 years ago.If you examine this paper about Wisconsian ice sheet interaction in Alberta (which you'll want to do since it briefly mentions dropstones - more evidence for you!) you'll see that papers on this subject tend to be extremely detailed in their gathering and analysis of evidence. You have to explain how evidence of a world-wide flood would not reveal itself in such studies. For example, even if the world-wide flood somehow incredibly left no silt layer, it would still have washed debris into the clefts and gullies from glacial runoff, yet no such debris has ever been found.

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On the comet element in my flood theory, for the very reasons you cited, I hate having it and if it wasn't for the fact that the evidence points towards it so strongly, I would throw it out in a heart beat.

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But the evidence doesn't point to it. You're just casting about for something, anything, that could serve as a cause of a sudden 40-day rain and world-wide flood (for which there is also no evidence), and so far a comet strike is all you've been able to come up with. But comets are not just slushy ice balls - they also contain significant proportions of solid material. And even if they were nothing but water, their speed relative to the earth once they've descended to the inner solar system is enormous, and a strike by a comet of even just pure water 10,000 years ago of the size you need would be so devastating an event that we would no longer be here to contemplate it. You need an event sufficiently significant to cause a world-wide flood, but not so energetic that it represents a major extinction event. You haven't found it in comet strikes.By the way, no recent cometary evidence has been found, not at the Carolina bays nor anywhere else. No isotopic evidence (comets have different isotopic profiles for elements like oxygen than the same elements on earth) is recorded in ice cores from Greenland or Antarctica. The bays are almost exclusively oval while impact craters are uniformly circular regardless of impact angle (just look at the moon). This is because the crater forms from the explosive reaction to the impact and not to the impact itself.The Carolina bays are an interesting scientific mystery, thanks for calling them to my attention. Most of the articles I've now read are well balanced and mention the variety of theories, but they also say the most widely accepted scientific explanation is some not-yet-understood weather action.

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A possible reason for problems associated with carbon dating events at the end of the ice age was put forward in an earlier post. The trapping of carbon dioxide gas by the firn, resulting in glacial meltwater from beneath the ice sheet containing large amounts of very old carbon. A sudden release of large amounts of such old carbon would confuse carbon dates for this time period.. This effect was shown in a reference in that earlier post, where the sediment layer for this event came up 2K older than the sediment layer above it.

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Carbon reservoir issues are well understood, and I'm sure this article only makes clear how very excellently well that is. You cannot conclude from this article that you always have a few thousand years of wiggle room. The changing carbon reservoir is a source of error only if you don't know about it.

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On "The strongest argument against your global flood thesis is that nearly all land life didn't disappear 10,000 years ago." ever hear of Noah's ark?

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Sure, ever heard of Santa Claus or the tooth fairy? I thought you were approaching this scientifically from an evidentiary basis. The mechanisms behind gathering all the animals of the world and then returning them to their original habitats can only be miraculous, not scientific.

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Or the Pleistocene extinction event?

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A world-wide flood would have wiped out nearly all land life around the globe. The American Museum of Natural History discusses this extinction thus on one of their webpages:

The end-Pleistocene extinction event does not qualify as a mass extinction. It is better classified as a taxon-specific event, affecting primarily the Class Mammalia (although birds and, to a lesser extent, reptiles were also affected). Nor was it global, although later in the Quaternary many other regions were affected by dramatic losses of a similar sort.

I think you have forgotten your original thesis. Your thesis was that the evidence supports a world-wide flood about 10,000 years ago. You now seem embarked upon a course that ignores the lack of quality and lack of relevance of your evidence and instead tries to persuade people anyway, as if you believe multiple presentations can overcome inherent insufficiency.--Percy

This thread is featured this week on the site's Home Page, check it out.--Percy

I'm not able to verify any of your contentions about dropstones in the driftless area of Wisconsin, including that they cover marine diatoms. The only evidence of submergence of Wisconsin comes from the Cambrian Period and the Ordovician Period. This evidence of submergence from 500 million years ago can still be identified, but evidence of a world-wide flood occurring a mere 10,000 years ago is absent. See this brief summary of Wisconsin geology.I think you are misunderstanding the objections to your proposal for sub-glacial lakes as a source of water for a world-wide flood. It isn't the existence of such lakes that is being challenged, but rather your proposal that they:

1. Contained sufficient water to flood the entire earth, including the glaciers from under which they flowed (now there's a trick);
2. Released that water suddenly so that sea levels could rise rapidly;
3. The ocean basins depressed world-wide and the land popped up world-wide relatively rapidly in order to follow the Biblical timetable, but leaving no evidence;
4. A world wide flood would have left little to no silt, nor evidence of other kinds, either.

Your cometary factor is not necessary from an evidentiary standpoint. You need glaciers around the world to simultaneously release their sub-glacial water in order to provide a sudden and catastrophic rise in sea level in order to match the events described in Genesis. But there is no evidence Genesis is an accurate account, and so there is no requirement that all glaciers released their water at the same time. The release of sub-glacial water would have occurred naturally over time during glacial retreat.What you need is evidence that the world was submerged by water 10,000 years ago, and that the amount of sub-glacial water was sufficient to do this.It has been said that old scientists do not become convinced of new views but rather just gradually die out. This is true not only of scientists but of humans in general. Our views are held firmly in place by many correlating connections with all our knowledge. To give up a view which feels consistent with many other things that we know would not make sense to most people, because if that view isn't true then perhaps many of the other views that we thought it consistent with may also not be true.Fundamental to your world view is that the flood was an actual event, and this causes you to interpret evidence you find in terms of that event. Stones you find in Wisconsin become dropstones from the flood. Diatoms you find beneath those stones become marine diatoms from the inundation by the sea. You tie in geologic mysteries because you require cataclysmic events. It all makes sense to you, it seems impossible to you that it couldn't be so.Evolutionists do somewhat the same thing, but with a significant difference: a firm evidentiary foundation. We look at the fossil record in the geologic column and conclude that it is rock solid () evidence that evolution has taken place, and so we interpret other evidence we find within an evolutionary framework. That many discoveries have been predicted by applying this framework makes clear the efficacy of having a firm evidentiary foundation.Your approach diverges significantly from the scientific because of this lack of a firm evidentiary foundation. There is no evidence of a world-wide flood 10,000 years ago. The foundation of your theory is not evidence but a religious book. Without evidence of a world-wide flood your theory drifts upon the wind.--Percy

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wmscott writes:
Incorrect assumption on two points, the sub-glacial lakes were not the only source of flood water and...

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What are your other sources of water, what is your evidence that they were sufficient to cover the globe, and what is your evidence that the world was ever completely submerged just some thousands of years ago?

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...the glaciers floated in the flood waters if they were deep enough.

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This presents a few contradictions. You once offered evidence of marine diatoms on Antarctic ice in support of submergence of the Antarctic ice sheet, but now you appear to be saying they floated, and only if the flood was deep enough. So is your scenario that the ice sheets submerged or floated? And if the flood wasn't deep enough to float them, then how can you say the entire world was submerged?

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Actually it did leave evidence, what do you think is in my book, blank pages? I put forward a theory called ice age flexing on the deep flexing of the earth which took place at this time caused by the sudden large shifts in pressure by water/ice on the earth's crust.

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Evidence and theory are two different things. What you did was propose a theory (ice age flexing that resulting in changes in elevation equal to miles) for which you have no evidence.

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A gradual flood caused by a tide like rise and recession of global sea level would leave next to no evidence compared to the standard YEC flood theories.

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You keep saying this, and it makes sense to no one. Slow, quiet floods leave copious amounts of evidence. For example:

1. When the Mississippi overflows its banks every few years, the water doesn't rush across the landscape but simple rises higher and higher, then after a while just as gradually recedes leaving layers of silt everywhere.
2. In the days before the Aswan Dam the Nile river used to overflow its banks every year. This was no raging flood of destruction but just a gradual rise in water level covering the fields next to its banks and leaving behind a layer of fertile silt.
3. When ancient Babylon was first discovered and excavated in the 1800s they came across silt layers indicative of a large flood and believed they had found evidence of the Great Flood of Noah. But further excavations in the ensuing decades revealed silt layers from many distinct flood events, and it was gradually realized that the Euphrates had overflowed its banks many times and that the floods had all been local.

In light of the obvious and significant effects of these quiet and periodic rising and fallings of river water levels of short duration, how do you explain the complete lack of any evidence that Noah's flood ever took place?

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Taking into account that the length of submergence was probably a matter of months, very little sediment would expected to be found. And I might add that I have found evidence of that sedimentation.

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A key facet of science is replication, where other scientists gather and analyze the same evidence you did. Do you ever ask yourself why professional geologists have never identified this evidence? Besides, you admitted earlier you can't afford carbon dating (a bargain at only about $500), so no matter what it is you've found you have no idea how old it is. Or even if it's carbon-14 dateable. Or even if you've found flood sedimentation.

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I also notice that you fail to provide an alternative explanation for finding marine diatoms beneath glacial stones which are still sitting on the original post glacial surface,...

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Well, yes, I did fail. I failed to find any mention of marine diatoms in Wisconsin anywhere on the Internet except your messages here (do a Google search on "marine diatoms" drop stones Wisconsin and only your posts to this forum appear - hey, you're famous!). I also failed to find any mention of dropstones in the driftless area of Wisconsin.

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...or for the whale bones found in the state of Michigan.

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As I already told you in message 173, the whale bones have been dated to less than 1000 years old. Like always, you claimed a dating problem, saying they'd been infiltrated by young carbon from rain water.When it comes to dates, whenever you need some piece of evidence to fit into your puzzle but it's dated to the wrong era, you just call it a dating problem and make up a reason. To you, all whale bones, diatoms, drop stones, comets and glacial flows are just 10,000 years old, no matter what the evidence says.

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Information on the glacial boulders in the Driftless area can be found in the two geology books I have cited in earlier postings on this.

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But we're not talking about glacial boulders, we're talking about dropstones. And when you earlier cited Diatoms of North America by William C. Vinyard, it was only as your source of information for identifying diatoms, not for any information about dropstones in the driftless area (you also mentioned Round's book Diatoms which you didn't like as much). What is your evidence of dropstones covering marine diatoms in the driftless area of southwest Wisconsin?

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But for now, it is just one person battling the world, and rather successfully too I might say. The mere fact that I have been able to so, should be an indication that I may be on to something.

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If your measure of your success is the degree to which you've been dissuaded from your viewpoint, then you're simply in company with that unending legion of inventers who every year attempt to patent perpetual motion machines. Few of these inventers are ever persuaded of any error in their argument, and they're battling much greater odds than you by going head-to-head with the law of conservation of energy.Your approach has a fundamental and very fatal flaw. You are starting with the premise that the global flood, something for which you have no evidence, actually took place. In science one first gathers evidence and then builds theoretical frameworks around it, but you put the cart before the horse by first erecting your theoretical framework and only then considering the evidence. This approach is a recipe for error.--Percy

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wmscott writes:
Sources of water in addition to sub glacial lakes include impact melted water flowing off the ice sheet and into the sea, release of ice dammed lakes, and ice/water blasted into the atmosphere of which some will fall into the oceans and glacial ice surging into the seas.

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Oh. The way you were talking I thought it was some significant new source of water. This is just different ways for water previously locked in glaciers to be released.

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On evidence for the flood, I have been posting some and there is more in my book. It is more a matter of the fact that you disagree with the interpretation of the evidence. But then it is up to you to put forward an alternative explanation that better explains the evidence. Rejecting but failing to explain would at least put the evidence in the category of anomalies which you are unable to explain.

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I haven't seen any anomalous evidence that needs explaining. As far as I can tell, you're the only one in the entire world who thinks marine diatoms are hiding beneath dropstones in the driftless area of Wisconsin. Or that there's evidence of marine sedimentation in the same area. Evidence of catastrophic glacial flows and rising sea levels is not evidence of a flood - that's why I asked you for evidence that the water released was sufficient to flood the entire earth. You appear to be the only one who thinks there's a 1000% dating error on 1000 year-old whale bones in Michigan. You've invented all your supposed anomalies yourself.Your evidence doesn't support your contentions because their source is a creation myth instead of evidence. You believe that the Genesis flood account is largely accurate, that all the animals of the world were somehow saved on Noah's ark, that the flood covered the entire earth (even though people then could not have known whether it did or didn't), that the flood left no evidence behind, and that after the flood the animals somehow returned to their original lands.There's no genetic "eye of the needle" that all species would have passed through 10,000 years ago.There's no mountain rain shadows suddenly appearing 10,000 years ago when your low elevation Himalayas and Andes and Rockies and Alps suddenly popped up a couple miles.There's no evidence of a comet strike in the form of changes in the isotopic profiles of elements like hydrogen, oxygen and carbon in Greenland or Antarctic ice cores, nor any fallout from particulate matter suspended in the atmosphere after such a strike.Anyone who could be persuaded today on the basis of your slim-to-none evidence could just as easily be persuaded of the opposite tomorrow.

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"Do you ever ask yourself why professional geologists have never identified this evidence?" Sure, I discuss it in my book.

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You're welcome to discuss away here.

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"...carbon dating (a bargain at only about $500)," Really? Tell me more, I am interested.

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Google's all you need. Shouldn't take you longer than a minute to track down labs that list their prices on the Internet. I'm sure that if you contact them they can tell you if they'd have any trouble dating diatoms, and what additional information they'd need to provide accurate dates.

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To find information on marine diatoms in Wisconsin you will have to consult the book "Solving the Mystery of the Biblical Flood" where the results have been published.

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If your participation here sells some books that's great, but replies of "It's in my book" kind of puts the kibosh on discussion.

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To find information on the drop stones, you will have to at least use the term "glacial erratics" or "glacial boulders" since geology doesn't accept the drop stone theory...

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What leads you to believe that what professional geologists think are glacial boulders are actually dropstones?--Percy

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Percy wrote:
I haven't seen any anomalous evidence that needs explaining.

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Wmscott replied:
I have. If you don't want to see it, that is your choice.

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This isn't a case of denying evidence before my very eyes but rather one of you citing evidence that doesn't support your hypothesis. Your evidence fits into these categories:

1. Evidence for which there is no confirmation. This consists of evidence only you yourself have seen and verified, in other words, it hasn't been confirmed by anyone else. Example: marine diatoms under dropstones.
2. Evidence for something, but not for global flooding. Example: evidence of catastrophic glacial flows.
3. Invented evidence. Example: Claiming a 1000% dating error for whale bones in Michigan.

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The flood is not a 'creation myth', it occurred long after creation and hence could not be such since it is not even part of the creation events.

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Sorry, sloppy terminology. Flood mythology, then.

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I guess that you have never heard of the pluvial period when rain regularly fell in areas where the rain shadows are today.

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I was referring to your lack of evidence that the Andes, Rockies, Alps and Himalayas suddenly caused rain shadows when they popped up a couple miles 10,000 years ago. This is the kind of confirming evidence you should be searching for, particularly since you believe there's no direct evidence.

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Percy wrote:
There's no genetic "eye of the needle" that all species would have passed through 10,000 years ago.

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Wmscott writes:
Who says there was? Sounds like you are slipping back into some old YEC debate.

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You believe all land animals of the world were saved on Noah's ark 10,000 years ago. This would have reduced the total genetic variation to only 2 or 14 individuals depending upon the kind. This filter to genetic variation would be readily apparent to genetic analysis, but it isn't there.You also haven't addressed how, scientifically and non-miraculously, pairs of all the kinds of animals of the world were able to migrate to the Middle East before the flood, and then to migrate back after.

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Really? Since I have been theorizing that the impacts occurred in connection with the Carolina bay impacts, then the lack of such evidence would mean that the bays have a non-impact origin. What is that origin?

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As you already know, there are about 30 different theories for the origin of the Carolina Bays, and at this time there is no consensus. The lack of an isotopic signature in ice cores of 10,000 years ago is unfavorable to the impact theory. The lack of any non-ordinary atmospheric particulate matter in the ice cores such as would be thrown up by impacts so large as to cause shock waves that crumpled entire ice sheets is additionally unfavorable.

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Percy wrote:
What leads you to believe that what professional geologists think are glacial boulders are actually dropstones?"

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Wmscott replies:
Because the geologists are unable to provide a glacial method of deposition. After all, we are talking about glacial boulders in an area that was not glaciated, that should be a clue.

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Geologists provide no explanation for glacial erratics in the driftless area of Wisconsin because they have found none. Check out this abstract from a paper by David M Mickelson of the Department of Geology and Geophysics of the University of Wisconsin which concludes, "there appears to be no evidence that the Driftless Area was glaciated at any time."So your claim of yet another geological mystery is false. Geologists are not trying to "explain away" glacial dropstones as erratics because they haven't found any erratics that have to be explained.--Percy

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[This message has been edited by Percipient, 03-16-2002]

Hi Edge,We've both been addressing the Driftless Area dropstone issue. As I understand Wmscott's position, it is that there are glacial erratics (boulders carried within glaciers that are left behind when the glacier melts or recedes) in the Driftless area that geologists can't explain since it is not believed the area was ever glaciated.But I've been unable to uncover any evidence for glacial erratics in the Driftless area. In fact, the reason the area is believed to have been unglaciated is due to the absence of glacial erratics and glacial till such as is found is many other parts of Wisconsin and neighboring states.I've therefore come to believe that Wmscott is making up this story of a geological conundrum. Any boulders he's found in the Driftless Area are neither dropstones nor erratics. Geologists are not resorting to claims of pranksters to explain glacial erratics in the Driftless Area because there are no glacial erratics to be found there. I cited this link to an abstract of a paper by David Mickelson in my previous message that is unequivocal about the lack of evidence for glaciation in the Driftless Area.--Percy

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Wmscott writes:
Here are two references to the drop stones found in the Wisconsin Driftless area: ... (The Physical Geography of Wisconsin, Third Edition by Lawrence Martin 1965, pages 130-131)

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But Martin's book is from 1965, and as the link just provided you says, "Black and several others in the 1960s suggested that the area was glaciated between 30 and 40ka B.P. and this idea spread widely through the scientific community." ( abstract of a paper by David Mickelson) Martin isn't even talking about the Wisconsian, but about a period thousands of years before. Mickelson's abstract briefly explains how Black's evidence was misinterpreted and concludes that there is no evidence of glaciation, ie, no erratics, in the Driftless Area. If the erratics in stream beds draining glaciated areas were actually dropstones then they'd be found randomly throughout the Driftless Area, but they're not. You're relying on a 40-year discarded theory.At nearly 30 years Gwen Shultz's book is nearly as old, and her proposal of students hauling in erratics from neighboring regions to trick their geology professors is simply bizarre. It could happen, I guess. Did it? Who knows? (It doesn't take a very large rock to out-weigh what a half-ton pickup should carry. A piece of granite 2.3-foot square weighs one ton.) Regardless, the consensus view today is that there are no glacial erratics in the Driftless Area.The fact of the matter is that though the Wisconsin Glaciation didn't reach the Driftless Area (nor the previous two glacial advances), past glaciations did. There's evidence of these older glaciations, some going back 65 million years, in various places like stream cuts through glacial till. But evidence of glaciation from the Wisconsian Period, especially in the form of erratics, is absent.From Ice Age Trail: Glossary: "Erratics can be found along the entire Ice Age Trail, except where it traverses parts of the Driftless Area."Since you like old data, here's a summary of an account from 1823 by a W. H. Keating: "In southwestern Wisconsin he noted the absence of the granite boulders, elsewhere known to have been brought by the continental glacier, but which he thought of as erratics of very old, or 'primitive,' rock, transported during the Flood. He commented upon this change and he did so close to the southern border of the district we now call the Driftless Area. After crossing the Driftless Area he observed the resumption of the erratics at the first point where one could possibly see them while following Keating's route."The evidence is pretty clear. Except for a brief period around the 1960s when some evidence was misinterpreted, no erratics have been found in the Driftless Area. To persuade us you must show how the misinterpreted evidence from the 1960s was actually interpreted correctly, and in what ways the current interpretation is incorrect. What you're doing right now is simply declaring current scholarship incorrect without explanation.Please notice I'm not saying that current scholarship cannot be wrong. I'm simply saying that if it *is* wrong you haven't demonstrated it yet.

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Now Guys, the reason we are having this debate, is you are trying to convince me that my views are in error...

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Not that you're in error, but that your evidence is unconfirmed, sketchy, and doesn't support your hypothesis. You should be seeking confirmation in cutting-edge scholarship instead of from 30 and 40 year-old books. Your criteria for accepting or rejecting data seems to be whether it agrees with you, when you should be seeking out the latest and greatest information. You should seek to reconcile your theory with what we know today.

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But then instead of showing what these better answers are, you go and ignore the evidence or claim that I made it up.

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When there's only one person making an extremely unusual and unlikely claim, the rational response is to ignore it or assume he made it up. Can you cite any recent scholarship that agrees with you?

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You also demonstrate that so far, I seem to be the only one with a theory that solves the mystery of these anomalies, if in attacking my theory you need to resort to claims of fabrication.

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One of the key qualities of science is replication. No one except you has gone to the Driftless Area and found marine diatoms beneath dropstones. Geologists don't even believe there are erratics in the Driftless Area, let alone dropstones. Since your data fails the replication requirement of science, why should anyone accept it as science?

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Percipient wrote "You believe all land animals of the world were saved on Noah's ark 10,000 years ago." Incorrect assertion. It is obvious that many land animals survived in their locations without a migration to and back from a point in the middle east. Many animals managed to survive the flood on their own by rafting or other means.

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It would be kind to say that this stretches credulity. Ever seen a cow rafted during a Mississippi flood? You either have to come up with a reasonable explanation, or somehow develop this one so it appears reasonable.And regardless, you would still have a genetic "eye of the needle" event for which there is no evidence, unless you're advocating that entire herds of animals were rafted.As long as were on the subject of credulity, I'm still amazed that you think a world-wide flood would leave little to no sediment. My earlier examples were for river floods, but if you prefer sea-flood examples then they're even better. When an unusual high tide brings water onto land the result is sediment everywhere. People are shoveling sand out of their houses for a week. In your scenario a comet has just struck the world with such force as to collapse glacial margins world-wide and release huge, mammoth amounts of water raising sea levels dramatically everywhere. Because of the recent cataclysms wave action would be at a maximum, and all expanding ocean margins would kick up huge amounts of sediment, especially given the huge availability of such material on land not recently submerged.

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Percipient wrote "there are about 30 different theories for the origin of the Carolina Bays, and at this time there is no consensus." The reason there are so many is because none of them is any good, only the impact theory makes sense.

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Can you see your own logical fallacy here? If there are so many theories only because "none of them is any good," then how could the impact theory be good? Obviously, by your logic, if it were good then there would be only one or a few theories. But since there are many theories, therefore none of them are good, and that includes the impact theory. I don't pretend to know the answer to the mystery of the Carolina Bays. As far as I can tell, there is insufficient evidence at this point to reach any definite conclusions.The absence of isotopic and particulate evidence in ice cores is unfavorable to the impact theory, as is the absence of impact evidence at bay sites. You need to address these issues in order to possibly begin excluding other theories.

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Percipient wrote "impacts so large as to cause shock waves that crumpled entire ice sheets" Not part of my theory, the ice sheets were too large to have been 'crumpled' by a single impact that the biosphere of the earth could have survived. The Carolina bays point towards multiple impacts spread out over a large area which would have resulted in large scale surface abrasion, but 'crumpling entire ice sheets' is a bit of over statement.

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I was just reflecting your theory back to you. You need an impact with sufficient shock force to cause the simultaneous release of mammoth amounts of sub-glacial water simultaneously, not slowly such as would happen with just a single release point or two.You also have to limit the force of impact to not cause a major extinction event.You also have to show the amount of sub-glacial water was sufficient to flood the world. The glaciation was extensive, but not even close to worldwide. For example, in our hemisphere it only made it down a little south of the Canadian border. Not only that, but there is evidence of ice grinding against rock all through glaciated areas, so you have limited room in which to hide sub-glacial water.You also have to show that the world's mountain ranges all popped up a couple miles after the flood.--Percy

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Fine. Dropstones are found at an elevation of 380 to 480 feet asl. What does this have to do with a global flood? I can see that we are not getting through, wmscott. You need to find evidence that shows not only that there was a global flood, but that your theory is diagnostic in explaining it. You have failed at this.

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Good point, but I don't think you have to accept the presence of dropstones in the Driftless Area. Wmscott seems to be the only one who thinks they exist.It was also interesting to see Wmscott's contention that the Mississippi wasn't dammed because, "There is of course no evidence for the giant damming of the Mississippi." There's no evidence for a world-wide flood, either, but that one he's sure of.--Percy

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Those rocks in the Driftless area are really giving you guys fits.

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Well, that's precisely the point: they're rocks, not dropstones. Why can't you just explain to us why you think they're dropstones when professional geologists think they're just rocks? You've resisted offering any evidence for your position, leading naturally to the conclusion that you don't have any.

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Considering what a problem this seems to be for you guys, if I ever do a second edition, I will have to try and include some pictures of these troublesome rocks.

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Problem for us guys? You're the one with the theory that has convinced no one.Anyway, you've got pictures? Why wait until the 2nd edition? Post 'em in a message. If you don't have anyplace on-line to put them then just send them to me at percipient@ and I'll load them onto the site's graphics area.What's really puzzling is why you don't understand my skepticism. Everything I've read says that you find erratics only outside the Driftless Area. For example, I posted excerpts from two links in my previous message that say precisely that, one a contemporary description, the other from 1823. That's a pretty long stretch of time during which people's consistent observation has been that there are no erratics. Yet you, untrained and non-professional, say you've found erratics. Naturally I'm skeptical.

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If you check the state geology books for the states that line the Mississippi, these rocks turn up in a number of river valleys that connect with the river.

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Rivers that drain glaciated areas commonly contain erratics from the glacier.As you said yourself, Corliss is out in left field. Strange that even though you're aware of this you accept his assertions about erratics. That someone like Corliss agrees with you should give you pause.I know you're beset by a sea of protests, so there's no hurry to reply, but when you get a chance I'm still interested in hearing your explanations about the other points from my previous post to you.--Percy

Found this at the CNN site today in an article about the floods in Kentucky:
Cow Waiting for a Raft

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--Percy

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Wmscott replies to Joe Meert:
What journal and journals are you the editor of and on the board of?

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Joe hasn't claimed affiliation with any journals. He's only asking why, if you feel so sure you have a valid theory, that you're bringing it to lay audiences such as might read your book or debate with you here, instead of to scientific venues where it could receive a more informed hearing.

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So do you believe the rocks are there or not?

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I believe there are rocks pretty much almost everywhere. What is it about these rocks that leads you to believe they're dropstones when professional geologists think they're just rocks?

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The references you cited on the lack of glacial erratics in the Driftless area are correct since they are speaking in general terms, and the few that turn up are the exception to the rule.

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The only scientific reference cited so far by either side was Mickelson reporting a single erratic of size 0.01 meters (1 cm). Given that the Driftless Area is surrounded by formerly glaciated regions and has been tromped through by generations of animals and people, that's no evidence at all. So where is your evidence for dropstones in the Driftless Area?

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Haven't had the chance to see these rocks for myself, so no, I don't have any pictures of them yet. The Driftless area is large, but perhaps someday I will happen to come across some of these odd rocks.

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If you have no pictures of them and have never even seen them, then why did you say you'd try to put pictures of them in the next edition of your book? This is pretty puzzling since you can't know whether pictures of something you've never seen would support your position or not.In message 176, in reply to me saying, ""Diatoms are often wind-borne," you replied, "Not when you find them underneath a glacial drop stone." Where does this claim of marine diatoms under dropstones actually come from? I thought you'd found this evidence yourself, but I guess not since you've never seen a dropstone in the Driftless Area.--Percy

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[This message has been edited by Percipient, 03-28-2002]