Re: Poor Noah and tree ring dating

On Aug 24, 11:53 pm, r norman <r_s_norman@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:55:38 -0700, John Harshman





<jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 23, 4:24 pm, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 21, 10:18 am, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 20, 8:22 am, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 19, 10:42 am, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 18, 6:47 pm, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
Ron O wrote:
On Aug 18, 7:43 am, r norman <r_s_norman@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:28:51 +0200, "Rolf" <rolf.aalb...@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:
SNIP:
Plywood is stronger to forces perpedicular to the layers.  This
lamination is stronger as corregated cardboard is to forces going with
the grain.  The radial structure of the tree lends the strength in the
perpendicular direction.  No mater where you put perpendicular force
on the surface of a branch or trunk it is parallel to some
laminations.
What laminations? In what way does it make sense to call these laminations?

Whether you like it or not the interspersed layers of the rings is a
lamination in the sense of to make or build up layers.  Hey, I don't
make up the definitions, just look it up in the dictionary.

Not that this is especially relevant, but I looked it up, and the
definition doesn't, in my opinion, fit wood.

They are laminated and it isn't just the stronger rings.  There is a
combination of different material properties.  The dark ring is denser
and is more flinty in that it it is harder, and it can shatter.  The
less dense layer is more flexible.  Interspersing them together they
form a material with the obvious strength and flexibility to face the
environmental conditions that the trees are subjected to.
One wonders, then, why tropical trees do not display such laminations
yet still manage to present the appearance of trees, quite tall ones.

Unfortunately I think that you are wrong.  I've seen plenty of
tropical wood like teak and other tropical hardwoods and they all show
ring structure.  You must be mistaken because that is a fact.  Just
look up "teak wood" on Google.  Even Mahagony has a ring structure it
just isn't the same as temperate climate.

Some tropical hardwoods do show rings. There are growing seasons in at
least some tropical forests. But do they all?

http://www.countyfloors.com/species_teak.html
http://hobbithouseinc.com/personal/woodpics/mahogany,%20african.htm

You might make a "wood" as strong by using bamboo grass as a model,
but bamboo lacks the radial integrity of the laminated ring structure
and you have the term split bamboo.  Trees based on that model would
not look like the trees that you see today.
Nobody is proposing a tree on that model.

From the picture it looks like hardwoods like Mahagony have given it a
partial try.  They have a denser pattern with interspersed bits of
increased density within most of the rest of the material dispersed in
a radial pattern, like bamboo, except they have the added strength of
a solid core.

Does that contradict your claim, then?

You probably could arrange the cells as if they had grown really
slowly and have just the right chemical composition to hold it all
together, but what does that get you?  You still have a bunch of dead
cells in the center of the tree where that part of the tree never had
living cells.
Ah, but the dead cells in the center would be necessary for the tree,
and hence explainable under necessary omphalism. Rings are not
necessary, thus not explainable.-
Unless you can come up with a means to make the same diameter wood
with the same strength you will get trees that look different without
rings.  Scaling problems would occur sooner with an increase in size.
Fewer and smaller leaves on each branch etc.  You not only have to
take the weight, but you have to adjust to forces due to the wind and
the resistance that leaf covered branches have to take.
I've got the baseball bat example to demonstrate that rings do lend
strength to the wood.
How is that an example? How does it show that rings lend strength?

I do not think that I have to explain it to you, but in the off chance
that you are that dense (pun intended) the layers obvious provide a
lateral strength to the wood.  Just think for a second what it means
when the breaking force is less in one direction than in another.  You
don't have to be Einstein to conclude that the rings do provide added
strength.

You have, I believe, conflated several different phenomena. The way
trees grow by radial addition of material means that they will respond
differently to radial stress than lateral stress. But rings are another
thing, the result of seasonal changes in growth rates. You have provided
no evidence that rings -- the visible results of seasonal growth rates
-- are important in the strength of trees, or of your baseball bat.

Neither Norman nor yourself has a counter
example where you can create a wood with no rings with the same
properties.  You also have to agree that the lamination and the radial
integrity of the rings gives the whole an added strength that a simply
strong material like bamboo does not have.
Why do I have to agree? First, I have to ask what lamination? There are
merely periods of slow and fast growth, of small and large cells. That's
not lamination.

If you can't see the laminations, I can't open your eyes for you.
They do confer additional strength to the wood, so what else can you
say?

I can say that you haven't shown any such thing. Please distinguish
between seasonal changes in growth rate and radial growth itself.

Can you make a tree that looks like it does today without rings using
the same materials that the tree is made of now?
I can't make a tree at all. But you still have not explained what
engineering properties rings lend to the wood, or how they do. You can
point at your baseball bat all you want, but it doesn't answer any
questions.

The baseball bat example is all that I need.  What do you have?

I have, for one thing, the knowledge that your "example" shows nothing
relevant to your claim.

I know that the
designer is supposed to be able to do anything, but why should he if
he had already designed a working system that would kick in when the
first seed sprouted.
I'm highly suspicious of your adaptive explanation for rings

Well, you obviously haven't thought it through very carefully.;)

At least one of us hasn't. There are at least three logical
possibilities there.

John, I'll leave Ron to you now.  I seem to simply be repeating myself
about the distinction between radial structure and visible rings from
seasonal differences in growth and he doesn't get it.

Frankly, I think his example of the baseball bat shows that rings
WEAKen the wood, producing directions along which it can easily split.
But that is another story.-

I don't think you can defend that because there is no direction to the
rings. They are radial. Do you know what that means? No matter
which direction the lateral force is coming from the rings are in a
better position than if they were uniformly parallel. Not only that,
but they have a solid core backing, and until the core rots and the
structure has a better chance of failing.

If you don't get the baseball bat example have someone else explain it
to you.

The structural failure occurs mostly in the weaker section of the ring
layers. That is true, but if you didn't have the rings it would all
be "weaker" and you would not have the lateral force advantage.

Ron Okimoto

.

Loading