coal, fire, etc.

From: bivalve (bivalve@mail.davidson.alumlink.com)
Date: Mon Sep 15 2003 - 20:19:27 EDT

  • Next message: george murphy: "Re: My daughter is a YEC"

    In light of the discussion on YEC terminology, etc., it seems worth stating that my overall point is that these are not good arguments for a global flood.

    >"Waterworn pebbles of banded coal often occur in the base of the overlying sandstone... By the time of reworking, the peat deposit must have been advanced in rank at least to the stage of lignite..."
    If the Pittsburgh coal was an active swamp when buried by the sand, how do you explain the coal pebbles in the sandstone?<

    The coal was not an active swamp when the overlying sandstone was deposited. Rather, it had been lithified into lignite. This implies a relatively long time between the deposition of the coal layer and the deposition of the sandstone and does not suit a global flood model.

    >" ‘Exotics,’ boulders or cobbles of composition other than the surrounding bedrock, are a common occurrence in coal... It is very likely that the boulders were attached to roots of floating trees, therefore indicating they were transported in rafts of marine plants. ..."<

    The statement is a little confused; trees are generally not marine plants, unless you count mangroves. Also, a boulder in tree roots does not have to be part of a raft. Quartz pebbles are very common in the Sipsey River where it goes through a cypress swamp, yet I have not noticed any ongoing global floods while I have been collecting mussels in the river.

    References on evidence of fire:
    Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology v. 164, no. 1, December 2000 has several articles on evidence of fires in the past. Fossil charcoal is known from the Devonian on up through the geologic column. Here are some of the articles:

    The Pre-Quaternary history of fire, Pages 281-329
    A. C. Scott

     Devonian charcoal, Pages 331-338
    Nicholas P. Rowe and Timothy P. Jones

     Fire ecology of the Carboniferous tropical zone, Pages 339-355
    H. J. Falcon-Lang

     A major fire event recorded in the mesofossils and petrology of the Late Permian, Lower Whybrow coal seam, Sydney Basin, Australia, Pages 357-380
    Ian Glasspool

     Fire across the K/T boundary: initial results from the Sugarite Coal, New Mexico, USA, Pages 381-395
    A. C. Scott, B. H. Lomax, M. E. Collinson, G. R. Upchurch and D. J. Beerling
     
     A review of charcoal analysis as a tool for assessing Quaternary and Tertiary environments: achievements and limits, Pages 397-407
    Isabel Figueiral and Volker Mosbrugger

    I still have that duplicate of a paper on modern transported peat deposits, if you are interested. Again, as we are not currently undergoing a global flood, the paper raises problems for the claim that evidence of allochthonous components to coal is evidence of a global flood.

        Dr. David Campbell
        Old Seashells
        University of Alabama
        Biodiversity & Systematics
        Dept. Biological Sciences
        Box 870345
        Tuscaloosa, AL 35487-0345 USA
        bivalve@mail.davidson.alumlink.com

    That is Uncle Joe, taken in the masonic regalia of a Grand Exalted Periwinkle of the Mystic Order of Whelks-P.G. Wodehouse, Romance at Droitgate Spa
                     



    This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Mon Sep 15 2003 - 20:19:35 EDT