PleaseReadThis wrote:

felltoearth wrote:
That's an excellent example of what I was talking about. Your actual Scientific evidence (i.e robust data set) for earth expansion is where?

Duh. The "data" is the location and shape of the Zodiac fan. Do you dispute the accuracy of that data? It could just as easily have been in a location that is in line with what PT predicts and requires and if that were the case I honestly would be convinced that the PT model is correct It doesn't. It could have been in a location that makes no sense to either theory, but that is not the case either. It is in a location that is in line with EE which is either an astronomical coincidence or says something we can learn from. Did you or anyone else have a credible explanation using "science" as you claimed was offered for every aspect of this discussion?

The Geological Society of America wrote:

As the minimum drainage (500,000 km2) is already equal to one-half of the State of Alaska, any major expansion is judged unreasonable. This requires that relative convergence at the Aleutian Trench be limited to less than ∼500 km from 40 m.y. B.P. to present. A possible method by which this limitation can be satisfied is to allow a significant portion of southern Alaska to move in concert with the Pacific plate since the upper Eocene.

It is rather simple to fit the Zodiac fan into modern plate tectonics. All that is required is for southern Alaska up to the Denali fault to have been pushed northward by the Pacific plate. Problem solved without resorting to a hypothesis that lacks an explanation of a mechanism by which expansion could possibly occur.

felltoearth wrote:

Florian wrote:

felltoearth wrote:I thought this was a thread about EE, not debunking plate tectonics. Please see the thread title.

Debunking refutations attempts of EE is not EE?

If this is what you think you're doing, you need to reread the entire thread. Basically it goes like this:

EE proponent: Look at this picture. Clearly it says EE.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: *sigh* can you just show evidence of earth expansion?

EE proponent: Sure. Look at this picture. Clearly it says EE.

Rinse and repeat.

That is clearly a misrepresentation of what I'm doing in this thread.

You claimed in this message that lack of evidence is self refuting (or evidence of absence), which is an incorrect statement showing your lack of scientific culture.

Then Weaver, in this message, came to save you and said that there are evidence that Earth is not growing.
I answered that all these evidence supposed to refute the growth of Earth have been debunked so far, and I also rapidly explained why.
Therefore, there are no evidence that Earth is not growing and the hypothesis remains scientifically open.

Then I propose a demonstration of the growth of the surface of Earth, based on the geodynamics of Wadat-benioff zone.
Of course, you splendidly ignore my proposition and keep repeating ad nauseam "show me the evidence!".

Seriously, if you don't want to make the intellectual effort to follow my demonstration that provide the evidence you have been requesting then what can I do?
It is as hopeless as to convince a creationist that no gods exist = I cannot force you to drink if you are not thirsty!

So, if you surprisingly change your mind and finally truly decide to adopt a rational and skeptic independent mind instead of embracing group thinking, then start THERE.

Oldskeptic wrote:
It is rather simple to fit the Zodiac fan into modern plate tectonics. All that is required is for southern Alaska up to the Denali fault to have been pushed northward by the Pacific plate. Problem solved without resorting to a hypothesis that lacks an explanation of a mechanism by which expansion could possibly occur.

Except that this hypothesis has been refuted because there are geological evidence that southern Alaska did not move thousands km northward along the Denali fault. And the nature of the sediment typical of the northern latitude of Alaska also refute this.
Plate tectonics has no explanation to offer, and worse, the position and history of formation of the Zodiac fan refutes the history of the pacific plate as required by plate tectonics. Therefore it is the basis for a clear refutation of the plate tectonics theory (one among others...).
You are free to ignore this fact, but then do not claim to base your convictions on the scientific method.

Newstein wrote:PT has no evidence at all. They 'think' the Earth has not changed in size. We know from the age ocean scan that new oceanic crust is created. They say: so it MUST be subducted.

They always do that.

Florian wrote:

Oldskeptic wrote:
It is rather simple to fit the Zodiac fan into modern plate tectonics. All that is required is for southern Alaska up to the Denali fault to have been pushed northward by the Pacific plate. Problem solved without resorting to a hypothesis that lacks an explanation of a mechanism by which expansion could possibly occur.

Except that this hypothesis has been refuted because there are geological evidence that southern Alaska did not move thousands km northward along the Denali fault. And the nature of the sediment typical of the northern latitude of Alaska also refute this.
Plate tectonics has no explanation to offer, and worse, the position and history of formation of the Zodiac fan refutes the history of the pacific plate as required by plate tectonics. Therefore it is the basis for a clear refutation of the plate tectonics theory (one among others...).
You are free to ignore this fact, but then do not claim to base your convictions on the scientific method.

If the PT model is incorrect and the EE model is correct and the pacific lithosphere is not moving significantly relative to Japan, then the Hawaiian islands must be formed by a hot spot that is moving eastward to some extent in tandem with the eastern active margin rather than by a stationary hotspot and a moving lithosphere. It always bothered me that if the conveyor belt is moving in the opposite direction at some depth below the Pacific, why wouldn't it drag a hotspot with it? Is there any support for or refutation of the idea that the hotspot is moving instead of the lithosphere?

Florian wrote:

felltoearth wrote:

Florian wrote:

felltoearth wrote:I thought this was a thread about EE, not debunking plate tectonics. Please see the thread title.

Debunking refutations attempts of EE is not EE?

If this is what you think you're doing, you need to reread the entire thread. Basically it goes like this:

EE proponent: Look at this picture. Clearly it says EE.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: Your understanding of what's happening in that image is erroneous. It's not what the science says. Here's an explanation.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

EE debunker: *sigh* can you just show evidence of earth expansion?

EE proponent: Sure. Look at this picture. Clearly it says EE.

Rinse and repeat.

That is clearly a misrepresentation of what I'm doing in this thread.

You claimed in this message that lack of evidence is self refuting (or evidence of absence), which is an incorrect statement showing your lack of scientific culture.

Then Weaver, in this message, came to save you and said that there are evidence that Earth is not growing.
I answered that all these evidence supposed to refute the growth of Earth have been debunked so far, and I also rapidly explained why.
Therefore, there are no evidence that Earth is not growing and the hypothesis remains scientifically open.

Then I propose a demonstration of the growth of the surface of Earth, based on the geodynamics of Wadat-benioff zone.
Of course, you splendidly ignore my proposition and keep repeating ad nauseam "show me the evidence!".

Seriously, if you don't want to make the intellectual effort to follow my demonstration that provide the evidence you have been requesting then what can I do?
It is as hopeless as to convince a creationist that no gods exist = I cannot force you to drink if you are not thirsty!

So, if you surprisingly change your mind and finally truly decide to adopt a rational and skeptic independent mind instead of embracing group thinking, then start THERE.

I misrepresented you? I don't think so. That would be against the FUA if I did.

Sorry for not being sciency enough for you, but you see, I'm not a scientist and MORE IMPORTANTLY I'M NOT THE ONE MAKING THE CLAIM THAT THE EARTH IS EXPANDING.

To be clear, the Zodiac fan might be able to support the hypothesis that the earth is expanding IF THERE IS ACTUAL EVIDENCE THAT THE EARTH IS EXPANDING.

The zodiac fan is an inference of an expanding earth, much like apes and humans having opposable thumbs is evidence of evolution. There are competing explanations that require far less complicated explanations. Your explanation of the zodiac fan requires:
1) a proposed robust mechanism for earth expansion
2) evidence i.e measurments and data that the earth is actually expanding.

That's how science is done. Nothing you have presented is a slam dunk until all the pieces of earth expansion fit the puzzle. It doesn't as you have yet to demonstrate it despite attempts to hammer the pieces in place.

You are attempting to do science. You are failing.

It appears to me that the archipelagos in the South Pacific are for the most part not parallel with the Hawaiian archipelago which makes no sense with a moving lithosphere if they sprouted in a similar time period. On the other hand, it is perfectly reasonable and expected that the hotspots might diverge for whatever reason under an EE model.

PleaseReadThis wrote:
It appears to me that the archipelagos in the South Pacific are for the most part not parallel with the Hawaiian archipelago which makes no sense with a moving lithosphere if they sprouted in a similar time period. On the other hand, it is perfectly reasonable and expected that the hotspots might diverge for whatever reason under an EE model.

So it appears we're at this point of the cycle again.

EE proponent: but look here, some scientists disagree about aspects of PT, therefore it must be wrong. Clearly I'm right. Look at this image.

You guys are a satire of your own making.

PleaseReadThis wrote:
If the PT model is incorrect and the EE model is correct and the pacific lithosphere is not moving significantly relative to Japan, then the Hawaiian islands must be formed by a hot spot that is moving eastward to some extent in tandem with the eastern active margin rather than by a stationary hotspot and a moving lithosphere. It always bothered me that if the conveyor belt is moving in the opposite direction at some depth below the Pacific, why wouldn't it drag a hotspot with it? Is there any support for or refutation of the idea that the hotspot is moving instead of the lithosphere?

Actually, There are evidence that the oceanic lithosphere is decoupled from the mantle. As a matter of fact, for the Pacific, the mantle is flowing in directions that are different than the relative motion of the lithosphere. That is one of the reason why geodynamists now believe that plate motions are driven by the plates themselves and not by the mantle.
Regarding hotspots, there is a big dispute about their origin. Some geophysicists believe that they have local shallow origin, and some believe that they origin from deeply anchored plumes. See www.mantleplumes.org for a wealth of information about this controversy.
In the frame work of Earth expansion, and in the case of a deep origin, the position of the hotspot is dependent on the mantle flows and the relative displacement of the decoupled lithosphere.
Last point about the relative motion of Japan and Pacific. Japan is an arc which is moving toward and over the Pacific. It was well illustrated by the coseismic displacement of the Tohoku earthquake.

felltoearth wrote:
I misrepresented you? I don't think so. That would be against the FUA if I did.

This is precisely what you did.

felltoearth wrote:Sorry for not being sciency enough for you, but you see, I'm not a scientist and MORE IMPORTANTLY I'M NOT THE ONE MAKING THE CLAIM THAT THE EARTH IS EXPANDING.

It is obvious from your various claims that you are not a scientist. Yet, you pretend to know better about making science than a scientist... It tells a lot!
If I make the claim that the Earth is expanding, it is because there are serious evidence. Or do you believe that I'm just dumb?
I'm ok to spend sometimes to explain you how we can reach the conclusion that Earth is expanding, but I won't certainly waste my time with someone who would not show any genuine scientific interest for that theory and would be here just for the pleasure of trashing.

felltoearth wrote:To be clear, the Zodiac fan might be able to support the hypothesis that the earth is expanding IF THERE IS ACTUAL EVIDENCE THAT THE EARTH IS EXPANDING.

Then you understand nothing about the implications of the history of the Zodiac fan. The Zodiac fan history IS an evidence itself because it proves that the north-pacific lithosphere has been moving southwestward relatively to the gulf of Alaska, while PT requires that it moved Northwestward. Then the hypothesis is that the oceanic lithosphere of the North Pacific formed by progressive exposure of the mantle originally located under Alaska. We can actually recognize it in the shape of the isochrons.

felltoearth wrote:The zodiac fan is an inference of an expanding earth, much like apes and humans having opposable thumbs is evidence of evolution.

Wrong see above.

felltoearth wrote:That's how science is done. Nothing you have presented is a slam dunk until all the pieces of earth expansion fit the puzzle. It doesn't as you have yet to demonstrate it despite attempts to hammer the pieces in place.

Then stop wasting our time and go THERE. How many times do I have to repeat it?

felltoearth wrote:You are attempting to do science. You are failing.

Of course, you know better... you are so much smarter than the rest of us...

Another part of science is predictive ability.

So, how large will the earth be in 10, 50, 100 and 1000 years?

Please show your working out.

Florian wrote:

Oldskeptic wrote:
It is rather simple to fit the Zodiac fan into modern plate tectonics. All that is required is for southern Alaska up to the Denali fault to have been pushed northward by the Pacific plate. Problem solved without resorting to a hypothesis that lacks an explanation of a mechanism by which expansion could possibly occur.

Except that this hypothesis has been refuted because there are geological evidence that southern Alaska did not move thousands km northward along the Denali fault.

No, but the Yakutat terrane did. It moved north with the Pacific plate ~1500 - 2000 km along with the Zodiac fan until it became part of south Alaska.

"This hypothesis is based on the reconstruction of magnetic anomalies and the development of the subduction of the Kula-Farallon spreading center (Bruns 1983). The southern option places the basement rocks of the Yakutat terrane as far south as northern California or southern Oregon in the Eocene ( ∼ 45 Ma; cf. Bruns 1983; Plafker et al. 1994) and thus involves ∼ 1500 – 2000 km of northward transport along the Cordilleran margin. The sedimentary cover rocks would consequently reflect movement along the western edge of the northern Cordillera (see Cowan et al. 1997). "

Florian wrote:And the nature of the sediment typical of the northern latitude of Alaska also refute this.

Turbidites of the Zodiac fan match the coastal mountains of British Columbia. And as the article cited above states: The basement rocks of the Yakutat terrane match those of as far south as northern California and the sedimentary rock covering the basement rock should match that of the the western edge of the northern Cordillera, which it does.

"The buried, Eocene turbidites are part of the Zodiac Fan, and were derived from the margin of N. America, at a high latitude (Creager and Scholl, 1973) . One candidate for the source terrane of the turbidites is the Coast Mountains Batholith of northern British Columbia, which experienced extensive 10–30 km and rapid (2 mm/year) uplift in the Paleocene and Eocene (Hollister, 1979, 1982)."

Florian wrote:Plate tectonics has no explanation to offer, and worse, the position and history of formation of the Zodiac fan refutes the history of the pacific plate as required by plate tectonics. Therefore it is the basis for a clear refutation of the plate tectonics theory (one among others...).

Clearly plate tectonics does have an explanation that fits well with the data and unlike EE includes an explanation of the mechanism.

Florian wrote:You are free to ignore this fact, but then do not claim to base your convictions on the scientific method.

Simply claiming that a hypothesis has been refuted and that there is geological evidence to support the refutation doesn't quite cut it. As anyone that cared to actually investigate the claim, that the Zodiac fan refutes plate tectonics and supports EE, can see it's EE that looses out when the data is examined.

Oldskeptic wrote:
No, but the Yakutat terrane did. It moved north with the Pacific plate ~1500 - 2000 km along with the Zodiac fan until it became part of south Alaska.

"This hypothesis is based on the reconstruction of magnetic anomalies and the development of the subduction of the Kula-Farallon spreading center (Bruns 1983). The southern option places the basement rocks of the Yakutat terrane as far south as northern California or southern Oregon in the Eocene ( ∼ 45 Ma; cf. Bruns 1983; Plafker et al. 1994) and thus involves ∼ 1500 – 2000 km of northward transport along the Cordilleran margin. The sedimentary cover rocks would consequently reflect movement along the western edge of the northern Cordillera (see Cowan et al. 1997). "

You did not read carefully the paper you are referring to. The Yakutat terrane was not on the Pacific plate as you claim, but on the Kula and Farallon plates (actually Kula and Vancouver plates). So the Zodiac fan which lays on the Pacific plate could not have moved north along with the Yakutat terrane.

I adapted fig24 from Wright et al Earth-Science Reviews 154 (2016) 138–173, which presents the most up to date plate tectonics reconstruction of the Pacific, to show you where the Zodiac fan (in red) is predicted to be at the time of its formation (from 40 to about 30 My, chron 18n.2o to 13y):



So Plate tectonics predicts that the fan formed on the Pacific plate side of the hypothetic triple junction between the Pacific/Kula/Vancouver plates, far from Alaska and the Yakutat terrane already accreted to Alaska at that time, and across the MORs (!).
Your hypothesis falls apart... plate tectonics makes a prediction that does not fit with the data. This is a clear refutation.

By contrast my hypothesis of a southwestward displacement of the fan relatively to Alaska also explains why the successive channels of the fan are getting younger from west to east.

felltoearth wrote:Another part of science is predictive ability.

So, how large will the earth be in 10, 50, 100 and 1000 years?

Please show your working out.

Predictive ability is not necessarily about prediction of the future. It can be about the prediction of the past. And Earth expansion has a much larger predictive power than plate tectonics for that matter.
Indeed, there is no conservation of the topological relationship of cratons in plate tectonics (the relative position of cratons). Because cratons are theoretically shuffled quite randomly depending on the ever changing global convection.
By contrast this topological relationship of cratons must be conserved in auxotectonics.
So if cratons A was surrounded clockwise by cratons B, C and D 1 By ago, then it has to be still the case today.
And guess what, this is exactly what tell us the data used to make reconstructions of hypothetic supercontinent. I earlier discussed the case of Rodinia for example.

I note that you still refuse to go THERE to get evidence of the expansion. Why am I not surprised... creationists have the very same attitude confronted to arguments that could shatter their beliefs.

Florian wrote:

PleaseReadThis wrote:
If the PT model is incorrect and the EE model is correct and the pacific lithosphere is not moving significantly relative to Japan, then the Hawaiian islands must be formed by a hot spot that is moving eastward to some extent in tandem with the eastern active margin rather than by a stationary hotspot and a moving lithosphere. It always bothered me that if the conveyor belt is moving in the opposite direction at some depth below the Pacific, why wouldn't it drag a hotspot with it? Is there any support for or refutation of the idea that the hotspot is moving instead of the lithosphere?

Actually, There are evidence that the oceanic lithosphere is decoupled from the mantle. As a matter of fact, for the Pacific, the mantle is flowing in directions that are different than the relative motion of the lithosphere. That is one of the reason why geodynamists now believe that plate motions are driven by the plates themselves and not by the mantle.
Regarding hotspots, there is a big dispute about their origin. Some geophysicists believe that they have local shallow origin, and some believe that they origin from deeply anchored plumes. See www.mantleplumes.org for a wealth of information about this controversy.
In the frame work of Earth expansion, and in the case of a deep origin, the position of the hotspot is dependent on the mantle flows and the relative displacement of the decoupled lithosphere.
Last point about the relative motion of Japan and Pacific. Japan is an arc which is moving toward and over the Pacific. It was well illustrated by the coseismic displacement of the Tohoku earthquake.

Thanks, Florian, that mantleplumes.org website is very interesting, though no mention of EE that I could find. If the movement of the hotspots is random or just "blowing in the wind" as one of the papers described, I would point out that the Hawaiian and the micronesian hotspots are clearly moving away from each other in addition to any decoupled plate movement to the northwest. This makes sense for an EE model as new magma is simply filling the space between them and migrating slowly toward the MORs (so it only warrants multiplying the product of all previous observed coincidences by at least another two as random movement could just as well have been converging and disprove EE!) Has there been any examination of the other hotspots to see if they exhibit similar diverging behavior over time?

Actually they are both diverging relative to the lithosphere when a random model would allow for either one to be moving in either direction, so there are really at least four crudely defined possible states only one of which EE allows, (which is duly observed) so multiply the combined odds by at least x4!

Florian wrote:

felltoearth wrote:Another part of science is predictive ability.

So, how large will the earth be in 10, 50, 100 and 1000 years?

Please show your working out.

Predictive ability is not necessarily about prediction of the future. It can be about the prediction of the past. And Earth expansion has a much larger predictive power than plate tectonics for that matter.
Indeed, there is no conservation of the topological relationship of cratons in plate tectonics (the relative position of cratons). Because cratons are theoretically shuffled quite randomly depending on the ever changing global convection.
By contrast this topological relationship of cratons must be conserved in auxotectonics.
So if cratons A was surrounded clockwise by cratons B, C and D 1 By ago, then it has to be still the case today.
And guess what, this is exactly what tell us the data used to make reconstructions of hypothetic supercontinent. I earlier discussed the case of Rodinia for example.

I note that you still refuse to go THERE to get evidence of the expansion. Why am I not surprised... creationists have the very same attitude confronted to arguments that could shatter their beliefs.

Nice hand waving.

Present the evidence here please. Is there something about EE that makes it difficult to predict future earth radii?

felltoearth wrote:

Florian wrote:
I note that you still refuse to go THERE to get evidence of the expansion. Why am I not surprised... creationists have the very same attitude confronted to arguments that could shatter their beliefs.

Nice hand waving.

Present the evidence here please.

The link points to a post of this very thread. So it is here.
Can't you just click on it? It won't bite you if you are confident in science and the skeptics method.
And for your information, the history of the Zodiac fan is an evidence. Now, do you accept this evidence or do you refuse it to satisfy your irrational beliefs?

felltoearth wrote: Is there something about EE that makes it difficult to predict future earth radii?

We can currently roughly estimate a yearly increase in radius that is an average over millions years. It shows us the current trend (about 2 cm/year) but that is a global average. If we make the assumption that this trend will remain stable for the next 100 year, then we can predict that the average global increase will be about 2 m, which includes uplift at some places sinking at other places and so on...
Better local predictions will become available when we'll have the data to follow the global surface deformation of Earth with time.

Florian wrote:

felltoearth wrote:

Florian wrote:
I note that you still refuse to go THERE to get evidence of the expansion. Why am I not surprised... creationists have the very same attitude confronted to arguments that could shatter their beliefs.

Nice hand waving.

Present the evidence here please.

The link points to a post of this very thread. So it is here.
Can't you just click on it? It won't bite you if you are confident in science and the skeptics method.
And for your information, the history of the Zodiac fan is an evidence. Now, do you accept this evidence or do you refuse it to satisfy your irrational beliefs?

felltoearth wrote: Is there something about EE that makes it difficult to predict future earth radii?

We can currently roughly estimate a yearly increase in radius that is an average over millions years. It shows us the current trend (about 2 cm/year) but that is a global average. If we make the assumption that this trend will remain stable for the next 100 year, then we can predict that the average global increase will be about 2 m, which includes uplift at some places sinking at other places and so on...
Better local predictions will become available when we'll have the data to follow the global surface deformation of Earth with time.

More handwaving and dodging answering a simple question. Just like a creationist.
You're no scientist. Any half decent scientists could readily answer the question felltoearth put to you.