Summations Only

June 1 about 3 pm changing the title from
The Methods of Historical Science to mystify the public: Assertion, no evidence because there's no way that describes it at post 243-======================================
Kind of as a reaction to jar's thread demanding that believers in the worldwide Flood be able to explain every single geological event that ever happened on the planet or else trash the whole Flood idea, I would like to talk about what evidence geologists have for their Geological Time Scale landscapes which are based on a stack of rocks with dead things in them that are best explained by the Flood.Oh I know they have evidence, I just want to see it spelled out because the usual presentation to the clueless public makes bald assertions about things they couldn't possibly know about, apparently based on some bits and pieces of this and that found in a flat sedimentary rock or assemblage of such rocks found in a stack of flat rocks, each supposedly pertaining to a landscape in a particular time period, a wonderful gift of the gods of science I assume to help us understand the history of the Earth. They can only get away with this bald assertion of "fact" because in the historical sciences there is no way to confirm or disprove anything they say.There are plenty of examples of this kind of "science" but here's a typical one from National Geographic: So here is one of those typical assertions in the Name of Science written as if someone had actually been there and experienced this supposed climate change, without one mention of what evidence led to this obviously perfect knowledge of the climate on earth 150 to 200 million years ago.So I'm asking what's the evidence this is based on?And since we're supposedly having a climate change right now that's occurring over a matter of decades, or make it centuries to be on the conservative side, how does it make any sense to talk about a change over a time span of fifty million years? In fact there are many things that occur much more rapidly in our present time than is imputed to similar events in the supposedly very distant past. But maybe that will come up later in the thread if the topic goes anywhere at all.Next we have an imaginative illustration of one of those landscapes I've so often referred to, this one of course illustrating the "Jurassic Period," (and since there seems to have been some objection to my use of the term "landscape" allow me to point out that National Geographic uses that term here just as I do). So this is another example of a flat assertion of what purports to be fact. Nothing tentative here, no consideration of different possible interpretations, just "this is the way it was" and that's it. We don't even have that kind of certainty about what happened a hundred years ago let alone millions.So at every such assertion I'm going to want to knowHOW DO YOU KNOW THIS?WHAT IS YOUR EVIDENCE?Perhaps the above is enough for now, but I'll quote the rest of the article and the same questions can be raised about it in their turn. Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Typo in topic title.

Thread copied here from the The Methods of Historical Science to mystify the public: Assertion, no evidence thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.

The usual innuendo in the title gives little hope of honest discussion. Especially when providing technical details also gives rise to false accusations of dishonesty.However the conclusions are based on evidence and it can be found.Just the other day I came across an example reported at
Ars TechnicaScientists investigating the climate following the Chicxulub impact went to Tunisia where there is a good geological record of the period after impact. There they extracted fossil fish bones, which could be chemically analysed. The ratio of oxygen isotopes present in the environment depends on the temperature, and the oxygen incorporated into the bones will represent the environment at the time the fish lived.They found that there was evidence of warming by about 5 degrees Celsius after the impact, which persisted for a period of about 100,000 years.

How does the flood explain the temporal-geographical distribution of species?It doesn't, it fails miserably. Like you on the age of the earth? If you can't explain the dating methods, cannot show that they don't work then logically you have to accept their results until such time as you can demonstrate with conclusive evidence that they are wrong. You're mixed up -- that's how YEC pseudoscientist fakirs work, this is well documented. A magazine, one that caters to the scientifically literate, using generally accepted science as given. Again, this is generally accepted science for scientifically literate people and the background does not need to be regurgitated, because it is understood.There are no scientific "different possible interpretations" -- just delusions of a few people living in fantasy worlds.A scientific "different possible interpretation" would be based on actual objective empirical evidence and presented in a scientific journal, not a magazine like the National Geographic. There are no such papers.Enjoy

Science communication is always a difficult prospect. Too much information and the presentation becomes dry and the 'clueless public' stops listening. Too little information and people are unsatisfied. Early Jurassic climate change and the radiation of organic-
walled phytoplankton in the Tethys Ocean -Bas van de Schootbrugge et al Isotopic evidence for Late Jurassic—Early Cretaceous climate change - Darren R Grcke et al Late Jurassic climate and its impact on carbon cycling - H.Weissert et al Vegetation history, diversity patterns, and climate change across the Triassic/Jurassic boundary - Nina R. Bonis. Wolfram M. Krschneretc etc etc There wasn't anybody deliberately digging up billions of tonnes of carbon and pumping it into the atmosphere. If you read a similarly basic article on World War I you'll find that there is more detail than the general climate and animals present. Assuming reading science papers is too far, and the Nat Geo article is too little you could always go looking for a middle ground. A 400 word summary is hardly going to satiate those curious for a discussion of the evidence.Here is an article that goes into a little bit more detail

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From a geologic perspective, a large amount of climatic evidence for the Jurassic period comes from evaporites. Evaporites are mineral deposits, such as gypsum and halites, that are left behind after a body of water evaporates. Deposits of mineral salts indicate deserts that were once covered by lakes or seas. These regions would likely have had a dry climate. Coals also offer insight into prehistoric climates. The presence of coals indicates a humid climate where land was covered by swamps or other wetlands. The location of bands of halite and coal deposits suggests that the climate close to the equator was arid and higher latitudes had a wetter climate. The lack of glaciation during the Jurassic period also indicates that Earth's average temperature was warmer than present day temperatures.

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Fossil evidence of ferns and cone-producing plants at the poles suggests that the climate in these regions was much warmer during the Jurassic period than in present day. The wide distribution of certain species of prehistoric ferns across many degrees of latitude supports claims that there was not as great a disparity of temperature between the equator and the polar regions as there is today. The diversity of ferns, palms, and needle-bearing trees in the Jurassic period shows that the climate must have been warm and humid.

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You mean the An attempt to let Flood supporters explain how things were created thread? The one you abandoned after two messages: The one that asked how the Flood explained a few interesting geological structures: So having no answers you instead open this thread so you can ask the same questions that have been answered in other threads, answers that you ignored or misunderstood. Questions like this one have been answered many times: Why do you think the geological strata and fossils are best explained by the Flood? Just so you have something to focus on, here is a list of questions still unanswered:

1. In stratigraphic columns, why does radiometric age increase with increasing depth?
2. Why does radiometric age also change laterally across a strata?
3. Why are radiometric isotopes older than 80 million years completely missing, something that could only happen if they'd had at least 4 billions years to decay?
4. What causes magnetic sea floor striping, and why is it consistent with radiometric ages?
5. In stratigraphic columns, why do fossils appear increasingly different from modern forms with increasing depth?
6. In stratigraphic columns, with increasing depth why are there first no mammals, then no dinosaurs, then no reptiles, then no amphibians, then no fish, then no multicellular life?
7. Why do you think the Grand Staircase region's geology to be representative of all geology worldwide?
8. If the Paleozoic layers were already present when the Supergroup layers tilted, why do the faults associated with the Supergroup extend down into the Vishnu Schist but not up into the Paleozoic layers?
9. If the Supergroup layers actually tilted, where did all the missing cubic miles of rock go?
10. If the Grand Canyon had been cut suddenly then the canyon walls would be vertical. How do you explain the sloping walls of the Grand Canyon?
11. Why is the rate of slope retreat at the Grand Canyon consistent with an age of millions of years?
12. What is your evidence that all tectonic activity worldwide occurred after deposition of sediments?
13. Given the randomness of floods, why has no fossil ever been found in the wrong strata evolutionarily?
14. How did the flood leave behind cross bedded sand dunes with animal tracks in the Coconino?
15. How did the flood transport and deposit sediments that include burrows, termite nests, worm holes, etc.?
16. What is the definition of kind?
17. How can you argue about kind without a definition?
18. Why, if you believe the Bible is God's inerrant word, do you think there are exceptions to God's claim to have "destroyed all living creatures" in Genesis 8:21?
19. How did the ocean keep all the sedimentary types separate?
20. Since floods only sort continuously by size/density of sediment and do not create sharp contacts, what is it about strata that says "flood" to you?
21. How did the deposition of sediments by a series of waves leave no evidence of that process behind?
22. If the flood rains washed all the land sediment into the sea, how was life left behind on the denuded landscape to leave tracks when waves deposited new sediments?
23. Why do you think Bertault's views relevant since his experiments deposited sediments at an angle of 45° and required a flume?
24. Since 3/4 of the globe is currently covered by water, how is a truly global flood that covers the remaining quarter much different?
25. Why did no fishermen survive the flood?
26. How was the original salinity of the ocean restored after the Flood?
27. If the fountains of the deep were undersea volcanos, where is the evidence that many undersea volcanos erupted 4500 years ago?

And here are a list of things Faith still has doesn't understand or has misconceptions about:

1. Constructive discussion.
2. How to anchor views in facts.
3. Subordinating everything to the Bible is not science.
4. Math.
5. Physics.
6. Walther's Law.
7. That the strata of the Grand Canyon formed through Walther's Law, except the Coconino.
8. The claim that no terrestrial landscape is as straight and flat as strata is false.
9. Strata are not as flat and straight as Faith thinks, even at the Grand Canyon.
10. Strata are rarely uniform with regard to sediment type.
11. Life in the past lived and died and sometimes became entombed just as it does today, above, atop and beneath surfaces of terrestrial, marine or lacustrine sediment, not on flat slabs of rock.
12. Most strata are marine. While terrestrial landscapes can become strata, they usually don't.
13. Lithified soil is called a paleosol.
14. Rocks do not form by drying but by diagenesis.
15. There are no underground rivers and streams eroding buried strata (karst structures are a different matter).
16. Buried strata cannot tilt without affecting surrounding strata.
17. Angular unconformities happen when sediment is deposited atop tilted strata, such as at Welcombe Mouth Beach.
18. Accelerated continental drift with the attendant accelerated creation of sea floor at mid-oceanic ridges would release enough heat to boil the oceans. This is even without taking into account the heat from friction and subduction.
19. In the oceans, sea floor sediment depth increases with increasing distance from mid-oceanic ridges where the sea floor forms. Sea floor near mid-oceanic ridges is young and has little time to accumulate sediments, while that far from mid-oceanic ridges is much older and has had much time to accumulate sediments.
20. The sediments comprising strata were always deposited during a particular time period, whether the millions of years of geology or the year of the Flood.
21. Stratigraphic columns continue to grow today, mostly at low points such as lake and sea bottom.
22. Fossil abundance varies widely among strata.
23. Life buried today could eventually become fossils.
24. Speciation does not take millions of years.
25. Old evidence is still evidence. Evidence has no expiration date.
26. Vegetation and trees did not keep buried sediments loose so that the 40 days and nights of rain could wash them into the ocean.
27. The dog does not have enormous genetic diversity compared to other species today. It can be no more genetically diverse than the gray wolf from which it is descended.
28. A definition of kind that is different for each kind is not a definition.

Naturally these lists are not exhaustive. Popular press magazines are unlikely to include that kind of information. Use Google Scholar. For instance, I was able to turn up the reference The Jurassic Climate which states at the beginning of the section titled Climatic Criteria on page 159:

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By far the best climatic indicators among sedimentary rocks found in the Jurassic are evaporites and coals (Frakes, 1979). Substantial deposits of evaporites (notably gypsum, anhydrite, and halite) indicate conditions of both warmth and aridity, whereas coals indicate swampy conditions in generally humid regimes, though there is no particular temperature connotation.

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Just read on, there's plenty of detail, though keep in mind that this reference is 35 years old and much has been learned since then. For example, if you start reading from the top of page 162 you'll note that it equivocates considerably on the humidity-aridity issue, while today the Jurassic is viewed as a more humid period. What you'll gain by reading this relatively short chapter is a bit of an understanding of how the types and prevalence of different deposit types can tell us about climate. Since you rarely pay much attention to evidence, why shouldn't this request for evidence be viewed askance as just another invitation for people to waste their time? Before putting any time into detailed descriptions of how we know what we know, I'd want some assurance that you're going to make an effort to understand and discuss them instead of inventing reasons to ignore them. The lists above are a testament to your efforts at ignoring information and explanations, and this type of behavior has to stop if this thread is to be any different from your past threads. You still don't think contemporary sedimentary deposits are adding to stratigraphic columns, which represents an incredible degree of ignorance, irrational thinking and blocking out of information.--PercyEdited by Percy, : Grammar.

Exactly. If the reference gets to be too technical, people like Faith start to complain about details and jargon. Frankly, I have a problem with characterizing the climate of the Jurassic in simplistic terms. After all, this is a fairly large planet with land, oceans, weather and tectonism. We clearly had deserts in what was western North America at the time. Really, there is no need to generalize. After all, why couldn't climates have been similarly variable as they are today?And remember, the Jurassic Period lasted for 50 million years.

National Geographic is known more for their photography and popular general stories about exotic people and places; exotic being different than at home. Original research is not reported because it would bore their audience.Interestingly, NG does fund scientific research. I was part of a team that applied for and received a research grant from NG. We received funding from several other sources also. The papers reporting the research that were subsequently printed were not published in National Geographic and all that appeared there was a short paragraph in their news section on one aspect of our observations.Our primary paper was published in the journal Biogeography and included paleo-biogeography, fossil distribution, modern species geographic distribution and molecular analysis (of all the species of one dragonfly family), and plate tectonics. The documentation of the scientific research that supports the assertions fills libraries at universities around the world. Stories in National Geographic are written to appeal to general readers and are not meant to be speculative but rather based on "generally accepted science" that doesn't need to be explained in every story.I remember some stories in the 1960's about medieval Europe and the growth of Christianity that really fascinated me when I was in high school. They inspired me to dig deeper into archaeology. That is what normal people do; they follow up to understand accepted science. If you haven't done the research you don't have a sound basis to criticize the scientific conclusions.

This is exactly right. My dad used to say that "the climate millions of years ago was mild and tropical." I had to keep reminding him that weather is local and global climate cannot be judged from local observations. Individual storms seldom if ever, leave evidence in the geological record and evidence of a warm (mild) climate does not imply that the weather was any less a chaotic system in the past than it is today.

Chief among the things Faith doesn't understand when she says things like... ...is the concept that it only takes one exception to falsify an hypothesis. No one expects creationists to explain every event in history, just to address the observations that falsify their claims. It would be helpful if creationists, like real scientists, outlined in advance the findings that they agree would falsify those claims.Edited by Capt Stormfield, : syntax

But others on the thread are saying the opposite, that my information is from a popular source where we shouldn't necessarily expect to find scientifically literate readers, so I'm directed to more scholarly sources where the background information is available.But my objection is that the public is being presented with a flat out assertion on the level of known fact without even a smidgen of tentativity, factual knowledge that nobody could possibly have about a time millions of years ago. And that shouldn't be the case with scientifically literate readers either if science is what it is claimed to be.The NG writeup is TYPICAL, that's my point. There are LOTS AND LOTS of examples of this flat out assertive way of presenting both Old Earth Geology and the Theory of Evolution, which has been driving me crazy since before I became a Christian or knew anything about creationism. I hope to get to providing some examples of this. I don't buy the explanation that you can't treat the public with the respect of giving some explanation instead of acting like you know it all and they just have to submit.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

It is reassuring to know that your resentment of science antedates your belief in religion. It really does explain a great deal about your refusal to learn and your apparent antagonism toward those who have..

Would it be impolite to inquire why, of all the sciences, you picked these two as examples? In my experience, the discourse around all of science is roughly equivalent in terms of presenting nuanced discussion in some rough proportion to the sophistication of the audience.If you make an inquiry of a software engineer regarding how to get the recycle bin off your desktop, would you expect a complex discussion of interface design and end-user behavior, or just an "assertive" answer that reflects the endpoint of a long conceptual journey? And if you did demand a complex answer, would it not be a bit, oh, let's call it assholeish, to then complain about the fact that you don't understand the answer?Edited by Capt Stormfield, : typo

It would seem to me that the solution is simple.Faith should abandon the popular literature for information on geology and evolution and go straight to the scientific literature.Problem solved!

That's fine as long as it's not extremely technical. Perhaps you could recommend the best sources for someone like me.But I'm hoping we'll get more information about the evidence I asked for. Percy provided some so I'll go there next.