At 09:30 PM 3/4/00 -0500, Dick Fischer wrote:
>Glen wrote:
>>First, the abyssal Mediterranean was a plain. Second, not all understanding
>>of the account can come from the Sumerians. Edin in Hebrew means pleasure.
>>Which religion do you think is inspired--Sumerian or Hebrew?
>>>That's a trick question. Hebrew is a language.
No Dick Hebrew is an adjective modifying the implict word 'religion'. Which
religion do you think is inspired the Sumerian religion or the Hebrew
religion? There is no trick to it at all. You always seem to side with the
Sumerians as far as I can tell.
I wrote:
>It is no more odd for the Tigris and Euphrates several million years ago to
>have flowed at 90 degrees to their present courses than it was for the Nile
>to have done so (it did you know) or for the Colorado River of the Grand
>Canyon several million years ago to have flowed straight west and emptied
>along the California coast rather than Baja as it does now. Consider this:
>
> "Upper Paleocene to Middle Miocene fluvial-deltaic rocks in the Los
>Angeles and Ventura basins were deposited by a Colorado paleoriver prior to
>300 km of dextral displacement on the San Andreas fault. During the late
>Miocene, movement on the fault and associated rifting in the Salton trough
>rerouted the paleoriver into the proto-Gulf of California." ~ Jeffrey L.
>Howard, "Paleocene to Holocene Paleodeltas of Ancestral Colorado River
>Offset by the San Andreas Fault System, Southern California," Geology,
>24:9(Sept. 1996):783-786, p. 783
>
> And the Yellow River in the last 1000 years has altered its course to have
>emptied south of Shan Dong Province and then back into the Bohai Bay.
>Consider this for the Yellow River.
>
> "In the last 3,500 years, there have been 26 significant changes in
the
>Yellow River's course. BEtween 602 B.C.--the year of the first recorded
>course change--and 1288, the river eptied into the sea between Tientsin and
>the Shantung peninsula, although in osme floods the stream split into two
>channels one on each side of the peninsula. Throughout those 19 centuries,
>the location of its mouth varied by only about 100 miles. THen in 1288, ag
>reat flood sent the Yellow charging across country, First it emptied into
>the Huai, nearly 200 miles to the southeast, then carved a channel across
>to the Yangtze and wound up emptying into the East China Sea almost 600
>miles south of its original porition."
> "During the next 567 years--a period of improvement in civil
engineering
>and of more or less stable government--the Chinese managed to keep a
>relatively tight rein on their wild river. But in 1855, the Yellow tore
>open the dike on its left bank at Tungwa Hsiang, about 30 miles east of
>Kaifeng. During the next six years, while engineers tried repeatedly to
>repair the shattered dikes, the uncontrolled river wandered northeastward
>to the sea in many channels. Finally, in 1961, the river settled into its
>present channel about 500 miles to the north of its 1288 course, emptying
>into the Po Sea instead of the Yellow Sea." Champ Clark, _Flood_ Time Life
>Books, 1982, p. 42
Here is a good example where two people who only wish to glorify God, who
give full weight to relevant data and evidence, and are dedicated to honest
reporting, can view the same data and reach opposite conclusions. I have
flown over the Mississippi river near New Orleans and have seen hundreds
of water filled horseshoe-shaped lakes that were once channels of the
mighty Mississippi as it changed course over millions of years. Glenn's
point is that river courses can be altered over eons of geologic upheavals.
He concludes that since we know of some rivers that have changed course,
the Tigris and Euphrates also could have flowed in a different direction.
But rivers leave tracks. We know rivers such as the Nile, Colorado, Yellow
and
Mississippi rivers have changed course because they left trails of water-worn
pebbles, mud, mineral and salt deposits, and fossils of riverine creatures.
And they carve out channels. Had the Tigris and Euphrates once flowed
west instead of east and south as they do today, we could see the evidence
of that. There is none. In the absence of evidence to the contrary, I
believe it is only reasonable to assume that they flowed in Bible times in
the same general direction as they flow today, and joined then where they
do today just before emptying into the Persian Gulf.
I don't know where you get the idea that there is no evidence of it. In
the early miocene times, prior to the desication of the Mediterranean,
northern Iraq was lagoonal. Lagoonal carbonates were being deposited. You
can't deposit carbonates if there is a big river sending sand and shale
into the area. Clean carbonates require clear sediment free waters for
deposition.I quote Beydoun,
"A conglomerate is present in different parts of this regin of northern
Iraq, between Oligocene and Miocene, and is followed by an important
transgression which introduced Lower Miocene lagoonal carbonates
(Euyphrates LImeston formation) along the shore of a wide gulf or sea-arm."
Z. R. Beydoun, _The Middle East REgional Geology and Petroleum Resources_
(Beaconsfield, Bucks,UK: Scientific Press, 1988), p. 99
The term "Euphrates LImestone" is not because the deposition had anything
to do with the river. It is that the limestone crops out along the river.
Above this, still in the Lower Miocene, is an evaporitic unite. Beydoun again:
"An evaporitic unit (Dhibban Anhydrite formation) follows the Euphrates
limestone (as it also does in NE Syria) and heralds partial or temporary
closure of the sea-arm. This was followed by further lagoonal carbonates on
reopening (Lower Miocene Jerribe formation), which also extends into NE
Syria."Z. R. Beydoun, _The Middle East REgional Geology and Petroleum
Resources_ (Beaconsfield, Bucks,UK: Scientific Press, 1988), p. 99
In the Upper Miocene, the time of the Mediterranean salinity crisis, the
Zagros mountains of Iran began to rise. They produced a lot of clastics
which were deposited over northern Iraq, FROM THE EAST, not from the
Northwest as would indicate the existence of the two rivers. Beydoun again:
"Rapidly-rising mountains in the northeast of Iraq as a result of the
Zagros orogeny due to the collision and suturing of Arabia with Iran and
Anatolia, produced large amounts of clastics, which were initially
deposited in a marine environment in the northern part to form the Upper
Miocene Upper FArs formation. A less clastic facies of limestones and
siltstones (Middle Fars) was deposited in the southern area." Z. R.
Beydoun, _The Middle East REgional Geology and Petroleum Resources_
(Beaconsfield, Bucks,UK: Scientific Press, 1988), p. 99-100
This means that in the Miocene, the two rivers were MISSING from Iraq.
Where were they? I think you can find the tracks you are looking for in
the Adana basin of Turkey which is right at the bend where the southern
coast of Turkey turns south and the coast line then runs north-south along
Syria, Lebanon and Israel. That bend is where the Adana Basin is to be
found. If you recall the present Euphrates heads straight toward the Adana
basin but turns to the SE about 100 miles from the present coastline. What
is in the Adana basin?
According to a chart in Robertson Research group's Stratigraphic Database
of the World, one finds 800 meters (2600 feet) of sands with 20-25%
porosity in the Upper Miocene Kusgun Formation. Such sands are what one
finds at a river delta. Indeed such sands are deposited into that area
until just after the beginning of the Lower Pliocene (which would be after
the refill of the Mediterranean basin). It was during the lower Pliocene
that the Dead sea uplift took place which then diverted the Tigris and
Euphrates to their present course.
This formation in the Adana basin is the appropriate deposit which appears
at the correct place at the correct time for my scenario. Like it or not,
the Tigris and Euphrates were NOT in Iraq during this time as is evidenced
by the sedimentation that was taking place there.
So before you claim that there is no evidence for the rivers being in the
Mediterranean, you better go look to be sure that there isn't any. In this
case you didn't look at the data you just made an assertion--which was
wrong. There is indeed plenty of geologic evidence for what I say.
I wrote:
>Dick, you really need to incorporate more geology into your objections.
Dick replied:
>You're not saying that because you are a geologist, are you Glenn?
No, but I am saying it because you are trying to talk about geology and it
would help you if you would read a bit more of it.
glenn
Foundation, Fall and Flood
Adam, Apes and Anthropology
http://www.flash.net/~mortongr/dmd.htm
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