Overturned Beliefs: North American Geology in Question

Creationism News – April 2013创造论新闻 – 2013年4月 Dedicated to David Coppedge who sacrificed his career as the Head Systems Administrator for the Cassini Spacecraft in JPL to honor the Creator of the Universe. He also spent literally thousands of hours to make his excellent websites. The contents of this presentation were taken from David Coppedge’s website http://crev.info. Pray for his fast recovery from cancer surgery. Pastor Chui http://ChristCenterGospel.org ckchui1@yahoo.com 1/1/2020 1

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • Researchers are stating that beliefs about the origin of western mountains in North America are all wrong. • In “Geologic History of North America Gets Overturned,” Live Science described how thorough the overturning was: “It’s time to redraw the map of the world during the reign of the dinosaurs, two scientists say.” The scientists, from Germany and Canada, dispute the existence of the Farallon Plate, long thought to give rise to the Rocky Mountains. Instead, they posit an archipelago, such as those in the South Pacific, instead of a continental margin. Finding stacked remnants is their justification for the overhaul. The new model is more complex in some ways, but also simpler, Nature News claimed in “How the West Was Built.” 1/1/2020 2

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • [Mitchell] Mihalynuk said the new model will make waves, as it overturns 40 years of accepted wisdom about the evolution of western North America. “It will take a while to turn people around. That intellectual ship has a lot of inertia,” he said. But for Mihalynuk, “this is one of those eureka moments.” 1/1/2020 3

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • If they are right, 40 years of accepted wisdom was really never wise at all. While this new model “makes perfect sense” to some, will it make sense to geologists 40 years from now? There’s room for reconsideration. The paper in Nature by Sigloch and Mihalynuk lists four areas of uncertainty and a fudge factor to make the model work: “This is accomplished by introducing an additional degree of freedom, an ad hoc, otherwise non-observable, westward shift of the lithospheric shell relative to the lower mantle.” 1/1/2020 4

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • In a Perspective article in Nature, Saskia Goes said, “The tectonic history of western North America is a puzzle in which many of the pieces are mashed up or missing.” Although she believes the new seismic image data alters the reconstruction of the pieces, she described the observational data as complex: “The western margin of the North American continent, comprising the Cordilleran mountain chain that runs from Alaska to Mexico, consists of scores of continental jigsaw pieces of different origins, sizes and ages.” 1/1/2020 5

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • Goes made it clear that the new model is not fixed in stone. “Sigloch and Mihalynuk have incorporated several new pieces into the North American jigsaw, but others remain to be placed,” she said. More modeling and interpretation will be required. “The new pieces remain to be connected into a self-consistent framework of plates with continuous and dynamically evolving boundaries,” she added, implying that the model is not self-consistent yet. Her piece ended with a number of remaining questions. 1/1/2020 6

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • Nothing in historical geology is ever as clean cut as the popular media would lead you to believe. They give the impression of progress: the new model is superior to the old. Is it necessarily? When you are dealing with scores of “jigsaw pieces” without the box cover to show you what they are supposed to look like, and no human observer around to watch what really happened, there is ample room for another overturn in the future. 1/1/2020 7

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • There is also ample room for alternative theories with different assumptions or different ad hoc, non-observable fudge factors. Some philosophers even claim an infinite number of theories can explain the same observations. However stated, theories and models like this are always “underdetermined” by data. It means that a measure of divination is required to conjure an appropriate vision that suits the preferences of the day. 1/1/2020 8

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • Overhauls also remind us that the consensus is often wrong. Forty years of false belief is what these two upstart geologists have to allege by overturning the old model: forty years of “accepted wisdom” that was foolish in their view. The new accepted wisdom awaits future self-proclaimed wise men ready to upset the applecart all over again. 1/1/2020 9

North American Geology All Wrong所有北美地质学是错误 • This is accomplished by introducing an additional degree of freedom, an ad hoc, otherwise non-observable, westward shift of the lithospheric shell relative to the lower mantle. 1/1/2020 10

Gloria Deo 愿荣耀归上帝 1/1/2020 11

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Some of the most unlikely creatures are making headlines because of their potential for advancing technology. • Hagfish clothing: Yuck! Hagfish, marine creatures without jaws, look like something out of a horror movie. When attacked, they disgorge gobs of sticky slime from glands on the sides of their bodies. You can see the goop in a photo on the BBC News, with its surprising headline, “Hagfish slime: The clothing of the future?” Strange as it seems, Canadian researchers see wealth creation in the slime. 1/1/2020 12

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • When its fibers get stretched out, they become soft and silky, like lycra or nylon, but renewable. “Scientists believe hagfish slime or similar proteins could be turned into tights or breathable athletic wear, or even bullet-proof vests.” Other amazing facts: a four-foot hagfish can contain hundreds of kilometers of slime threads. The silky threads bear resemblance to spider silk, even though the creatures are unrelated. A hagfish fossil said to be 330 million years old already had the slime-making technology. 1/1/2020 13

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Wet gecko adhesion: Previous biomimetics entries (8/27/02, 12/06/06, 8/16/12) have described gecko toes’ amazing adhesive properties. Now, according to National Geographic, the next challenge is understanding how the toes continue to adhere when wet—even underwater (cf.10/18/10). Researchers at the University of Akron, publishing in PNAS, are taking up the challenge. It’s all theory at this stage, but they feel, “Our findings provide insight into how geckos may function in wet environments and also have significant implications for the development of a synthetic gecko mimic that retains adhesion in water.” A press release from the university described how they harnessed geckos to tease out the secrets of their clingy wet feet. 1/1/2020 14

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Dragonfly copter: Festo, the company that developed the SmartBird flying robot that resembles a seagull (see 3/28/11), now has a robotic four-wing helicopter called the Bionic Opter that resembles a dragonfly (see press release with video clip). It’s lightweight, highly integrated, and has 13 degrees of freedom for complex flight maneuvers. Substantially larger than the insect, it is operated by a wireless remote control. Festo claims it has “mastered the highly complex flight characteristics of the dragonfly,” but theirs cannot yet lay eggs and hatch babies. “Just like its model in nature, this ultralight flying object can fly in all directions, hover in mid-air and glide without beating its wings.” 1/1/2020 15

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Speaking of dragonflies, they are becoming popular subjects for wildlife watchers, Live Science says. A blog post from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service described how these insects (neither dragons nor flies) are garnering a “swelling fan base” – • “You might call dragonflies the stunt pilors [sic] of the insect world. They wear flashy colors, dart at speeds of up to 30 miles per hour, boast ancestors that predate dinosaurs … and they even mate in mid-air.” 1/1/2020 16

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Dragonflies are harmless to humans and are also conveniently active in the daytime, making them attractive subjects for watching, with their jewel-like wings and bright colors. “Dragonfly festivals are popping up across the country and a crop of new field guides are making the rounds around American towns and cities,” the blog said. National wildlife refuges, like 4 listed in the blog, are excellent places for viewing them. More interesting facts: dragonflies have almost 360° vision, they keep mosquitoes at bay, and they are indicators of clean water. 1/1/2020 17

Of Hagfish, Geckos and Dragonflies 盲鳗，壁虎和蜻蜓 • Biomimetic Briefs: From ear to smartphone app (Medical Xpress); from jellyfish to seafloor mapper (Live Science); from squid beak to medical implants (PhysOrg). • What’s not to love about the biomimetics revolution? It’s turning people’s attention back to the wonderful designs in nature; it’s promising advances in technology to improve our lives; and it’s 100% Darwin-free. Turn your kid onto dragonflies. Take a nature walk where they are likely to be found. Teachable moment: explain to him or her that if something works, it isn’t by accident. Numerous technical constraints have to be satisfied for flight. When the flight is superb, as with dragonflies, you know the technical design is even more superb. Then wow the kids with the fact that some fossil dragonflies had wingspans over two feet! 1/1/2020 18

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Planetary origin theories come across as popular and charismatic, till some little moon pops off and says, “Yoo-hoo! Remember me?” • Io, Io; It’s Not So Long Ago • Jupiter’s volcanic moon Io is a pain in the astronomical dating game. Imagine if similar-sized Earth’s moon were carrying on like that; it would be a fireworks show every night, keeping scientists awake wondering how it stays active. Planetary modelers have had a hard time figuring out Io’s heat source (and how long it could last) since Voyager revealed the eruptions in 1979; and no, tidal flexing is not sufficient. Now, some NASA and ESA scientists say the volcanoes are “all wrong” – the volcanoes are in the wrong places from where models say they should be. 1/1/2020 20

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • A press release from NASA Goddard opens with a dramatic image from the New Horizons flyby in 2007, showing a huge plume at Io’s north pole in action. If the tidal flexing models worked, the expected volcanic action should be 30 to 60 degrees east of where it actually is. “We found a systematic eastward offset between observed and predicted volcano locations that can’t be reconciled with any existing solid body tidal heating models,” Christopher Hamilton (U of Maryland) said. 1/1/2020 21

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • “Possibilities to explain the offset include a faster than expected rotation for Io, an interior structure that permits magma to travel significant distances from where the most heating occurs to the points where it is able erupt on the surface, or a missing component in existing tidal heating models, like fluid tides from an underground magma ocean, according to the team.” 1/1/2020 22

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Each of those possibilities seems a stretch, except for the admission something might be missing in their models. Another possibility is that their starting assumptions are wrong. None of the discussion dealt with how this heating could persist for 4.5 billion years – a time period so long, Io would have disgorged its entire mass 40 times over by now (CEH 09/27/2002, Science), in addition to losing mass to a torus around Jupiter at the rate of a ton a second–that would amount to 145 quadrillion tons over 4.5 billion years. And if Io has a magma ocean and magnetic field, as the article said scientists are tending to believe, keeping that ocean liquified for billions of years is another serious issue. 1/1/2020 23

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • The article tried to distract attention from these problems by briefly titillating onlookers with thoughts of life at Europa or Enceladus. But when pressed, the scientists tried another tack: pride in ignorance: • “The unexpected eastward offset of the volcano locations is a clue that something is missing in our understanding of Io,” says Hamilton. “In a way, that’s our most important result. Our understanding of tidal heat production and its relationship to surface volcanism is incomplete. The interpretation for why we have the offset and other statistical patterns we observed is open, but I think we’ve enabled a lot of new questions, which is good.” 1/1/2020 24

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Readers who had faith in scientific “understanding” may be taken aback by this statement. Here, after over 30 years of knowledge of Io’s volcanism, and centuries of understanding about planetary motion and the behavior of heat, more questions have emerged than answers. Live Science discussed this “mystery” with its “surprising conclusions” that the “Volcanoes on Jupiter’s Moon Io Are All Wrong.” Correction: the volcanoes are what they are. It’s only the scientific interpretation that could possibly be all wrong. Much of the mystery is resolved instantly if Io is not that old. 1/1/2020 25

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Deep trouble at Enceladus • Another embarrassing erupter is Saturn’s little moon Enceladus. It has one thousandth the mass of Io and is subject to far less tidal friction. Universe Today leaked something that was revealed at the Lunar and Planetary Science conference in Houston last month. It appears that the salty water jets blasting out of the moon’s south pole reach all the way to an interior ocean. Scientists think that the ocean lies under 10 kilometers of ice. 1/1/2020 26

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • “Where the jets are getting their supply of liquid water has been a question scientists have puzzled over for years. Is friction caused by tidal stresses heating the insides of the stripes, which melts the ice and shoots it upwards? Or do the fissures actually extend all the way down through Enceladus’ crust to a subsurface ocean of liquid water, and through tidal pressure pull vapor and ice up to the surface? • Researchers are now confident that the latter is the case.” 1/1/2020 27

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • No longer can researchers assume, therefore, that the eruptions are a near-surface phenomenon. The heat source reaches deep into the moon, implying melting on a vaster scale that requires even more heat. • “In a presentation at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference titled “How the Jets, Heat and Tidal Stresses across the South Polar Terrain of Enceladus Are Related” (see the PDF here) Cassini scientists note that the amount of heating due to tidal stress seen along Enceladus’ tiger stripes isn’t nearly enough to cause the full spectrum of heating observed, and the “hot spots” that have been seen don’t correlate with the type of heating caused by shear friction.” 1/1/2020 28

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • The heat must be “carried upwards along with the pressurized water vapor from the subsurface sea, warming the areas around individual vents as well as serving to keep their channels open.” You don’t say. How long has that been going on? They didn’t say. 1/1/2020 29

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Color Divination Keeps the Faith • Meanwhile, other planetary scientists found a new story line to keep the Saturn system old. A JPL press release turned public attention to a homey analogy. “Saturn Is Like an Antiques Shop, Cassini Suggests; Moons and Rings Date Back to Solar System’s Birth.” Perhaps so, if that birth were recent; but no, they mean billions of years. Apparently they don’t want to devalue their antiques. 1/1/2020 30

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Gianrico Filacchione from Italy did some divination with colors on the rings and moons and concluded that the Saturn system is old. One myth can lead to another. Since the little F-ring shepherd moon Prometheus has a similar color to the rings, Bonnie Buratti added to the story. “Scientists had been wondering whether ring particles could have stuck together to form moons — since the dominant theory was that the rings basically came from satellites being broken up,” she said, preparing the reader for a dramatic turnaround. “The coloring gives us some solid proof that it can work the other way around, too.” Solid proof has a nice-sounding ring of certainty to it. If it “can” work the other way around, why, then, it must have. 1/1/2020 31

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • The press release conveniently left out any discussion of how long the Enceladus eruption affair has been going on. The handlers of these aberrant moons know their job: mitigate the bad news by controlling the focus of attention. 1/1/2020 32

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Divination, distraction, domination. That’s how the scientific guild maintains its grab on public trust. Divination: One cannot look at color and come up with an age. The article even said that the deposits from the geyser spray and dust from asteroids is only skin deep. Does that sound like it’s been going on for billions of years? Distraction: Let’s not talk about the age of these things; let’s talk about life! If there’s water going out of this moon, maybe it produced the “ingredients for life” or could “support life.” Domination: Just state the party line boldly and repeatedly. That should be enough to keep the peasants from doubting the experts’ “understanding” of how things came to be. After all, they’re scientists – the knowers of the culture. It would be very upsetting for the knowers not to know. 1/1/2020 33

Bimbo Eruptions in the Solar System 宾博爆发在太阳系 • Note to secularists: Our criticisms here are not with the observational data. We love observational data; more power to the champion observers and data collectors of the Cassini team. The criticisms are directed at interpretations that violate the evidence: interpretations that insist on billions of years of undirected natural processes producing planets, life, and human brains possessing the audacity to imagine their own undesigned brains being capable of assessing true knowledge. 1/1/2020 34

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • Why is it that scientists need to investigate “the evolutionary origins” of anything humans do? • An article on PhysOrg, “The Origins of Laughter,” begins, • “We know the benefits of laughter on health. But why do we laugh? What are the evolutionary origins of laughter and humour? Steven Légaré has asked these questions and has made them the subject of his master’s thesis, which he recently submitted to the Université de Montréal’s Department of Anthropology. • “Science provides few answers to these questions other than in psychology and neuroscience. From the perspective of anthropology, laughter and humour are often overlooked. However, it is a serious subject,” says the recent graduate.” 1/1/2020 36

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • Before chuckling at the idea of laughter as a serious subject, let’s see what Steve came up with. It’s not enough to say, “laughter and humour exist in all cultures and times.” Nor is it enough to describe the different kinds of laughter, or say, “sense of humour varies considerably from one individual to another.” What’s Darwin got to do with it? 1/1/2020 37

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • “What then is the primary function of laughter and humour? “Communication principally,” says Légaré. “But it was not until the evolution of language that verbal humour could be involved in the process of socialization. Such humour is impossible if we have little mastery of language.” 1/1/2020 38

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • Steve is still not there. If language was designed, humor has a function and makes sense. How could language or humor arise by unguided natural processes? To distinguish the origin of laughter from intelligent design, Steve needs to describe its origin by natural selection without reference to purpose or function. 1/1/2020 39

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • The article is accompanied by a photo of a capuchin monkey appearing to make a laughing face. • “As in case of the vocalizations of apes in response to tickling, the primary function of laughter was to communicate an intention to play or indicate a desire to continue play in progress. The evolution of laughter and humour was marked by three distinct adaptations: acquisition of a theory of mind; language evolution; and recognition of incongruities in symbolic representations.” 1/1/2020 40

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • As if by magic, we suddenly see three distinct adaptations. Where did they come from? “Theory of mind” refers to the ability to ascribe intentions to another. If monkeys can do that, why do we have to believe they got it by evolution? Maybe they were designed to do that. “Language evolution” is a classic case of question begging. One cannot answer the question, “How did language evolve?” by saying, “By language evolution.” And symbolic representation is a distinctly human quality. Steve’s answer is filled with “intention,” “function” and “communication” that are hallmarks of design, not evolution. 1/1/2020 41

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • “To reach this conclusion, the researcher analyzed five evolutionary theories about laughter and humour: social manipulation, socialization, sexual selection, honest signalling, and emotional contagion. The researcher extracted predictions he then compared to empirical work from various disciplines, including ethnology, psychology, and neurobiology. 1/1/2020 42

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • “In conclusion, he proposed an evolutionary scenario that reconciles the various theories discussed. “In the 3,000 publications listed in a recent bibliographic guide on the psychology of laughter and humour, the words “Darwin” and “evolution” appear only four and two times, respectively, while the concept of natural selection is completely absent,” says Légaré. “The transcultural recurrence of laughter and humour and the facial expressions with which they are associated nevertheless suggest a certain genetic determination.” 1/1/2020 43

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • All of the highlighted words above imply intelligent design: analyzing, comparing, concluding, proposing, suggesting. They refer to immaterial things like theories, concepts and disciplines. By his own admission, the 3,000 publications he searched for the origin of laughter did not use “natural selection” at all. Should he not have concluded that laughter emerged by a non-Darwinian process? • The article detoured into two types of laughter, and suggested they had different evolutionary histories. That doubles the problem for Steve. 1/1/2020 44

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • In the end, his “research” into the “origin” of laughter devolved into a mere opinion: • “In his opinion, it is likely that the capacity for humour was influenced by the effect of sexual selection. As such, the expression of humour functioned during human evolution as an indicator of fitness. Once developed, verbal humour gradually gained in sophistication and complexity, which illustrates its remarkable cultural variability today.” 1/1/2020 45

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • Steve did not explain how “likely” his “opinion” was, how humor “developed,” or to what extent sexual selection “influenced” laughter. Did Neanderthal men tell dumb blonde jokes in the cave? Did Homo erectus women laugh at the men’s dangling participles? How, exactly, did this indicate fitness? Was it by the other sex’s ability to take a joke? • It’s not known whether the thesis advisor wrote “A” or “LOL” on Steve’s paper. 1/1/2020 46

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • You have to admit that evolutionists are funny. Read our evolutionary humor page and see if you evolve more sophistication and complexity. We intelligently designed it to do that. 1/1/2020 47

Laughing Matters 笑的事项 • For more funnies in evolutionary anthropology, see 9/08/12, “Evolution Funnies”; 7/08/12, “Eats Shoots and Leaves”; and 6/10/12, “Myth Busters: Flubs in Evolutionary Anthropology.” For more on the evolution of laughter, see 6/08/09 “Tickle Me Darwin”;5/02/06, “The Evolution of Slapstick”; and 11/22/05, “On the Origin of Hee-Hees by Natural Selection.” • The “Dream Dream Dream” song at the end of the 1/30/13 entry makes a nice encore to this story. 1/1/2020 48

The Hunt for Selection in the Genes 寻找基因的选择 • One might think that 154 years after Darwin’s book about it, natural selection would be empirically obvious. The journal Nature went on a search for it in DNA. • Nature’s piece, “Evolutionary Genomics: Detecting Selection” begins with hopes and worries: • “Advances in population genetics and genome sequencing have made it possible to identify anonymous fragments of DNA that have undergone selection. This yields some evolutionary answers, and a panoply of puzzles.” 1/1/2020 50

Overturned Beliefs: North American Geology in Question