Ophiolite

This is Olber's Paradox. The expanding Universe (whether Big Bang or Steady State) gets around this problem.

Newtonian, you said this: "Soft tissue almost always rots before mineral replacement can take place.There are cases were fossilized impressions of internal organs and muscles, including the intestines, colon, windpipe, liver, etc.However very rare. Unless frozen in ice and hence not a true fossil,soft tissue will rot and not be evident 65million years later." This certainly reads as if you believe, with the exception of freezing, that soft tissues cannot survive over millions of years. You appear to use this 'fact' to dismiss this latest T-Rex find. Mokele is pointing out that your premise is wrong.

`Here is a summary of what’s been said, with a couple of extra points thrown in. Ocean currents are driven by two factors: 1. Winds 2. Density contrasts (related to temperature and salinity) They are modified by the Coriolis force. There are surface currents and deep currents. Lets look at the surface currents first. These are driven primarily by wind. They form five major circulating systems called gyres. There are two in the Atlantic (North and South), the Pacific (North and South) and one in the Indian Ocean. They rotate clockwise in the Northern hemisphere and anti-clockwise in the Southern, driven by the prevailing winds. (The Indian Ocean current is unusual in that it reverses direction from summer to winter under the influence of the monsoon.) They carry warm waters from the equatorial regions towards high latititudes and cold water back towards the equator. They rarely run any deeper than about 100m, so they effect only a small volume of the total ocean. The deep currents replace the waters of the deep oceans over a time scale of hundreds of years. They are driven primarily by density contrasts. The most important of these begins between Scotland and Greenland, where the descending cold waters of the North Atlantic Drift (the extension of the Gulf Stream) begin moving south down the Atlantic. They join the deep Antarctic circumpolar current that runs clockwise around that continent, before turning north in the Pacific and heading for the Aleutians, between Asia and North America. Here they surface and become part of the surface circulation pattern.

And what are they decaying into? Nothing?

It sounds as if your friend has a closed mind. He is arriving at what he believes in by what he feels is correct, not on the basis of evidence. For that reason, no matter what arguments you produce, he will always come up with a counter argument.I would still recommend trying to convince him, for two reasons. 1. You might eventually succeed. 2. One of the very best ways of learning something thoroughly is to try explaining it to someone else, especially if they are hostile to the idea.

Your arguments are being lost in the 'noise' of your personal attacks. It predisposes readers to take the other side even if the facts support you. It may be fun, but is it worth the price.

Some links: University of Berkley site on the Pleistocene. Brief, focusing on animals, but has some interesting links: http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/quaternary/ple.html This site focuses on the current Ice Age: http://museum.state.il.us/exhibits/ice_ages/ This is a nice summary of the Quaternary period: http://qra.org.uk/what.html A nice summary of some of the theories on causes: http://www.sentex.net/~tcc/iceage.html A word of warning. I just quickly googled these. They are reliable, but there are a lot of links that are nonsense. Watch out for them. And Aardvark, yes the film was silly, but it could initiate an ice age thus: Temperature rises Oceanic evaporation increases Precipitation increases In high latitudes and at high altitudes this falls as snow. Ice thickness increases Glaciers and ice caps advance Albedo increases Global temperature drops Edit: By the way CrazyKillerGhost you will have a ringside seat in Chicago if the glaciers head south in your lifetime.

In one sense we are still in an ice age: about 10% of the Earth’s land surface is covered by glacier ice. If all the ice in the Polar caps (mainly Antarctica) and in Greenland were to melt the world’s sea level would rise by about 300’. When the ice was at its greatest extent, covering almost 30% of the land, sea levels were 300’ lower than today. (So the total range is 600’, or almost 200m.) We are in what at present is called an interglacial. There have been several of these since the current Ice Age began around 2.5 million years ago. The early researchers in Europe and North America thought there had been four major advances and retreats of the ice, but we now know there were many more: they have been recurring roughly every 100,000 years over the last million years, and every 40,000 years before that. So, what causes ice ages? The cyclic advance and retreat of the ever present ice has, as noted, been a feature of the last 2 ½ million years, but it has not always been the case. During long periods of the Earth’s history the planet seems to have been ice free. This was the case, for example, during the time that the dinosaurs lived. On the other hand there has been at least one occasion when all, or almost all, the planet was covered by ice. Severe ice ages of this kind (the Snowball Earth Hypothesis) are thought to have occurred in the Pre-Cambrian. Some scientists suspect that the last of these may have generated the conditions that led to the sudden (in geological terms) appearance of many complex animal forms: an event known as the Cambrian Explosion. So, why do sometimes glaciations occur and at other times not? Here are the major factors: • Solar Radiation – the sun was dimmer billions of years ago. It has slowly brightened by about 30% over the last four billion years. There was therefore a greater chance of an ice age, and a major ice age at that, in the Pre-Cambrian. • Plate Tectonics – If there is no continental mass at the poles there is nowhere for snow to build up, and sea ice is readily drifted to warmer zones by currents. (The Arctic retains so much ice because it is largely land locked.) Over time as the continents drift, one will find itself over one of the poles and the potential for an ice age is there. • Mountain Building – associated with the plate tectonics are mountain ranges and plateaus. These not only provide high elevations on which ice may build up, but they alter the weather patterns around the globe, sometimes encouraging and other times discouraging an ice advance. • Ocean Currents – ecoli has already made reference to these. • Atmosphere – the concentration of greenhouse gases (e.g. methane, carbon dioxide) has varied during ice ages. • Orbital Variations – Milankovitch refined the work of a Scottish geologist John Croll, demonstrating that variations in the orbit of the Earth, the tilt of its axis and the precession of the equinoxes would vary the amount of sunlight reaching the surface. There is a good correlation between that and the advances and retreats of the ice during the last two million years. Because of the complexities of the above, especially the variations in greenhouse gas caused by human activity, and uncertainties in the details of some of the mechanisms at work it is really impossible to say when the next ice age proper may arrive. Perhaps we have forestalled it by our flagrant use of fossil fuels. Perhaps not. I imagine that is the longest way of saying ‘I don’t know’ you have seen. Hope it was helpful.

The reference is to red blood cells, correct?. In mammals the red blood cells do not contain a nucleus and so there will be no DNA. Mokele is this also true of reptiles and therefore likely true of dinosaurs, or not?

Metatron, I have read the entire article you linked to and am faced with one of two possibilities: 1. The combination of my limited intellectual capcity and your blending of an unusual writing style with contentious and heavily abbreviated concepts has rendered the document unintelligble to me (and, I suspect, to others). 2. The document is arrant nonsense and should, at best, be relegated as Mokele suggests to pseudo-science. I shall work on the first hypothesis for the time being. I shall limit myself to two questions initially. These are designed to bring some sense of your underlying thesis into the scope of my understanding. A. You note that Mantarana and Varela(1) say "an organism can be defined as a cycle of relationships unified into a circle of self creation, that contains component parts, which make parts, that in turn make those parts, in a recursive cycle of self-making. This unified system can simply be visualized as a ring." (The emphasis is mine.) In the next paragraph you state "how did these eukarya form into these complex circular systems so suddenly? " You appear to have leapt from a metaphor in which the process is seen as a ring, to an organism, which physically is a ring or circle. Have I misunderstood you? B. The implication in your writings is that simple eukaryotes arose almost (in geological terms) at the same time as more complex metazoans. Again, is this what you are stating, or have I misinterpreted your writing? Thank you. 1. It would be helpful to have a link or a proper reference for these.

Remember that all these sub-divisions of science, while useful and generally logical, are wholly artificial. The more you know about any science the better will be your understanding of your chosen field.

It isn't matter that is expanding, it is space itself.

ed if you are using a simple centrifuge, mechanical or electrical, inside, while rotating the configuration is as you describe. Stop the centrifuge and remove the sample container and it matches YTs description. It's all depends on POV.

I believe, swansont, that zazzzoom is trying to establish that the shape of space conforms to the internal shape of his skull. He certainly has me convinced.

Bill Clinton! But I'm genuinely a sincere person. Honest. Really.

The only relationship I can see between the two is wholly indirect: both are influenced by plate tectonics; one dramatically and immediately, the other subtly and over the long term. Tsunamis of course are generated by the sudden movement of tectonic plates. Mezarashi's point is critical here: there is practically no transfer of water, only of energy. I also find it difficult to accept that a sea floor movement of the required order of magnitude could occur. The Indian Ocean tsunami involved a displacement of 30ft approximately, even if it had been 300m that in an Ocean more than ten times that depth would be unlikely to have a significant effect. (Though I keep thinking of Amazonian butterflies.) However, repeated movements of the tectonic plates alter the planetary geography with consequent changes in oceanic circulation. That is the only, non-causative, link I can see between the two.

Which does not make him right, just worthy of some attention. Edited to add "some"

Unless there are only eighty seven ions present, then the lattice is quite small.

TT, you've allowed Pangloss to divert you from the central issue. He has you trying to justify your rather bizarre guilty verdict before the defense has even cross examined; and debating the nature and quality of a web site. Agree you got theverdict wrong, or just pend it for a moment; forget about the website and get back to discussing the merits and demerits of the case against the government. Pangloss, I'm not suggesting your diversionary tactics were conscious or deliberate, but they sure were effective. Syntax, of course you are right. No government could ever be complicit in something like that. Nixon never heard of Bernard Barker. Kennedy won his election fair and square, and didn't abandon the Cubans in the Bay of Pigs. And even if such fanciful notions were true, no leader of a country would ever allow destruction of life and property on such a scale even if he believed it was for the greater good of the country.......Of course that leaves me wondering why Coventry has a new cathedral. You are old enough and knowledgable enough that that reference should not be an enigma to you.

Does the latter relate to synchronicity?

I just noticed your response to my post. I shall defend everything I say until I see an error in it, at which point I shall condemn it with equal vigour. I have often, perhaps even generally, been on the opposite side of an argument to Aardvark. You can find an example earlier in this thread. I believe we were both surprised to find ourselves in the same position. I trust we have mutual respect, but admiration - that's a bit strong. This is a public forum. You have read my words. I did not express them in a pm to Aardvark. I declared my opinion openly. The substance behind my words (calling your statements inaccurate) lies in Aardvark's post. He said what I would have said, probably more precisely than I would have said it. Did you really want a paraphrase? Not difficult, merely pointless, as noted above. I think we covered that point.

She shouldn't have eaten it then.

The most elegant solution would be that we live in an oscillating Universe. That would match the oscillating character of our theories: metaphysics reflecting cosmology.