From: tcc@sentex.net (Douglas Cox)
Newsgroups: talk.origins,alt.fan.publius,alt.catastrophism
Subject: Re: glaciers
Date: Tue, 26 Mar 1996 10:37:18 GMT
Organization: TCC
Lines: 356
Message-ID: <4j9rsp$mf2@granite.sentex.net>
Reply-To: tcc@sentex.net

On Sun Mar 24, 1996, macrae@geo.ucalgary.ca (Andrew MacRae) wrote:

>In article <4j3qav$9eh@granite.sentex.net> tcc@sentex.net (Douglas Cox)
>writes:
>> On Fri Mar 22, 1996, chris@xerox.com (Chris Heiny) wrote:

>> >In article <4ikp3r$j75@granite.sentex.net>, tcc@sentex.net
>> >(Douglas Cox) writes:
>> >>In article <4ifraf$f9v@ray.atw.fullfeed.com>, John Hoffman
>> >><hoffman@mail.atw.fullfeed.com> writes:

>> >>>Sir,

>> >>>I read with interest your posting about the ice age in
>> >>> Wisconsin.  There are many local evidences of glaciation
>> >>> in the area of Wisconsin in which I live, including such
>> >>>landscape features as kames, eskers, and drumlins.

>> >>Why do you think that drumlins, for example, are "evidence" of
>> >>glaciation? Or, for that matter, kames, or eskers, etc?

>> >Because, Douglas, we see drumlins, kames, and eskers being
>> >formed today only in glacial environments, and we see those
>> >drumlins, kames and eskers that formed in the past only in
>> >association with other evidences of glacial presence.  We do
>> >not see *any* of these features forming in non-glacial environments
>> >today.

>> But, no one has actually seen drumlins being formed by ice movement in
>> Antarctica or Greenland, have they? Or eskers, or kames, or even the
>> rounded stones such as one sees in drift gravel.
 
>        This is just *wrong*, Douglas.  Eskers, kames, and "rounded stones
>such as ones seen in drift gravel" are known from modern glaciers.
>Drumlin-like structures are also known, but they are not known at the
>scale of the ones formed by continent-scale warm-based glaciers.

This is a matter of definition. The glacialists *define* a ridge
formed from debris deposited from glacial streams as an "esker" and
therefore the above may be technically correct, but these ridges
formed in glaciers do not resemble the _true_ eskers such as those
that occur in Southern Ontario, for example, in their dimensions, or
in their character, or in their internal structure. 
 
>> Some have gone to
>> these regions looking for these effects, but have not found them. Oh
>> yes, a few "true believers" amongst the glacialists have labelled some
>> minor moraine ridges formed in tunnels beneath the ice as "eskers," in
>> some cases, but these bear no resembence to real ones, IMO.
 
 
>        What?  They stick out the front of the glaciers as a meandering
>ridge of riverine sediment, and are composed of similar river-rounded
>sediment to the ancient ones.

What glacier is this? Are you thinking of a certain much-touted
example from Alaska, photographed from the air decades ago by B.
Washburn, that shows a short ridge of debris deposited from a tunnel
or a crevasse in a glacier snout that has retreated some distance?
This photo has been reproduced in many textbooks, indicating how rare
even such tiny examles are. But it is not proven that there is any
stratification whatsoever in these deposits, in the reports I have
seen. Much less that the internal stratification resembles that of
_true_ eskers, which typically exhibit large-scale cross strata in the
sandy layers. And, the _real_ eskers may extend for 50 or 100 km.

>  Do you have a model which accounts for
>their internal structure in detail? 

In my model, eskers have been thrust up in a manner analogous to
"pressure ridges" of ice that may form in enclosed frozen ponds and
lakes, in thick cross stratified drift that formed by _in situ_
disintegration. The pressure ridges formed in response to expansion
effects, as large areas of newly formed drift were produced by the
disintegration of the bedrock. This mechanism suggests certain
predictions that can be tested by observation. Testing the theory is
quite simple; one only needs to look in gravel pits where eskers are
exposed in section. There is no expense involved; no special training
required; anyone can do this very easily, who lives in the vicinity of
an esker.

The theory say the stratified material in eskers has been thrust up,
which would produce anticlinal structure in eskers. It would also
suggest there would be evidence for faulting and disturbance of the
drift material. It might also be supposed that where there could often
be a difference in height between the levels of drift on either side
of eskers. The strata at the sides of eskers would be continuous with
that in the drift of the area adjacent to the esker. All of these
features are common in eskers I have observed.

OTOH, in the conventional theory, the eskers are sometimes supposed to
have been let down on the surface of the drift below from
supra-glacial streams, when the ice melted. This would require an
unconformity at the bottom of eskers, but evidence for such
unconforities does not seem to have been reported.  

> Or the fact the ancient ones
>sometimes terminate in deltas?

The glacial interpretation might suggest there should be deltas at the
ends of some eskers, and it would even predict the direction of
inclination of patterns of inclined strata that one would expect at
esker terminations. However, observations that are reported in the
scientific literature often do not support the expectations based on
the glacial interpretations. For example, detailed studies of the
patterns of cross strata in an esker led investigators to conclude the
flow direction was across the axis of the esker, not along the axis,
as the theory predicts. The theory failed miserably in this case. Many
similar examples can be found.

My theory based on expansion effects upon disintegration can account
for eskers trending up and down hills, and over drumlins, and the fact
that the eskers may cross divides or cols.  
 
>> Usually,
>> the stones deposited by the glaciers are angular, not rounded and
>> smooth;
 
>        If you visit the front of glaciers and observe the sediment, no.
>It depends entirely upon where you are with respect to the glacier front
>and the depositional processes occurring there.  Glacial ice does not
>effectively round pebbles and boulders.  It often facets them.  You are
>correct on this point.  However, you would have to go to the coldest parts
>of Antarctica or the Arctic in the wintertime to find glaciers without
>large meltwater rivers which *do* round pebbles and boulders.  You can not
>have one without the other for most of the year.  In my experience, the
>boulders and pebbles within 100 metres of the front of many glaciers are
>mostly rounded anywhere a river exits from the front.

It may have happened, that glaciers formed in valleys that contained a
drift floor formed previous to the ice, in which case the ice would
redeposit the drift, and so would contain rounded stones and pebbles
like those of the drift. In the case of the Athabaska Glacier, I
understand some of the drainage occurs through caves, which suggests
there was _in Situ_ disintegration that produced the caves and the
drift in them, that was eroded out by streams from the ice. There are
also potholes in the Athabaska River, which also supports this. Drift
lower in the valleys was formed by _in situ_ disintegration,  and does
not resemble the debris that can be seen in the moraines at the
terminus of the glacier, which consists of angular material and muck
derived from the mountain peaks above.

>> the internal stratification, if present, is different,
 
>        The "sharpness" business, or something else?

The distinctiveness of the patterns of cross strata in the eskers does
not occur in the sediments formed in direct contact with the ice in
many cases. The sand is quite different as well.  
 
>> and the
>> scale of the structures that have been reported is so vastly
>> different, any hopeful comparison to the real thing seems pathetic.
 
>        You are correct that there are significant differences.  However,
>it is difficult to compare features formed by the smaller glaciers we have
>now to ones covering the entire continent of North America.  Of course,
>the comparison between modern floods and a global flood also has a similar
>problem, if not worse.  At least the conventional model has smaller
>versions of the same process occurring today which can be used as
>analogues.  Your model seems to rely predominantly on processes which have
>not been observed even at smaller scales.

Yes, some of the mechanisms that I have proposed, to explain the
geology we observe in terms of catastrophic processes are not seen
acting anywhere in the world today. But, these processes are still
real ones, and if my theory is correct, it should be possible to
duplicate experimentally disintegration processes similar to those
responsible for the drift. 

>> And there are no great waterfalls plunging down through holes in the
>> ice, eroding deep, cylindrical holes or "moulins" (i.e., potholes)
>> into the hard rocks beneath the ice.
 
>        It is a little difficult to observe in action, but deep casms with
>large waterfalls do occur in glaciers, and there is evidence for fluvial
>processes that reach the bed of glaciers.  Plunging waterfalls are not the
>only way to produce "potholes" anyway.  Moulins are also a bit different
>from other types of potholes.  You are taking those signs in Rockwood too
>literally.  Just because some of the structures may be moulins produced by
>glacial waterfalls at stagnant ice fronts does not mean all the structures
>observed there.  It is a park sign, not a scientific paper.

Do you agree the "moulin" hypothesis for drilling such holes ought to
be abandoned as utterly implausible and absurd? Shouldn't those
responsible for posting such silly claims in public parks be informed
of the gross error they are promoting? For it is absurd, IMO, to claim
intersecting potholes could have formed in such a manner as claimed in
these signs.  

>> All those mechanisms are
>> evidently fabrications, and are imaginary, and hypothetical, existing
>> only in the minds of the glacialists who have derived their ideas from
>> books, written by others.
 
>        Your "in situ disintegration process" is imaginary in terms of
>accounting for the evidence in a plausible, physically possible way or an
>experimental demonstration.

I agree that experiments need to be done on it. 

>> >If we were to find a drumlin in, say, the Amazonian rain forest,
>> >with no evidence of glaciation contemperaneous with the formation
>> >of the drumlin (esker, or kame, or moraine, or col, or whatever
>> >-single- glacially formed feature you want), then that might be
>> >evidence for your assertions that they are formed by the deluge.

>> L. Agassiz thought he had found evidence of glaciation (erratic
>> boulders, scratched rocks, fluted valleys etc.) in Brazil in 1865.
>> Similar "evidence" was found in British Guiana. And equatorial Africa.
 
>        He did find glacial evidence.

What he found was certain effects, that people think suggests the
former presence of glaciers; however, there may well be another
interpretation for them that does not involve glaciers. For the
glacial theory to maintain a scientific status, it is necessary that
it continue be considered a "theory" that can be falsified, and even
replaced should a better one come along. 

IMO, it was already adequately shown to be wrong, by Sir Henry H.
Howorth in 1905.
 
>> These discoveries ought to have suggested that the theory was wrong,
>> but no...
 
>        They are glacial.  They do not indicate "that the theory was
>wrong".  They indicate continental glaciations have happened before, much
>earlier in Earth history.  There is also evidence from the Precambrian.

Again, the "evidence" has been interpreted as suggesting former
glaciation, but another explanation for it may exist. This evidence
consists of conglomerate rock, that looks like the drift that is seen
in temperate areas, which has been lithified. There are also
striations on bedrock similar to the striations that occur on the
surface of bedrock beneath the drift, that can be explained as the
effect of expansion of the drift upon disintegration.   
 
>        These occurrences are *completely* different age.  They are either
>Latest Carboniferous and Early Permian or they are near the
>Ordovician-Silurian boundary.  They are stratigraphically isolated from
>the most recent glaciations typically by kilometres of strata, they are
>thousands of kilometres geographically away, the orientiations of the
>"streamlined" features (e.g., bedrock striations) are completely
>inconsistent with your model, and none of them represent modification of
>the sediment at the surface, as the glaciations in northern North America,
>Europe, and Asia do.  They are buried deep in the bedrock.  They are
>completely consolidated.  How does your model account for these?  Were
>there multiple "in situ disintegration process" events during the Flood?

In my theory, these effects of disintegration could occur in various
parts of the world, in various kinds of rocks. The disintegration
process may have occurred at considerable depth in some cases; this
seems to be related to the rate of change of pressure during uplift.

>        Furthermore, paleogeographic reconstructions and paleomagnetic
>determinations "coincidentally" place these areas near the south
>geographic pole at that time, and there are plenty of climatic indicators
>from those times which are consistent with the areas being at high
>paleolatitudes, and other areas (some currently in the Arctic) being near
>the equator.  I.e. they are consistent with the conventional model. 
 
>        There are *no* drumlin fields in Africa, central South America, or
>Australia on the current surface.  There are no large areas like southern
>Ontario, Nova Scotia, or New York state where practically every rounded
>hill is a drumlin.  There are no glacial features at all in the surface
>sediments with the exception of areas of current mountain glaciers (e.g.,
>the Andes or a few African mountains).  They are all in the bedrock.  For
>your "global flood" process, this seems pretty inconsistent.  How could
>your "pressure release mechanism" produce "drift", and then bury it to
>kilometres depth and reconsolidate it into hard bedrock?  How could these
>features form, and then get buried, all during the flood if this
>"disintegration process" operated near the end of the event?

Pressure release could occur due to tectonic movements, faulting and
associated release of fluids, or by erosion of overburden. It is also
possible, I suppose, that some drift formed at the surface was
submerged and became buried in sediment.
 
>> The old diluvial theory attributed the drift phenomena to the flood,
>> and it was supposed that the currents of the flood deposited the
>> stratified drift, and the fossils included in it.
 
>        This model was inconsistent with the observation of fossils in
>growth position and fossil soils within many glacial sediments -- not in
>the "drift" itself, but interbedded with the "drift".
 
>> In the glacial
>> theory of Agassiz, the assumption made in the diluvial theory about a
>> sedimentary origin of the stratified drift was retained.
 
>        It is not an "assumption", Douglas.  Everything about "drift" is
>consistent with a sedimentary origin.  You have yet to demonstrate that
>the process you advocate is a physical possibility, let alone one that
>accounts for the details of the structures found in unconsolidated
>surficial sediment you refer to as "drift".

It is actually quite difficult to understand how the boulders in
typical stratified drift could have been deposited where they are, in
a sedimentary environment. Many writers have expressed bafflement when
describing some of the features of typical drift. Geikie, for example,
describes stones in the drift that have "indented" one another, that
he attributed to intense pressure. The difficulties encounted in
explaining the drift become increasingly evident for the larger
stones, and for coarse gravel interbedded with sand that exhibits fine
stratification. To form patterns of cross strata, with its typical
sweeping curves, it is necessary that rapid currents be invoked; the
presence of boulders in association with it seems to require
turbulent, chaotic conditions. So the mind boggles, just trying to
imagine former sedimentary conditions that could accomplish the
effects one sees. The same problems appear to be involved when
considering the environment of formation of the cross strata in great
cliffs of sandstone such as, for example, those in Zion National Park
in the US.  

>> The glacial
>> theory, then, retains the same flaws as the older diluvial theory.  My
>> theory of a disintegration origin of the drift, and the boulders in
>> it, and the patterns of cross strata, etc., does not make this flawed
>> assumption which leads to so many inconsistencies and contradictions
>> in both of these theories.
 
>        Even if these supposed inconsistenties were granted, it does make
>the chemical impossibilities inherent in your theory any more plausible.
>The chemistry responsible for your "disintegration process" and its
>simultaneous production of igenous, metamorphic, and sedimentary
>mineralogy of mutually-exclusive compositions is still virtually
>unspecified.  You still have not demonstrated your "pressure release"
>process can produce the very specific geometries of cross bedding which
>are known and explained in the conventional model, and which are
>completely consistent with formation of most cross bedding by migration of
>ripples and dunes.  Even if your model supposedly solves inconsistencies,
>it encounters what appears to be physical impossibilities, or is so vague
>hypotheses can not be tested.

One of the reasons for this that my _in situ_ disintegration theory is
still in the development stage. I think I have already shown that the
theory has immense potential and can be applied to a great variety of
geological problems to help to explain the effects that are observed. 

The _in situ_ disintegration theory of the drift may have successful
applications in prospecting for minerals such as gold, and diamonds;
if my disintegration theory is correct, present methods that involve
tracing indicator minerals based on the assumption of transportation
by glaciers may be replaced by new methods yet to be devised, based on
the new theory, that may suggest ways to considerably improve on
techniques in the future. While some geologists no doubt will continue
to prop up their flawed uniformitarian theories such as the glacial
theory, others may perhaps wish to investigate alternatives, and begin
to devise their own experiments and means for testing some of the
predictions of my _in situ_ disintegration theory of the drift.    

--
Douglas Cox