The Hydroplate Theory

[Glass*Soul]

I was directed to this website earlier today: http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/HydroplateOverview6.html

It describes a theory advanced by a Dr. Walt Brown that promises to explain Noah's flood, plate tectonics, fossils, meteors, coal beds, and the ice ages, all in one fell swoop.

I'll quote a little from it:

"About half the water now in the oceans was once in interconnected chambers about 10 miles below the earth’s surface. Excluding the solid structure of the interconnected chambers, the subterranean water, containing a large amount of dissolved salts and carbon dioxide, would have approximated a thin, spherical shell, averaging about 3/4 of a mile in thickness. Above the subterranean water was a granite crust; beneath the water was a layer of basaltic rock."

He then describes how this subterranean water burst forth all at once causing the phenomena I've mentioned above and oh so much more.

I ran a few searches to try to determine whether a topic had already been started in this forum debunking his theory. If it has, please feel free to direct me there rather than duplicating your efforts. :) Where's the best place to start?

[buckshot23]

I ran a few searches to try to determine whether a topic had already been started in this forum debunking his theory. If it has, please feel free to direct me there rather than duplicating your efforts. :) Where's the best place to start?
I thought science was open to a new hypothesis. Why such the a priori assumption that it needs debunking?

On a side note I have never heard of this theory. If it can be called that.

[judanne]

Scientific evidence suggests that most of Earth's 1.36 billion cubic Km of water, including subterranean water, originated from ice-bearing comets that coalesced to form our planet. This water reaches the surface of the Earth through a continuous and observable process known as outgassing. Try using google to search the latter term. I'm sure you will find lots of information about it.

[Glass*Soul]

I thought science was open to a new hypothesis. Why such the a priori assumption that it needs debunking?

On a side note I have never heard of this theory. If it can be called that.

By all means, approach the article in an unbiased manner.

After having read it myself, I feel safe in predicting that the denizens of this forum will, for the most part, debunk it.

If I'm wrong, you may chastise me. :)

[Glass*Soul]

Scientific evidence suggests that most of Earth's 1.36 billion cubic Km of water, including subterranean water, originated from ice-bearing comets that coalesced to form our planet. This water reaches the surface of the Earth through a continuous and observable process known as outgassing. Try using google to search the latter term. I'm sure you will find lots of information about it.

Yes. I was aware of that. One of the assertions in the article that caught my attention was that the ice-bearing comets were caused by subterranean water and debris jetting into outer space.

Is this possible, and if not, why not?

(What's more, the article asserts that the water that shot up high enough to freeze but did not escape the earth's gravitational pull, fell back to earth burrying the woodly mamoths that we have found frozen in Siberia.)

[RBH]

As usual, TalkOrigins has resources:

Index of creationist claims (http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CH/CH420.html). See also the section on hydroplate "theory" here (http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html).

A more detailed refutation (http://mypage.direct.ca/w/writer/hydro.html) from 10 years ago.

Glenn Morton (former YEC) on it (http://home.entouch.net/dmd/hydroplate.htm).

RBH

[Hyndis]

Yes. I was aware of that. One of the assertions in the article that caught my attention was that the ice-bearing comets were caused by subterranean water and debris jetting into outer space.

Is this possible, and if not, why not?

This is not possible. First off, you'd have to propel this water at speeds much greater than escape velocity. Consider the mass of the space shuttle, and then consider the mass of the fuel it must burn to get into orbit. And the space shuttle is quite light, too. Its mostly just follow and filled with air. Water is a rather heavy substance.

So, in order to get enough water into space to form an itty bitty comet thats too small to matter, you'd need even more energy than what the space shuttle's boosters and main fuel tank contain. Remember, you need to escape orbit and head into deep space, which is something the space shuttle cannot do.

Then consider the number of icy bodies floating around out there. Icy bodies, say, like Pluto and those other newly discovered planets/objects. The whole planet/icy object debate is another issue entirely, but these are very large objects.

The amount of energy to get that much ice off of the surface of Earth and flung into deep space would be enough to melt the entire crust of the planet, most likely.

Furthermore, all of these icy objects would have to have their orbits explained. If they were flung from Earth, they'd all be heading away from Earth. Their paths would be altered by gravity, but they'd still be heading generally away from here. This is not what has been observed. All of these icy objects tend to orbit that nearby star of ours at predictable distances. Some objects get bumped out of their orbits and fall in towards the star. These are known as comets. They burn up a little bit every time they get close to the sun until nothing's left.

(What's more, the article asserts that the water that shot up high enough to freeze but did not escape the earth's gravitational pull, fell back to earth burrying the woodly mamoths that we have found frozen in Siberia.)

If that happened then the poor mamoths would have been crushed flat and utterly destroyed. Imagine you have a large block of ice. Now get a 10 story build. Get a friend to stand on the street below, and drop the block of ice on them. (Don't actually do this, though. :eek: ) What do you think would happen?

If we're talking glacier size for more realistic proportions, thats like dropping a 10 story block of ice ontop of a person from the height of a commercial airliner. Squish.

[N.Wells]

None of these are quite what you wanted, but they should get you started on Walter Brown
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/hydroplate.htm

http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/articles/6339_issue_25_volume_9_number_1__8_21_2003.asp
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/articles/2595_issue_27_volume_10_number_2__11_17_2003.asp
http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/articles/9154_issue_26_volume_9_number_2__8_21_2003.asp

http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/tim_thompson/brown.html

Edited to add: shoot, scooped while off-line.

[Glass*Soul]

First of all, if anyone noticed, I apologize for "burrying the woodly mamoths." :D Spelling has never been my strong suit, but even I know better than that.

This is not possible. First off, you'd have to propel this water at speeds much greater than escape velocity. Consider the mass of the space shuttle, and then consider the mass of the fuel it must burn to get into orbit. And the space shuttle is quite light, too. Its mostly just follow and filled with air. Water is a rather heavy substance.

So, in order to get enough water into space to form an itty bitty comet thats too small to matter, you'd need even more energy than what the space shuttle's boosters and main fuel tank contain. Remember, you need to escape orbit and head into deep space, which is something the space shuttle cannot do.

Then consider the number of icy bodies floating around out there. Icy bodies, say, like Pluto and those other newly discovered planets/objects. The whole planet/icy object debate is another issue entirely, but these are very large objects.

The amount of energy to get that much ice off of the surface of Earth and flung into deep space would be enough to melt the entire crust of the planet, most likely.

Furthermore, all of these icy objects would have to have their orbits explained. If they were flung from Earth, they'd all be heading away from Earth. Their paths would be altered by gravity, but they'd still be heading generally away from here. This is not what has been observed. All of these icy objects tend to orbit that nearby star of ours at predictable distances. Some objects get bumped out of their orbits and fall in towards the star. These are known as comets. They burn up a little bit every time they get close to the sun until nothing's left.

In one of the links provided in this topic, (Thanks to those who provided the links!) Glenn Morton makes the argument that the velocity of the water, steam actually, coming out of the crack would be such that all of it would escape earth's orbit and head out through space never to return. I hope I'm not misrepresenting his view here.

My sense in reading Dr. Brown's article is that he's working more with his intuition and imagination coupled with a strong belief in creationism than he is good scientific methods. I don't want to fall into the same trap when I debate his theory, saying basically that I don't agree with something because it doesn't fit my preconceptions or because it just doesn't "feel right" to me.

I certainly don't want to simultaneously hold forth that none of the water could have reached escape velocity and that all of the water must have.

If that happened then the poor mamoths would have been crushed flat and utterly destroyed. Imagine you have a large block of ice. Now get a 10 story build. Get a friend to stand on the street below, and drop the block of ice on them. (Don't actually do this, though. :eek: ) What do you think would happen?

If we're talking glacier size for more realistic proportions, thats like dropping a 10 story block of ice ontop of a person from the height of a commercial airliner. Squish.

This is one of my questions. If the water/steam didn't reach escape velocity but rose high enough to freeze, in what form would it fall? How fast would it accumulate? Would it crush a woolly mammoth or would it very quickly bury it intact? How would a person go about figuring that out?

[Peez]

Originally Posted by Class*Soul
I ran a few searches to try to determine whether a topic had already been started in this forum debunking the theory that the moon is really made of cheese. If it has, please feel free to direct me there rather than duplicating your efforts. :) Where's the best place to start?I thought science was open to a new hypothesis. Why such the a priori assumption that it needs debunking?

On a side note I have never heard of this theory. If it can be called that.

[Hyndis]

In one of the links provided in this topic, (Thanks to those who provided the links!) Glenn Morton makes the argument that the velocity of the water, steam actually, coming out of the crack would be such that all of it would escape earth's orbit and head out through space never to return. I hope I'm not misrepresenting his view here.

You still run into heat problems here. It takes a lot of energy to get an object to escape velocity. Obviously, small objects use less energy than larger objects, but its still a lot of energy per object. And even particles of water, such as vapor, would quickly have all of their energy requirements adding up to absurd results.

Futhermore, it would take quite a lot of heat to keep all of this water in the form of vapor. The atmosphere can only hold so much water vapor before it turns into rain and falls back down. In order to keep all of this extra water as vapor, you'd need to heat it into steam.

Consider the 100C degree heat in the atmosphere to keep all of that water in the form of steam. This is at sea level, mind you. In the upper reaches of the atmosphere its extremely cold. So either the sea level heat would have to be vastly hotter than 100C or you'd have to propel this steam at incredible speeds so the tiny ice crystals would continue to fly upwards beyond escape velocity.

In either case, any living organism on the surface of the planet would have been killed by this. Perhaps Noah could have survived had he been in an armored bunker with a massive air conditioning unit, a vast power supply (nuclear, probably), and a self contained environment. Basically, a similar life support system as to what you'd need on the surface of Venus.

I certainly don't want to simultaneously hold forth that none of the water could have reached escape velocity and that all of the water must have.

If a theory doesn't explain some rather obvious and important parts of the data, its got some serious problems. So I'm tackling the obvious and important part first. If it can't explain such an obvious and important thing, then why bother to even consider it for other things? The theory is incomplete, has errors, and lacks predicting power if it can't even come up with the basics.

This is one of my questions. If the water/steam didn't reach escape velocity but rose high enough to freeze, in what form would it fall? How fast would it accumulate? Would it crush a woolly mammoth or would it very quickly bury it intact? How would a person go about figuring that out?

If the water is sufficiently vaporized, it would begin to fall down as tiny ice crystals, which we call snow. As it descends through the atmosphere, air currents would move these ice crystals around where other crystals would grow upon them. We call this hail. With all of this water vapor in the air, the size of this hail would be immense.

Today, severe hail can form into spheres the size of grapefruit. And today's atmosphere is far more arid than this hypothetical atmosphere, so hail would be much larger. And this grapefruit size hail can do nasty things even to metal, such as destroying cars in car dealership lots.

If the hail is even larger, it'll fall with more knetic energy, such that it would probably pulverize bone upon impact. And if mamoth bones had been pulverized, we wouldn't have many fossiles from them, would we?

[buckshot23]

I thought science was open to a new hypothesis. Why such the a priori assumption that it needs debunking?

On a side note I have never heard of this theory. If it can be called that.
:huh:

[Worldtraveller]

I have downloaded and read more than one of the papers from ICR. They have one where they 'model', using finite element analysis (FEA), plate tectonics under 'potential biblical flood conditions'.

Since I do FEA for a living (with aircaft) I read it pretty closely. Bascially, they 'proved' that if you make rock plastic enough, plates can move around quickly. Well duh!! And If I model aluminum wings with high plasticity, I can model an airplane flying by flapping its wings!!

Soon to be submitted: my wing flapping model for publication in Aerospace Testing. I'm sure fame and fortune are soon to follow.... :Cheeky:

Cheers,
Lane

[Peez]

buckshot23:
:huh: Read the text that I quoted. :)

Peez

[buckshot23]

Read the text that I quoted. :)

Peez
Ah I didn't read it close enough. I thought it was just a quote from the OP. :o

[Richard Forrest]

I have downloaded and read more than one of the papers from ICR. They have one where they 'model', using finite element analysis (FEA), plate tectonics under 'potential biblical flood conditions'.

Since I do FEA for a living (with aircaft) I read it pretty closely. Bascially, they 'proved' that if you make rock plastic enough, plates can move around quickly. Well duh!! And If I model aluminum wings with high plasticity, I can model an airplane flying by flapping its wings!!

Soon to be submitted: my wing flapping model for publication in Aerospace Testing. I'm sure fame and fortune are soon to follow.... :Cheeky:

Cheers,
Lane

As a matter of idle curiosity (and because I have better things to do with my time than reading "papers" from the ICR) what mechanism do they propose for moving the plates at the high speeds which would be required? Bearing in mind that convection currents within the mantle are as far as I am aware the accepted mechanism for movement of plates, it seems somewhat unlikely that they would propose to move them more quickly by putting more heat into the mantle. Under those conditions, the "flood" would be one of molten rock covering the whole planet which would, I suggest, have left some trace of its existence.

Perhaps it was all those dinosaurs scrabbling madly for a foothold as the plate they were on was subducted which drove the process.

Richard Forrest

[Mageth]

Dr. Walt Brown believes a myth, the Genesis Flood, is true, even though several disciplines of Science strongly, even conclusively, indicate that the Genesis Flood account is, indeed, mythical.

Rather than accept that, Dr. Walt Brown attempts to manipulate Science to be consistent with the myth which he believes to be true. His "theory" is simply a case of a back-asswards and misguided application of "science." As such, it's not Science.

When and if Science is concerned with the veracity of such a story, Science looks at the evidence to determine if the story could be true. If the evidence does not support the story, even contradicts the story, then it is highly probable that the story is mythical. What Science does not and should not do is look at a story and then attempt to come up with a (in this case fantastical) theory in which the evidence would support the story being true.

[Tzar Bomba]

As a matter of idle curiosity (and because I have better things to do with my time than reading "papers" from the ICR) what mechanism do they propose for moving the plates at the high speeds which would be required? Bearing in mind that convection currents within the mantle are as far as I am aware the accepted mechanism for movement of plates, it seems somewhat unlikely that they would propose to move them more quickly by putting more heat into the mantle. Under those conditions, the "flood" would be one of molten rock covering the whole planet which would, I suggest, have left some trace of its existence.

Perhaps it was all those dinosaurs scrabbling madly for a foothold as the plate they were on was subducted which drove the process.

Richard ForrestAs Worldtraveller talked about above, if you change the constants in your FEA model enough you can make it show anything you want. Rather than modelling convection currents in the mantle, you could just assign astronomical forces to your landmass bodies and they would start to move around. If you make the material properties of the bodies soft enough, they will deform nicely until you get the result to look the way you want. Then, you can print out nice color pictures of the stresses and even make slick movies of the things moving around. Your common member of the public will find this pretty convincing.

The mechanism they used to model the plate movement is called "lying." It is a common research tactic employed by creation "scientists" to sell their theories to the public. :down:

[Graculus]

fell back to earth burrying the woodly mamoths that we have found frozen in Siberia.)What, all three of them? :devil3:

[Glass*Soul]

As a matter of idle curiosity (and because I have better things to do with my time than reading "papers" from the ICR) what mechanism do they propose for moving the plates at the high speeds which would be required? Bearing in mind that convection currents within the mantle are as far as I am aware the accepted mechanism for movement of plates, it seems somewhat unlikely that they would propose to move them more quickly by putting more heat into the mantle. Under those conditions, the "flood" would be one of molten rock covering the whole planet which would, I suggest, have left some trace of its existence.

Perhaps it was all those dinosaurs scrabbling madly for a foothold as the plate they were on was subducted which drove the process.

Richard Forrest

Well, after the water began forcefully shooting out of the crack, eroding the edge and carrying debris away, the crack eventully widened enough to allow the underlying basalt to bulge upwards. This caused the granite crust above the water layer to retreat away from the crack on either side, with the water still remaining beneath lubricating it so that it slid freely. There were supposedly collumns holding up the granite crust. If they impeded this free slide at all, he doesn't mention it.

[Glass*Soul]

What, all three of them? :devil3:

We mustn't mourn the poor woolly mammoths. They couldn't have survived during an ice age anyway. Their noses would have gotten too cold.

I kid you not. That's really in his article.

[RBH]

Anyone who wants to slog through all of Walt Brown's ideas, such as they are, can read most of them at the Kansas Citizens for Science Forum (http://www.kcfs.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=3;t=000306;p=1), where a creationist is copying them, word for word, with Brown's permission and (very occasional) participation. The thread is now up to 57 pages!

There's a Quicktime animation of hydroplate theory (http://www.thetaxpayerschannel.org/graphics/creation/fonte23.mov) on Brown's site.

Warning: Set Irony meters on standby before viewing: they are not guaranteed to operate in Kansas (http://groups.google.com/group/talk.origins/msg/b02705a5e7c3cb86?q=g%3Athl3412715144d&dq=&hl=en&lr=)!

RBH

[Richard Forrest]

As Worldtraveller talked about above, if you change the constants in your FEA model enough you can make it show anything you want. Rather than modelling convection currents in the mantle, you could just assign astronomical forces to your landmass bodies and they would start to move around. If you make the material properties of the bodies soft enough, they will deform nicely until you get the result to look the way you want. Then, you can print out nice color pictures of the stresses and even make slick movies of the things moving around. Your common member of the public will find this pretty convincing.

One of my fantasy projects is to build an electric power station which harnesses the kinetic energy of moving tectonic plates by using a huge system of gear wheels anchored one plate, and connected to an adjacent plate moving at a high relative velocity (for tectonic plate, that is) using a long toothed rod which drives the gears. Although they are moving very slowly, tectonic plates are very massive and mass*velocity squared gives megawatts of power available from my device, though I may be completely wrong: when dealing with enornously large and very small numbers it's easy to get the wrong orders of magnitude.

If tectonic plates are moving thousands of times more rapidly, I wonder how the heat from the kinetic energy is dissipated? It's the molten earth scenario all over again.

The mechanism they used to model the plate movement is called "lying." It is a common research tactic employed by creation "scientists" to sell their theories to the public.


Now there's a potentially unlimited power source! Can anyone think of a way of harnessing it?

Richard Forrest

[Tzar Bomba]

<snip>Quicktime animation of hydroplate theory (http://www.thetaxpayerschannel.org/graphics/creation/fonte23.mov) on Brown's site.<snip>This is pretty amazing. The guy actually claims in his video that the "hydroplates" reached velocities of 45 miles per hour. 45 mph! Imagine a large piece of the crust following after you as you drive away from it. That is the kind of speed they are claiming.

Oh shit! The Earth is chasing us! Step on the gas Bertha!! :(

[Glass*Soul]

I have downloaded and read more than one of the papers from ICR. They have one where they 'model', using finite element analysis (FEA), plate tectonics under 'potential biblical flood conditions'.

Since I do FEA for a living (with aircaft) I read it pretty closely. Bascially, they 'proved' that if you make rock plastic enough, plates can move around quickly. Well duh!! And If I model aluminum wings with high plasticity, I can model an airplane flying by flapping its wings!!

Soon to be submitted: my wing flapping model for publication in Aerospace Testing. I'm sure fame and fortune are soon to follow.... :Cheeky:

Cheers,
Lane

[Emphasis mine]

You've put your finger on something than bothers me about the hypothesis that many Young Earth Creationists are holding forth, that the earth took on its present topography due to massive shifts in the crust during Noah's months in the arc. One other site I was directed to suggested that the ocean floors quickly sank under the weight of the water to accomodate the run-off from the flood.

I asked myself what could possibly make the earth's crust that malleable and the only answer I could come up with was heat. Then I had to ask myself how hot the crust would have to get for it to be that stretchy, and how hot the flood waters would get, and how hot Noah and everyone else on the arc would get! What would it do to the atmosphere? I also had to wonder what sort of mechanism inside the earth could account for it heating up that much and then cooling down to a habitable state quickly enough for those in the arc to disembark and take up their lives.

The Hydroplate Theory side-steps some of these questions by having the crust slide on a lubricating layer of water. Okay. I want to know more about the columns that supposedly held up this granite crust for thousands of years, keeping it so stable that not a single crack opened before the flood. How massive would they have to be and how close together would they have to be spaced? To what degree, if any, would they impede this mind-boggling slide?

Am I asking the right questions?

My last formal study of earth sciences was in 9th grade, and that was *ahem* more than a few years ago. I know enough to know that I can't answer these questions scientifically. Without help I'm liable to create a model that's just as faulty as the ones I'm questioning.