Re: More from the Pitman parallel universe....

On Jan 2, 9:09 pm, Seanpit <seanpitnos...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
On Jan 2, 12:03 pm, richardalanforr...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

On Jan 2, 7:38 pm, Seanpit <seanpitnos...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

Fossil orientation is actually very widespread - as is evidence of
currents across entire continents (despite Richard's bald claims to
the contrary).

Sean, the Morrison Formation is a deposit laid down by a braided river
system. Within that system there are a wide range of different
depositional environments. Some bone beds show orientation because
they were accumulated by water flowing in rivers. In others the
orientation is random. I provided not only the references, but the
abstracts of papers which describe the evidence for all these
different conditions.

The fossils in the Morrison Formation are *generally* oriented with
respect to flow.

And we are expected to take your word for this? I don't know the
literature on the Morrison Formation particularly well, but as many of
the large collections of vertebrates were made during the 19th century
I doubt that there is much information available on the orientation of
the bones. Marsh and Cope were not much interested in taphonomy.
However, even if current orientation is common in the Morrison
Formation, I fail to understand why such orientation is evidence of
anything other than water flowing in rivers.

As far as braided channels, what do you think formed
the Scablands during the massive Bretz' floods?

Not braided river channels. They were formed when a glacial dam broke
and released vast quantities of water. They weren't formed by a global
flood.

You complain when I don't provide "quotations", but now that I've
provided "quotations" you simply ignore them!

There is nothing that necessitates long periods of time for the
features in question in what you've quoted.

Only if you ignore all the evidence that they were laid down over long
periods of time. How long do you think it takes a meandering river
system to lay down deposits which are over 30 meters thick, especially
one which contains a series of different depositional environments?


AAPG Bulletin; August 1997; v. 81; no. 8; p. 1267-1291

Sandstone-body and shale-body dimensions in a braided fluvial system;
Salt Wash Sandstone Member (Morrison Formation), Garfield County, Utah
John W. Robinson, and Peter J. McCabe

Snyder Oil Corporation, Denver, CO, United States
U. S. Geological Survey, United States

Excellent three-dimensional exposures of the Upper Jurassic Salt Wash
Sandstone Member of the Morrison Formation in the Henry Mountains area
of southern Utah allow measurement of the thickness and width of
fluvial sandstone and shale bodies from extensive photomosaics. The
Salt Wash Sandstone Member is composed of fluvial channel fill,
abandoned channel fill, and overbank/flood-plain strata that were
deposited on a broad alluvial plain of low-sinuosity, sandy, braided
streams flowing northeast. A hierarchy of sandstone and shale bodies
in the Salt Wash Sandstone Member includes, in ascending order, trough
cross-bedding, fining-upward units/mudstone intraclast conglomerates,
single-story sandstone bodies/basal conglomerate, abandoned channel
fill, multistory sandstone bodies, and overbank/flood-plain
heterolithic strata. Trough cross-beds have an average width:thickness
ratio (W:T) of 8.5:1 in the lower interval of the Salt Wash Sandstone
Member and 10.4:1 in the upper interval. Fining-upward units are
0.5-3.0 m thick and 3-11 m wide. Single-story sandstone bodies in the
upper interval are wider and thicker than their counterparts in the
lower interval, based on average W:T, linear regression analysis, and
cumulative relative frequency graphs. Multistory sandstone bodies are
composed of two to eight stories, range up to 30 m thick and over 1500
m wide (W:T > 50:1), and are also larger in the upper interval.
Heterolithic units between sandstone bodies include abandoned channel
fill (W:T = 33:1) and overbank/flood-plain deposits (W:T = 70:1).
Understanding W:T ratios from the component parts of an ancient,
sandy, braided stream deposit can be applied in several ways to
similar strata in other basins; for example, to (1) determine the
width of a unit when only the thickness is known, (2) create
correlation guidelines and maximum correlation lengths, (3) aid in
interpreting the controls on fluvial architecture, and (4) place
additional constraints on input variables to stratigraphic and fluid-
flow modeling. The usefulness of these types of data demonstrates the
need to develop more data sets from other depositional environments.



Consider also the huge Jurassic Morrison Formation
(famous for its dinosaur fossils). It covers over 1,000,000 square
kilometers - being spread from Canada to Texas. It has been suggested
that it was distributed by widespread flowing water.

The evidence shows that the formataion was laid down by a braided
river system. There is a wide range of different depositional
environments in the Morrison Formation, as the papers whose abstracts
I've posted describe.

There is an overall general pattern of stream orientation in the
Morrison formation and in paleocurrents continent wide and worldwide.

And we are expected to take your word for this, are we?

The Morrison Formation is a deposit laid down by a braided river
system. Rivers in an area generally flow in the same direction, which
is *downhill*!

There is no problem in explaining this in terms of perfectly normal
geological processes.

The fossils found
within it, millions upon millions of them, are generally oriented with
respect to flow - confirmed by GPS mapping (Arthur Chadwick).

How the hell do you confirm orientation by GPS?
GPS is used to pinpoint *location*, not orientation.

Did you even look at the reference I gave you? Fossil orientation,
not just location, mapping can be carried out and has been carried out
by high-resolution GPS mapping.

Turner, L. E., A. V. Chadwick, and L. Spencer. High Resolution GPS
Mapping In A Vertebrate Taphonomic Quarry. Geological Society of
America. Abstracts with Program 32:A499. 2000.

That reference refers to a single quarry, Sean. You can tell by
*reading* the title. How on earth does that demonstrate widespread
patterns of current alignment? And it doesn't demonstrate that GPS
records orientation.

Some of the long bones in some bone beds are orientated in the same
way, which is what is to be expected in a river. In case you didn't
know, Sean, rivers are channels full of *water* running downhill. They
flood occasionally, and sometimes those floods cover large areas. That
does not mean that any evidence for any body of flowing water is
evidence for a global flood.

It is also not evidence necessitating long periods of time either.

No Sean, it's a completely different point. However, to lay down over
30 meters of sediment in a meandering river system *does* take rather
a long time.

That's the point. The overall general orientation of fossils within
such large formations and continent wide

The Morrison Formation is *not* continent wide!
More unfounded assertions, Sean?

and worldwide paleocurrents

Nor is it worldwide.
Another unfounded assertion. You should try to be more honest.

is what is not expected given the mainstream paradigm.

As that is not what is found, it's not a problem, is it?

As the Morrison Formation was laid down by a river system, and river
systems flow downhill, I suggest that the orientation of bones in
channel fills by water flowing in the rivers is not really much of a
problem, is it?


Beyond
this, the general preservation of current orientation in organic
materials and inorganic sediments suggests general flow patterns that
affect entire continents and even the entire globe affected by
directional flow.

Sean, the Morrison Formation is found in North America, and though
extensive it is *not* global. Within the Morrison Formation there are
no "general flow patterns", just evidence that some of the bone beds
were laid down by water flowing in the rivers for which there is ample
evidence.

Did you look at the reference I gave you? - - listed below?

This data is also being compiled by Arthur
Chadwick.

http://www.detectingdesign.com/geologiccolumn.html#Paleocurrents

This one? The orientation of paleocurrents does seem to be continent
wide and worldwide.

I suggest that you provide a reference from a scientific paper, not a
video by a creationist. Scientific papers are demonstrably rather more
reliable sources.


Richard Forrest doesn't seem to know what he's talking about when he
suggests things like perpendicular and parallel orientation is
actually "jumbled". That's nonsense - as anyone with any experience
with flow orientation can tell you.

Oh please, Sean! You made me choke on my coffee!

The abstract of this paperhttp://tiny.cc/VkXcx
contains the following:
"There is no statistically significant orientation of elongate
elements and little apparent evidence of hydraulic sorting or
transport damage. "

Sure - focally. The overall formation does show general orientation
however.

What do you mean by "general orientation", Sean? All the bones have an
orientation. Yep. In some places they are in river channels, and as
water runs in river channels (geologists have a technical term for
this: it's "river") it is not entirely unexpected that long bones are
aligned by the flowing water.


I'd say that "jumbled" is a pretty good way of describing " no
statistically significant orientation of elongate elements", wouldn't
you?

You are looking at a tree instead of the forest, Forrest.

No, I am giving you a reference which shows that some of the bone beds
in the Morrison Formation are jumbled.

You need to learn some geology if you want to know about this stuff.

Ditto . . .

Sean, I know something about geology. I've studied geology formally
and informally for 40 years. I've spent countless hours in the field
scrabbling around in the rocks, and published scientific papers which
contain descriptions of the geological context of the specimens I am
describing.

And you still haven't finished your Ph.D.? What did you do with your
time during that 40 years?

Qualified as an architect and worked in that profession for 20 years.

Although I have collected fossils for most of my life, I didn't start
studying vertebrate palaeontology seriously until about 10 years ago.

RF



Sean Pitmanwww.DetectingDesign.com

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: More from the Pitman parallel universe....
    ... Some bone beds show orientation because ... Those are not braided *RIVER* channels. ... Salt Wash Sandstone Member (Morrison Formation), Garfield County, Utah ... Morrison formation and in paleocurrents continent wide and worldwide. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: More from the Pitman parallel universe....
    ... There are, of course, instances in which bones *are* ... a single orientation. ... These results were applied to an assemblage of soft-shelled turtles ... Morrison Formation of south-central Montana, ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: More from the Pitman parallel universe....
    ... Sean, the Morrison Formation is a deposit laid down by a braided river ... Some bone beds show orientation because ... Morrison formation and in paleocurrents continent wide and worldwide. ...
    (talk.origins)