Damned / Rejected Science (Miscellaneous)

[feen5]

As I understand the theory, the continental plates do not subduct, but raft across subduction zones. Even if I'm wrong about this, subduction would surely destroy any coal.

The lighter oceanic plates are subducted under the heavier continental plates. Because the coal is formed from decaying vegetation the coal is formed on the heavier continental plates and as a result they will not be subducted and destroyed instead they will be lifted up as the continental plate is pushed up at the subduction zone. Other coal seams are simply exposed by erosion.

The world around us and the solar system outside show huge amounts of evidence for catastrophism and the coal is just one example

Of course the world and the solar system show evidence of catastorphism, the solar system would not exist without it. All the planets are formed from the coalescence of the original solar dust. The sun accounts for 99.9% of the total matter in the solar system. The planets themselves formed from the same particales eventually coalescing into larger planetisimals. One of these eventually dominates an orbit around the sun and hoovers up all the material in the orbit to form a planet. Other forms of this catastrophism in the solar system are comet and asteroid impacts. If a upernovae went off close enough to us it would destroy us. On Earth major volcanic eruptions and earthquakes are also catastrophic events. But where on earth do you get coal as a catastrophic event. Coal is formed by the compaction of decayed vegetation over millions of years, hardly catastrophic.
Yes catastrophic events occur but the wandering Venus is certainly not one of them. There is no evidence for for it, none.

In the north there is an island made of nothing but bones and vegetable and and animal remains frozen together. Huge areas of the Canadian permafrost are a “muck” of animal and vegetable remains and the same in Siberia. In India there are hills made almost entirely of bones of the last geological period

Can you supply me with the name of this Island please, i have an interest in palentology and i'm aware of mass fossil beds such as the tar pits of La Brea in LA, the Burgess Shlaes in Canada, the Hell Creek formation in Montana and the Flinders Range fossil beds of South Australia but iv'e never heard of 'an island made up nothing but bones and vegetable remains frozen together'. And anyway what has any of this got to do with the passing of Venus and Velikivsky. Large numbers of animal fossils are found together in varioous places around the world and they have nothing to do with your idea Venus transits so why mention them.

 

[Stormkhan]

Everyone knows it's where the Ancient Ones swept up the remains after the cataclysm. They didn't have a rug they could brush 'em under so they thought to hide it under permafrost.

 

[wembley8]

Well, it depends who you read and if they were there at the time. I have already posted stuff on the symposium that was fixed not in Velikovskys favour

Even he admitted that the 'hot Venus' theory predated his work. You still seem reluctant to.

 

[wembley8]

During earthquakes fissures open and close in the surface of the earth. This earthquake was worldwide and the oceans were in turmoil. You may as well ask why there is coal under the sea, or indeed why there are deep coal mines on land. How did coal, that's supposedly from trees get to be a mile underground?

Coal formed tens of millions of years agao certainly can be explained (see above) - but that's hardlty relevant.

What you're not explaining is how oil could find its way underwater 3,500 years ago when it floats. Any thoughts?

 

[almond13]

Hi feen
Can you supply me with the name of this Island please, i have an interest in palentology and i'm aware of mass fossil beds such as the tar pits of La Brea in LA, the Burgess Shlaes in Canada, the Hell Creek formation in Montana and the Flinders Range fossil beds of South Australia but iv'e never heard of 'an island made up nothing but bones and vegetable remains frozen together'. And anyway what has any of this got to do with the passing of Venus and Velikivsky. Large numbers of animal fossils are found together in varioous places around the world and they have nothing to do with your idea Venus transits so why mention them.

This has everything to do with the “Venus Transits” as your interest in paliontology will tell you; that everything has a date and the dates of the examples are consistent with the transits. The obvious exception being Mars where cosmic dates are up for grabs anyway. For the earth, the dates fit with the ancient documents and also the dates fit with scientific dating. I don't think that there is any other source? As modern science has an aversion to ancient documents, I find Velikovsky's version more reliable and wider in scope.
The Ivory Islands are referenced by Corliss as “Whitley, D Gath; “The Ivory Islands in the Arctic Ocean”, Victoria Institute Journal of the Transactions 42:35, 1909. Also Liakoff's Island. These islands are situated north of Siberia.

All of these old scientific discoveries are downplayed by modern science because of the old uniformitarian fear of providing evidence for the flood. This has now been replaced with fear of supporting Velikovsky's theories. More than half a century after his books were written there is sill a need, it seems, for cover-up and I find this both remarkable and extremely unscientific.

I see that you admit that there is no subduction of continental plates and this is good – we seem to be getting somewhere at last. Now all we need is an explanation of how the coal got to be a mile underground?

 

[almond13]

Even he admitted that the 'hot Venus' theory predated his work. You still seem reluctant to.

Yes he did, and I posted the quote on page 19. It is also abundantly clear that the theory was rejected and resuscitated when it was convenient. Velikovsky clearly states that he used no ones else's work, but was aware of it and also aware that it had been debunked.

What you're not explaining is how oil could find its way underwater 3,500 years ago when it floats. Any thoughts?

The coal certainly is relevant as the two questions are about the same thing.
The presence of coal a mile underground has never been explained except by fudging as feen tried to do.
The oil in continental shelves can be explained in terms that are easily available as part of science and history. The sea level rose after the last glacial period and if you track this back you will find that most oil bearing areas were not under water at the time of deposition. As I recall, the North sea was dry land with a river running down the centre? It is a recent historical fact that Cardigan Bay, Wales has sunk beneath the waves in recent times and also parts of the east coast. The names of submerged towns are known in many cases. The oil didn't need to float.

The end of the “Ice Age” has been controversial for as long as I can remember.
I suggest that you look at things like the erosion of the Falls at Niagara and such; many estimates fit very nicely with the Velikovsky scenario.

 

[stu neville]

What you're not explaining is how oil could find its way underwater 3,500 years ago when it floats. Any thoughts?

The coal certainly is relevant as the two questions are about the same thing.
The presence of coal a mile underground has never been explained except by fudging as feen tried to do.

Speaking personally, it doesn't strike me as fudging in the slightest.

The oil in continental shelves can be explained in terms that are easily available as part of science and history. The sea level rose after the last glacial period and if you track this back you will find that most oil bearing areas were not under water at the time of deposition. As I recall, the North sea was dry land with a river running down the centre?

IIRC it was more marshy and boggy, rather like the fens and Netherlands would still be were it not for the rhines. Dry land is a relative concept. As for the river running through it, we're talking more Amazon estuary or Nile Delta than a picturesque backwater. A lot of water.

It is a recent historical fact that Cardigan Bay, Wales has sunk beneath the waves in recent times and also parts of the east coast. The names of submerged towns are known in many cases. The oil didn't need to float

Can I ask what this has got to do with the question in hand? Are you claiming that submerged communities somehow have something to do with subterranean or submarine oil?

The end of the “Ice Age” has been controversial for as long as I can remember.

Only to a point - in geological terms, a hundred thousand years is two shakes of a lamb's tail. In that context, most of the estimates are of the very small hair-splitting variety. Added to which, most authorities seem to agree that ice ages happen relatively often.

I suggest that you look at things like the erosion of the Falls at Niagara and such; many estimates fit very nicely with the Velikovsky scenario.

Or, playing Devil's Advocate, did Velikovsky fashion his scenario to fit the estimates?

Discuss .

 

[eburacum]

The presence of coal a mile underground has never been explained except by fudging as feen tried to do.

The science of stratigraphy is one of the oldest in geology; are you suggesting that there is anything about the Carboniferous succession that is not understood? If that were so, then geologists working for coal-mining companies must be working under innumerable misapprehensions.

I nearly went down that route to become a coal-board rock jockey myself at one point- a decade or so before the collapse of the coal-mining industry in the UK. Lucky I didn't, in some ways.

And concerning oil bearing rocks; geologists look for anticlinal strata forming domes and other stratigraphic traps which are covered in impermeable strata; those strata are essential for the existence of an oil reserve, as oil would otherwise rise to the surface and be lost. Far from sinking into the ground, oil is forever rising to escape. And the existence of such a statigraphic trap and capping impermeable layer precludes any oil from descending from above.

Sorry, Mr V; the professional geologists who have to learn this stuff in order to successfully find fossil fuels are well aware that the mechanisms you proposed are unworkable.

 

[feen5]

I see that you admit that there is no subduction of continental plates and this is good – we seem to be getting somewhere at last. Now all we need is an explanation of how the coal got to be a mile underground?

I see your trying to twist things to make it look like i'm somehow coming around to your way of thinking. It is the oceaninc plates that are pushed under (subducted) under the heavier continental plates. The continental plates are pushed up to form mountain ranges. As for the coal i'll refer you to the answers Stuneveille, Wembly and Eburacum have given in responce to your ridiculous attacks.

 

[wembley8]

It is also abundantly clear that the theory was rejected and resuscitated when it was convenient.

Only to you

The sea level rose after the last glacial period and if you track this back you will find that most oil bearing areas were not under water at the time of deposition. As I recall, the North sea was dry land with a river running down the centre? ...The oil didn't need to float.

3500 years ago the North Sea was dry land? I'd like to see some evidence for that! And every other undersea oil field as well? This just gets less and less plausible - you/Velikovsky just extend and extend to fill in the gaping gaps. This looks far more like rejecting inconvenient evidence than anything conventional scientists do.

 

[eburacum]

Here is a nice map of the North Sea during the last glaciation, 18000 years ago; the rivers are arranged rather differently in this map to other reconstructions, but still, a nice image...
http://www.sogaer.ex.ac.uk/archaeology/ ... erland.jpg

But the North Sea was underwater by 3500 b.p, as Wembly says.

 

[almond13]

Hi stu
For a little light relief:
Rene Descartes was sitting in a pub late one night long ago, finishing a last glass of wine. The publican said to him, "Will you have one more for the road, Professor?" Descartes responded, "I think not," upon which, 'Poof', he promptly disappeared.

OK, back to business:
“”Speaking personally, it doesn't strike me as fudging in the slightest. “”

Both the coal and the oil appear to be the result of catastrophism. In the case of the coal we need an explanation as to how it got so deeply into the ground, while accepting the current paradigm. I have said that the oil seeped into fissures that were the result of the Velikovsky scenario, with the close encounter of Venus.The earth's crust was cracked and convulsing and, to me this does not cause a problem with seepage. However, the whole of Velikovsky's theory is shocking to all of us exposed to years of uniformitarianistic conditioning – it was to me when I first read it. If you read “Mankind in Amnesia” the man admits this himself.

“”IIRC it was more marshy and boggy, rather like the fens and Netherlands would still be were it not for the rhines. Dry land is a relative concept. As for the river running through it, we're talking more Amazon estuary or Nile Delta than a picturesque backwater. A lot of water. “”

Again, huge cracks in the continental shelf and oil is often, if not always accompanied by water.

“”Can I ask what this has got to do with the question in hand? Are you claiming that submerged communities somehow have something to do with subterranean or submarine oil?””

No, just proof that lands submerge even in recent historical times. The question that I was answering was about how oil got to be underwater.

“”Only to a point - in geological terms, a hundred thousand years is two shakes of a lamb's tail. In that context, most of the estimates are of the very small hair-splitting variety. Added to which, most authorities seem to agree that ice ages happen relatively often. “”

I have seen some very recent estimates for the start of the erosion of Niagara and I'm talking about in the last three and a half to seven thousand years. Ancient maps show Britain glaciated. See The Path of the Pole and Maps of the Ancient Sea Kings, Hapgood.

“”Or, playing Devil's Advocate, did Velikovsky fit his scenario to fit the estimates? “”

Yes, I suppose we all do that. In Velikovsky's case I would say not, because his critics would have used the it to beat him with in the last half century plus. You are the first one that I know of to use that particular argument, although he was accused of tapping sources from the old catastrophists. He answered all this, to my satisfaction at least.
My own interest, comes from not finding much from his accusers that stands up to close scrutiny. Although he did make mistakes the overall theory still stands today, although you wouldn't think so with the catastrophic deluge from others, he can hardly be heard for the noise.

 

[feen5]

Its funny you mentioning amnesia seen as how it has been pointed out to you on several occasions that the coal is formed over millions of years and you continue to ignore that fact.
Can you please tell me how the formation of coal over millions of years is a catastrophic event. A catastrophic event by its very nature would not occur over a protracted period of time (especially millions of years) now would it.
Also can the coal, which has formed over millions of years, be formed by your transit of Venus 3,500 years ago. Is this some sort of special time travelling coal?
Will you please give the blinkered conditioned science talk a rest as well its getting really really boring and unsulting to be honest. Just answer the questions and facts that several people have asked you. And by continuing to say just read the book is not an answer. You should have cold hard facts but you have not supplied any that have not been refuted by someone in this thread.

 

[almond13]

Hi eburacum
Coal lies between strata of rock and beds can sometimes be 800 feet thick. There are often no fossils in coal and it would be difficult to attribute it to any geological period. This fact also tends to throw doubt on the plant/tree origin theories.
Some coal is deposited in veins like fingers as if it were liquid when the seam formed. How does this happen?

The consensus theory is that coal measures originate as peat with successive layer building up. Alternatively, the plant/tree material is washed to it's location by river or flood; then compressed and heated.

The huge hundreds of miles extent of some coal seams casts doubt on the latter and problems with how so much vegetation managed to grow to form an 800 feet seam is a problem with the former. Plants and trees need soil and humus to grow and this is conspicuous by it's absence in coal. Laid down as strata the coal would collect dust and wind blown soil over time; this is missing. When burned, coal leaves .5-3pc ash. There is no way that successive generations could survive on that amount of soil.

Where there are fossils, most are what are called replacement fossils, with the original material replaced with some mineral not associated with coal. A few fossils are made of almost all coal. How can the plant material be replaced without destroying the structure and why did it not become coal like it's surroundings?
How do polystrate trees manage to penetrate coal and other strata without rotting or losing integrity?
According to T Gold, It's not unusual to find lumps of carbonate rock within a coal seam. “Inside these rocks is found uncoalified wood of a light colour”. So much for the heating?

“”And concerning oil bearing rocks;””
I think that you've answered your own question with this one. You don't seem to recall that the earth was cracked and that these cracks closed applying pressure to the oil.
As far as I can tell, the conversion process from organic material to oil as per theory, is not understood.

 

[eburacum]

Plants and trees need soil and humus to grow and this is conspicuous by it's absence in coal.

They grow perfectly well in peat; a trip to Wicken fen would demonstrate that quite well.
http://www.wicken.org.uk/
The top layer of the fen is humus-like in composition, but soil is not necessary. Wind blown soil inclusion would only happen in dry conditions, and deposition would be concentrated around the edge of the area of Carboniferous forest; of course many coals do contain plenty of wind-blown soil and are therefore less economically attractive for mining. If only such perfect seams as you describe could be found more often; but many are far from grit-free.

The conditions on the Earth during the Carboniferous were very different to those on our planet today; the oxygen level was perhaps 15% higher, and vast forest fires were only prevented by waterlogged forests of fire-resistant species, none of which are extant today. I've found fossils in coal flat as a pancake, just as would be expected in compressed peat. No flowing material would have caused such a preservation.

 

[eburacum]

“”And concerning oil bearing rocks;””
I think that you've answered your own question with this one. You don't seem to recall that the earth was cracked and that these cracks closed applying pressure to the oil.

I'd like to see any process which could force oil (and gas! )underground into cracked receptacles, which then close up and seal that oil in, all against the natural bouyancy of oil in water. And many of those receptacles have no sign of cracking, otherwise the oil and gas would have escaped long ago. No; sorry; not a feasible scenario at all.

The Late Tom Gold suggested instead that oil came from deep underground, filling the stratigraphic traps from underneath. A more sensible suggestion, except that isotope analysis of oil and the presence of 'biomarkers' is apparently consistent with an archaic surface origin. This of course also rules out Velikovsky's idea too.

 

[eburacum]

Here is a point-by point dismissal of Gold's ideas by Dr Jon Clarke
from here
http://www.oilempire.us/abiotic.html

The fact remains that the abiotic theory of petroleum genesis has zero credibility for economically interesting accumulations. 99.9999% of the world's liquid hydrocarbons are produced by maturation of organic matter derived from organisms. To deny this means you have to come up with good explanations for the following observations.
1) The almost universal association of petroleum with sedimentary rocks.
2) The close link between petroleum reservoirs and source rocks as shown by biomarkers (the source rocks contain the same organic markers as the petroleum, essentially chemically fingerprinting the two).
3) The consistent variation of biomarkers in petroleum in accordance with the history of life on earth (biomarkers indicative of land plants are found only in Devonian and younger rocks, that formed by marine plankton only in Neoproterozoic and younger rocks, the oldest oils containing only biomarkers of bacteria).
3) The close link between the biomarkers in source rock and depositional environment (source rocks containing biomarkers of land plants are found only in terrestrial and shallow marine sediments, those indicating marine conditions only in marine sediments, those from hypersaline lakes containing only bacterial biomarkers).
4) Progressive destruction of oil when heated to over 100 degrees (precluding formation and/or migration at high temperatures as implied by the abiogenic postulate).
5) The generation of petroleum from kerogen on heating in the laboratory (complete with biomarkers), as suggested by the biogenic theory.
6) The strong enrichment in C12 of petroleum indicative of biological fractionation (no inorganic process can cause anything like the fractionation of light carbon that is seen in petroleum).
7) The location of petroleum reservoirs down the hydraulic gradient from the source rocks in many cases (those which are not are in areas where there is clear evidence of post migration tectonism).
8 ) The almost complete absence of significant petroleum occurrences in igneous and metamorphic rocks (the rare exceptions discussed below).
The evidence usually cited in favour of abiogenic petroleum can all be better explained by the biogenic hypothesis e.g.:
9) Rare traces of cooked pyrobitumens in igneous rocks (better explained by reaction with organic rich country rocks, with which the pyrobitumens can usually be tied).
10) Rare traces of cooked pyrobitumens in metamorphic rocks (better explained by metamorphism of residual hydrocarbons in the protolith).
11) The very rare occurrence of small hydrocarbon accumulations in igneous or metamorphic rocks (in every case these are adjacent to organic rich sedimentary rocks to which the hydrocarbons can be tied via biomarkers).
12) The presence of undoubted mantle derived gases (such as He and some CO2) in some natural gas (there is no reason why gas accumulations must be all from one source, given that some petroleum fields are of mixed provenance it is inevitable that some mantle gas contamination of biogenic hydrocarbons will occur under some circumstances).
13) The presence of traces of hydrocarbons in deep wells in crystalline rock (these can be formed by a range of processes, including metamorphic synthesis by the fischer-tropsch reaction, or from residual organic matter as in 10).
14) Traces of hydrocarbon gases in magma volatiles (in most cases magmas ascend through sedimentary succession, any organic matter present will be thermally cracked and some will be incorporated into the volatile phase, some fischer-tropsch synthesis can also occur).
15) Traces of hydrocarbon gases at mid ocean ridges (such traces are not surprising given that the upper mantle has been contaminated with biogenic organic matter through several billion years of subduction, the answer to 14 may be applicable also).
The geological evidence is utterly against the abiogenic postulate.
Cheers
Jon Clarke

And many of these points apply to Velikovsky's bizarre ideas too, of course.

 

[wembley8]

Both the coal and the oil appear to be the result of catastrophism.

Not to most of us...

However, the whole of Velikovsky's theory is shocking to all of us exposed to years of uniformitarianistic conditioning .

I don't think anyone is shocked, but I think most people can spot a number of glaring flaws in an instant. And I think most people are smart enough to realise that trying to use the bible as a textbook and shoehorn physics into it is a doomed if entertaining enterprise.

The question that I was answering was about how oil got to be underwater.

But you didn't answer it! Where is the evidence that the North Sea was dry land 3500 years ago? For that matter, where is the evidence that oil can end up in chambers as you suggest - wouldn't they already be full of water which oil (being less dense) cannot displace?

 

[almond13]

Plants and trees need soil and humus to grow and this is conspicuous by it's absence in coal.

They grow perfectly well in peat; a trip to Wicken fen would demonstrate that quite well.
http://www.wicken.org.uk/
The top layer of the fen is humus-like in composition, but soil is not necessary. Wind blown soil inclusion would only happen in dry conditions, and deposition would be concentrated around the edge of the area of Carboniferous forest; of course many coals do contain plenty of wind-blown soil and are therefore less economically attractive for mining. If only such perfect seams as you describe could be found more often; but many are far from grit-free.

The conditions on the Earth during the Carboniferous were very different to those on our planet today; the oxygen level was perhaps 15% higher, and vast forest fires were only prevented by waterlogged forests of fire-resistant species, none of which are extant today. I've found fossils in coal flat as a pancake, just as would be expected in compressed peat. No flowing material would have caused such a preservation.

Hi eberacum
Sorry for the delay.
What you are describing is a cow living by sucking it's own tits – there must be a source of nourishment to produce an 800 ft. seam as in Australia for instance.
“The top layer of the fen is humus-like in composition, but soil is not necessary. “
What you are proposing is that the vegetable matter of the first layer leaves enough for the formation of coal and that it also is sufficient to feed the next generation and that it's possible for this to continue ad infinitum?
Have you any notion as to exactly how much plant and tree matter is required to produce such seams?
Wind blown dust and soil are insignificant if you are speaking about the next few months, but the years during the formation of a large coal seam are another matter.
I note that you make no mention of the geological age of coal in the absence of fossil evidence. I have references that speak of some sparsely distributed fossils that are found in most coals that are only found in salt-water environments.

“”The conditions on the Earth during the Carboniferous were very different to those on our planet today; the oxygen level was perhaps 15% higher, and vast forest fires were only prevented by waterlogged forests of fire-resistant species, none of which are extant today. I've found fossils in coal flat as a pancake, just as would be expected in compressed peat. No flowing material would have caused such a preservation.””

You do not mention if the flat fossil was coalified or mineralised?

“”I'd like to see any process which could force oil (and gas! )underground into cracked receptacles, which then close up and seal that oil in, all against the natural buoyancy of oil in water. And many of those receptacles have no sign of cracking, otherwise the oil and gas would have escaped long ago. No; sorry; not a feasible scenario at all.””

Looking at this explanation I decided to Google “sedimentary rock” and use the first thing that came up – here it is:
“”For thousands, even millions of years, little pieces of our earth have been eroded--broken down and worn away
by wind and water. These little bits of our earth are washed downstream where they settle to the bottom of the rivers, lakes, and oceans. Layer after layer of eroded earth is deposited on top of each. These layers are pressed down more and more through time, until the bottom layers slowly turn into rock.”” http://www.fi.edu/fellows/fellow1/oct98 ... diment.htm
I don't think this needs comment?

“”The Late Tom Gold suggested instead that oil came from deep underground, filling the stratigraphic traps from underneath. A more sensible suggestion, except that isotope analysis of oil and the presence of 'biomarkers' is apparently consistent with an archaic surface origin. This of course also rules out Velikovsky's idea too.””

The famous “bio markers” are due to terrestrial organisms in the oil – contamination.
No mention of the bio-alchemy that turns plant matter into mineral oil?
This is typical of modern science; if you can get away with it, ignore it. I have multiple examples of this in all fields that must require a certain cognitive dissonance - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance - in order to be tolerated.

My examples using Gold were originally to show that the paradigm is not accepted by all scientists. This thread is about Velikovsky and debunking Gold is of no consequence to the argument, which still stands as far as I am concerned.

 

[almond13]

Will you please give the blinkered conditioned science talk a rest as well its getting really really boring and unsulting to be honest. Just answer the questions and facts that several people have asked you. And by continuing to say just read the book is not an answer. You should have cold hard facts but you have not supplied any that have not been refuted by someone in this thread.

Hi feen
You seem quite angry and just when I thought that I was going to make you into a real Fortean? I do answer all questions where possible, but I'm only human.
You see, scientists are just like you and me but they have to support something that says it knows everything. This causes them to exaggerate a bit and all I do is to point out the unlikely.
If you read my answers to others, you will see that I ask them to refute things and they don't.
Coal is a catastrophic event, in that it would need a catastrophe in order to collect the vast amount of vegetation required to form these coal seams. The slow build-up theory does not stand up to scrutiny

 

[almond13]

wembley8
I don't think anyone is shocked, but I think most people can spot a number of glaring flaws in an instant. And I think most people are smart enough to realise that trying to use the bible as a textbook and shoehorn physics into it is a doomed if entertaining enterprise.

I'm glad that you've hit the nail on the head; most people don't spot glaring flaws because the flaws have the stamp of science on them which is the seal of authentication.
As you seem determined to include the bible: this comment is not new and it has been pointed out that what Velikovsky did was to remove the biblical events from the supernatural and put them on a natural basis. There are many historical mentions in the bible however, with Ur of the Chaldees, Jericho and Sumer as examples.

But you didn't answer it! Where is the evidence that the North Sea was dry land 3500 years ago? For that matter, where is the evidence that oil can end up in chambers as you suggest - wouldn't they already be full of water which oil (being less dense) cannot displace?

You don't get it do you ? What is being discussed is a world-wide conflagration. The earth is split open all around the globe with quakes and tremors of unpresidented ferocity . The oceans are attracted to the pull of Venus and not in their rest position. There is heat, lightening and all manner or terrible things going on. The poles of the earth are shifting and the previously glaciated areas are moved to new locations.
Although Velikovsky does not mention polar positions I tend to think that before the first encounter the pole was situated at Hudson Bay. If you imagine this and ask what effect this would have on the oceans you must admit that moving all that ice from land to the sea would cause quite a displacement of water and the oceans would rise. This did not happen overnight and the gradual build-up of Arctic sea ice accelerated by the fluvial would raise the oceans.

You see, there is no real evidence that the north sea was under water at this time. Scientists are not good with thousands of years, only millions.

 

[eburacum]

You do not mention if the flat fossil was coalified or mineralised?

Converted to a flat layer of pyrite, as often happens.

Layer after layer of eroded earth is deposited on top of each. These layers are pressed down more and more through time, until the bottom layers slowly turn into rock.”” http://www.fi.edu/fellows/fellow1/oct98 ... diment.htm
I don't think this needs comment?

Not with you at all here. Salt dome stratigraphic traps in particular do not display cracking, if they do, the oil escapes upwards.

In fact, Gold was right in one way, the oil that fills these traps does come from underneath- but just from sedimentary rocks containing kerogen lower in the sequence. Rocks containing kerogen are at least a thousand times more widespread than rocks containing oil; as Dr Clarke points out, petroleum deposits are chemically identical to kerogen deposits, in similar rocks, so one came from the other. This means that any theory such as Velikovsky's must also explain solid, stratified kerogen deposits within shales and other sedimentary rocks. Exactly how did kerogen get into competent, unfaulted shale while remaining solid? If it was introduced via percolation, why did it choose certain strata and ignore others?

The task of explaining oil deposits as a deposition from the sky is a thousand times harder if you consider kerogen as well; Velikovsky's ideas come nowhere near any such explanation.
.

 

[eburacum]

What you are describing is a cow living by sucking it's own tits – there must be a source of nourishment to produce an 800 ft. seam as in Australia for instance.

The bulk of the biomass in the forest comes from water and CO2, not from soil. In peat formation, minerals are kept in solution in the water and recycled to feed the next generation; with the high CO2 levels available in the coal-forming periods the biomass could grow rapidly just on water and CO2 rich air. Any minerals deposited in the peat are dissolved out and used by the growing plants, leaving carbon rich material to eventually become coal.

Plants are autotrophs- they basically create their mass from sunlight, water and air, and if there is a consistent throughput of minerals, they will thrive.

 

[feen5]

Hi feen
You seem quite angry and just when I thought that I was going to make you into a real Fortean? I do answer all questions where possible, but I'm only human.
You see, scientists are just like you and me but they have to support something that says it knows everything. This causes them to exaggerate a bit and all I do is to point out the unlikely.

You thought you were going to make me a real Fortean? You think to be a fortean you have to believe the rubbish of Velikovsky without questioning it? Do you think i'm not a fortean just because i don't agree with you? What are you now a prophet of fortean studies bravely trying to convert the masses of science Zealots to your ways. At first i thought you were serious about your beliefs but now i am convinced your just here to wind people up or to have a bit of a laugh. Why else would you be so pompous and condesending. Your message to us of opening our minds to other possiblities really just turns out to be a bunch of shit when you won't allow anyone elses beliefs to be anything more than scientific delusions that the rest of us sheep are programmed to obey.

 

[almond13]

What you are describing is a cow living by sucking it's own tits – there must be a source of nourishment to produce an 800 ft. seam as in Australia for instance.

The bulk of the biomass in the forest comes from water and CO2, not from soil. In peat formation, minerals are kept in solution in the water and recycled to feed the next generation; with the high CO2 levels available in the coal-forming periods the biomass could grow rapidly just on water and CO2 rich air. Any minerals deposited in the peat are dissolved out and used by the growing plants, leaving carbon rich material to eventually become coal.

Plants are autotrophs- they basically create their mass from sunlight, water and air, and if there is a consistent throughput of minerals, they will thrive.

Ok eburacum, I can't fault your logic on this, although the huge size of the seams makes me wonder. :?

 

[almond13]

You thought you were going to make me a real Fortean? You think to be a fortean you have to believe the rubbish of Velikovsky without questioning it? Do you think i'm not a fortean just because i don't agree with you? What are you now a prophet of fortean studies bravely trying to convert the masses of science Zealots to your ways. At first i thought you were serious about your beliefs but now i am convinced your just here to wind people up or to have a bit of a laugh. Why else would you be so pompous and condesending. Your message to us of opening our minds to other possiblities really just turns out to be a bunch of shit when you won't allow anyone elses beliefs to be anything more than scientific delusions that the rest of us sheep are programmed to obey.

Hi feen.
Your memes are your own concern and I wish you well.
Velikovsky's ideas are still with us after fifty years and I've no doubt will be here in another fifty. If you want to wave him away then that's you prerogative, but I for one will stick with it until I understand. Rubbish ideas do not get the whole scientific community - knives drawn and ready to say anything in order to squash a book written by a then unknown. This treatment is reserved for exceptional heretics.
If I am pompous and condescending, it's because I do this alone on this MB and unlike you have no backing. Try it sometime.
If you put Velikovsky into your Google Alert you will find several messages a day – he's not going away. In fact there is a whole new generation who find his writings fascinating and want to know more.

 

[feen5]

Being alone in your convictions does not mean you have to be pompous and arrogent and dismiss everyone else's beliefs. Several people have already posted rebuttals of Velikovskys writings and just because i believe their sources and findings it does not mean that i am blinkered sheep. Or do you believe that we are not allowed to make up our own minds. Eburacum has already taken your coal argument apart and you yourself have just stated that

Ok eburacum, I can't fault your logic on this, although the huge size of the seams makes me wonder.

So you were bluffing your way through the argument about coal until you came up against a sound scientific reposte. This is not the first time you have done this, remember the feathered dinosaurs debate, you dismiss the archeopteryx fossil and feathered dinosaurs as a hoax and when your proved wrong and supplied with other examples of fossiled feathered dinosaurs you don't want to play any more dismissing it as to emotive an argument whatever that means.
People might be more willing to take your ideas more seriously if you could provide anything in the way of evidence to prove velikovskys theories. But time and again when the evidence you have presented has amounted to nothing more than smoke and mirrors you resort to the old line of the rest of us being blinkered by the scientific agenda.

 

[eburacum]

The large size of the seams makes me wonder too; it makes me wonder just what the coal forests with their massive lycopods and metre wide dragonflies were like. Not like our planet, that is for sure.

Incidentally the whole idea of high O2 in the Carboniferous was once itself damned science, and still has many detractors; for that matter Sagan was never accepted as a member as the National Academy of Sciences, because he too was damned by the establishment for being too controversial. The idea of damned science is certainly important, but some science is damned simply because it is wrong.

 

[almond13]

So you were bluffing your way through the argument about coal until you came up against a sound scientific reposte. This is not the first time you have done this, remember the feathered dinosaurs debate, you dismiss the archeopteryx fossil and feathered dinosaurs as a hoax and when your proved wrong and supplied with other examples of fossiled feathered dinosaurs you don't want to play any more dismissing it as to emotive an argument whatever that means.
People might be more willing to take your ideas more seriously if you could provide anything in the way of evidence to prove velikovskys theories. But time and again when the evidence you have presented has amounted to nothing more than smoke and mirrors you resort to the old line of the rest of us being blinkered by the scientific agenda.:furious: :kissers:

Feen
Are you now going to crow for weeks about my bowing to eberacum's logic? And yes it's the logic that I like and not your “sound scientific reposte”. You obviously have a very selective memory as you have to return to the “Jurassic Chicken” time and time again. If you want, I will do some research on this – but I will not be again drawn into the pathetic evo debate and all the excess baggage that comes with it. What I suggest that you do in the mean-time is to read up on geology and in particular about plate tectonics as you don't seem to be able to get your head around it even though you vehemently support it. This is the kind of hypnosis that interests me.

 

[almond13]

eberacum
The idea of damned science is certainly important, but some science is damned simply because it is wrong.

I would like to look at this but there's a long, long way to go yet with the damned.