..In which we continue the dismantling of Plate Tectonics by the rejection of so-called 'fold mountains'
Current consensus recognises five types of mountains. Not being at school any more I can't tell if this is so or if it is just a joke. Here they are:- 1. volcanoes (which are self-evident examples of a 'built' mountain), 2, 'dome' mountains apparently pushed up by igneous intrusion, 3. horst mountain formed by an uplifted block of crust (or a crustal block bounded by downfaults), 4. fold mountains formed by elevation by crustal crumpling, and 5. plateau mountains, formed by erosion of plateaus. This last is frequently referred to as 'pseudo-mountains' because they are a topographic curiosity formed by weather, and not orogenic aspects of crustal formation. Not real mountains at all, in other words (in the consensus view).
Now, this classification strikes me as odd to say the least - so it could be a joke, though if it is then with 25,800 google-entries on the net at the time of posting, it's a bit stale by now. I certainly don't remember there being any such division when I was at school (though it's been a while) - a mountain was just a mountain. What's the deal ? It's a land form, not a geological one any more than a hill, a valley, ..a plain, ..a cliff etc etc., (..a waterfall?). We wouldn't dream of classifying hills or cliffs as 'geological' features. Besides, ever since school, I've always thought hills and mountains were formed by erosion - by rivers cutting down the land, forming ravines, gorges, valleys, and finally, with what was left as attrition continued, mountains, hills, and finally a peneplained surface, where no more erosion was possible.
Well, ..weren't they? .. ?? Apparently no. It seemed that was only half the story. The other half lay in the reason for the elevation of the land in the first place, which was deemed to be due to crustal crumpling by continental collision. ..hence 'fold mountains', while the other lot, 'plateau mountains', those formed by the erosion of a peneplained surface, were designated not really mountains at all (since they were formed by erosion).
Now, .. it used to be wrongful practice in geology to name elements according to one's perception of how those elements came to be formed; 'genetically' so to speak (rather than morphologically, i.e., how they physically are). I guess, however the first classification, 'volcano', seems to be ok. It's in that middle ground, being formed by a build-up of volcanic detritus, which is 'geological stuff', rather than being formed by weather - like the other mountains. Nevertheless, the word refers to the physical description of the edifice, not the fact that it can spew lava. It may seem a bit like splitting hairs, but it is an important distinction within the broader perspective that differentiates taxonomic aspects from genetic ones. Dinosaurs for example are classified by their descriptive characteristics of size and bone structure, not because they could run fast or ate meat or vegetables. The second is an inference dependent of the former.
Similarly in tectonics. So we shall set aside 'dome' and 'block' mountains, in order to consider the two main categories, which are 'fold' mountains and 'plateau' mountains. However the caution just mentioned regarding taxonomy v. genesis has come to be overlooked by Plate Tectonicists to the extent that 'fold mountains' (23,600entries) are considered today, not to describe mountains that look like folds, but mountains that are formed by folding. And 'plateau mountains' are thought to be formed by a continuation of the erosion that formed that land surface. The second is true, the first is not; with cursory examination it can easily be seen that both are really the same thing, namely 'plateau mountains'.
As we have seen it is simply wrong to link folding with mountain 'building', and it requires no more than a casual Google Earth traverse of the Earth's surface to show it to be wrong. All regions of the Earth from whence 'fold mountains' are described, are in fact eroded plateaus ('plateau mountains'). Once upon a time it took adventurous people to climb mountains and look to the horizon to verify this, ..and then write about the implications of what they were seeing using the concepts of orogensis, taphrogenesis, and epeirogenesis, developed over decades of study of regional geology. These days children can do it with the passing ease of Google Earth before playtime, and even though they may not easily understand the meaning of those terms, they can at least easily see the common heights of the mountain tops, and with a little help from the teacher and a sketch on the blackboard, know that the mountains have been carved from a planed surface, and not formed by the folding.
Fig.1. Blackboard sketch. Mountains formed by erosion; folding predates the erosional surface. The jagged surface of mountains is unrelated to the folding in the rock.So, if children can do it (before playtime), .. (see that mountains wherever we look are erosional features carved from an earlier peneplained surface), then what are Plate Tectonicists up to, maintaining the myth of colliding plates heaving and shoving and pushing up mountains? Which is it? Are mountains formed by pushing up? Or eroding down? And which authority would *you* rely on to tell you? - those putting it around that mountains are formed by the collision of colliding plates? Schoolchildren before playtime? Me? Or your own eyes, as you too load Google Earth, and see for yourself - that the surfaces from which the mountain belts are carved were once flat?
What they up to? What they are doing is a combination of building on sand (taking the simplisitic picture of rumpling tablecloths as an analogy of folding that they learned as children), telling lies by omission (ignoring the peneplanation that typifies the high tracts of the planet in order to support their contrived model of Plate Tectonics), and drawing the long bow. They are relying on institutional kudos to pull Joe Public's leg to get grant money to research faeries up the garden path with smushy chicks. Are we to believe that they do not know that a conformity of rocky peaks derives from a once-flat surface? ... either peneplained or directly exhumed from the sea? Look, ..these are guys at the most prestigious institutions in the world, and they are ignoring the fundamentals of erosion that are taught virtually in primary school, and using that ignore-ance to obstruct investigation into the most profound question of the Earth sciences that's been around for the last more than sixty years, "What is it, that is causing a massive blowout of the planet to create the oceans of the world?" And at the same time, at the cost of billions of dollars of taxpayer's money, they are giving oxygen to the supposed rationale for investigating 'Plate Tectonics' on other planets, .. when through the imaginary lens of so-called 'fold mountains' it doesn't even exist on this one.
( "We are a community of scientists." .. ?? )
That's big bikkies if you ask me (the lies, and the wasted expenditure in the name of so-called 'science'). And you thought it was just the financial sector that could work out ways how to rip you off? How do you feel about that, .. spending your money just to shore up their ignore-ance.
'Fold mountains' ? ... The term epitomises the nonsense of Plate Tectonics that was an adaptation of a convenient and naive sketch of the analogy between folding and crumpling tablecloths learned when they were children before school. They are hoping the same meme will help it work on you too - like pot-of-soup convection, ..both of them contrived to by-pass a problem that was (and still is) profound, which was (/is), "What is the process that has caused the outward movement of the Earth's surface from an equilibrium condition on the ocean floors or of zero erosion near sea-level, to the highest elevation on the planet, ..and that accounts for the extrusion of the mantle that is everywhere young?"
An Earth that is expanding provides the answer, and, in the context of the choice that faced Plate Tectonicists in the beginning - the only answer. But no, geophysicists back then chose to look at the problem from the oceanic side, from aboard the Big Ship trolling the oceans with a black box which they believed would tell them what to think, .. and *philosophised* in a 'whilst-this-and-whilst-that' way, about tablecloths, mountains and the continental crust, rather than looking at the problem from the continental (field /geological) side (of geology and geomorphology - of mountains, plateaus, and peneplains, ..of orogensis, taphrogenesis, and epeirogenesis). And (dammit!), they just plain got it wrong. What doozies!! (?) Well, not for the bad guess, ..anybody can get the flip of a heads-or-tails wrong, ..but for their determination to maintain that wrong in the face of the obvious right.
"...We are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield." ~ George Orwell.
Bang, bloody bang.
"Are they nuts?"
"Have to be."
"Why?"
"Sitting in the dark."
"Sucking blood?"
"Yeah.."
"Weird people."
No, .. not nuts, ..not weird, ..just cognisant of the need to build and maintain a consensus in order to ease publication /grants /careers. Is that science? For the bereft many, sadly it is.
So take a trip on Google Earth and check out the high surfaces of the planet from which mountains are carved (not 'built'), and find them to be incised peneplains. These days children can do it in class (before playtime). But to understand why Plate Tectonicists cannot, we have to recognise the decades of baggage that have to be off-loaded, but which they cannot do without copping a whole lot of egg-on-face, because their mistake was apparent from the beginning. For "philosophical reasons" they deliberately chose the option that contradicted the geological facts, rather than further investigate those facts.
(" When thoughts, logic and facts have the potential to humiliate and frighten, they will always be ignored. " ~ Mister Supernatural )
Fig.2 The uplifted floor of the Upper Triassic sea, known now as the Italian Alps ('Dolomites'). The floor was already essentially flat, so, ..minimal erosion on emergence. You can see it, can't you (thanks to Google), .. tide out, the water washing over it. It almost still looks like a rocky coral shore, (It's been eroded a bit since of course.) :))However it is not the *mistake* that will be the future focus of attention, but the reasons why so many could get it so wrong and for so long (and still persist in doing so). In short, Plate Tectonics will go down as the biggest con-job in the history of Earth science, if not science as a whole.
Fig.3. Close up of the rocky shore above. Makes the sea-shore a bit more difficult to see because the sea-shore is a point in time, whereas the build-up is over many millions of years. ("Build-up?" Do we mean this is how mountains are built? No, .. but by the logic of Plate Tectonics it might as well be,) (image courtesy of wikipedia )
[ See also Expanding Earth blog at
http://www.earthexpansion.blogspot.com/ ]
No comments:
Post a Comment