Saturday, January 3, 2009

Great Trango Tower



Stephen Smith: How Long Ago? Part Two.

Geologists continue to depend on theories that were first proposed in the seventeenth century, or perhaps by the ancient Greeks.

Erosion: the process of eroding or being eroded by wind, water, or other natural agents. From erode, gradually wear away (soil, rock, or land): the cliffs have been eroded by the sea.

Most children are taught simple geological theories when they enter elementary school. The principles of wind and rain are presented as the "natural processes" that take millions of years to create the various landscapes in which we live.

Rain is not the harmless fall of water droplets gently tapping on the windowpane, but is a carbonic acid solution that is dissolving the very bedrock, converting it into atmospheric carbon dioxide and mineral salts that wash down to the sea. This "weathering" is said to have been wearing away the mountains for several hundred million years, since rain began to fall on this planet, much like it is doing today.

The blowing breezes carry minute dust motes that crash into cliff faces, chipping away at their adamantine permanence with inexorable power, slowly reducing them to powder. Vertical walls become long slopes; steep valleys are gradually ground down into meandering river valleys; sharp mountain peaks slump into flattened hills and then slip back into the topography out of which they were formed.

Giant boulders are split into pebbles by water freezing inside cracks, expanding as it freezes and pushing the cracks farther apart with every seasonal cycle. After millions of years the boulders get smaller and smaller, accumulating in riverbeds, piling up into mountains of gravel, creating vast sandy beaches or desert dunes that cover entire countries.

Since the earliest days of Electric Universe theory, a suspicion has existed in the minds of its investigators that something was wrong with the "long, slow" view of geology. Because fossils are dated based on the rock layers in which they are found, a uniformitarian view of geology influences the understanding of how life began and evolved on Earth. If the rock ages are wrong, fossil ages are wrong, as was discussed in part one of this paper.

Great Trango Tower is an example of contradictory morphology when it comes to the consensus view of erosion. It is composed of granite and rises to 6286 meters above sea level. One of its distinguishing features is the world's highest nearly vertical drop—1340 meters. Only Mount Thor on Baffin Island is considered to be purely vertical, with a fall of 1250 meters straight down. These gigantic, supposedly eroded massifs are peculiar because they show little debris at their feet.

Great Trango and some of its tall cousins are thought to be "plutons," magma intrusions that melted their way up into sedimentary rock strata and then solidified before breaking the surface. They have been subsequently exposed because the softer sedimentary rocks layers in which they were once encased have been eroded away. The reason that they appear to be so sharp and new is thought to be due to the overburden of sediments that kept them "protected" from weathering.

The idea seems reasonable, but it suffers from logical inconsistencies. First, the sediments are nowhere to be seen. The lakes in the area are not filled with silt, although they are refreshed each year by snowmelt and have no outlets. If they have been the catch basins of runoff containing eroded particles for "millions of years" one would expect them to have been clogged-up eons ago.

Second, the peaks have to have been exposed for millions of years by now, because they are completely unburied. They have been acted on by freeze and thaw, feeling the full force of hurricane winds, subzero temperatures, and bombardment by sandy grit for thousands of centuries, yet they appear as if they emerged from their stone prisons a short time ago.

In a previous Picture of the Day about the mountains of Patagonia, similar oddities were examined. Lakes with no outlets; vertical cliffs accentuated by terraces stepping up their sides; multiple layers; flat-topped mesas with shotgun-patterned potholes on top; clean-floored, narrow valleys; amphitheater-like "blind canyons"; and mountain ranges in concentric rings are manifestly contrary to conventional thinking.

Electric Universe theorists postulate that between 5000 and 10,000 years ago (perhaps sooner), the Earth and its sister planets were engulfed in a catastrophic interplay of celestial forces that have not been seen since. Clouds of electrified plasma and electric arcs described by the ancients as "thunderbolts of the gods" dissected the continental geography, creating what traditional theories say are ages-old structures in an instant of time.

Sky-high tornadoes of fire writhed across the face of the Earth, excavating canyons, ocean basins, and river valleys. Lakes like inland oceans were vaporized along with their attendant flora and fauna, leaving nothing but scorched and naked stone behind. Those plasma vortices formed intense electrodynamic fields that compressed and lifted material out of the surrounding region. The resulting "fulgamites" are mistaken for intrusions when they are actually extrusions. The Brandberg Massif, Shiprock, New Mexico, and Uluru were given as examples of that phenomenon in past Picture of the Day articles.

There is much more that could be written regarding the conflict between observation and theory that seems to dominate science today. There is a need to overcome preconceptions and adopt an approach that takes into account all parts of the observation rather than ignoring those that do not fit the theory.

11 comments:

Anaconda said...

A TRUE INTERDISCIPLINARY APPROACH

The Electric Universe theory has much to say for it, as I've written numerous times, being convinced of the validity of the theory.

But while the leaders of Electric Universe theory pay much lip service to the need for an interdisciplinary approach (acknowledging the contributions of various branches of scientific inquiry) the commentary offered on the Picture of the Day series tends to be exclusive -- just as exclusive as the other branches of science they criticize for same. Each branch or in my opinion "school" of science jealously sweeps up all observations into their own "perspective" and discounts all other perspectives.

This is a wrong approach for all "schools" concerned.

It retards scientific understanding and progress.

Man can to better.

Take the article featured in this Oil Is Mastery post and numerous other POD articles focussing on Earth's geology. To take the article at face value, all geologic features are due to Electric Universe theory.

Surely, other "forces" are at work besides cataclysmic electrical discharge machining.

I suppose the desire to gain legitamacy for one's own theory tends to blind one to any other theory.

True indisciplinary effort requires a scrupulous standard of objectivity be applied to all observations and measurements.

That is the only way that the present "impasse" between the various scientific "schools" can be set aside.

It takes a serious effort to see the other side's perspective.

And devise tests that can either confirm or falsify that perspective's analysis.

Correctly articulating the other schools' perspective is paramount to initiating dialogue and continuing discussion, and evidently is an ability lacking in many scientists of various stripes.

From my study of the various scientific perspectives, I find a myopic preoccupation with justification of one's own theory, even where there are paradoxes bettter explained by another theory's perspective.

(One can crticize this writer for his devotion to Abiotic Oil theory to the exclusion of "fossil" theory, but so little actual scientific evidence points to "fossil" theory's validity that to accomodate "fossil" theory in anyway seems to be coddling a bankrupt theory. But never-the-less, this writer has treated "fossil" theory exhaustively.)

All the above is preliminary for the main point of this comment: Electric Universe theory does provide a "process" that accounts for certain geologic anomalies.

When I read the above posted article, I thought of this article available at the left-hand side-bar: The End of Fossil Fuels, by Thomas J Brown.

(Re-reading the Brown article in light of Electric Universe and Expanding Earth theories makes it even more interesting than when originally read with only Abiotic Oil theory in mind.)

Brown's article mentions certain anomalies:

"But the trials and tribulations of the carbon element cannot explain the many curiosities and anomalies of the geologic column, of which petroleum and coal are but mere pieces of the puzzle."

"The Athabascan sands, which date from the Cretaceous, overlie extensive Devonian bitumen deposits bearing a chemical affinity thus indicating a common origin! It is curious to note that in this general geographical region, there is an unconformity of other Cretaceous rocks conformably overlying Devonian rocks, with outcrops for over 150 miles in one direction. This is quite a bit of the geological column to be missing as though nothing had happened during those vast stretches of time: the carbonaceous Carboniferous itself, the great die-offs of the Permian, the initiation of the age dinosaurs in the Triassic, the dinosaur fluorescence in the Jurassic, all as if not a day had passed. This unconformity, like many others, are best left alone, or cherished notions shall be lost, forever."

"Near Banff, Alberta Lower Cretaceous beds are overlain conformably with Lower Carboniferous. Some of the rock consisting of this dual formation is so similar as to be easily mistaken for the same deposit, save for the difference in fossil content. That is, that if it weren't for the fossil differences it would appear to be the same bed of deposits, completely lacking Pennsylvanian, Permian, Triassic and Jurassic activities. There are many such anomalies and curiosities in the structure of the earth, some of which make us question the true nature of the geological column, whether or not it truly represents a linear time line of deposits."

All the above suggests conventional geologic explanations are missing a vital ingredient. Does cataclysmic electric machining explain all or part of the anomalies cited?

As for the "Great Trango Tower", does Electric Universe theory explain its formation in total?

No.

In my estimation something else is going on. Expanding Earth theory has something to say about "natural pinnicles and rock spires" being observed. Yet, Electric Universe theory proponents discard Expanding Earth theory without ever fully presenting its supporting evidence.

See, the Expanding Earth series (three part) of Picture of the Day articles over at thunderbolts.info, at the subject archive, under Earth Geology. The articles are unprofessional in my opinion in their dismissal of Expanding Earth theory because they don't present all the best evidence available supporting Expanding Earth theory. (If one is to dismiss a theory in total, then one must be prepared to treat the subject exhaustively. A three part series may seem exhaustive, but the way the evidence is presented mixed in with standard subduction theory, hardly counts as exhaustive.)

So again, if you want "YOUR" theory treated fairly and objectively, it's critically important that you treat other scientific theories fairly and objectively.

Sadly, Electric Universe theory does not do that.

And they wonder why they get little scientific respect.

"Look in the mirror."

Anonymous said...

It's amazing what water can do. It supports life and removes it. It shapes our lives in so many ways.

Anaconda said...

Raptor Lewis:

Yes, water does have a large impact on the environment, but the question is whether water is the only element that "shapes" the environment.

There are many unanswered questions about various geologic formations. Take a look at WEIRD ROCKS Of New Zealand's West Coast,
By Thomas Joseph Brown.


Geology certainly doesn't have all the answers, but more discouraging is that geology seemingly doesn't consider all the possibilities.

Anonymous said...

Anaconda

Well put :-)

Incidentally the tar sands and other oil shale deposits suffer from one glaring issue - how are kerogens formed from buried biomass that has been limited to depth of burial PT conditions, or diagenesis.

Your references on this thread are new to me and more for me to study, so this is a quick post.

Also you are right in concluding EU theoriests tend to be somewhat exclusive but you'll find that its those who don't have an actual multidisciplinary background that tend to do that, and they can't help it because of their background in one area of science or line of inquiry.

You'll find the scientists who have to earn a living from their science in a practical sense, end up being the ones who make the breakthroughs, usually not the govenrment funded ones whose career is a government position, rather than science as a vocation.

Gee, both you and Oil is Mastery produce a deluge of inconvenient facts that are hard to keep up with.

I did a quick Google Earth on the Great Trango Tower, and the imagery is poor, but I need to get a better idea of the local structure (geological/topographic) before making any further comments.

Incidentally Raptor Lewis brings in interesting comment re water.

I used to work for the Snowy Mountains Engineering Corporation and we offered technical advice to governments etc re dams and similar water schemes like the Snowy Mountains Scheme in Australia.

One area SMEC waa adament about was no building dams in the Himalayas - experience showed that after one melt season the dam catchment are would have been filled up with rock, not so much sediment.

Cold water has rather unusual properties and, it is alleged, can carry ovoidal rocks downstream when the water temperature is close to freezing.

Lyall Watson, author of Supernature and other books, described this and an Austrian Forrester, Schauberg (Victor?) is one source. Watson said it could be demonstrated by using a chicken egg, presumably cooked, in a glass of cold water using a glass mixing rod to cause the water to rotate, "hyperbolic space curved motion" or something was the term Watson used.

Might be useful for you folks to chase up as I don't have the time at present.

Keep the good work up!

OilIsMastery said...

EU is the mechanism for EE.

Freund, Tassos, Ford, and Arp are all EU people who believe in EE...=)

Anaconda said...

Louis Hissink:

LH: "Incidentally the tar sands and other oil shale deposits suffer from one glaring issue - how are kerogens formed from buried biomass that has been limited to depth of burial PT conditions, or diagenesis."

Yes, that is a problem for "fossil" theory because it violates the "oil window" corollary to "fossil" theory that states kerogen can only form under certain pressure and temperature conditions.

This has long been noticed and remarked: Nikolai Kudryavtsev, pointed out that hydrocarbons, "are not rare in igneous and metamorphic rocks of the Canadian Shield...[and] noted as mentioned above that the enormous quantities of hydrocarbons in the Athabasca tar sands in Canada would have required vast amounts of source rocks for their generation in the conventional discussion, when in fact no source rocks have been found."

So there are multiple problems with "fossil" theory when considering Athabasca tar sands in Canada.

One commenter on this website, TheCoalMan, went to great lengths to explain it away -- it was amusing to see all the "backflips" that were necessary to carry off his "explanation" for Canada's tar sands according to "fossil" theory.

LH: "Also you are right in concluding EU theoriests tend to be somewhat exclusive but you'll find that its those who don't have an actual multidisciplinary background that tend to do that, and they can't help it because of their background in one area of science or line of inquiry."

I agree.

It's human nature -- allowances have to be made for human nature.

Anaconda said...

OilIsMastery:

OIM: "EU is the mechanism for EE."

Yes, agreed.

Thanks for pointing out that salient fact and listing scientists that support that view.

It's good to know there are others that support both Plasma Cosmology and Expanding Earth theory who are scientifically knowledgable and have written about the subject or presented actual scientific papers on the subject.

Also, it suggests the difference between the two groups of scientists.

I know you, OilIsMastery, have a lot of respect for Velikovsky, I also respect Velikovsky's work, but it seems that those that buy into the "myth" argument at it's most radical, i.e. Earth as an "invader" planet to this solar system, under the wing of a wondering 'brown dwarf' which is Saturn, are more loyal to the "myths" than they are to anything else.

The scientists you list come from either pure astronomy (Arp) or pure geophysics (Freund, Tassos, and Ford).

They come to their conclusions based on scientific observation and measurement, not a devotion to a particular interpretation of cross-cultural world myths.

I think this slavish devotion to cross-cultural world myths may be the Achilles' heel of the thunderbolts project.

OilIsMastery said...

Your point is valid.

Mythology can never trump observation so I just tend to ignore that stuff.

"Observations in science are the primary and ultimate authority." -- Halton C. Arp, astronomer, 1998

OilIsMastery said...

Louis Hissink,

I have just now read Clark Whelton's paper on Velikovsky and hidden fundamentalism. I am not knowledgable enough on the chronology and so can't comment or add to the debate other than to say that I treat Velikovsky's beliefs on an individual basis. I am not a fundamentalist so I have no problem moving the conventional Biblical chronology just as I have no problem moving the Egyptian chronology. I agree with the author that Velikovsky will be remembered as a genius despite particular errors we are all prone to as human beings. No one is infallible. Great Paper. I look forward to corresponding with these gentlemen.

Anonymous said...

Oil is Mastery

Re Velikovsky - good conclusion - and I will have to get Ginenthal's latest book.

The chronology of the Middle East is interesting - Gunnar Heihnson odf Bremen University, (I think), has done some excellent work on this and I support his conclusions of a doubling up of Middle East chronology based on the lack of archaelogical evidence for the Sumerians, who Heihnson suspects were the Chaldeans, etc. All related in Pillars of the Past.

The reason I support Heihnson's work is that its based on stratigraphy - past civilisations must leave physical evidence for their existence.

And its as controversial an area as Quaternary geology.

Anaconda said...

REVIEWING MATERIAL IS PRODUCTIVE

Our increase in knowledge is mostly incremental. Rarely do we make a huge "breakthrough", and part of our incremental increase in knowledge is reviewing material already once covered.

Why review it again? Because as our knowledge incrementally increases, reviewing material may spark new insights or clarify ideas that previously were fuzzy.

Also, in reviewing one may find material one missed previously, or appreciate specific aspects which were lost on original inspection.

This post spurred me to review material, specifically scientist David Ford. Ford has a compelling introduction to Expanding Earth theory.

Ford also covers in detail orogenesis (mountain building). Mountain building is essentially the topic in the article linked in this post. And while the Picture of the Day article suggests electric discharge machining is the only explanation for the Trango tower, Expanding Earth theory does provide a compelling explanation for mountain building, including pinnicles and rock spires.

And Ford and Tassos also provide an interesting scientific paper which postulates that electromagnetic energy is the "driving mechanism" of Earth's geologic activity (volcanic and tectonic). The paper provides a compelling scientific argument against Suduction theory.

It should be noted that while Ford and Tassos argue for electromagnetic energy being the "driving force" behind geologic activity which makes sense based on the idea that heat is the product of electrical energy and not the other way around, they are less clear on where this "electrical energy" is ultimately generated from.

Let me suggest it comes from the galactic Birkeland currrents that drive the Sun and in turn drive the Earth's energy dynamics.