Summations Only

Why are you answering a post addressed to Coragyps which has nothing to do with my conversation with you? And you are answering remarks about what the water would do with your totally irrelevant comments about sedimentation. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It is an open board. I'm completely baffled by your approach to science and learning. Sort of a morbid fascination, I guess. My apologies to Cora. Is this the new last refuge of the scoundrel? Sorry, but it's all of a piece. A flood would result in sedimentation and we were discussing sedimentation. And I'm really interested in the effects of your flood.

My post was specific to what Coragyps said and your response is totally irrelevant.

Are you serious? Try to focus on the topic.

The topic I was discussing with Coragyps is not the topic I'm discussing with you. My post was specific to what Coragyps said and your response is totally irrelevant.

But I'm curious about what made the flood special. I would like an answer expanding on how 'things were different then'.

I'm still back on the Geologic Column, but if you want to raise a particular issue, do so.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It would be a great help to Faith if someone could provide valid arguments for her views. Faith believes that a flood incursion onto land would deposit sedimentary layers identical to those deposited by a gradually transgressing or regressing shoreline following Walther's Law, indeed, that a flood incursion *is* a demonstration of Walther's Law.My own understanding of Walther's Law is that it plays out over a great deal of time, and that flood deposits are distinctively different from normal shoreline-related deposits. That's not to say that floods don't occur while shoreline-related sedimentary deposits are forming, they of course do, but if big enough to leave a sedimentary record they are recognizable as flood deposits.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Fix quote.

The way I see it, Walther's Law is really all about energy gradients. You can see this pattern of deposits in alluvial fans, to a lesser extent in rivers, and in any situation where there are differences in energy levels of water that carries sediments.As for the flood, I can't see that during the initial rising of the flood waters that there could be significant energy gradients. Especially when the initial flood stages need to strip off huge amounts of sediment so that there is actually material to deposit. I suppose there would be some gradient, like the energy on shore would be higher than that in deep basins, but if that was the case, could there be enough motion to continually strip sediment off the land? In any case, I would expect the energy of the entire system to be very high and there would be no places where there energy would be low enough to allow fine particles to drop out.So, because of that, I would not expect to see transgression sequences in a flood of that magnitude, since it would be a system of net erosion, not deposition.However, once the inundation of water ceased, energy levels would began to fall. Of course, large cobbles would fall out first then smaller clasts, ect. But once land began to be exposed at the surface you would begin to have the kind of energy gradients that Walther's Law requires. So then I would expect a long series of regression sequences.Of course, then there would be rapid plate tectonics that would alter the structures, but I would only expect that the kind of movement needed for such a scenario would keep energy levels rather high throughout the system.Idk, its all kind of a have your cake and eat it too situation.HBD

The Claron was never sea floor. It was deposited in a lacustrine (lake) environment. Maybe it was something like the current Minnesota: By the way, if you want to present an image smaller, just say [img=200], where "200" is the width you want the image to be in pixels. For example, if I entered this: Then I would get this (click on image to enlarge): And of course you can always click on "peek" to see how something was done.But the Claron was not at its current high elevation when it was deposited. At its current elevation the Claron layer is in a region of net erosion. That's why the hoodoos form there - they're erosional formations. The Claron was at a much lower elevation when it was deposited. At its lower elevation sediments from higher elevations were swept down into it by weathering forces like wind, rain, rivers and streams, and it was then a region of net deposition.The Claron must have subsided deeper into the Earth and received deposits above it to a great depth, because a great weight of above layers would have been necessary to lithify the Claron.Later the entire region was uplifted, and the region became one of net erosion. All the layers above the Claron were eroded away, and in many places even the Claron itself was completely eroded away.The material eroded away was carried away by wind, rain, streams and rivers to plains, lakes and oceans at lower elevations where they formed new sedimentary layers. This process of subsidence, deposition, uplift and erosion is a continues cycle that has persisted on our planet for a very long time and that continues today.--Percy

Another aspect of Walther's Law is that long time periods are required to produce the sand, mud, silt, clay and limestone sediments that comprise the majority of sedimentary layers. A shoreline region is a production system for that sedimentary material.Walther's law also produces a sequence of layers that tend to blend from one to the next, as shown by this diagram: Floods don't do this.--Percy

What the heck would you do with the facts? There is only one way you can interpret them. If you were presented with the following facts about the structure of a sediment how would you interpret them?Rock type: quartz arenite (sandstone) or gypsum
Grain size: sand
Grain sorting: well sorted
Grain shape: rounded
Color: yellow
Structures: cross bedded
Biogenic structures: track and trails* interpretation:
Geologist: desert dunes
Faith: flood depositsOr this one?Rock type: breccia and conglomerate
Grain size: clay to gravel
Grain sorting: poor
Grain shape: angular
Color: brown to red
Structures: graded and cross bedded
Biogenic structures: none* interpretation:
Geologist: alluvial fan
Faith: flood depositsTwo completely different structures; same interpretation. Why are the facts needed?So, do you reject that different environments would create different deposits or that we can tell which is which by analyzing the rocks? Or is it that you feel there is just no way to know that the flood did not create these different structures? If you really cared about the facts, this would be a legitimate question. As it is, you don't care about facts. What you are doing is attempting to call into question the null hypothesis, which you think will then lend credence to your hypothesis. That different depositional environments deposit different types of sedimentary structures is considered "common knowledge" in geology and it doesn't need to be supported every time it is mentioned.You need to provide evidence that the same environment can produce different sedimentary structures. In other words, demonstrate the "flood deposits" is the correct answer to both sedimentary structures listed above. That is your hypothesis - you need to support it.HBD

I agree. I try to imagine the scenario Faith is describing and see if there is any way it could work (you know all too well how that usually turns out though - being accused of misrepresenting her position , etc. ) Her scenario assumes the sediment was all present when the water begins recession. I can see this type of sequence developing as the ocean levels fall. Do you not think so? I certainly see this as a much more viable explanation. Just offering suggestions as to how Faith could provide a valid model / hypothesis.HBD

But Faith's objection to this is that the Flood would have been an event unlike any other in history, as so, we need to understand it differently. On one level I would agree with that. However, I don't think the evidence it left behind would look like it was deposited slowly over long periods of time.HBD

I thought others might appreciate this resource.It is the syllabus for the GEOL342 - Sedimentation and Stratigraphy course at the University of Maryland. The bottom half of the page is the lecture and exam schedule with links to the lecture notes.Of particular interest to this thread would be: Sequence stratigraphy

quote:

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Transgressive-regressive packages bounded by unconformities make up the sedimentary record of most basins on cratons and continental margins. Some of these unconformities span great distances and long periods of time, and these divide the stratigraphic record of continents into discrete packages called sequences. These unconformity-bounded packages likely represent large scale tectonic or eustatic events that persist for tens of millions of years. These are natural intervals of sedimentary history that may cross biostratigraphic period boundaries. These form the basis of sequence stratigraphy.

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Sequence: discrete package of sediments bounded by the unconformities that divide transgressive-regressive cycles from one another. Note: These unconformities generally form through erosion of exposed sediments at lowstand.

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• Some of the unconformities span great distances and long time periods
• Usually represents large scale tectonic or eustatic events that persist for up to tens of millions of years
• Natural intervals of sedimentary history that may cross bio/lithostratigraphic boundaries

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HBD