> Ager insists, as do numerous leading geologists of today, that many of
> the geologic deposits are actually a sequence of rapid catastrophic
> deposits, usually water related.
Again, I fail to see how this pertains to what you're really trying to
show -- evidence for a unique global flood a few thousand years ago. Ager
(1983) has a chapter on "Catastrophic Uniformitarianism." Allow me to quote
from this chapter (p. 75)...
"Papers have been written on 'the significance of the rare event
in geology' and one must never forget the significance of the old
truism that given time, the rare event becomes a probability and
given enough time, it becomes a certainty. We certainly have
enough time in geology."
and (p. 83-84)...
"However, I would not for one moment deny the continuity and the
gradualness of the processes which are changing the earth. But
we must always distinguish between the nature of the process and
the nature of the record. I do not deny uniformitarianism in its
true sense, that is to say, of interpreting the past by means of
the processes that we see going on at the present day, so long as
we remember that the periodic catastrophy (including sudden events
like the rushing of a turbidity current) is one of those processes.
All I am saying is that I strongly suspect that those periodic
catastrophes make more showing in the stratigraphical record than
we have hitherto assumed."
Bottom line Randy, is that Ager believes in an old earth and when he speaks
of catastrophic events, he's speaking of hurricanes, tsunamis, turbitity
currents, local floods, sea level rises (not just one, but many throughout
the earth's history) and other rare events which show up with some frequency
given rocks that span hundreds of millions of years of time.
It puzzles me that young-earth creationists like to quote Ager, implying
that he somehow supports their ideas of a young earth or a global flood.
Ager (1993, p. xi) himself has written...
"On that side too [catastrophism] were the obviously untenable
views of bible-oriented fanatics, obsessed with myths such as
Noah's flood... That is why I think it necessary to include
the following 'disclaimer': in view of the misuse that my words
have been put to in the past, I wish to say that nothing in this
book should be taken out of context and thought in any way to
support the views of the 'creationists (who I refuse to call
'scientific')." [Disclaimer appeared in bold-face type]
Pretty strong condemnation of your position by someone you appear to have
quoted out of context.
> Do you deny that Dr. Ager has spearheaded a revival in geology back
> toward flood processes?
I absolutely deny it. Ager did not support a global flood -- reread
the above quotations.
Ager (who has passed away), spearheaded a revival away from a strict
uniformitarianism that was current in stratigraphy before he wrote the
first edition of his book (1973). He wanted stratigraphers to look at
many parts of the stratigraphic record as composed of sequences of
catastrophic events (like deposits from local hurricanes, for example)
which appear uniform due to there being many of them given the millions
of years the rock strata represent.
> Are you a "neo-catastrophist"?
No, because I never adopted a simplistic view of uniformitarianism.
Maybe that's only because I started my geological education in the late
1980s. The geologic concept of uniformitarianism is summed up in an essay
entitled "Uniformity and Catastrophe" by Stephen Jay Gould (1977, p. 147-152)
where he showed that Charles Lyell's (the "father" of uniformitarianism)
concept of uniformitarianism had four different components...
1. "Natural laws are constant (uniform) in space and time."
2. "Processes now operating to mold the earth's surface should be invoked
to explain the events of the past (uniformity of process through time)."
3. "Geological change is slow, gradual, and steady, not cataclysmic or
paroxysmal (uniformity of rate)."
4. "The earth has been fundamentally the same since its formation
(uniformity of configuration)."
Gould goes on to say that (p. 152)...
"We accept Lyell's first two uniformities, but so did the
catastrophists. Lyell's third uniformity, appropriately derigified,
is his great substantive contribution; his fourth (and most
important) uniformity has been graciously forgotten."
I don't believe any geologist today believes in a strict uniformitarianism of
rate for earth changing processes. The real world operates between the two
extremes of strict uniformitarianism and strict catastrophism. Pelagic
sedimentation is pretty strictly uniform (at least while that part of the
world is in the deep ocean), reef growth is pretty uniform, etc. Turbidites,
on the other hand, are small-scale catastrophic events. None of this,
however, supports your idea of a global flood or a young earth.
References:
Ager, Derek V. 1983. The Nature of the Stratigraphical Record (3rd ed).
John Wiley & Sons, NY
Ager, Derek. 1993. The New Catastrophism. Cambridge University Press, UK.
Gould, Stephen Jay. 1977. Ever Since Darwin: Reflections in Natural
History. W.W. Norton & Co., NY
- Steve.
-- Steven H. Schimmrich Callsign KB9LCG s-schim@uiuc.edu Department of Geology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 245 Natural History Building, Urbana, IL 61801 (217) 244-1246 http://www.uiuc.edu/ph/www/s-schim Deus noster refugium