Age of Grand Canyon and Cave Speleothems

I have a friend to thank for originally bringing this information to my attention.From Just a moment...Science 7 March 2008:
Vol. 319 no. 5868 pp. 1377-1380
DOI: 10.1126/science.1151248Age and Evolution of the Grand Canyon Revealed by U-Pb Dating of Water Table-Type Speleothems^(a)by Victor Polyak*, Carol Hill and Yemane Asmerom

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Abstract

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The age and evolution of the Grand Canyon have been subjects of great interest and debate since its discovery. We found that cave mammillaries (water table indicator speleothems) from nine sites in the Grand Canyon showed uranium-lead dating evidence for an old western Grand Canyon on the assumption that groundwater table decline rates are equivalent to incision rates. Samples in the western Grand Canyon yielded apparent water table decline rates of 55 to 123 meters per million years over the past 17 million years, in contrast to eastern Grand Canyon samples that yielded much faster rates (166 to 411 meters per million years). Chronology and inferred incision data indicate that the Grand Canyon evolved via headward erosion from west to east, together with late-stage (∼3.7 million years ago) accelerated incision in the eastern block.

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(Note that they are not talking about biological evolution, but the gradual development of the canyon by geological processes.)AlsoHow to Date the Grand Canyon: Go With the Flow | WIRED

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It turns out that the time stamps were there all along. They were just hidden away inside the hundreds of caves inside the Grand Canyon's walls. Strange formations known as mammilary coatings -- named for their vague resemblance to breasts -- line some of the cave walls. Mammilary coatings form on the walls of caves that are submerged just below the water table. As the Colorado River sliced deeper down into the Colorado Plateau, the water table gradually dropped. Mammilary coatings marked the river's fall. And as mammilary coatings form, they also happen to trap a lot of uranium. By measuring their age, scientists can measure how long ago they were near the water table.

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Three geologists from the University of New Mexico have explored caves along the Grand Canyon, ranging from the very bottom to the rim. In this week's issue of Science, they report that the highest caves have mammilary coatings dating back about 17 million years, and the lowest ones date to about 800,000 years. And all the caves between the top and bottom have the intermediate ages you’d expect. By measuring the distance from the rim to the caves, the geologists were then able to estimate how fast the Colorado River carved the canyon. The downstream end of the canyon formed first, and only later did the upstream end catch up. These new measurements show that even as the river sank down into the earth, the earth itself rose, lifted by hot rock welling up through the crust

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Here is creationist Kent Hovind and his (bad) argument^(b) for how the Grand Canyon was made:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ze5A2pua1E4The dating information above says two things that invalidate the creationist concept that the canyon was formed by flood waters in a few days or weeks as the water drained away, slicing into and through the ridge:

1. The canyon formed from west to east, while the creationist model would form from east to west (eroding the top of the barrier to the drainage flow first), and
2. The canyon took at least 16 million years to form according to radiometric dating (17x10^{^6} - 8x10^{^5}).

The evidence that the canyon formed from west to east is independent of the validity of Uranium-Lead dating, it just depends on the measured levels of Uranium and Lead without any age calculation:

• soluble Uranium is captured in the formation of the speleotherm\mammilaries,
• Lead is not soluble in water and so would not be deposited in the speleotherm\mammilaries
• Uranium turns into lead, not vice-versa
• The speleotherm\mammilaries form after the caves have been formed as they are deposits on the cave walls
• Higher ratios of Lead/Uranium therefore are due to greater age of the speleotherm\mammilaries, and thus so are the locations where they are found.

We can also discuss the validity of Uranium-Lead dating with reference to:
Are Uranium Halos the best evidence of (a) an old earth AND (b) constant physics?Enjoy^(a) - Speleothem Definition & Meaning | Dictionary.com ^(b) - Note that I have shown in previous threads why Hovind's explanation is bogus and doesn't work by his own argument that water does not flow uphill -- where the Grand Canyon crosses the ridge is not the lowest point of the ridge, but up on a slope between two lower points, so if he was correct then the canyon would be in a different location.Edited by RAZD, : linkEdited by RAZD, : x10Edited by RAZD, : titleEdited by RAZD, : added definition for speleothemEdited by RAZD, : engls

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Where I am starting is from Dr Wiens:
Radiometric Dating

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13. "Radiation halos" in rocks prove that the Earth was young.

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This refers to tiny halos of crystal damage surrounding spots where radioactive elements are concentrated in certain rocks. Halos thought to be from polonium, a short-lived element produced from the decay of uranium, have been found in some rocks. ...

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At any rate, halos from uranium inclusions are far more common. Because of uranium's long half-lives, these halos take at least several hundred million years to form. Because of this, most people agree that halos provide compelling evidence for a very old Earth.

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(bold added for empHASis, part deleted not about uranium halos)

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Thus when you have isotopes decaying into other isotopes by alpha decay, the energy of the alpha particle is unique to that decay stage because of the unique before and after mass of the decaying isotope and the constant mass of the alpha particle.

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Very simply put, if you change the decay rate, you change the decay energy, and the diameter of the halo changes.

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The existence of (common) uranium halos then is evidence that shows the physical constants have not changed while they were formed, and their formation in turn is evidence that the earth is old, at least several hundred million years old.

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And in relation to the OP we can also focus on the accuracy of Uranium-Lead dating techniques:From Radiometric DatingRadiometric Dating
A Christian Perspectiveby Dr. Roger C. Wiens

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Uranium-Lead and related techniques. The uranium-lead method is the longest-used dating method. It was first used in 1907, about a century ago. The uranium-lead system is more complicated than other parent-daughter systems; it is actually several dating methods put together. Natural uranium consists primarily of two isotopes, U-235 and U-238, and these isotopes decay with different half-lives to produce lead-207 and lead-206, respectively. In addition, lead-208 is produced by thorium-232. Only one isotope of lead, lead-204, is not radiogenic. The uranium-lead system has an interesting complication: none of the lead isotopes is produced directly from the uranium and thorium. Each decays through a series of relatively short-lived radioactive elements that each decay to a lighter element, finally ending up at lead. Since these half-lives are so short compared to U-238, U-235, and thorium-232, they generally do not affect the overall dating scheme. The result is that one can obtain three independent estimates of the age of a rock by measuring the lead isotopes and their parent isotopes. Long-term dating based on the U-238, U-235, and thorium-232 will be discussed briefly here; dating based on some of the shorter-lived intermediate isotopes is discussed later.

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The uranium-lead system in its simpler forms, using U-238, U-235, and thorium-232, has proved to be less reliable than many of the other dating systems. This is because both uranium and lead are less easily retained in many of the minerals in which they are found. Yet the fact that there are three dating systems all in one allows scientists to easily determine whether the system has been disturbed or not. Using slightly more complicated mathematics, different combinations of the lead isotopes and parent isotopes can be plotted in such a way as to minimize the effects of lead loss. One of these techniques is called the lead-lead technique because it determines the ages from the lead isotopes alone. Some of these techniques allow scientists to chart at what points in time metamorphic heating events have occurred, which is also of significant interest to geologists.

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Note that lead loss from the speleothems would result in younger age errors, so the corrected results would be older.Enjoy.

The reason is simple: the ridge that is supposedly breached during run-off from the flood is LOWER to the south and the north of the canyon location.Here is the objective empirical data that you can see with your own eyes: Google Maps (Linking to the map does not work, so you will need to click on the link above. Make sure it shows "Terrain" to indicate the topology.)The dark areas are higher than the lighter areas. According to Hovind (and physics) water does not willingly flow uphill, so it would have flowed over one of the lower sections of the ridge (north or south) and the canyon would be in a different location.Enjoy.

From Speleothems - DesertUSA

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Slightly acidic groundwater in limestone regions gradually dissolves passages and caverns in the underground rock. Geologists call this karst topography.

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Speleothems are cave features created after the underground chamber has been formed. They are a result of slow-moving water, usually containing calcium carbonate, which has been dissolved from the limestone where the cave was formed. When this water enters the cave, a chemical change causes the calcium carbonate to precipitate (harden), creating all manner of cave formations and features -- speleothems.

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Calcite is the stable form of the widely distributed mineral calcium carbonate (CaCO3). Calcite is the primary mineral component of speleothems as well as limestone, the sedimentary rock in which most caves are formed.

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Mammilary or Cloud: Carbonate coatings that form underwater in cave pools, around projections and rocks lining the pool, whose water is super-saturated with calcium carbonate.

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From Paleoclimatology: Speleothems

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Paleoclimatology: Written in the Earth
by Holli Riebeek design by Robert Simmon June 28, 2005

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Speleothems: Cave rocks

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A deep cavern dips into the New Mexico desert, shielding spiky icicle-like rocks that hang from the ceiling and the rounded columns that grow from the floor in a myriad of shapes. One of the world’s largest underground chambers, the Carlsbad Cavern is resplendent in the intricate finery of the rock formations that form there. Beyond their breath-taking beauty, the formations in Carlsbad and the more than 100 other caves in the area provide a record of rainfall in the southwestern United States.

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Tucked away inside the Earth, the rocks are protected from the weathering and large-scale erosion that taints other land-based climate records. As water runs through the ground, it picks up minerals, the most common of which is calcium carbonate. When the mineral-rich water drips into caves, it leaves behind solid mineral depositsthe same solid material that forms white spots on water faucets or glass dishes. The mineral deposits accumulate in the well-known icicle-shaped rock on the ceiling, a stalactite, and in a mound on the floor where the drip lands, a stalagmite. Less well known, water deposits can also dry in a flat slab called a flowstone.

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Geologists refer to the mineral formations in caves as speleothems. While the water flows, the speleothems grow in thin, shiny layers. The amount of growth is an indicator of how much ground water dripped into the cave. Little growth might indicate a drought, just as rapid growth could point to heavy precipitation. When the speleothems stop growing, the outside becomes dirty and eroded in places, giving it a dull appearance. A growing speleothem looks smooth and wet.

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Scientists can date the layers in the speleothem by measuring how much uranium, a radioactive element, has decayed. Uranium from the surrounding bedrock seeps into the water and forms a carbonate that becomes part of each layer of the speleothem as it forms. Uranium decays into thorium, which sticks to the clay in the bedrock instead of seeping into ground water and from there into the speleothem. As a result, the newest layers of a growing speleothem typically contain no thorium.

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Over time uranium predictably turns into thorium, so scientists can tell how old a layer is by measuring the ratio of uranium to thorium. ...

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And, as we have seen in the OP, the thorium decays into lead, so Uranium-Lead dating can also be used.The Uranium inclusion can thus be used to accurately date when any particular layer of the speleothem was formed.Enjoy.

Hi Faith, An opportunity to learn. Will you take it? So you agree that water does not flow uphill, that Kent Hovind is mistaken in his video. Which is invalidated by two things:First, the physical geology of the Grand Canyon -- it's shape and the objects in it (spires etc) -- are not observed to occur in ANY overflow erosion, from the scablands to the dikes in New Orleans (Katrina).Channeled Scablands - WikipediaSecond, the timing of when the parts of the canyon formed was from the west end to the east end, when all overflow erosion observed is from the top of the dike down the face , cutting deeper and forming the exit end last.You are free to experiment with sand piles and take pictures if you disagree. Note that the experiment in the video, of pouring water on sand created a gully similar to the scablands, rather than the Grand Canyon and that the erosion started at the top and proceeded then to cut deeper with the last erosion at the bottom, with braiding at the end. First, this is not an "eruption" but an uplifting:Geology of the Grand Canyon area - Wikipedia

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The geology of the Grand Canyon area exposes one of the most complete and studied sequences of rock on Earth. The nearly 40 major sedimentary rock layers exposed in the Grand Canyon and in the Grand Canyon National Park area range in age from about 200 million to nearly 2 billion years old. ...

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Uplift of the region started about 75 million years ago during the Laramide orogeny; a mountain-building event that is largely responsible for creating the Rocky Mountains to the east. In total, the Colorado Plateau was uplifted an estimated 2 miles (3.2 km). ...

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This is another instance of using proper terminology to describe what is meant. There were eruptions (at least 13 lava dams are known), but the process of lifting up the Colorado Plateau is not an eruption.Remember too that you claim that volcanic activity only started after the flood.Second, the physical shape of the Grand Canyon does not conform to this kind of process. When we see cracks in the surface crossing rivers we see the river being redirected by the crack to proceed along the crack and follow its shape. We do not see that in the Grand Canyon.Curiously, there are fault lines in the Grand Canyon, but they run north-south rather than east-west and they do NOT show any spreading with rock material falling into the faults, as would have occurred with your proposed "cracking under stress" explanation.

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Geology of the Grand Canyon area - Wikipedia

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... It was caused by subduction off the western coast of North America. Major faults that trend north—south and cross the canyon area were reactivated by this uplift.[49] Many of these faults are Precambrian in age and are still active today.[57] ...

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If what you claim were true then these north-south faults would have been spread and filled with rubble, so the fact that this did NOT occur invalidates your idea.Again, you are free to experiment, placing wet sand over a balloon and then inflating the balloon to simulate your "volcanic" action ... and observe the crack pattern.See if you can get this pattern: This is also invalidated by the evidence for the timing of when the different parts of the canyon formed. Read the evidence of the speleothems for the relative time of formation (Message 1). Please don't use abbreviations that are not defined in the thread (or don't use them at all) as this can be confusing to new readers. Which means that there is no reason for the Grand Canyon to exist at all -- all the land would have eroded away. Again, I refer you to experimenting with sand and water to see if you can replicate what you imagine occurred.In addition, you now have an imaginary process to remove all this covering sediment in a way that does not form any canyons or scabland type patterns at the lower elevations that they have mysteriously uncovered.And you need to explain where all that material went. (Perhaps it dissolved into the air?) Imagination is a wonderful thing. Grounded in evidence, it is even better. What you have now proposed means that the water would not flow in this direction at all but would have found another lower outlet that is not part of the uplift (SE for example).You have also avoided all the information from the speleothems for timing of the various parts of the canyon.Science explains all the evidence. It may take a while for the evidence to sink in, but the evidence that the earth is old, billions of years old is as powerful, if not more so, as the evidence that the earth is roundish (an oblate spheroid) and orbits the sun along with the other planets.Curiously, last night I viewed four moons of Jupiter through a telescope.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : clrtyEdited by RAZD, : addendumEdited by RAZD, : adddedd

Hi Dr Adequate, That would not be isotope specific, so they could rule it out by checking the lead isotopes.Radiometric Dating

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... Natural uranium consists primarily of two isotopes, U-235 and U-238, and these isotopes decay with different half-lives to produce lead-207 and lead-206, respectively. In addition, lead-208 is produced by thorium-232. Only one isotope of lead, lead-204, is not radiogenic. ... The result is that one can obtain three independent estimates of the age of a rock by measuring the lead isotopes and their parent isotopes. ...

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If all three agree then we can have high confidence that it was little lead carbonate contamination.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : splng

Hi Faith, dance away, dance away. So in other words you are saying that he is wrong, but you can't bring yourself to say that he is wrong. Again, that is not an eruption: you are misusing the word. An eruption occurs when lava or ash comes out through the surface.In addition, the uplift in this area is caused by plate tectonics:Tectonic uplift - Wikipedia

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Orogenic uplift is the result of tectonic-plate collisions and results in mountain ranges or a more modest uplift over a large region. The Himalayas were (and are still being) formed by the collision of two continental plates, the Indian and Eurasian Plates. This ongoing collision produced the Tibetan Plateau as well as the Himalayas and associated ranges. Ozark Plateau is a broad uplifted area which resulted from the Ouachita Orogeny to the south during the Permian Period. Another related uplift is the Llano Uplift in Texas, a geographical location named after its uplift features. The Colorado Plateau with its spectacular scenic canyons, the Grand Canyon, is also the result of broad tectonic uplift followed by river erosion.

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The plate tectonics make the area ripe for possible volcanic action. No, Faith, it is a terminology problem:Types of volcanic eruptions - Wikipedia

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During a volcanic eruption, lava, tephra (ash, lapilli, volcanic bombs and blocks), and various gases are expelled from a volcanic vent or fissure. ...

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Imagine all you want, but you don't end up with spires, you get broad open U shaped channels rather than V shaped channels. If your imagination does not fit the facts, then it is useless conjecture at best. And nothing like the erosion pattern that occurred in the scab-lands, or the breaching of levees by Katrina, or any other time an earthen dam has been over-topped, has occurred in the formation of the Grand Canyon -- thus the evidence shows that the canyon formation has not been affected by over-topping flow. What matters is whether or not your fantasies explain the evidence for when and how the canyon formed.All you are doing is adding more fantastic behavior without regard for the actual evidence that exists. Of course you would: it invalidates your belief/s. This is predictable behavior due to cognitive dissonance theory. Repeat: there are North-South faults that are still active, they were not opened up and filled with rubble nor were they used as drainage paths for your conjecture\fantasy, and as such your fantasy could not have occurred.Do you understand that this invalidates your "cracking" model? So your volcanic activity could not be the cause for the uplifting of the area until "at or after the end of the Flood" (and you are already equivocating by adding "at"). You really need to think about the sequence you have proposed, because it does not logically work.Of course you could also abandon it because it is invalidated by the N-S fault lines, and the sequence of formation of different parts of the canyon, and by overall erosion pattern ... etc etc etc ...That is how science works, instead of fantasy. Where?Where did it go? You've said the area was pushed up and cracked open. These fault lines would also have opened. You've said "the remaining standing water of the Flood, rushing in from all sides of the cracks and carrying chunks of the strata with it" so these same chunks would have filled in the open N-S fault lines when they were pushed open. This did not happen, ergo your model is wrong. Classic cognitive dissonance behavior. Your concept is invalidated, falsified, trashed, but instead of acknowledging this you cling more strongly to your fantasy. Clay and sand then.There is no west-east ridge, there is a north-south ridge. You should be thinking more in terms of lifting a dome shaped area than a linear one. If you insist on linear then it should be north-south.I suggest you actually try it. Amusingly, that still would not form the bend seen there. Don't make so many silly claims and it won't take so long to reply to all of them. Or are you complaining that I can reply to all your silly claims to show how silly they are, one after the other? More silly claims that are not worth addressing at this point until you get more specific. Are you sure they didn't just evaporate into thin air?And you still have not addressed the speleothems (Message 1):

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The dating information above says two things that invalidate the creationist concept that the canyon was formed by flood waters in a few days or weeks as the water drained away, slicing into and through the ridge:

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1. The canyon formed from west to east, while the creationist model would form from east to west (eroding the top of the barrier to the drainage flow first), and
2. The canyon took at least 16 million years to form according to radiometric dating (17x10^{^6} - 8x10^{^5}).

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The evidence that the canyon formed from west to east is independent of the validity of Uranium-Lead dating, it just depends on the measured levels of Uranium and Lead without any age calculation:

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• soluble Uranium is captured in the formation of the speleotherm\mammilaries,
• Lead is not soluble in water and so would not be deposited in the speleotherm\mammilaries
• Uranium turns into lead, not vice-versa
• The speleotherm\mammilaries form after the caves have been formed as they are deposits on the cave walls
• Higher ratios of Lead/Uranium therefore are due to greater age of the speleotherm\mammilaries, and thus so are the locations where they are found.

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This information invalidates your base assumption, and thus everything you image from that base assumption.The earth is old: get used to it.Continuing to post falsified concepts is not a sign of scientific rational thinking.Curiously, I looked at Jupiter again last night, and the four moons that I saw before had moved, with two of them now appearing on the other side of their earlier location.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : splng

Hi herebedragons, thanks Yes the canyon is still eroding (and the uplift is still occurring, at a rate that explains the height observed over the time that the canyon has existed). The problem is finding caves with the speleothems to test, rather than just testing the latest part of the canyon. We should expect sediment transport along the river in either case. Neither do I, so we will need someone with access (Coragyps?). That would be a fun map to make. There were glacial lakes, but I am not sure of the location and extent.Explore Glacial Lake Missoula and the Catastrophic Ice Age FloodsThis one was responsible for the scab-lands drainage.The ones I can find are north of the Canyon and have drainage patterns that don't involve the canyon. The closest I found is Lake Bonneville (Bonneville salt flats?)

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Lake Bonneville was a prehistoric pluvial lake that covered much of North America's Great Basin region. Most of the territory it covered was in present-day Utah, though parts of the lake extended into present-day Idaho and Nevada. Formed about 32,000 years ago, it existed until about 14,500 years ago, when a large portion of the lake was released through the Red Rock Pass in Idaho. Following the Bonneville Flood, as the release is now known, the lake receded to a level called the Provo Level. Many of the unique geological characteristics of the Great Basin are due to the effects of the lake.

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The purported lakes in Hovind's video (Hopi and Grand Lakes) ONLY appear on creationist sites. Made up?Enjoy.

Hi again herebedragons, My understanding is that the whole canyon is eroding, so there would be little opportunity for deposition until you come out the end.Also see CD210: Colorado River's deltaYou would want to look on the floodplain just below the canyon,.Enjoy

Hi Faith, In other words the evidence from the speleothems remains uncontested. while it invalidates both a young earth model and claims that the Grand Canyon was formed by flood outflow. Thanks, I will.Enjoy.

Hi Coragyps,I figured you'd come through.Thanks

Hi Coragyps,I signed in and went to
Just a moment...and also downloaded the PDF.Thanks.Two different dating methods were used on each speleothem: (1)238U/206Pb and (2) 235U/207Pb. The dates derived, while slightly different, are within the margins of error for each one.I was also thinking that just the existence of these speleothems presents an additional problem for creationists:IF the canyon was carved by flood drainage, then the caves occurred after the flood.The speleothems have to be deposits after the caves were formed, so they too occurred after the flood. The youngest speleothem is 0.8 million years, and it is at the top end of the canyon.IF there has been no change in radioactive decay rates since the flood, then the canyon is OLD, way too old for the YEC model.Enjoy.

Topic is Grand Canyon age data provided by speleothems.

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The data refutes YEC models for:

1. the age of the earth -- the youngest part of the canyon is 0.8 million years according to the data.
2. the formation of the canyon -- west to east instead of east to west so it would not be due to flood dam overflow (which should be a dead issue anyway for other reasons).
3. that earth age data is misinterpreted due to pre-flood differences in radioactive decay -- they formed after the canyon had cut down to the elevations of the caves and the subsequent formation of the caves, so this decay occurred post flood.

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I may figure out a few more wrinkles, but that should be enough for now.

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Enjoy.

Hi NoNukes, Taq, ooh-child, and Coragyps, The speleothems date the most recent erosion being 0.8 million years and the oldest at 17 million years. These are uranium-lead dates (two methods) taken on speleothems formed underwater in caves along the canyon walls.These can be taken as minimum dates, because the caves need to form before the speleothems can form, however they do need to be underwater to form, which means water levels of the canyon need to be higher than the caves. That certainly would seem to be a possibility. Tectonic activity with the uplift could also cause fracturing that would allow easier escape paths for Helium.Enjoy.Edited by RAZD, : added