Hi Bill
I will butt in on this conversation simply because my name was mentioned
Bill Payne wrote:
> [snip]
> the objective of the litigation is not to arrive at what is fair or true,
> but to win a judgement against the company for which I work.
This is the precise reason why holding up the legal process as a model for
determining truth is unwise. If it is a doubtful tool to discover truth in
matters of law, it is an even more doubtful tool in matters of science. PJ
please note (not that he will).
>
> I am in the process of doing just that, i.e., showing that the swamp
> model for the origin of coal is based upon an incorrect interpretation of
> data. To "prove something beyond a reasonable doubt" is a slow and
> meticilous process, and Jonathan is doing a good job of checking my every
> move.
I am glad I am being helpful. But I must point out that there is no "swamp
model". There are a great many models for coal formation that have have
differing sedimentary and tectonic frameworks, rather depths, hydrology,
topography, ecological successions, and degrees of transport. These reflect
the great range of coal found it the world. The three things they must have
in common are abundant terrestrial plant matter (to make the coal), low
clastic input (otherwise it won't be coal, and water logging (without which
the plant material won't form peat and then coal). Everything else is
variable. As it happens coally environments all seem to be swamps (of many
different kinds), shallow lakes, and lagoons. But that is a result of
research.
>
> Back to the main point of this post: If a bridge were engineered with
> the same lack of correspondence to reality that the swamp model of coal
> has to the observable data, and if the bridge fails, the lawyers
> representating the owners of the bridge, and those representating any
> injured personnel or owners of damaged property, would pour through the
> failed bridge's engineering design, the qualifications of the engineer
> who stamped (approved) the design drawings, the materials-testing data,
> the construction (were specified materials actually used or were
> substitutions made, were the plans followed or were there deviations,
> were all deviations approved by the engineer), the records of the project
> manager responsible for quality assurance/quality control (QA/QC), in
> short - the full spectrum of details associated with design/build.
Two things. First, you can't compare a building a bridge to a scientific
theory. They are not even remotely alike in terms of methodology.
Second, companies have spent billions exploring for coal using rigorously
empirical techniques. They have to find coal and mine it in sufficient
quantities to not only survive, but keep their stockholders happy. The
models which have worked in this exercise - that correspond to reality - are
the ones you say do not. Take the Miocene lignites of the Gippsland basin in
Victoria, Australia. they are some of the largest lignite deposits in the
world. The lignites do not occur associated with the well drained uplands,
or in the similarly well drained sandy barrier that separated the lagoon and
coastal plain from the sea, or associated with the offshore limestones.
They occur in the back barrier coastal plain. Similarly, the Eocene lignites
of the margins of the Bremer and Eucla Basins of south and western Australia
occur not in the sandy upper reaches of the palaeovalley successions, or
interbedded with the marine sediments of the main basins, but in the lower
reaches of the palaeovalleys. Every coal basin I know tells a similar
story. If the exploration concepts hadn't worked these deposits would not
have been found and the shareholders would have been most upset - and perhaps
taken the directors to the courts you regard so highly.
>
> In summary, if the theory of the origin of coal fails to find empirical
> support, the theory is eventually modified and life goes on. [snip]
That is what geologists have been doing for the last 200 years.
>
> [snip]
>
> I reiterate, the consequences for a mistake in the world of construction
> are potentially catastrophic for a business and a career; the
> consequences for a mistake or misinterpretation in the world of academia,
> especially historical science, are virtually non-existent.
It depends what the mistake is. If it was an honest mistake, then there are
not (and should not) be penalties except that it should be rectified. If an
academic persistently gets it wrong they won't get their papers published,
attract graduate students, or have a high reputation, for reasons of
incompetence.
There is no fundamental difference (only details of methodology and
reasoning) between historical science and non-historical science, unlike the
difference between law and science or egineering and law.
>
>
> Bill
>
>
Jon
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