Summations Only

It's really rather simple. You don't need to assign any age, old or young, to make sense of these charts. The layers are defined by the assemblage of fossils that are found in them. This is known as Biostratography using Index Fossils. Deposits in different locals can look vastly different but contain characteristic fossil assemblages. So when a particular assemblage of fossils occur in a layer, the layer is defined as Ordovician, Devonian, ect.It is erroneous to claim this is a case of the fossils dating the rock and the rock dating the fossils. Instead, this method establishes relative ages of the layers and rocks defined as Ordovician are found to have been deposited after rocks defined as Cambrian and before rocks defined as Silurian regardless of where in the world they are found. This method was well established even before Darwin proposed his theory of evolution, so it is not a product of that philosophy but simply a way to categorize different layers of sediment.So what I am asking is that you offer an explanation for the distribution patterns we find in these various layers. If this occurred in a single, catastrophic event, how could it explan the patterns in the different layers? Here are the images again. They only cover the unconformity between the Muav limestone and the Redwall limestone.Ordovician (missing from GC formation): Silurian (missing from GC formation): Devonian (intersperced in erosional features between Muav limestone and Redwall limestone: Mississippian (Carboniferous) (Redwall limestone): Also see Percy's Message 508 for his suggestion as to how to make the interpretation of these charts clearer.
_______________I found this image that outlines the kind of time frame involved for these deposits to be laid down during the great flood. 3600 feet of deposits laid down in just 150 days???? Erosional features between layers; sequential layers missing; erratic depositional patterns; sediment not sorted large to small; terrestrial layers within the stack ... on and on. How is this possible???
_______________ Did you not point out that if the stack was deformed after it had been laid down and lithified that it would crack and break and not bend as it has? Well, that kind of deformation is happening right here in Michigan without breaking or cracking.
_________________ Here is a good overview of how the canyon was formed.In the section "Why does it look like it does?" the author states

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The reason that it looks the way does is due to the sequence in which the events that help to create it happened.

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It took a unique order of events to form the canyon the way it is and that is why it is the only formation like it on earth. If the sequence of events were significantly different, the canyon would not have formed like it is and would just be an "ordinary" canyon. This point is important to recognize in trying to determine "how" it happened.Scroll down to the section called "When did all this happen". Ignore the dates that you find objectionable, just focus on the sequence of events. This sequence is important. Now cram that sequence into 150 days. How???? I didn't say that the Bible did not address you (or all of us modern people), I said it wasn't written TO you. There is a distinction. What there is to discus is the inconsistent way you determine what absolute Biblical truth is and how anyone that disagrees with your position is a compromiser.HBD

Hi Faith, thanks for the replies. This misconception comes from the creationist PRATT that the geological column does not exist anywhere in the world. That if the earth was old and sediment was laid down over millions of years that we should see all the layers stacked in one place. But that's nonsense. Just think about where layers are being formed. Here in Michigan there are currently no geological layers being laid down except withing the Great Lakes themselves, so we are missing the entire Recent Epoch. In fact, the last glacier scraped off huge amounts of rock layers and deposited them south of here. So we are missing those layers too.However, with a global flood we would expect that layers would be fairly well distributed across the whole earth. And we would expect the layers to be sorted from coarse to fine; perhaps not perfectly sorted as in the jar experiment I mentioned way back in Message 85 (due to currents etc...), but the sorting would be in that relative order. See, this makes no sense what-so-ever. The flood waters stripped off the land, kept those sediments packaged together, moved them around the world, waited for the proper time for other deposits to get laid down, and then dropped them off still all kept together so as to look like they were from a terrestrial environment. Have you ever been to Iowa? or Kansas? or any of the central plains states? What does the erosional features look like there? Catastrophic or pretty much non-existent? Why do we expect catastrophic erosion everywhere?HBD

Do you not think that these kind of geological forms exist anywhere else in the world? The GC is unique because these forms have been exposed by a unique sequence of events. It seems to me that if a great flood could lay down all these layers and the carve it up to the extent that it did, then we should see structures like this all over the world. The flood waters would be laying down sediment all over the world and then running off in great torrents as much in Africa, South America, Asia, etc. Why would the processes that formed the GC be different that the forces that were at work in the rest of the world? That observation is recognized. The layers were put down and then cut through. But your wrong that OE doesn't have an explanation for it... and one that does not violate the laws of physics. You just refuse to accept it. Ok, I admit, the idea that the super group was an enormous mountain chain that was subsequently eroded away gives me pause too. However, there is supposed to be 500 - 800 million years between Visnu Schist and the Bass limestone, which is a very, very long time. A lot can happen in 500 million years. I don't think there is much know about this unconformity, so speculation may be an appropriate term to use here. However, we do know mountain ranges get eroded down, compare the Appalachians to the Rockies or the Himalayas. The Appalachians are supposed to be 400 million years older than the Rockies and are about 1/2 the size; rounded rather than jagged, etc.HBD

Not so much, sorry. There is a clear distinction between speculation and basing conclusions on evidence. Of course, there is uncertainty when dealing with events that happened long, long ago, but speculation either does not have enough information to make an inform conclusion or ignores that evidence. Basing conclusions on evidence means studying ALL available evidence and comparing it to processes that are known to happen (in labs or in nature) and THEN drawing conclusions. Another important factor of evidence based conclusions is that when new evidence is presented, the conclusions also change; they cannot be held to dogmatically (although sometimes it may take a while for the change). What type of deposit would you expect to be the FIRST deposit to be laid down after the flood (say on day 41 after the rain and turbulence subside) and why? How is sediment deposited, Faith? Have you ever been to a place where sediment is being actively deposited? Have you read anything written by someone who has actually studied these areas? This stuff is pretty much "common knowledge" now-a-days. Again, how could this possibly work? How could this whole terrestrial ecosystem be transported by flood waters and deposited as an intact unit? It is impossible. There needs to be some mechanism that can do this type of "sorting." There is no such mechanism that exists. So, you need to posit divine intervention in the sorting of the layers - one that creates a deceptive picture of the history of the earth that has led countless millions of people astray from a "Biblical Christian" perspective, even devout and dedicated Christians such as me who do believe the Bible to be the inspired Word of God. Why would he do that? Why would he not just let the layers sort naturally so that no one would be led astray by the actual evidence. And no, the evidence does NOT support a global flood depositing the GC it is only the DENIAL of evidence that can support that proposition. I think this illustrates that scientists are willing to admit uncertainties in their theories. How the Colorado came to find its current course is still debated and there is evidence that supports both scenarios. Sorry, but no not at all.HBD

I for one will recognize that all the strata were laid down before the canyon was carved and the fault lines created and magma dikes injected. So you made your point there ... so what?And I just want you to recognize that the great flood did not create the canyon, either laying down the foundational sediment or carving the canyon itself. That idea is based on more impossibilities than a reasonable mind can accept. If you still want to cling to the idea of a great flood, fine ... but the GC is not the evidence you are looking for.HBD

Interesting charts! Those are used primarily for oil exploration, are they not?One of the reasons that creationists tend to reject charts like this is that they have dates associated with them. They believe that a particular foram is dated by the rock it is in and then inserted into the geological column according to the date, giving the impression of circular reasoning. But the convincing thing about sequences like these is that they can be established without assigning dates to them or the layers they are in. So it doesn't matter if they were laid down over 4 thousand or 4 billion years, the sequence is what's important.The layers can then be named based on the fossil assemblages found within those layers. Still no assumption of ages, old or young. And then, surprisingly, the relative sequences are consistent wherever you go in the world.Another thing to note is that these sequences were worked out before Darwin even proposed the ToE, so no assumption of evolution. The only assumption involved is that layers on top were laid down after layers underneath them.BTW, I know you know this, I am mentioning it for the benefit of others who might have a different idea of what makes an index fossil. Maybe it would be nice to have chart without dates, that only associates fossil assemblages with a particular geological layer. That might help with misconceptions (although probably not since denial knows no boundaries).HBD

Yea, good point. I should have qualified that statement a little better, like "are visible in the cross sections we looked at in this thread", or something like that. Oh they definitely were affected by many different geological processes, but not of the kind that Faith thinks should be there - they should be visible from across the canyon or from pictures taken from across the canyon. And that is what I have to concede to be true that those kind of disturbances are not visible there. Yea, I don't think she clearly specified the start point of the flood. IIRC, at one point she stated the Bass limestone was the first flood layer, but at another time I think the great nonconformity came before the flood and Tapeats would then be the first layer. I'm not totally sure??But yea, its all kind of a moot point since there is no way that it could have all been laid down in one single event, so even if this statement is true:

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all the strata were laid down before any of the canyons, fault lines, magma dike etc. occurred.

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... no floodHBD

Percy was simply making a suggestion as to how I could have explained the diagrams better. I thought it might help you understand what the author was indicating. No, you are missing the point. The deduction needs to be based on ALL available evidence. You only want to look at the cross section because that supports your point, but you ignore anything that contradicts your speculations. When you leave out important information, you are NOT basing your speculation on evidence. There is no feeling of moral superiority on my part. You want to do science and you want to provide support for the flood using science, but you're going about it in such an anti-science way. I know you feel this is, at its core, an issue of science verse faith and you are trying to do science the "faith" way rather than "compromise." But what I object to (and I think that most others here share this objection) is that this "faith" way of doing science has no resemblance to how science is really done. However, you continue to insist that you have a better idea of how science SHOULD be done than those who spend their lives studying in their respective fields. All because scientists are blinded by the evil of "old earth presuppositionalism." And who's sanctimonious??? LOL. Before you can say "this layer looks like it was laid down by a flood," you need to know what flood deposits look like. You don't seem to have any idea why a geologist who studies these processes would suggest that this deposit is shallow water marine, or deep water marine, of terrestrial, or fluvial or whatever, they just decide "hey, this layer has some plant fossils in it, it must be terrestrial"; or "this layer has a fish fossil in it, it must be marine." Come on. Its insulting. Have you even looked for such things happening? They actually are!! Yes water sorts sediment, but not the way you propose. Water sorts particles in very specific ways that can be studied and interpreted. How does water sort sediment fine, coarse, fine, coarse, fine? How does water sort all terrestrial fauna into distinct layers? And marine organisms into distinct layers? How does water sort forams into the order shown below? There is no known mechanism that can do what you propose. If you want to know what known mechanisms can do, then learn about them. Your false dichotomy is showing again What I reject is the notion that the Bible was written to inform us how to do science. That it was written to people with our scientific knowledge and should be used to correct that knowledge. I reject the notion that the creation is deceptive, that we cannot trust what the evidence tells us is real. But according to you anyone who is a compromiser cannot be a believer. Are there different levels of believers? Like a level A believer (you) and level B, C, D and E (compromisers)? A big step in preventing this is to address the issues in a honest and real way and quit this nonsense that if an absolutely literal interpretation of Genesis is not true then we need to throw the whole Bible out and with it our entire faith. That right there is a major reason why Christians are becoming atheists "because of this stuff." And I recommend for you to continue to believe in the flood if you must, but don't use misrepresentations and distortions of science to justify it.HBD

Good post dwise. I especially like the comparison chart between scientists and creationists. This was my experience when I spent some time over at evolution fairy tale. It didn't matter how stupid the argument was or how contradictory it was to evidence as long as it came to the "right" conclusion. While it was very frustrating to debate in that environment, I hadn't thought of it in the way you put it here that since the truth was already known, the process is irrelevant as long as the proper conclusion is reached.An analogy could be that if you knew that every time you shot an arrow it would hit the bull's eye, there is really no reason to aim. Just fire it out there - you can't miss. That's how they do "science." Any argument will work since the answer is the truth regardless.HBDEdited by herebedragons, : added additional quote

Wow what a beautiful image. There really is incredible detail.I marked the image below with arrows that seem to indicate where there once was a level plain. It appears to be at the upper part of the Supai group. You can even see similar features in the background, but its difficult to tell if they are on the same plane. This area looks to have been eroded rapidly by a much broader river creating a wide flood plain which the river eventually could have settled into and began its meandering. I am not sure how the time frame would work out or if this idea is supported in other parts of the canyon, but it is one of the first features I noticed when I looked at this image.HBDEdited by herebedragons, : fix image link

Did that fix it?

Exactly. Although more specifically they are maps of sedimentary rocks of the same geological age. They may even be exclusively marine deposits, but I am not sure about that. He does infer that the marked areas are seas.Since Faith has an issue with deep geological time, I tried to point out to her that there is no need to assign any time frame to the geological units to arrive at this pattern. So fine, assign ages based on the flood time frame. I even found this image that does just that So with that, any objection to vast ages is irrelevant, because the relative order of the strata is determined independently from the age of the layers. Now the critical challenge is to explain how a single flood event could have laid down these layers with such high consilience that the strata are formed in this same relative order throughout the world with no mixing of the layers.Another thing Faith objects to is missing layers, but the fact is they are only missing from a local, which is very much problematic for a single flood event. Those maps show the layers do exist, but are distributed in a particular way. A flood mechanism needs to not only explain the relative order of the layers but also the pattern that the individual layers assume.To me that's really the main issue: how could a single flood have deposited all these layers??? That's the question a floodist needs to answer. But of course, there is no way to get that across to her.Now, did the great flood carve the canyon itself? I think that is a separate issue, one you brought up at If Caused By Flood Drainage Why is the Grand Canyon Where It IS?.HBD

Do you consider a car to be "floating organic debris"? HBD

I guess my explanation may have been a bit confusing. I was relating the geological strata to the layers visible in the GC. Formations are a subset of the geological strata and could be deposited from different sources , in different environments etc. How extensive is the Redwall limestone formation? I don't know for sure. The map shows deposits that are characteristic of a particular geological period.HBD

Is this your explanation ... Maybe that's why I didn't realize you had answered it because that's not really an answer - it's hand-waving. No one denies that water sorts things. They deny that it sorts it in the way that we see in the Grand Canyon layers. It needs to be demonstrated that water CAN sort things in such a way as to form the layers of the Grand Canyon. And that you have not done. You have hand-waved it away. The sediments would have been thoroughly mixed, not relatively homogeneous collections of materials. Once the waters calmed, then sediments would begin to drop out of suspension in order from large particles to small particles. Sure there would be currents and turbidites that would move sediments around. What a flood model needs to do is explain where those drainage systems would have been, what sediments would have gone where and then test to see if it can accurately predict such phenomenon. Do you realize that something like 95% of the river's flow is diverted to irrigation and municipal systems? Practically the entire Southwest gets its water from the Colorado. In fact, there are times when no water at all reaches the gulf. So the actual Colorado River is something like 20 times the size of what you see running through the canyon today. Hardly a small river. So, 5 million years of water flow at its natural flow rate would not be sufficient, but a huge lake would be? How much water would those lakes need to hold to provide an equivalent erosional force?HBDEdited by herebedragons, : No reason given.