RE: Roots Below Coal

> -----Original Message-----
> From: bpayne15@juno.com [mailto:bpayne15@juno.com]
> Sent: Wednesday, December 03, 2003 9:06 PM
>
>
> On Tue, 2 Dec 2003 05:58:41 -0600 "Glenn Morton"
> <glennmorton@entouch.net> writes:

> > The transition from light to dark is indicative of an increasing
> organic
> > content. That is what I said originally. And so now you acknowledge
> > that the transition isn't abrupt. You are being inconsistent here with
> what
> > you said above.
>
> Sorry, I wasn't clear in what I said. I meant to say that the
> sandstone/coal contact is abrupt, the light to dark sandstone transition
> is gradational.

But that change in color is part of the transition Bill. An electric log
would pick up the additional organic content.

>
> > As to the roots, explain how soft unconsolidated sand can cling to
> > the veggie mat long enough for roots to grow into them when the sand is
> > soaking wet.
>
> Again, I don't think the sand clung to the roots while they were hanging
> from the mat.

Then they couldn't have come from the veggie mat. the roots had to grow in
place which is the entire point of our discussion. These coals are not due
to veggie mats.

>
> Based upon the observations of dissociated, inverted and horizontally
> terminated roots, the most likely scenario is that the roots sank and
> were buried by loose sand washing in around them.

And they always landed vertically. Amazing!

>
> > If you can live with 13,000 years, then neither the global flood nor
> the
> > young earth is true. Thus there is no need to try to make this data
> out to
> > be a deposit of the global flood.
>
> I am more concerned with logically interpreting the data associated with
> the coals I can see, than trying to support YEC or a global flood. If I
> can make the same inference on the other continents that I have made in
> the eastern US for transported peat becoming coal, then by connecting the
> dots the individual floods become global.

But the dots don't connect. It is highly unlikely that the roots would fall
and land vertically waiting for more sand to deposit around them. That is
like dropping pencils from the empire state building and expecting them to
land on their eraser ends and wait for the dust to infill around them.
Doesn't make sense to me, Bill.

> If the single piece of coal on the left side is from the J seam, then the
> J seam likely was banded throughout. I cannot see banding or any
> significant structure at all in the coal above the sandstone. Therefore,
> I am saying that either the coal seam is actually the remains of mined
> coal or is structurally altered (gouge or crushed). It doesn't look like
> any coal seam I have ever seen. Maybe your friend can clear this up.

I emailed him but he hasn't responded yet.

> In August I presented these ideas to a group of about 45 engineers and
> geologists. Several were very enthusiastic about the problems with the
> conventional theory of swamp coal which are answered with the floating
> mat model; the talk was generally well received and I got no negative
> comments. In September I presented the same talk to a group of mining
> engineers and geologists. One University of Alabama geology prof
> monopolized the Q & A period, after having made snide comments under his
> breath during my talk. Needless to say, he was laying for me. When I
> sat down a mining engineer reached over and shook my hand, saying he had
> no trouble seeing geology as a series of catastrophic events. The logic
> is not flawed; trying to convey the concepts in this format is difficult.
> With what we have discussed here, you only have part of the picture.

But the part of the pic I have rules out floating veggie mats.

> The reason I think this banding is probably bark is because of a study by
> Steve Austin as part of his doctoral thesis. "Vitrain, the vitreous coal
> lithotype thicker than 0.1 cm, was studied megascopically in more than
> 250 vertically oriented, polished blocks of Kentucky No. 12 coal.
> Vitrain, which comprises 10% by volume of the coal, exists as think
> sheetlike masses, and as wide, thin-walled, flattened cylinders with
> extraordinary, unbroken extent lying parallel to bedding.... The size
> and shape of vitrain, and its association with abundant miospores from
> _Lepidodendron_ and _Lepidophloios_, indicate that vitrain sheets in the
> Kentucky No. 12 coal represent ruptured cortex shed or broken from the
> outer supportive structure of aborescent lycopods. It is extremely
> difficult to imagine how abundant, horizontally extensive bark sheets
> could remain intact in an intensely root-penetrated environment such as a
> swamp. Instead, the bark must have been deposited in a subaqueous
> environment below a floating vegetation mat. Mechanical abrasion of
> floating lycopod trunks appears to have stripped off large, waterlogged
> bark segments and cylinders which were deposited at the bottom of the
> water mass where rooting was absent, and where the fine interlamination
> of bark with macerated plant material and clay could be preserved."
> (Austin, Steven A., 1980. Depositional environment of mummified bark
> sheets in the Kentucky No. 12 coal bed: Geological Society of America
> Abstracts with Programs, v 12, p 380)

But you are extrapolating from Paleozoic coal to coal you haven't studied.
You may or may not be correct, but you can't claim it until you examine it.

> > You can't do that Bill. First, surely not every single root is so
> > gentlemanly as to fall from the veggie mat before the bark. Secondly,
> if
> > the veggie mat is shedding material, and sand is being deposited, there
> > should be sand in the base of the coal and coal in the top of the sand,
> > meaning the contact couldn't be sharp. Your explanation is a bit
> > stretched.
>
> Sharp contacts between coal and the underlying rock aren't a problem for
> me; they are for your model. This is the point I made with the graphs
> plotting % ash in the Indonesian peat swamps.

But I keep telling you that the change in color has to be due to an
increased influx of organics which means that the contact isn't sharp. If
our difference boils down to this, then we can go no further in this
discussion.
>
> Every single root doesn't fall, just some of them settle first and are
> buried with the last of the sediment. Then the influx of sediment (sand)
> stopped and waterlogged peat covered the bottom.

And why are none horizontal???? Some should be just by virtue of chance.
>
> > I will acknowledge I don't understand how partings take place...
>
> This isn't rocket science, Glenn. Partings are planar layers of
> impurities in coal resulting from turbidity flows or air falls of dust.
> How can you not understand that? Could it be your _bias_ making you
> unwilling to follow the evidence where it leads? Can't you figure out
> how to get a planar parting and lay sheets of bark out flat in a swamp?
>
> Isn't this refusal to consider data what you accuse the YECs of? On your
> web site you say "The YEC silence is deafening on these posts. Can't
> ya'll explain them?" Looks like the pot's calling the kettle black.

Saying I don't know something is not the same as ignoring it. But I don't
think that mystery to me, rises to the strength to overthrow the roots I see
in those coals.

>
> > Oh, I am always desperate. :-)
>
> Stop it, you're going to make me feel sorry for you. <G>

That was the point. Didn't it work? :-)

>
> > First off, I haven't seen the evidence you say you presented.
>
> The Power Point slides on the CD I sent to you.
>
> > Secondly, I didn't claim these were tree roots. They aren't at least
> the small
> > ones aren't. So don't try to claim that this was necessarily a forest.
>
> > The roots look more like shrubs than trees.
>
> Bet you a B-B-Q that the coal consists of trees and not shrubs or
> grasses. The shrubs in my yard have roots that radiate out horizontally
> and vertically from the central bush. I don't see that pattern in the
> photos. They all seem to be more or less vertical and evenly dispersed.

The reason I said shrubs is that the roots in that one photo aren't that
big. But if my friend from Canada ever responds I will ask him what he
knows.

>
> > If these were roots growing down
> > looking for water, how did they know to stop at the dark bed? <<<
> >
> > Don't see any real significance to this observation.
>
> The thin, horizontal dark bed is an old depositional surface. When the
> roots floated down and touched the bottom, they stopped at the bottom
> surface (the thin, horizontal dark bed).

And stood on their tippee top ends waiting for sand to be deposited. That
doesn't make sense. If it was waterlogged enough to fall, it would not stand
in such an unstable position for very long.

 Sand settled in around the
> roots sitting on the bottom. We would not expect to see this common
> plane of termination if the roots had grown in situ - some would have
> stopped short of this depth, others would have grown deeper. Of course
> there are roots above and below this plane, but several seem to stop at
> the dark bed, which is at least curious.

Maybe the root goes into the plane of the outcrop, merely being diverted by
the old surface (if that is what it really is)?
Received on Wed Dec 3 22:35:47 2003