The old thread is dead, a new one lives. Now dance, monkey boys and girls! Dance!
Pharyngula
Evolution, development, and random biological ejaculations from a godless liberal
The old thread is dead, a new one lives. Now dance, monkey boys and girls! Dance!
Bible verses served up with burgers:
@Cath #364
For someone residing in the land Up Over rather than the land Down Under, could you please explain the phrase: “chuck a little wobbly”? I like the sound of it but I would hesitate to use it without clarification. I think I know what it means, but I would hate to use it in an inappropriate context.
Also:
For what it’s worth from a noob, I agree with ‘Tis & PZ. Too much embedding = too slow page loads. (Although I am guilty of doing it once or twice myself.) Isn’t posting a link sufficient?
I too encourage restraint.
—
Owlmirror, I do run NoScript but don’t bother with FlashBlock. OTOH, I have enabled ScienceBlogs.
—
boygenius, Google should be your friend.
http://chukkawobbly.blogspot.com/
(I.e., it’s akin to spitting the dummy)
Owlmirror,
Not to be tedious, but what is this Noscript+Flashblock you speak of, and how do you implement it on FireFox?
(Again, I’m pretty much a noob when it comes to blogs, especially ones with registration services, etc.)
boygenius, in FireFox go to
Tools → Add-ons → Get Add-ons to, um, get add-ons. :)
John Morales,
*Sigh*
Yes, Google is my friend. I am spitting the dummy as we speak. Sorry for the interruption.
As you were.
http://noscript.net/
http://flashblock.mozdev.org/
All right, thanks John and Owlmirror. Now I have noscript & flashblock installed. However, I am now unable to sign in without disabling them. Don’t spoon-feed me anymore, let me tinker a bit and figure it out on my own. It’s the only way I’ll ever learn. :-)
Of the sites that noscript shows as having javascripts on Scienceblogs, the only one that I am allowing is scienceblogs.com itself.
The following are all blocked:
google-analytics.com
outbrain.com
addtoany.com
researchblogging.org
quantserve.com
postrank.com
doubleclick.net
I mention this not to spoon-feed, but out of curiosity to wonder if any other noscript users have a different configuration.
You’re welcome! I wish I had known I was playing that game!
I only forbid quantserve and doubleclick here, mainly because I couldn’t be stuffed fine-tuning, but also because I don’t want PZ to lose too many stats.
I used IE until version 8 (ptui!), relying mostly on my hosts file to avoid crud, and it’s still fairly up to date.
—
Quantserve gets stats for USA, and doubleclick is an advertisement service.
(I don’t see any ads on this site) :)
Socializing and soaking up light and vitamins, mostly… I’ve been trying to cut down on frivolous flying, but put this one down to
medicalphysiological necessity.frozen_midwest;
Thanks! I might also go here at some point.
Flashblock yes, noscript no. And I block those stat sites within FF, also google.com, even though I only allow session cookies anyway.
Lynna @ 470,
thanks for linking to that article, I dont normally read newspapers here, for a conservative paper like that that was quite an achievement !
And the comments to the article are, to say the least, encouraging !
Now Catalina I can recommend. Probably too cold for snorkelling, but they should still be selling fish tacos at the pier. Hike up into the interior–nobody else does–and you can get some amazing views.
I don’t seem to need to bother with Flashblock any more – not for quite a while.
NoScript – Turn off notifications, it is one of the reasons some people quit NoScript. (Actually, it is because they can’t be bothered to configure anything aside from their desktop themes and wallpaper.)
I had allowed researchblogging.org in the past, for some reason. Otherwise the same as Owlmirror’s forbidden list.
You just allow certain domains, which are usually obvious, if you seem to be missing expected content. (On some sites, CDNs like akamai and edgesuite must be allowed.)
AdBlockPlus is quite handy. I use it w/o importing or subscribing to pre-defined filter lists. ‘Collapse blocked elements’ is the bees knees.
That was supposed to be a possessive s. Bee’s.
I run NoScript (same configuration as Owlmirror) and because of this thread I decided to forbid youtube.com. The page loads much faster that way and if I want to see a video I just click on it.
Thanks to AdBlockPlus, I haven’t seen any ads in a while. :)
Flashblock: I don’t have it installed, but I think I will give it a try
.
re: #483
Lynna: On second thoughts, I know it’s coming to a good home. It’ll be in the mail soon as I can get to the Post Office.
As one of the biggest offenders about embedding videos, I am sorry. I will keep this in mind.
The In-N-Out Burger bible verses are found in the various ass-cracks of the packaging: appropriate, really. I’m waiting for the day when I pull the flap over and it tells me I’ve won a car!
In the meantime, make mine a double-double, no-cheese, animal-style, extra lettuce.
#474 mythusmage
Good. Now you are reading some better “stuff” we can talk a bit more.
The material of which the diagram is a part is an introduction to plate tectonics. On the front page:
http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/view.php?id=2717
you will find that it is estimated that you will need about 15 hours to study it properly so it is not a trivial one page, leaving lots of questions unanswered. It is a (small) part of a module that fits into a range of degree courses with the Open University. For a 3 year UK degree course it comes at a about second year level (hence the reference number S[for science]279). [The large majority of UK degrees are 3 years rather than the 4 years which I understand is more normal in the US.] The full module will go into more detail with audiovisual material, exercises etc. etc.
The Open University (OU) is a University based on distance learning – i.e. students live at home, carry on working (or not), have families, look after relatives etc. etc. Study is fitted into the normal day as you wish. An honours degree is 360 points. Except under unusual conditions, you are only allowed to take 120 points in a year and this is considered to be the equivalent of a third of a full time degree. You can take less – many do 30 points on some years, more on others. Currently, I am one level 3 course away from a pass degree and three level 3 courses away from an honours degree (having already got a B.Sc. in Chemistry 40+ years ago).
The OU is a major University with more students than any other in the UK. When I took the second year geology module (S260 at the time), there were over 1000 home kits sent out. This number has halved more recently but there are few Universities that can claim that they have over 500 students taking a level 2 geology course. Everybody received a quality metallurgical microscope, a set of about 30 rock specimens, about 30 mineral specimens and about 30 high quality casts of fossils (so everybody was looking at the “same” specimen). Each of the rock samples had a thin section slide to examine under the microscope. I only mention this to give you some background into what you are reading.
The OU, like any other organisation, wishes to interest potential students and also wishes to provide an educational service to UK society (and anyone else who might be interested). Part of this is the “Open Learn” Learning Space. You will find a list of all the courses available at:
http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/course/
Any or all of them are available free, no charge whatsoever.
You can do a course without anyone knowing or you can join in on a discussion web site if you wish (I am not sure how this works – I have not used it). There is a wide range of courses, from parts of Year1, Year2 and Year3 degree modules (with a few post graduate). These are taken from the whole range of OU faculties including Science, Arts, Maths, Social Studies, Law etc. etc.
Taking one of these free courses will not count towards a subsequent degree (they are not examined). However, you will only be charged if you enroll in one of the modules which will then build towards a degree (BS or BA depending on the range of modules you’ve taken).
I would suggest that you go through the entire Plate Tectonics material – it really is worth the 15 hours. There are a number of geology courses that you can follow up with or brush up your maths if that is an interest, or find out about the Tay Bridge disaster (at post graduate level) or Textiles in Ghana or Welsh History and its Sources …
Have a browse, have a go!! And that goes for anyone on this thread. You will almost certainly find something of interest.
I’m skimming through the tectonics discussion. I’m not even sure where to begin.
Actually, yes I do. And here it is: Granitic doesn’t equal granite.
I understand what you’re trying to say, but when the bulk density of a mass of continental crust is reduced down to calling the whole thing granite, it’s hard for me not to just stamp “Alan Clarke” on the entire discussion and move on. And no, it’s still not really okay to do if you’re just being broad brush to try and make a point. Not in the context of a discussion that I’m supposed to take seriously. It’s fine if it’s just an off-the-cuff blog comment. It’s not fine if you’re trying to convince me that you have novel hypotheses to advance. I mean, there are a lot of lemurs in Madagascar, but if you were trying make a general statement to contrast the marine mammals of the Indian Ocean with the terrestrial mammals on Madagascar, would you really think it’s okay to say something like: “Well, we’ve got marine mammals in the Indian Ocean, but once you get onto the land, say around Toamasina, things change. You go from marine mammals to Mirza coquereli.”?
Used to be, in Southern California you couldn’t swing a dead cat without hitting the car of some douchebag who thought it hilarious to modify his (always, always “his”) In-n-out Burger bumpersticker to read “IN-N-OUT URGE” heh heh heh.
One wondes how the apparently xtian overlords of the corporation feel about that.
I also use Noscript and Flashblock. Noscript is a pain in the ass, but eventually you get all the usual suspects on the good list and it’s ok. When I want to do something crazy like browse multiple store sites with crazy scripts(looking for a specific thing, for instance), I just go use IE for a few minutes.
#502 boygenius
“Land up Over” and “Land Down Under” are geographic terms of uncertain meaning. As an Englishman (stands up straight, hums “Land of Hope and Glory” from Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March No. 1**), I can only say how it’s used over here.
“Chuck a wobbly does not sound English” (or at least British). I doubt whether Her Majesty (God Bless Her) ever “chucks” anything. Throw, sir, Throw. Throw a wobbly.
It can be used in a literal way. Thus, there was a footbridge in London which swayed whenever people walked on it (interesting concept, when you think about it …). The Garundia***, a paper well known for its typing errors used the sentence:
(I am not aware that they ever did try the herd of wildebeest: there was nothing in the gnus about it.)
[Ed. handpalm]
However, a wobbly (or wobbler) is generally taken to be “a fit of panic, nerves, anger”. Thus, to throw a wobbly means “To burst out into a verbal uproar”
I did find one example of its use:
Not, admittedly, a common feature of life in my household but I understand it has been known to happen elsewhere.
** http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=THYgeETrkPs&feature=related
*** Otherwise known as The Guardian
A wobbler is something that woobles. What is it that woobles but doesn’t fall down, again? ;)
wobbles, even.
I’m glaring at you now. You can’t see it, but it’s happening…
And you did it twice!
Priceless.
I was probably thinking about the other word and it ended up as mixture of the two.
Humpf.
*giggle*
+10
@Josh:
Hsst !! Chicxulub.
I have no fucking clue.
<*looks innocent*>
I’m on it. I don’t have an opinion just yet. I find Keller et al. to be dreadfully hard slogging sometimes, so I’m reading in increments (otherwise they put me right to sleep).
Thanks for the effort, then.
Don’t forget to check your six…
Gesundheit!
Alan B @519
Thanks so much! I will share the map with my brother, Steve, of course.
Owlmirror @507 didn’t mention Mos Def exactly, so I will:
“Right here’s where the end’s gon’ start at!”
Also, I think your gumby experiment was not the success you thought it was. Weren’t you trying to show what _would_ get put in moderation?
Nota Bene: This is a revised version of the original comment, edited to remove most of the link. If you’d like a copy of the original, drop me a line at mythusmage (at) gmail (dot) com. Anyway, here’s the edited comment;
The western edge of the North American plate borders the Eurasian Plate at the Chersky Range, the Okhotsk Plate at the Ulakhan Fault (an east moving transform boundary), the Aleutian Trench where the North American Plate first meets the Pacific Plate, the Explorer, Juan de Fuca, and Cocos plates. (remnants of the Farallon Plate; the Nazca Plate borders the South America Plate.). The Pacific Plate meets the North American again at the San Andreas Fault, which stretches between the Juan de Fuca and Cocos plates
The San Andreas and Ulakhan faults are transform boundaries; with the San Andreas moving generally northwest while the Ulakhan is moving easterly There is some compressional activity at the San Andreas, since the Pacific Plate is moving generally northward while the North American Plate is moving generally west. For this reason the San Andreas could be called a combination boundary, exhibiting both transform and convergent activities. The Ulakhan is more a pure transform fault, only with both bordering plates moving to the east.
(Adding to the complex situation at the San Andreas Fault is the Basin and Range Province in western North America, which is separating the Rockies in the east from the Sierra Nevada in the west. It would appear that the Basin and Range rifting system is breaking off the western part of the North American plate from the eastern part.)
The rest are convergent boundaries, with the North American Plate overriding the Farallon remnants and compressing the Eurasian Plate.
As you can see at most boundaries the western North American Plate is either pushing the bordering plate down (subduction) or crumpling it up. The two exceptions is the Ulakhan Fault, which is pretty much a transform boundary, and the San Andreas, which appears to be a combination transfrom/convergent boundary. Complicating matters is the Basin and Range Province, which is ripping the North American Plate apart.
After all that exposition the first thing to note is that at no point is the western edge of the North American Plate being subducted under any other plate. No subduction, no slab pull. From the evidence available the most reliable conclusion is that the North American Plate is being moved west largely by ridge push plus possible western movement by the convection cell underlying it.
A possibility is that since the North American Continent is composed of continental crust, while the Pacific (at the Aleutian Trench), Explorer, Juan de Fuca, and Cocos plates are oceanic crust (which means the latter are denser than the former), North America is overriding the others and, in effect, being transferred from the North American Plate to the others, eventually — when the remnant plates disappear, to become part of the Pacific Plate.
Then again, the Basin and Range Province might be the last sign of the old Farallon Plate, with the original eastern edge rising again as part of a rifting system tearing apart the tectonic plate that destroyed it.
And that is what I got from my research.
Dania, #527
Once a man was driving down a country road in California’s Central Valley. As he drove he passed by a diary farm with a herd of cows quietly grazing as a bull watched the scene. As he came abreast of the bull the area was hit by an earthquake, which cased all the cows to fall down in jumbled heaps. The bull only swayed from side to side.
The man stopped his car and got out. As he was doing this another tremblor hit and the scene was repeated. Perplexed he approached the bull and asked, “How is it the cows were knocked down by the quakes, but you weren’t?”
The animal looked him in the eyes and said, “We bulls wobble, but we don’t fall down.”
Avoiding moderation is always the implicit goal of any post. But you’re right, I did not confirm the original hypothesis that background image links in a comment would invariably force that comment into moderation.
Great. Now I have to test it. Thanks heaps.
For the sake… of SCIENCE… !!
Does
this
get
dumped
into
moderation?
Let the record show that the six-gumby-comment post, using image URL links with http://scienceblogs.com as prefixes, did indeed go into comment moderation upon being posted.
Hypothesis not falsified !!
Science works !!
From Diskworld Monthly:
I imagine throwing such a thing would have serious consequences.
Also, OU FTW!
What does it mean to accept that The Rabbit is not the answer to anything, but remains the unanswerable question?
Alan B @ 522
Thanks for the info re OU. Wanted to do a course or two with them in the past but it cost too much (UK citizen but no address in UK at the time, was living in Spain). May just check out the options now that I have the requisite address (now living in France but UK contract). Unfortunately there aren´t enough years left to pursue everything I would like to learn!
Dania
A weeble wobbles but it doesn´t fall down!
#546 vanitas
I know 3 people who were in their mid-80s and working towards a Geosciences degree. One was unable to leave the house but lapped up eveything he could. The other two, a married couple, I met on SXR260 which was a geology summer school with field trips every day and working until 9 p.m. (then an exhausting hour or so over a few pints …) They were mid-80s and they were 2 of the most active students – physically and mentally. There is no upper age limit at the OU.
Also, the Government is reducing funding specifically to the OU even though it provides an important means to achieve their target of 50% to go to University**. This is in addition to the general reduction in funding recently announced. It will only get more expensive.
** However, if a University takes more students than set by the Government, they will now be fined a hefty amount! No. I don’t understand it either!
#526
That’s the trouble with Ed. He thinks he’s so clever:
[Ed. handpalm = [Ed. facepalm]
Josh: Can you explain this?
http://newsimg.ngfiles.com/60000/60474_Tactical_facepalm.jpg
Except that the subduction of the Pacific Plate under the North American plate generates suction that sucks the entire plate westwards. There is no compression between the North American continent and the Atlantic seafloor, nor has there ever been.
When movement between plates ceases, they become one plate. Happened to Europe and Asia…
No, the original eastern edge melted long ago. The Basin and Range and the Gulf of California are just what happens when a midocean ridge (the Eastern Pacific Ridge) hits a subduction zone. Quadruple junctions aren’t stable, they become two triple junctions.
That’s an odd picture. It looks like some sort of police STOP team or SWAT team or something; some sort of tactical response unit. They don’t look military to me, even though they’re decked out in a quasi-hi-speed manner.
I think they are demonstrating a hand signal* (i.e., it’s just a show), but it’s not one I’m familiar with. Unless it’s a weird variant of “cease-fire,” then it doesn’t appear to be a signal that we use (they’re cutting down a good bit of visibility, even for the very short time that it takes them to execute the signal–that’s not great**; additionally, it looks like it requires a lot of arm displacement*** and movement–also not something that’s not particularly tactical****).
*When we’re in bad guy territory and being all creep around, we tend to communicate with subtle hand signals, since even whispering into the team radios makes more noise than you want.
**If you’re a point guy or something, then I’d argue that whatever the hell that signal is amounts to a reduction of security–cardinal sin.
***I’m actually a fan of developing intra-team SOPs whereby by-the-book signals are modified so that they involve less motion. You lose some distance visibility in thick brush/low light, but you gain security in that you’re waving your arms around less. *shrug*
****For a second, I also thought that they were giving the signals with their firing hands, which would be absolutely unforgivable. But I don’t think they are. Even though they’re holding the weapons in a strange way, they’re most likely right-handed and thus are probably giving the signal with their non-firing hand.
Okay, that was probably more explanation than you wanted, but you asked.
gro
#551 Josh said:
No. On the contrary. That was the kind of assessment I was looking for. I simply could not understand why any system of signalling would:
Block an important part of your visibility.
Presumably, you would not be using (or practising) hand signals for a situation where there were no enemy combatants. The last thing, therefore, you would want to do would be to take your hand so far from your weapon.
Also, what kind of situation would require a hand signal directly in front of the face which would not be seen from behind or the side (palm flat to the face and blackened)?
Looked good fun but did not seem to have any sense or logic behind it which I find unusual for the military. A form of quasi Natural Selection comes in here i.e. people who do stupid things are less likely to be alive to pass on the “good idea”.
While you are around, Josh, would you care to explain, “Check your six”? Seems just about everyone knows the term but I had not met it before being on this (unending) thread.
At first I thought it meant keeping an eye open for where your half platoon members were. In UK, at least many years ago when I was in the Combined Cadet Force at school, a platoon was about 10 men lead by a corporal with 2 lance corporals. Hence “Check your six” could be an instruction for the LCs to make sure they knew what their half-platoon was doing thus enabling the Corporal to think more about what the platoon as a whole was up to.
Now I suspect that it refers to being alert to what is going on around you. “Tactical awareness” presumably if you want long words. But why 6? Front, Rear, L, R, Above, Below?? “Below” presumably being watch what you are about to tread on (IED, tripwires), esp. important in a guerilla-type war.
Is this better?
You don’t have a signal for “I’m a dumbass”?
Looks to me like they were practicing to do a Thriller video, like that prison in the Philippines did.
“Watch your six” is in analog-clock-space. Like, “bogies at 2 o’clock!”
That “tactical facepalm” is pretty funny. i agree with Carlie that it’s some kind of choreography. Check the guy in back’s stance–either he’s a Marvel superhero or he’s dancing.
At risk of confusing mythusmage, there is also the concept of the Wilson cycle. As I understand it, over a long period of time (I remember typically of the order of 500 Ma) plate tectonics could undergo a reverse whereby, for example, the Atlantic Ocean (N & S) could close.
The mechanism proposed is that the very oldest oceanic plate material (i.e. that closest to Africa) would cool and shrink/sink and start to subduct under the edge of the African continent. That part is currently at a greater depth than the rest of the Eastern Atlantic Ocean. This would then set up a subduction zone and the newly-started slab pull would then cause the closure of the Atlantic ocean with N/S America closing up to Europe/Africa. The floor of the Atlantic Ocean would be subducted below Europe and Africa.
The Wilson cycle was not emphasised in the OU courses on plate tectonics I have taken and I dug out most of the idea from US University sites and by digging around in the literature.
Is the long-term Wilson cycle still considered valid?
(Incidentally, it is my understanding that, Yes there were separate American/European and “Asian” plates and they did join with the suture zone being the Urals, stretching out onto the archipelago of Novaya Zemlya. I presume that this is still accepted?)
#557 Sven DiMilo
So, with 12 o’clock in front, “Watch your six” would mean, “Mind your back”? Or, in pantomime terms
“He’s behind you”
“Oh no he isn’t”
BANG
“Oh yes he was!”
I thought “bogies at 2 o’clock!” was used by mothers to tell their child to wipe its nose!
(Sorry, poor joke)
Well, that’s what these maps show.
#544 eddie
Only with the meaning, For the World. Not the other one!
But, from that page, it looks like the floor of the Atlantic ocean (and the ridge itself) will be subducted beneath the Americas, not Africa and Europe.
Bed calls. Up early(ish) tomorrow to hear England beat S Africa in the second test.
With such drawish pitches and poor bowling attacks, will this be enough to win the series (1 win to England, rest draws)? Somebody needs to pull out some gardening/groundsman’s skills and find out how to produce a strip that will allow a bit more excitement and, more particularly, a result. Too many flat pitches (see Kennington Oval).
Yep, as Sven said, “watch your six” refers to the fact that we orient on an analog clock when in the suck. The direction to your front is always “your twelve,” and the natural, I guess, result is statements like: “I’ve got movement on my 3–RPG and a rifle–350 meters!”
“Watch your six” is team slang for “watch your ass.”
Very close to spot on. We actually refer to it as situational awareness, or SA.
It turns out that people can process clock directions faster than they can L, R, etc., although we definitely modify the directions with up or down, especially when taking fire.
I kinda figured they were doing some choreography, but it never occurred to me that it might be set to music. Creepy…
Yeah. We do. It’s the signal we award Purple Hearts for…
That’s why they are always done with the non-firing hand. You don’t ever want your firing hand to be that far from the trigger housing.
Yeah, it’s odd to be sure. We have a signal for ceasing fire that’s kind of like the one that they’re doing, whereby the hand is waved up and down in front of the face, palm facing out. It’s also a reduced visibility, large range of motion signal. But if that signal is given in a combat situation, it’s given after rounds have been fired. When that happens, you’re not tactical anymore; everyone knows you’re there*.
*And any QRF is rapidly headed your way.
“in the suck” is my new favorite term.
Reminds me of living in Boston. There’s an intersection where like 5 or 6 big roads come together where the little bridge crosses the Charles in Watertown (here), which is more-or-less commonly known as “The Fuck.” As in:
“What’s the quickest way to Home Depot from here?”
“The Fuck.”
By the way, the library and Armenian Museum visible in that map are the locations for some of the junky scenes in Infinite Jest.
Funny, I rather like Boston. But driving in it…well that’s something else entirely.
@Alan B….I am starting to follow some of the geology, but I’m sorry… I just don’t know that much about Pokemon (post #565).
Carlie:
Temporarily allow all of this page
The analog-clock is also used in Medicine to describe pathology around the anus, by convention when examined with the patient prone on their back with the legs spread.
For example in such sentences as ” Patient X has a thrombosed hemorrhoid at 3 o’clock”.
:-)
I’m not sure. Personally, I doubt it, because the Pacific opened 700 million years ago and still hasn’t closed, even though no seafloor older than 200 million years survives there. Some oceans close very quickly (such as the Penninic one, which opened in the Late Triassic or so and is now gone except for some parts of the Mediterranean, leaving pillow lava in the Alps), others don’t. I think the cycle is a coincidence.
Of course.
This signal is for when we’re already past that. It means:
Oi, I’ve been fucking shot in the head.
Reunite Gondwanaland !!
*clenched-tentacle salute*
FTW more usually means For The Win, so … ??
Let me see if I got this right; if motion was to stop at the Chersky plate we would then have a Northern Hemispherical superplate. What would we call this structure, the Eurasian-American plate?
As to the possible closing of the North Atlantic, the Basin and Range Province might be the cause of that, assuming it becomes more active and starts pushing on the eastern portion of the North American Plate harder.
I shall call him “Squishy.”
Mystery of dinosaur disappearance solved !!
Why did all the dinosaurs die out?
And there is this interesting vid that promotes a book called The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas
I’m pretty happy that I am not “Patient X” right now.
In fact, I’m pretty happy period. My grades are finally done and in, gifts are finally packed up and mailed (yeah, both a little late this year *shrug*) and I am drinking a last Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale (so freakin good if you like bitter, and I mean bitter hoppy ales) at 5 AM because I’ve been up all night. And now I will sleep the sleep of the just.
The just plain beat.
shit I forgot: 15777
Also:
Congrats on completing the grades, Sven. I’ll toast to that, but will have to do so with water (getting suited up for a very unwarm prework ruck–beer would be a bad idea right now).
So we come full circle to my original contention, that the floor of the Atlantic Ocean is subducting under the North American Continent. After all the rumble and fuss we have learned that the situation regarding the North American Plate does not match that of any plate that is subducting under another plate, but is more that of a plate that is overriding neighboring plates.
With one exception of course, that of the Puerto Rico Trench, with the North American Plate is subducting under the Caribbean Plate, while at the same time sliding past it. Making the Puerto Rico Trench a combination Transform/Convergent boundary. But that, it would appear, is a special case, all in all the North American plate in large part is overriding everything it meets.
And yet, as Dania has pointed out, the floor of the Atlantic Ocean has basins, much like that of plates that are being subducted. Basins that develop as a result of slab pull. But, so far as we know, there is no slab pull.
As a matter of fact, we have a rift system in North America — the Basin and Range Province — that is pushing east on Eastern North America. At the same time the Mid Atlantic Ridge is pushing west on the same part of the world. Countervailing forces basically.
Something’s going on here. I’m thinking that there is slab pull involved, but the trench in question is under North America, having been pushed there over tens of millions of years. However, we seem to have found no evidence of such a trench. I have no answer to that, except to note that we tend to overlook things that contradict what we expect to see, or interpret things as we expect them to be. As the old saying goes; the hidden we can spot right away, the obvious takes a bit longer.
In other words, we don’t see evidence of a trench under eastern North America because we don’t expect to see that evidence, and what evidence we do see gets interpreted as arguing against a trench. There can’t be a trench, therefor there is no trench.
So there’s the situation; there is evidence pointing to slab pull regarding the floor of the North Atlantic, yet other than a minor trench no obvious site where slab pull could be taking place. There might be a trench hidden under eastern North America, but no evidence of such has been found, or, if found, interpreted as arguing against the presence of a trench. Since there is, according to the accepted wisdom, no evidence for a trench, there is no need to go looking for a trench.
So we find ourselves at an impass.
For a look at earthquakes in New York State visit the Lamont-Doherty Cooperative Seismographic Network. Turns out that the New York area is a earthquake active place.
David Marjanovic,
just for the fun of it, and the austrian accent(he talks a while in that one) :
:-)
So? You seem to be forgetting that trench suction force is pulling the entire North American plate westwards!
Which seems to be related to the existence of seismically active faults there.
Also, look at this map from the site you linked to. Look at the zones which we know to be subduction zones. Now look at the east coast of North America and at the west coast of Europe. What conclusions can you draw from those data?
Well, to put an active trench* under eastern North America, there are a number of observations (and “anti-observations”) that you’re going to have to explain.
For example, why isn’t the crust of eastern North America being actively crumpled in a major way? Why are the Atlantic Coastal Plain sediments, which are for the most part poorly lithified or unlithified, happily sitting there with close to flat dips all the way up and down the eastern seaboard? How is a ton of oceanic crust getting stuffed under eastern North America with nary a notice by the continental rocks under which it’s being stuffed? What, subduction leads to orogeny except in eastern North America? Or better yet, subduction leads to orogeny except in eastern North America, this time**?
Where is all of the heat from the subducting slab going? Why isn’t West Virgina an active volcanic province? Or Ohio? Given the lack of major crustal thickening (ala the Himalyas) exhibited in the region, there is no reason to think that a good number of the rising diapirs wouldn’t make it to the surface. Or is there no partial melting going on at depth in this case?
Then, of course, you need to account for the age distributions of the oceanic rocks.
________________________
*But what you’re really trying to advocate is that the oceanic crust we see in the Atlantic continues under the observed rocks of the North American continent and then subducts further inland, right? You’re not really advocating a trench, per se, are you? It’s not necessary (think India) and to do so you have to additionally create a detachment at depth whereby the subducting oceanic crust is bending where it smacks into the continental crust (and thus creating a trench). To put a trench in all of this makes it even more complicated (and again, it isn’t needed). I think you’re saying trench, but what you want to be saying is subducting portion of the Atlantic oceanic crust.
**Or are you also going to argue against the evidence for the various orogenies that are recorded in the Appalachians?
That made me laugh. I wish I knew enough geology, and had enough time, for some anthropomorpic continental-rock puns…
Oh, well. Before I hit the road,
Sadly, I don’t think this will work as a band name, but I really wish it would.
SC, when you have time, there is a reply waiting for you on this thread.
Walton, I saw it, and plan to respond at some point later today (tomorrow morning at the latest). About three hours behind schedule today. :/
I never could get the hang of Wednesdays.
That’s an interesting definition of “impasse” that mythusmage must be using.
Quite.
I don’t know why this is making me hungry for pizza, but its subliminal effect is strong.
Does anyone remember if I have posted about Southstone Rock in the Teme Valley area? I don’t think I have but I don’t want to bore people even more than usual.
If not, I’ve got some interesting info together in the “Share and Enjoy” real rocks series.
[Ed. Well, he thinks it’s interesting.]
OFFS, now I want pizza. And I’ve just now finished a tasty club sandwich.
Sorry, I can’t watch any YouTube videos at the moment. Later.
There’s no pushing going on there (there’s no midocean ridge), and the Basin and Range isn’t somehow fixed to the lower mantle or anything. No, the entire Basin and Range moves westward, its western part a bit faster than the eastern part. That’s because of things like the trench suction force, which is strongest at the western edge of the continent, and the San Andreas transform fault.
Except the western edge of the Eurasian plate, which it meets at the mid-Atlantic ridge.
Whuuut?
There is no pull-apart basin in the Atlantic Ocean.
No, the Basin and Range is being pulled apart.
This sounds entirely reasonable if and only if you have no idea whatsoever what traces subduction leaves. See comment 588 for the most obvious ones. Moreover, I have pointed out that North America and the floor of the eastern North Atlantic do not move relative to each other. You have yet to address these points.
Translation: you find yourself too lazy to spend a couple of hours in teh intart00bz.
Here’s a link to make a 100% edible Flying Spaghetti Monster. /www.evilmadscientist.com/article.php/edibleeyes
Alan, regarding the Wilson Cycle. It hasn’t been falsified. But it’s of limited utility. I just dug around in one of my old structure texts. Turns out the text of the passage I was looking at is online. From Twiss and Moores, 1992, Structural Geology, W.H. Freeman and Company, NY, 532 pages:
http://books.google.com/books?id=14fn03iJ2r8C&pg=PA493&lpg=PA493&dq=Twiss+Moores+Wilson+Cycle&source=bl&ots=JgeoxjUGRL&sig=nXk_OFa_LvdciQNt2p-gfTsCl-0&hl=en&ei=jJQ7S6ibAZHnlAfdkZGbBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAoQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false
Great. Now I want pizza too. Damn you, Antiochus Epiphanes!
I don’t know (or didn’t know) whether there are basins in the Atlantic Ocean or not, but I have not “pointed out” anything regarding basins in the Atlantic Ocean. Not sure where mythusmage got that idea from, but it wasn’t from me.
Okay, pizza for all.
I actually am not sure even how to deal with this assertion. Plates that are being subducted develop basins? Do you mean fore-arc basins? In what part of the Atlantic are you talking about? Pictures/maps/sections/seismic lines/citations?
Not to give the nutcase any ammo, Josh, but there are some Tertiary intrusives in West Virginia. And as I recall, there is a magnetic anomaly in the NC Coastal Plain sediments that is probably a buried intrusion.
Obviously all of the geophysical data collected on the coast would indicate an active trench if there was one present. But these intrusions are interesting.
And just to muddy the waters further, the East Tennessee Seismic Zone has quakes with strike-slip motion.
A passive boundary doesn’t mean a dull one, does it? Not that you implied that…
Dania, #586
How? Doesn’t the plate in question have to be subducting in order for slab pull to be a factor?
Dania, #589
And why are there seismically active faults in New York State.
BTW, I don’t have full access to the (pay) article, and the available abstract is sketchy
Josh, #590
Could it be a quiet subduction zone? A subduction zone, that is, where oceanic crust is descending into the mantle slowly, melting slowly, and so not building up to the point the molten material is rising to the surface in eruptions. Could the Atlantic Trench (to give it a name) be an atypical subduction zone?
Yes! Yes it could!!!
‘Cept there’s, like, no evidence of its existence is the problem.
Alan B :
As far I know, you haven’t graced us with info on Southstone Rock in Teme Valley.
As far as boring us goes, I think the only one that’s bored is Ed.
You could have Ed. establish a boredom baseline that does not include him, and always strive to stay above it. Ed can take a poll among his friends … if he has any.
I know. There’s some of it in Virgina, too. Tertiary (Eocene) isn’t now (if he is trying to subduct the slab now, then the volcanism needs to be much more recent than Eocene). Besides, while enigmatic, as far as I know, the problematic igneous rocks in West Virgina are mafic/intermediate in composition. Not really going to help his case much. If he is going to subduct a slab below the Appalachians, then I want to see recent felsic volcanism on the scale that is preserved in the Devonian and Silurian intrusive suite in Maine (at the very least, the scale of the Silurian intrusives):
http://www.maine.gov/doc/nrimc/mgs/pubs/online/bedrock/bedrock11x17.pdf
Nope. Not in the least does it mean a dull one. And I agree with you: those intrusives are interesting. The earthquakes, too. Even a passive margin is going to accommodate stress, and much of the northeastern US is underlain by highly fractured crystalline rock. Any of those blocks can potentially move against each other to relieve stress. That’s why NY/NE have the earthquake risks that they do, despite being not particularly active regions.
I admire the tenacity of mythusmage, but I must say that he/she is beginning to resemble an atypical subduction zone, one in which all intelligent comments proffered by Dania, David M., and Josh are quietly pulled into the overheated brain of mythusmage. There, the knowledge is subjected to metamorphic forces that warp it into unrecognizable flights of imagination.
Josh, #590 revisited
As a wild guess, because the subduction is happening slowly. It is a gentle subduction, a quiet subduction. An atypical subduction that does not behave as it’s supposed to. After all, just because something is unnecessary doesn’t make it impossible.
Even if it’s melting slowly, if you’re partially melting that slab of oceanic crust, then where is the heat going?
And again, if you’re going to actually advocate a trench, then you’re making the case even more complex, because you’re essentially saying that the oceanic crust is sliding under the eastern part of eastern North America, and then running into some other, thicker part of eastern North America and then bending down, thereby creating a trench. I don’t think the physics works at all.
It would definitely be atypical, because you’re trying to hide it beneath the Appalachians (or further west, I don’t know–you haven’t specified). But you need to deal with the heat/partial melt problem and you absolutely have to explain how this slab is sliding under eastern North America and not deforming it. The speed at which it’s moving isn’t really relevant; the fact that it doesn’t appear to be crumpling the crust…is.
As far as we know.
#575 Rorschach – if your patient is on his back, isn´t he supine?
#550 Alan B – there´s lots of energy and life, just not enough time to learn about everything I want to know. Never was any good at prioritizing…I want it all!
David Marjanovic, #601
Insofar as the North American Plate is moving west, wouldn’t structures found as part of the plate be moving west with it?
Where my willingness to go looking on the Web is concerned, it ever occur to you that I don’t know how to do that effectively.
I have Aspergers Syndrome, the confusion and chaos inherent to the Web frustrates the fuck out of me, and discourages my searching. Search engines don’t help matters any, what with their disorganized and irrelevant results. Not knowing what to ask doesn’t help matters any.
Adding to this is the fact you, and others, come across as relying on the voice of authority. I don’t trust authority. I have seen how reliance on authority hurts, and can hurt very badly. You tell me I’m wrong, but you don’t show me how. Or if you do show me how, when I check out the lead, I find it doesn’t say what you think it says.
In short, you keep telling me I’m wrong, you don’t take the time and effort to show me how I’m wrong. You don’t explain yourself. Merely saying that Star-Bellied Sneetches are superior does nothing to prove Star-Bellied Sneetches are superior.
#617 vanitas
I went looking for ocean basins in the Atlantic Ocean, but found only the Blake Basin at Wikipedia. Ad that entry a stub.
A Google Search produced this page
Except I said “trench suction”…
There hasn’t to be an active tectonic boundary for there to exist active faults. It’s not like tectonic plates are coherent, intact pieces of lithosphere. They’re complex, dynamic systems constituted by lithospheric material that just happens to move as a unit at the present moment.
We must not be reading the same thread… :-/
I don’t have the requisite knowledge to contribute intelligently to this discussion, but I’ve been following it with great interest… and in doing so I just can not see how you can possibly make this assertion. There have been countless responses by persons for whom geology is what they do in this thread, and many, many of those responses have not only included their own expertise, but have included references and materials for you study.
You have claimed an inability to access some of the materials… well, I’m sorry but that is not the fault of the posters here… I have been able to access them and they illustrate precisely what is being explained to you.
You have a problem with “trusting authority”, well fine… but these guys (gender neutral) are not simply spouting off what they think… they are explaining to you what their years of experience AND rigorous study of the actual evidence have told them… when your authority is evidence, it’s actually ok to accept it until you can find evidence that directly contradicts it.
You are asserting several “could be” possibilities and making “as far as we know” statements… which is fine for the purposes of inquiry and self-education… but frankly, until you provide some material evidence for them, they are merely unsupported suppositions.
So…?
Ah, I see. You cannot prove there is no
teapot orbiting the sunsubduction zone, therefore its existence is not impossible.True, but… not a very convincing argument, is it?
Update
Other North Atlantic Basins include the Guiana, North American, Cape Verde, and Canaries basins. No Wikipedia write ups however.
Dania, #623
I see, I’m obviously wrong, so my objections don’t need to be considered seriously.
That’s creationist-speak right there, my friend.
If you’re objections weren’t considered, people like David and Dania and Josh would not have wasted (a considerable amount, I might add) their time responding so diligently to your questions / objections.
Stop pretending to be persecuted. If you want your assertions / objections to the current base of knowledge to be considered seriously, then start providing some level of actual supporting evidence for your suppositions.
If you can’t or are unwilling to, then why exactly should they be taken as anything more than unsupported supposition?
No, that’s not what I meant. I was trying to make the point that without evidence to back up your claim it really doesn’t matter whether it is impossible or not. It’s not impossible, alright. But is there any good reason to admit it is true?
dammit…
you’re = your
Celtic Evolution, #622
My problem is I keep seeing people flat out denying the possibilities. Most recently Dania (#621) reminded us that she was talking about trench suction, not trench pull. That apparently the descent of the Pacific Plate (and others) is pulling the North American Plate west. My question is; how? Is the subduction of those Pacific Ocean plates producing sufficient ‘pull’ on the North American Plate to keep it moving west. I just don’t see Dania and David and others explaining their positions all that well. They are coming across as doctrinaire and authoritarian.
My point is, there is more to the story. There is still more to be learned, more to be discovered. Unfortunately I just don’t see certain people admitting that. Going by what Marjanovic and Dania are saying, we know it all and we don’t need to learn any more. That’s the impression they give me, and they’re doing nothing to correct that impression.
So here’s a question for all you geologists out there; why are there earthquakes in New York State? I know it’s possible for faulting to occur intraplate, but why are such plates active when there is apparently nothing to move them?
And while I’m at it, what powers Leanon Spring in New York State?
“Share and Enjoy”
Real Geology Series
I live in the West Midlands of England although I choose not to be more specific than that. An American would probably consider the countryside as quintessentially English with patchwork fields, orchards and woodlands. Unlike so much of the scenery from the arid regions of America, there is little in the way of exposed rock except for occasional quarries which quickly get overgrown unless effort is made to keep them clear to expose the geology beneath. There is a beauty and a subtlety in the English landscape.
The River Teme (Ref. 1) flows through some of this scenery on its way to join the River Severn at Worcester. It rises in mid-Wales in an indeterminate area where springs run following rains and the source then moves further uphill while dry periods can push the source downhill. Throughout its length the river is designated as a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) which gives it some legal protection.
It flows through regions well known in British and World geology. The castle at Ludlow (Ref. 2), stands on a river cliff, partly surrounded by a loop in the river.
Further down the river flows roughly North to South and acts as the county border between Worcestershire and Herefordshire. In this region it flows through a steep sided, but flat-bottomed, valley. The valley bottom is covered with alluvium while the Western hillside is composed of rocks from the Pridoli sequence of the Silurian, overlain by the Early Devonian. The hillside is too steep for crops and animals and a mixed deciduous woodland has been allowed to grow. There are many steep valleys with swift-flowing tributary streams. Many of these arise from springs where permeable limestone beds overly marls (calcareous clay) with lenticular siltstone and sandstone beds.
All of this was laid down under fluvial conditions and the limestone bands are calcretes, locally known as cornstones. There is one particularly extensive calcrete, now called the Bishop’s Frome Limestone (after a town in the type area). This covers much of S Wales and the Welsh Marches (England/Wales borderland).
We park on the road running (Ref. 3) near the edge of the hillside and walk across a muddy field. As the path steepens we enter the woodland. The path itself can be extremely slippery, especially following heavy rain and occasionally trees collapse and block the path. To the left is a deeply incised fast-running stream: the path is well above the stream. In many places the stream (if you were to clamber down, looks a bit like these pictures (Ref. 4 and 5). The general area is well known for bryophytes, liverworts and mosses.
About halfway up the hillside a track leads off the the left through woodland that is becoming increasingly like a scene from “Lord of the Rings”. The stream gets louder until you suddenly see this view in front of you (Ref. 6 and 7). You have reached Southstone Rock.
More next time.
Ref. 1 http://www.welshicons.org.uk/html/river_teme.php
Ref. 2 http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/618671
(This side of the bridge is the start of the geology trail which ends at Ludford Corner:
http://www.shropshiregeology.org.uk/sgspublications/Trail%20Guides/Teme%20Bank%20Trail%20Leaflet.pdf)
Ref. 3 The single road through Shelsley Walsh (Grid Reference SO722629) does not have a name. The road is met at the north end by the B4203 at Stanford Bridge. The southern end of this road is met by the B2404 which runs from Martley to Tenbury Wells. The Grid Reference for Southstone Rock is: SO708639.
Ref. 4
http://www.flickr.com/photos/baldyd/2665413388/sizes/l/
Ref. 5 rbg-web2.rbge.org.uk/bbs/meetings/mtgs04/mtgs041.htm
and scroll down to the subheading Mill Coppice, just above Wednesday 7th April. While not the stream of interest, it is similar and shows another group of mad scientists (not geologists this time) floundering around in mud.
Ref. 6 http://www.geograph.org.uk/photo/777675
Ref. 7 Photo on Page 3 of: http://www.bromsgrove.gov.uk/cms/pdf/Geodiversity%20Action%20Plan.pdf
Celtic Evolution, #626
Your evidence?
And what makes you think I think I’m being persecuted? People are not persecuting me, they’re just not explaining themselves all that well.
Maybe a post on this topic at Mythusmage where people can post tons o’ links in comments and there’s a much shorter moderation queue would help.
#629 mythusmage
Did you mean to give a link to Leanon Spring?
Google gives nothing for “Leanon Spring”. If you want an answer, I need a link (remember us asking you for links previously?).
A long while ago on this thread which has no visible ending there was reference to a “Journal” full of non-science from somebody putting forward crazy ideas. At the time it seemed to be recognised by several regulars.
1 Can anyone remember what it was?
2 Could mythusmage be getting his “stuff” from there or somewhere similar? To date he has been coy (to say the least) about his source of information.
The “Journal” went out of its way to produce wacky ideas with genuine-sounding evidence (until you looked hard at it). I vaguely remember that plate tectonics came into it. Ring any bells?
Make that denying the possibilities for which there’s no evidence whatsoever. Actually, it’s not even denying. We’re just asking for evidence and/or explaining to you why that possibility is being discarded. Since when is that unreasonable?
I’m certainly not the best person to answer your question, but from the OU link:
Sorry, I’m not a geologist, I can’t explain it to you any more clearly than this. I’m also learning from this discussion…
Why? We’re just behaving like regular, skeptical scientists. You, on the other hand, are starting sound more and more like a creationist… I mean, “doctrinaire”? Seriously? Like in “doctrine of Darwinism“? Like not trusting the geologists because you think you know more about geology than them? What next, a conspiracy?
Now, that’s just stupid. We’re saying no such thing. You’ve been making unfounded/wrong assertions, and we (but mostly him) have been calling you on it. FFS, you’re on Pharyngula, what did you expect?
#603 Josh
I plugged in that link (many thanks) but it just goes to the info about the book and does not appear to display any pages. What have I done wrong or not done right?
Alan
Can anyone explain to me how a tuyere (tuyére) works? My brother Steve has a 1902 Champion blower for his forge. He ordered two replacement tuyere(s?) for it and I’d like to understand the physics.
My understanding Lynna is that the tuyere is just the contact piece between whatever is blowing the air into the furnace and the furnace. Used to deliver a hot blast to the furnace to up temps to increase the efficiency.
A tuyere is a venturi tube through which air passes into a hearth or furnace. A venturi is a constriction or narrowing of a tube which causes a gas or liquid flowing through it to increase velocity (and decrease pressure). As you know, blowing on a fire causes it to burn hotter. A tuyere has the same effect. It’s just a tube, the air (or sometimes oxygen) is supplied by a bellows or compressor.
#633
Could it be Pratt in Journal of Science Exploration??
But I’m [mis?]remembering that from 1991 and my forging class at UGA so I could be way off.
Plate tectonics movement depicted visually from GPS data:
The International Terrestrial Reference Frame Velocity Field
Note that the ITRF has stations in the North Atlantic as well as on the continents.
Shit. I tried that link before posting it, too. Sorry.
Here, try this (this is how I got it):
Google: Twiss Moores Wilson Cycle.
It should be the first link that pops up (it’s a books.google.com link)
Well, yes, but we know pretty far. Satellite measurements, you know, to a precision of a millimeter per year.
Of course… what’s your point?
In that case, ask us (especially the actual geologists, i.e., not me, but Josh and Alan B), instead of egnorantly asserting that whatever we might know that you don’t know is wrong.
Isn’t that logical?
Why do you instead insist on talking about stuff you don’t understand???
Because I don’t know where to start. I’m not sure how much you have actually understood, so I don’t know at what level to explain anything.
I recommend you use the following strategy:
1. Go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_tectonics . I have not bothered to check whether such an article really exists, I guessed the URL – Wikipedia articles tend to have easily guessable addresses. Usually, when you google a noun, the first result is a Wikipedia article anyway.
2. Check out the links in that article, even those to concepts that you think you already understand, both those to other Wikipedia articles and the external ones (somewhere near the bottom of the article). That will take a few hours, if not days.
3. Come back here and ask about everything you’re not completely sure you’ve understood.
I haven’t cited primary literature because most of what I know about plate tectonics comes from a university course the syllabus of which isn’t online (or available as a book or anything). It was called “Introduction into Geology”. Four hours per week, lasting a semester, intended for paleontology undergrads…
Finally, I have real trouble getting over the fact that, when Dania gave you a link to an interesting site, you ignored it and posted a long egnorant rant before you followed the link. At least your willful ignorance didn’t last!!!
All true, and all irrelevant thrice over. What you should be looking for is a pull-apart basin in the eastern edge of the North American continent, and there is none.
So… you can’t even recognize a parsimony argument when you see one?!?
Yes, as demonstrated by the Basin and Range province (the initial stage of a pull-apart basin) and the Gulf of California (a continuation of the same pull-apart basin).
Yes. It was really wacky, basically denying plate tectonics altogether.
Lebanon perhaps?
Not being one of the two geologists, and being too lazy (at half past 1 am) to look for more information, I can only guess. I bet, however, that the reason lies in the fact that passive continental margins are messy affairs, which in turn is because the upper part of a plate (I forgot if it’s all of the crust or just the top) is brittle while the lower part is ductile. When a continent breaks in two, the lower part becomes thinner because it’s being pulled apart, while the upper part bursts into a lot of separate blocks (smaller and smaller ones closer to the spreading center) that slide vertically and obliquely against each other. This sliding may not have completely ceased, I guess. Too bad I can’t just draw what I mean, or dig up the syllabus of that geology course – no working scanner here.
Although I have to say, whereas it was annoying for you, I’m glad we ran that experiment. I have avoided using the books.google.com stuff that often pops up when I’m searching to provide sources for comments. After your experience, I will continue to omit those links.
I haven’t read all of the mythusmage postings but what I’m getting is that he expects any possibility he comes up with to be taken seriously despite the glaring lack of evidence he’s provided and in spite of all the evidence flat out showing it to be completely off base from what we know.
Is that about right?
Yes!
Wonderful! (Even though the map omits a couple of plate boundaries.)
Is the Geological Map of the World online yet?
Thank you, Owlmirror (#641). I was looking for something similar, but you were quicker. :)
Alan B @630: Southstone rock certainly has a lot character. Yay for Tuff.
Thanks, Rev BDC and ‘Tis Himself for the tuyére info. ‘Tis, may I use your explanation if I post photos of the forge parts on my website? I will give you credit.
I looked tuyére up via google and found a lot of generalities, plus a lot of highly technical articles, with very little in between.
@Josh: A books.google link really only needs two parts: the ID — “id” — , and the page number — “pg“.
In your link, the id field is “14fn03iJ2r8C” and the page field is “PA493“.
Thus your long link @#603 can be truncated down to:
http://books.google.com/books?id=14fn03iJ2r8C&pg=PA493
Which works for me, at least, to go directly to page 493, which has the Wilson cycle in the 2nd column.
Alan B — does the above work for you?
If not, you should be able to put 493 into the Google books page viewer to go to that page.
On the other hand… Alan B, what browser are you using?
Firefox 3.5 appears to be clever enough to translate & characters in URLs into actual & characters, but more primitive browsers may not do this.
I meant “‘&’ strings“.
Why does Sb translate ‘&’ into ‘&’ inside of a URL anyway?
Bah.
As I said before, not being at a plate boundary is not a reason for there not to be a stress field. Stress rules the day. The crust of the Earth is basically all connected–or perhaps I should say that there isn’t any part of the Earth’s crust that’s really in true isolation from the rest of the crust. You’re talking about the cracked shell of a hard-boiled chicken egg. You cannot press a tooth pic against an edge of a piece of that shell without having some effect on the entire egg crust.
The spreading that occurs at Mid-Atlantic ridge imparts stress upon the rocks at the Mid-Atlantic ridge. But it also imparts stress upon the rocks of New England, and the rocks of the southern Appalachians, and to a lesser extent the rocks of Missouri. The subduction that occurs on North America’s western side imparts stress upon the rocks of North America’s western side. But it also imparts stress upon the rocks of Kansas, and the rocks of Missouri, and so on.
Much of the bedrock that comprises New York state and New England, and Pennsylvania, and western Maryland and western Virginia is what’s called crystalline rock (igneous and metamorphic (some sedimentary rocks arguably qualify)). It’s very hard and it is full of fractures. Indeed, you will be very hard pressed to find an outcrop of crystalline rock anywhere that doesn’t have some fracturing exposed in it. This is also true of pretty much any clastic rocks that are well-cemented. The blocks that side on either side of pretty much any of these fractures can potentially move against each other because of imparted stress; the vibrations that result from these slips are earthquakes. Additionally, there are tons of old, not currently active faults (fractures in rocks along which movement has occurred) crisscrossing the entire region. Once a body of rock has broken, it’s pretty much broken unless the area is metamorphosed (some fractures can “heal” via mineral precipitation as well), so over time, the number of potential slip surfaces in an area tends to increase, not decrease.
You combine this bedrock of fracture crystalline rock with a stress field and you have an earthquake risk of some severity.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/1978/RG016i004p00621.shtml
http://gsabulletin.gsapubs.org/content/84/6/1861.abstract
http://bssaonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/71/6/1875
Post-glacial rebound of course also plays a role:
geology.geoscienceworld.org/cgi/content/abstract/12/11/677
That worked for me as well, which is awesome.
Thanks.
Yes.
è, not é.
I know about a legendary radiolarite… a 1.90 m tall guy told me he took a jackhammer, swung it through a wide arc against that rock, and it made “dinnnng” and came back up to the same height with no damage to the rock whatsoever. They killed eight chisels in one day in the vain attempt to get an ichthyosaur forefin or something out of that rock.
Geology is boring.
There.
I said it.
PZ is a poopyhead.
“an ichthyosaur foreskin”?
Oh, never mind…
Certainly.
I was taught about tuyeres and venturi tubes in Navy Machinist’s Mate A School over 40 years ago. I haven’t thought about them in all that time. It’s amazing what memory will dredge up sometimes.
Fuckin’ A, man. I can tell you about some sandstones I’ve met in my day. Break rock hammers like quartz will break teeth.
Ah. Thank you, David M. I didn’t notice that I’d made that mistake.
Thank you ‘Tis. I’ll use your Navy Machinist’s Mate A School memories.
I’ve experienced venturi effects when crossing mountain passes or traversing mountain saddles. If the pass or saddle is narrow enough, it can funnel some harrowing winds across the trail.
Really? Only sandstone I have an intimate knowledge of is in Zion Nat. Park, high up on a vertical face.
And let me tell you, that shit ain’t so tough in many places. Frighteningly so.
Hey how come Sven gets to call PZ names. I want to call PZ names too. :)
It could not have been a jackhammer (powered by a compressor, also called a pneumatic drill), if he swung it.
Probably a sledgehammer, yes?
In other news, Rush Limbaugh taken to hospital in Hawaii with chest pains.
I got the book Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds in my seasonal gift harvest. I am bracing myself for the section on ‘Witch Mania’, which does not sound like it will show humanity at its best…
Rev @66a
Might this be related?…
http://www.xkcd.com/682/
Apparently he was having chest pains which would make one think it was heart related.
Which of course is confusing because I long thought he had no heart.
And tres appropriate comment number. mine, not the mistype of the Rev’s.
Speaking of xkcd: This ought to be made real;
http://xkcd.com/591/
I’m the neighbor of the beast
Did those conservatives try that prayer thing again? I don’t think it works.
I wonder if they’ll give him oxycontin for pain?
That’s how it started for Carlin, too.
Now, my first thought when I read this was, maybe I shouldn’t duck down to the shops to get more cigarettes for tonight….
Which brings me to new year resolutions, since Melbourne AU is now only 8 hours away from the new year and I have dutifully commenced Vodka consumption !
NY resolutions anyone, or will PZ give us a separate thread for that ?
Every year I make a resolution to not make a resolution.
I’m saying a new thread for it, but PZ has set the bar high for titles. Still, with all the horror references and a new year, I’m thinking it might be “Dawn of the Thread”.
Ah, here is a true miracle folks, to go with the season :
Wasn’t the doctors and the CPR and the drugs, was divine intervention :
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/989255/mum-son-come-back-to-life-after-dying
And yet another seasonal miracle:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/117741/nbc-today-show-goldman-reunion-a-christmas-%E2%80%98miracle%E2%80%99
Perhaps Sean Goldman is the second coming?
PROOF that atheists indoctrinate their children with their disturbing worldview! Listen in horror as these atheists podcasters baldly admit teaching their innocent children the Orwellian concept of “freethought”!
You’d only get seven more years out of quitting. What would do with those seven years? Continue to live your GODLESS life of SIN and DEPRAVITY?
JESUS makes you smoke so you’ll die sooner, and therefor sin less, and not burn so badly when you get to HELL. Be grateful for those cancer sticks. They’re the love of God.
Horror? “Dawn of the Thread” brings to mind images of emotionally charged teens playing musical instruments, and riding telepathic teleporting dragons through the sky, who save the world by burning up the horrible thread that falls from the other planet.
You make it sound so dirty and really unattractive !
Do you work for an insurance company? :-)
7 years only if the cancer doesnt wipe me out somewhere in between…
Nice link btw, listening now.
I wish.
llewelly @679 – teleporting dragons
I don’t much like leGuin myself but know her admirers really love it. Maybe PZed will use that phraase in the next title.
So, I notice Daniel Florien at unreasonable faith has a video of Bertrand Russell showing “new atheists” were around back then.
eddie @681
Not LeGuin, http://www.amazon.com/Anne-McCaffrey/e/B000ARA0JO/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1 and her son Todd.
Stupid html. That’s Anne McCaffrey. Glad the link works anyway.
And what’s with the submission failure because I wanted to post two comments in a row?
And what’s with the submission failure because I wanted to post two comments in a row
That sounds interesting, let’s talk about it in private…:-)
But srsly, SB doesnt like it if you post too many comments in too short a time, spammers and all, I’m not sure what the time period is exactly, 2 minutes or something.
Yep. The amount of variation in sandstone hardness/cementation/resistivity isn’t trivial. I’ve seen Mesozoic sands that you can pull apart with your fingers because they are completely unlithified. I’ve also seen sandstones that are so hard they break jackhammer bits. A buddy of mine and I once spent two full days chopping away at a ridiculously resistant sandstone/siltstone* exposure trying to remove a fossil. And in that same study area there are sandstone ledges that I won’t walk on because I predict they’ll crumble beneath me.
*Most of the outcrop was siltstone. A mudrock. Not even a sandstone.
Oh, and in case anyone was curious as to what the hell kind of rock David was referring to in comment #655, he was talking about deposits that result from silica-rich biogenic oozes*.
This is a nice discussion:
http://www.mnhn.fr/mnhn/geo/PDW/De%20Wever%20et%20Baudin%201996.pdf
*Yes, I did just want an excuse to write that in a comment. Why do you ask?
Sorry about lack of response to several helpful comments – time zones beat on-line conversation every time!
#638 My own comment. Don’t you just love that name: D. Pratt? I know he can’t help the name he was born with but …
#643 David Marjanović Thanks David. I thought “Leanon Spring” might be Lebanon Spring but why should I go off on a wild goose chase and risk a put-down at the end because I’d guessed wrong. He gives the wrong name (apparently) to what looks like a link (light blue and underlined) but goes nowhere. He then bails out and is not available for comment. It’s well past time he sorts out his etiquette if he wants to make progress here.
#648 Lynna, OM “tufa” not “tuff” but it is easy to get them mixed up! More to come to explain …
#651 Owlmirror asked which browser I use.
IE8 with Vista. (I know, I know but there was no option when I bought my PC and to be fair, I have not had the problems so many others have had. I was not an early-adopter.) I’ve tried Firefox and I have nothing against it but I do not really have the nous to understand why I should think it is better. For me there’s a lot to be said for something that works (even if not as well as it might).
Haven’t had a chance to try the book yet (Josh/Owlmirror) – I will when I get back.
Interesting that David thinks Wilson Cycles have gone out of style. I’ll have to follow that up (eventually!).
That’s so, hmm, enlightening… ;)
Very broadly speaking
tufa: ambient temperature freshwater carbonate rock, usually from carbonate precipitation in springs or streams (to be distinguished from lacustrine limestones and from hot water travertines)
tuff: a suite of deposits composed of fine-grained volcanic detritus. Tuffs are complex and it would take a while to get really into them here, but for the purposes of this comment, they are volcaniclastic* sediments, as opposed to tufas, which are water-derived carbonate sediments.
*These kinds of rock result from the deposition of volcanically-produced particles (generally blown out of a vent) as opposed to resulting from coherent bodies of molten material that flow as a mass and then cool. They are sedimentary deposits of volcanic origin.
Ahhh, I see. It’s going to be that kind of a day, is it?
Okay…
I don’t know. It could be because I haven’t had coffee yet…
Ahhh, okay. I just had several cups, while glaring at the ice outside my window, the amount of which is a little disheartening.
I’m doing the same, now. Except it’s rain instead of ice. It’s a beautiful sight anyway… I can see three big cedars and some pines in front of my window.
Did I say rain? ‘Cause it’s starting to look more like hail. Ah, there you have it. Ice.
There is a small pine across the street and a bushy holly tree outside my window. Both are draped in ice crystals that glitter faintly from the weak light of the sky brightening to the east. The berry clusters on the holly tree take on the look of some odd confection as the ice encloses them; sugar-glazed cranberries or something. The kind of thing you’d decorate a holiday place setting with, but which none of the guests would actually eat.
It’s a beautiful morning, but I’m not particularly excited about trudging out into it. I think I’ll bust out the gore-tex.
You people somehow live on the wrong side of the world !
It’s 2330 now, 30 mins to go to 2010, and it’s raining, still 25 degrees tho, better then the 35 we had during the day.
I am pleasantly, if not sufficiently, inebriated at this point.
All the best to everyone for 2010 !!
There’s a holly tree in front yard, but it’s probably a male. No berries.
Happy New Year, Rorschach! We’ll still have to wait a bit, you know…
Thank you, Dania, you too !! I be here nursing my headache when you guys celebrate tomorrow…:-)
Indeed, we do. It appears that it will be a moist one here.
Wonderful. I’m watching New Years’ fireworks from Sydney on TV!
Happy New Year, Rorschach. Kinda cold here in Charleston, SC this morning – 7C/43F, but warming up to about 54F later. It is rainy, though. Many of the people in the ice belt here in the US hate it when I give the local weather.
Take care, Jeffrey
All the best and a happy new year JeffreyD !! Hope all’s well mate !
Rorschach, been an odd year, but I am still on the sunny side of the dirt. (smile)
Take care, brudder.
Amen to that !
Same here for sure…..
But then again, life is absurd and we should expect odd years to be the rule not the exception…:-)
New Year song :
Rorschach, thanks for the Scorpions vid, nicely done. For me, this has been the “make it through the decade” song –
Ciao
Nips in. Waves.
Happy New Year everyone.
Nips out again.
Oh !!! Tom Waits !!
I wouldnt have made it past my 16th birthday without Tom Waits mate…
Off for a little coffee and brekkie. Ciao and Happy New Year to the rest of the clan.
Jeffrey
Ok, one more. Thought you might be a Tom Waits fan. I love his stuff and it got me through a lot. My voice is a lot like his, but mine is deeper and less melodious. (smile)
OK, coffee and goodies call.
Ciao
Yeah I can remember numerous climbs in Zion where I could place protection and pull it straight out myself in one spot but move it up to a different crack and it would be fine. Makes running out pro on a long climb ultra sketch.
Let’s not even discuss the Fisher Towers.
JeffreyD, great way to say it. Going to steal it for my facebook status now. :)
Yeah–seriously fractured sandstones? Damn. Although highly vesicular basalts can be similar. You zip right up the columnar jointing, no problem. And then you come to the vesicular zone at the top of the ancient flow and suddenly everything is a spiderweb of cracked blocks…
Happy New Year to everyone!!
Currently around 15:45 in the UK so things are running down for another public holiday and the same old repeats on the telly.
Here’s a piece of music everyone thinks is trash because it is so simple – 3 chords (or so I’m told) by a group that can hardly sing but everytime they do I challenge anyone NOT to have a smile on their face:
Status Quo – Officers of the Most Noble Order of the British Empire – presumably for services to entertainment – even their greatest fans would quail at the thought of it being for services to music!
I know. I know. The Most Noble Order of the British Empire is out-of-date nonsense. But it’s fun.
I love Status Quo because they play the same pieces at every concert because that’s what the fans from 5 to 105 want. They aren’t there to plug a new album or to play other people’s hits. They thump out the same old stuff and people leave happy.
One totally true story of incompetence at the BBC. Status Quo were booked to play against a background of a tremendous firework display so what did the producer do? Set the sound to the fireworks and the picture to Status Quo playing. 2 uglier performers it is harder to imagine! (And they only share 1 nose – it gets passed back and forth between concerts.)
Celebrate the New Year with a New Thread.