Questions about Mt. St. Helens

[Herman Hedning]

If so, the slope should be the same and continuous all the way down to the river.

And that could have been the case if the rocks making up the canyon had been completely uniform and the erosion absolutely even. However, this is not the case. Everyone knows this.

 

[Gracchus]

And that could have been the case if the rocks making up the canyon had been completely uniform and the erosion absolutely even. However, this is not the case. Everyone knows this.

Everyone doesn't know this. Some people are abysmally and purposely ignorant.

 

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

Didn't evolutionists uses the lack of meandering at the bottom of the Mt. St. Helens canyons against rapid erosion? They knew exactly that it formed rapidly, because there isn't any meandering but just flat bottom. They accepted that those canyons formed rapidly compare to the Grand Canyon - that takes longer time they say. But the lack of meandering can be argue against rapid erosion ONLY when they knew those canyons were formed rapidly already. Had it not been the case, they would have concluded that it takes long periods of time, just like anybody today can make the same claim. If I go see the canyons on Mt. St. Helens today, heck, I would make the same uniformatarian assumption. And might have conclude something it like this: "The canyons formed slowly and it may even have had meandering". See where I'm going?

Where you are going is to impune the integrity of geologists while knowing nothing about the subject yourself.

Geologists can tell the difference between rapidly formed structures like the so-called little Grand Canyon of the Toutle river and the Grand Canyon by many observations. For instance the lower gorge of the Grand Canyon is V-shaped where it cuts through the hard Vishnu Schists and Zoroaster Granites. The Toutle Canyon is u-shaped where the water cut through the soft mud and ash that had just been deposited by the volcano and has banks angled at about 45 degrees rather than the steep cliffs found in the Grand Canyon. The side canyons of the Grand Canyon cut through the rocks to the same depth as the main canyon and many such as Bright Angle canyon come in at 90 degrees to the main canyon. You do not see such features in the Toutle Canyon. Below is a picture of the upper Toutle River taken in 1994. You can see that it looks nothing like the real Grand Canyon.

The walls of the so called little grand cayon continued to slump away as the soft mud and ash was washed down the river and a massive dredging project had to be undertaken to unclog the lower Toutle River. Of course the real Grand Canyon is more than 100,000 times the size of the canyon the Toutle carved through soft mud and ash.

 

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

(Think: why does the inner gorge of the Grand Canyon has a much steeper slope? The schist is not that harder than sandstone.)

The steepness of cliff slopes does depend on the compressive strength of the rock forming them. For example some of the steepest cliffs in the Grand Canyon are in the 400-800 foot thick sections of the very hard Redwall Limestones.



http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...Butte_and_Muav_formations_in_Grand_Canyon.jpg

 

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

You did not see what I said. The power of erosion by water is similar to that of ice. The hardness of material is not an important factor. It is the cohesiveness of the material. In this sense, a fractured rock formation (does not matter what kind of rock) can be as easily eroded as (to a scale) unconsolidated pyroclastic material.

. Cohesive strenght and compressive strenght are correlated and "harder" rocks are more difficult to erode. For example erosion caused by breaching of the lava dams in the Grand Canyon eroded away nearly all of the basalt from the lavas without significantly eroded the stronger Vishnu Schists and Zorastor Granites. To use erosion of soft mud and ash that has no cohesive strength as an analogy for erosion of solid rock makes no sense.

In you mind, is the Noah's Flood like a storm with huge force of turbulent flow? That is not true. In many, if not all, places, the water level must just rise quietly (imagine a volcanic eruption along a midoceanic ridge, nobody would even notice it).

So it was not turbulent but somehow eventually carved a canyon thousands of feet deep in rock with sufficient compressive strength to support cliffs thousand of feet high. How did that work?

We interpret the time required for limestone deposit based on the current seawater chemistry. We should know the water chemistry during the Noah's Flood must be very very different. A quick deposition of limestone is not chemically impossible (such as the carbonate deposit in a hydrothermal environment).

So tell us what sea water chemistry resulted in a flood depositing the very pure Mississippian Redwall limestones in a layer 400-800 feet thick atop all the underlaying layers and how is it that the only macro fossils in the Redwalls are Mississippian? Or don't you think the Redwall is a flood deposit? Perhaps you could tell us exactly which layers are flood deposits and which aren't.

Geologic Formations of Utah: Redwall Formation

The Redwall Limestone is medium gray on fresh exposures but is colored by a superficial red stain derived from the overlying formations. It is characteristically well bedded; but, when viewed from a distance it appears almost as a single massive unit, because the subtle divisions between strata are not etched out in sufficient relief to be seen from the canyon rim. In many places, especially in the lower part of the Redwall Cliff, beds of bright red jasper are found, some of which are semiprecious gern quality. The Redwall Limestone is a very pure calcium carbonate rock containing less than one percent sand and shale particles. Its origin is as interesting as its topographic expression. The pure limestone indicates that it was formed in a relatively wide, shallow, quiet sea, far from shale and clay deposition near the shore. Fossil sea shells and a wide variety of other marine life including common corals are found within the Redwall Limestone. Most of the fossils are preserved in remarkable detail.

This sure doesn't sound like something deposited by a global flood to me.

 

[Sophophile]

If God is in control of nature as you have shown, then please don't try and convince me that He sent the Colorado River to forge the Grand Canyon.

Hi AV1611VET

I'm not trying to convince you of anything.

I'm pointing out how your argument from Psalms was false and irrelevant. This goes to show the weakness of your position.

Once again, and let's make this plain as day:

The Grand Canyon came first, then the Colorado River.

The very Documentation that shows God in control of nature also shows God in control of time; and if you think the Colorado River had time to forge the Grand Canyon at God's command, then you must think it hyper-forged it, eh?

Documentation that the physical evidence shows you are misinterpreting with regard to the age of the earth.

Regards
S.

 

[juvenissun]

And that could have been the case if the rocks making up the canyon had been completely uniform and the erosion absolutely even. However, this is not the case. Everyone knows this.

Here is where the problem is. The inner gorge rocks are not more erosion resistant than those rocks above it.

 

[Herman Hedning]

Here is where the problem is. The inner gorge rocks are not more erosion resistant than those rocks above it.

The rocks above are more exposed and have been so for a longer time.

 

[juvenissun]

The steepness of cliff slopes does depend on the compressive strength of the rock forming them. For example some of the steepest cliffs in the Grand Canyon are in the 400-800 foot thick sections of the very hard Redwall Limestones.



http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...Butte_and_Muav_formations_in_Grand_Canyon.jpg

If so, why can't the Redwall LS protect rock layers underneath it?
I say it one more time, it has little to do with the hardness of the rock. It is structure controlled.

 

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

Here is where the problem is. The inner gorge rocks are not more erosion resistant than those rocks above it.

So you are claiming that the metamorphic and igneous rocks of the inner gorge (Vishnu Schists and Zoraster Granites) are not more resistant to erosion than the sandstones, mudstones, shales, basalts and limestone interbedded with shale of the Unkar Group, Nankoweap formation and Chaur group. I would like to see a citation on this. The inner gorge rocks may not be more resistant to erosion than the pure hard limestones of the Redwall (which also forms sheer cliffs) but I think that granites and schists are more resistant to erosion than sandstones, mudstones and shale of these groups and I am virtually certain they are more resistant to erosion than the Cardenas Lavas.

 

[juvenissun]

The rocks above are more exposed and have been so for a longer time.

I see your argument.

Now think about this: the exposed rock would depend on landslide process to collapse itself. It would be a much slower process than water erosion which is active at the bottom of the valley.

Let me focus back to the problem: the inner gorge should not exist if a normal fluvial process is responsible for the formation of the Grand Canyon.

 

[juvenissun]

. Cohesive strenght and compressive strenght are correlated and "harder" rocks are more difficult to erode. For example erosion caused by breaching of the lava dams in the Grand Canyon eroded away nearly all of the basalt from the lavas without significantly eroded the stronger Vishnu Schists and Zorastor Granites. To use erosion of soft mud and ash that has no cohesive strength as an analogy for erosion of solid rock makes no sense.

So it was not turbulent but somehow eventually carved a canyon thousands of feet deep in rock with sufficient compressive strength to support cliffs thousand of feet high. How did that work?

So tell us what sea water chemistry resulted in a flood depositing the very pure Mississippian Redwall limestones in a layer 400-800 feet thick atop all the underlaying layers and how is it that the only macro fossils in the Redwalls are Mississippian? Or don't you think the Redwall is a flood deposit? Perhaps you could tell us exactly which layers are flood deposits and which aren't.

Geologic Formations of Utah: Redwall Formation


This sure doesn't sound like something deposited by a global flood to me.

Of course the coherence between the fresh ash deposit and the schists/gneiss can not be compared directly. However, it is still possible to use one as a scaled model for another. In particular, if we consider the mechanism of water erosion.

I do not know how to answer your question about the origin of Redwall LS in terms of the flood model. And, I said the formation of rock layers is not the point of my argument. The issue is on the mode of erosion. Basically, I think a normal fluvial origin for the formation of Grand Canyon has many problems.

So, I did not answer your question. But I attack your model. I don't know, but you don't know either.