Claim CD750:
Plate tectonics occurred, but catastrophically. Slabs of oceanic crust
broke loose and subducted along continental margins. This lowered the
viscosity of the mantle, leading to meters-per-second runaway subduction.
The earth's magnetic field rapidly reversed several times. Steam caused a
global rain. Flood basalts erupted. The lighter mantle material of the
new ocean floors made them rise, causing the oceans to flood the
continents. The flood carried and redistributed sediments. The process
slowed almost to a stop when nearly all the old ocean floor had been
subducted. Subsequent cooling of the ocean basins caused them to sink to
where they are today.
Source:
Austin, S. A., J. R. Baumgardner, D. R. Humphreys, A. A. Snelling, L.
Vardiman and K. P. Wise, 1994. Catastrophic plate tectonics: A global
flood model of earth history. Proceedings of the third international
conference on creationism. Pittsburgh, PA: Creation Science Fellowship,
Inc., pp. 609-621.
Response:
- Much geological evidence is incompatible with catastrophic plate
tectonics:
- Island chains, such as the Hawaiian islands, indicate that the ocean
floor moved slowly over erupting "hot spots." Radiometric dating and
relative amounts of erosion both indicate that the older islands are
very much older, not close to the same age as catastrophic tectonics
would require.
- Catastrophic plate tectonics says that all ocean floor should be
essentially the same age. But both radiometric dating and
amounts of sedimentation indicate that the age changes gradually,
from brand new to tens of millions of years old.
- As sea-floor basalt cools, it becomes denser and sinks. The
elevation of sea floors is consistent with cooling appropriate for
its age, assuming gradual spreading.
- Guyots are flat-topped underwater mountains. The tops were eroded
flat from a long time at the ocean surface, and they sank with the
sea floor. Catastrophic tectonics does not allow enough time for
the sea mountain to form, erode, and sink.
- Runaway subduction does not account for continent-continent
collisions, such as between India and the Eurasian plate.
- Catastrophic plate tectonics has no plausible mechanism. In
particular, the greatly lowered viscosity of the mantle, the rapid
magnetic reversals, and the sudden cooling of the ocean floor
afterwards cannot be explained under conventional physics.
- Conventional plate tectonics accounts for the evidence already and
does a much better job of it. It explains innumerable details that
catastrophic plate tectonics cannot, such as why there is gold in
California, silver in Nevada, salt flats in Utah, and coal in
Pennsylvania (McPhee 1998). It requires no extraordinary mechanisms to
do so. Catastrophic plate tectonics would be a giant step backwards in
the progress of science.
References:
- McPhee, J., 1998. (See below)
Further Reading:
McPhee, John, 1998. Annals of the Former World. New York: Farrar,
Straus and Giroux.
created 2004-3-31
