[SNIP]
>John Woodmorappe has done alot of literary research which shows that
>radiometric ages are not internall nor externally consistent. I refer you
>to his publications.
[SNIP]
Pardon the plain talk, but Woodmorappe's work is total crap. I refer people
to my critique of it (and Woodmorappe's lovely reply) at:
http://home.earthlink.net/~schimmrich/essays/woodmorappe.html
[SNIP]
>At Grand Canyon, there are proposed lines of demarcation for the beginning
>of the Flood and post Flood events such as the carving of the Canyon.
>However, my point was that just because we might consider the great
>unconformity below the Tapeats Sandstone as the initial point of the Flood
>here at Grand Canyon, that may not mean that the same holds true for some
>other unconformity between supposed Pre-Cambrian and Cambrian eras
>somewhere else. Each site would have to be interpreted within it's own
>context or setting. In general, it is usually proposed that the line of
>demarcation for the initation of the Flood catastrophe is the general lack
>of fossils below and fossiliferous strata above.
[SNIP]
If you read YEC papers, you'll see that they can't agree on where to place
the upper OR lower boundaries of the so-called "flood" deposits. Henry Morris,
for example, argues that it's "mandatory for Bible-believing Christians" to accept
his view that essentially ALL fossil-bearing strata from late Proterozic through
Tertiary are flood deposits (Morris, 1996). Other "flood" geologists place the
flood/post-flood boundary at the Cretaceous/Tertiary boundary (Austin, 1994,
Vardiman, 1996). Maybe they're not bible-believing Christians? Some, like
Froede (1995), argue that since YEC's can't agree, that they should abandon all
reference to the standard geologic time scale and propose a YEC time scale. In
that scale, there's Pre-flood strata, Flood strata, and Post-flood strata (so the
"flood" strata is whatever the heck they say it is and they can ignore those messy
stratigraphic correlations that mainstream geologists have so painstakingly worked
out over the past century! In other words, that allows them to locate the flood/
post-flood boundary in the Cretaceous in one area and in the Tertiary somewhere
else. How convenient!). YEC's use mainstream geology when it supports their
preconceived ideas about Noah's flood and ignore it when it doesn't support them
(it's called selective use of evidence).
References:
Austin, S.A. 1994. Grand Canyon: Monument to Catastrophe. Institute for Creation
Research.
Froede, C. R. Jr. 1995. A proposal for a creationist geological timescale. Creation Research Society Quarterly 32, 90-94.
Morris, H. M. 1996. The geologic column and the flood of Genesis. Creation Research Society Quarterly 33, 49-57.
Vardiman, L. 1996. The sands of time: a biblical model of deep sea-floor sedimentation. Creation Research Society Quarterly 33, 191-198.
-- Steven H. Schimmrich Assistant professor of geology Department of Geology and Geography sschimmr@calvin.edu (office) Calvin College schimmri@earthlink.net (home) 3201 Burton Street SE 616-957-7053, 616-957-6501 (fax) Grand Rapids, Michigan 49546 http://home.earthlink.net/~schimmrich/