...Physical Geology: Term Paper The break that now separates the Ouachita Mountains from the Appalachians, a feature known as the Mississippi Embayment, constitutes one of the largest and least understood landforms of the central U.S. In the article, “The Mississippi’s Curious Origins” the authors, Roy B. Van Arsdale and Randel T. Cox shed light on the mysterious Mississippi Embayment. They begin by explaining the origins of the horseshoe-shaped lowland that is underlain by massive quantities of sand, silt and mud deposits. They begin at what geologist call Pangea, which is when North America, South America, Africa and Eurasia came together to form one supercontinent. This collision raised several mountain ranges, including the Ouachita-Appalachian. Pangea is said to be ripped apart where it had previously been sutured together: just outside the arc of the Ouachita-Appalachian Mountains. This opening formed both the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. This article then states that for a long period of time the Gulf Coast remained geologically stable, with no continents plowing into it or rifting away. The northern coast of the Gulf Coast began to warp upward over a large area; this is the footprint of what is now the Mississippi Embayment. As the very large arch that formed up to three kilometers high and then subsided just as much below sea level, what had been the crest of a high, arched mountain range became inundated with seawater and was eventually buried by as...
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...The relation between geology and medicine is quite intriguing and can be dated back to the times of Hippocrates and Aristotle. For centuries man has looked up to Earth for the numerous answers he seeks concerning his own body, an amalgamation of elements once sheathed in Earth. To his surprise man has found that geology is both a poison and remedy to his health. In my paper I present the two sides of the geologic coin in the world of medicine. The rocks below our feet can be deemed culprit for a number of health related issues. How many times have we heard that, ‘We are what we eat’? The source of human nutrition is cultivated from the soil. Farmers throughout the globe consider the soil as the source of their family’s bread, however dissolved material, both beneficial and harmful, get incorporated into the ground. Bunnell’s article, ‘Medical Geology: a globally emerging discipline’, discusses the “Endemic diseases correlative with soil deficiencies in selenium, the juvenile cardiomyopathy “Keshan Disease”, and the iodine deficiency disorders including goiter and myxedematous cretinism.” (Bunnell) Another area of geology I would be focusing on is groundwater; groundwater as we know is the largest reserve of fresh water to humans. So how can water something essential to human life be harmful? The answer is contamination. Contaminants in water, even present in trace amounts, can be deemed culprit for delayed brain growth, cancer and many other problems. As stated in Robert...
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...Chapter 1 3. Uniformitarianism has scientifically proven that geological processes have been nearly unchanged from the past. Catastrophic events that once impacted the Earth still have the potential to repeat itself due to the observable geological features and geological processes that still act in the same manner. Since natural events that have been proven to repeat themselves, the tendency for ongoing natural disasters will always be a major concern. 5. Geological processes still maintain the ability to affect daily life due to the nature of the Earth’s surface and the natural effects that coincide with each other. Erosion, natural weathering, and tectonics are all processes that could act in a manner to drastically affect daily life. Chapter 2 2. Because igneous rocks are solidified from magma or lava, I believe that when ash is released it is consider igneous. Volcanic ash, by origin, is inconsiderably igneous. The point in which volcanic ash may be considered a sedimentary rock is when the ash has fallen to the floor and undergoes a cementation process. Behaviorally, once volcanic ash is shot into the air, the after effects closely resemble sediments. 3. Water does not qualify to be considered a mineral because it fails to meet the requirement of being a solid. Beach sand is not considered to be a mineral because it contains organic materials. Diamonds are classified as minerals. They contain a crystalline structure and are a solid. Wood is not...
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...Final Exam Review material: Physical Geology (GEOL 1114) 1. Explain the Uniformitarianism. The birth of Modern Geology, the physical, chemical and biological laws that operate today have also operated in the geologic past 2. What are the spheres of the Earth system? Atmosphere, Geosphere, Biosphere, and Hydrosphere 3. What are the mechanical and compositional layers of the Earth’s interior? Compositional: Crust, Mantle, Core. Mechanical: Lithosphere & Athsenosphere 4. Know the prominent features of the continents and the ocean floor? 5. Define tectonic plate and which layers of the Earth’s interior they contain. Earths outer layer divided into several plates, composed of the lithosphere which is made up of the crust and uppermost mantle 6. What are plate boundaries? Know the different types of plate boundaries and processes at each boundary. Plate boundaries are the zones of interaction between individual plates. There are three types: Convergent/Compression (Destructive margins), Divergent/Tension (Constructive Margins), and Transform/Shear (Conservative margins) 7. What is the difference between continental volcanic arcs and island arcs? Both form at convergent plate boundaries, but continental volcanic arcs for at Oceanic-Continental boundaries while island arcs form at Oceanic-Oceanic boundaries. 8. What are hot spots and mantle plumes? Hot spot: A concentration of heat in the mantle, capable of producing magma that, in turn, extrudes onto earths surface. ...
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...Geology Assignment #3 1.) A.) The artificial quartz is very similar to the real quartz; it is only slightly different in my opinion. From what I could see in the video I watched they have the same horizontal shape as the real quartz possesses. B.) They are very interlocking to mean that they have very minimal space between the grains. 2.) A.) The most interesting geologic location to see folded rock up close is the Alps in Europe. B.) The Alps were formed because of a collision of tectonic plates, which caused enormous stress on the sediments in that area which caused the rocks to fold and form the Alps. 3.) Compression near the San Andreas Fault created a fold- and thrust belt that is encroaching northeastward into the micro plate. The result of this increased rate of crust shortening has caused a regional reversal of sediment-transport direction, which is laying thick deposits being laid down over basin fill derived from the Sierra Nevada. This continues to affect the landscape evolution even to this day. 4.) A.) The various orgenies would have a reverse and thrust dip-slip fault B.) With the Triassic rifting event would be normal 5.) I would say that it was a pull-apart extension in the picture provided. I do not believe from the picture provided that there are any ranges formed from East to West 6.) The answer to the question is Thrust Fault 7.) The answer to the question is Old Rocks 8.) The answer to the question is Strike Slip 9.) ...
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...The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century The theories and beliefs about how the world began can be a tense and hot button issue. Usually, it is the Christians vs. the scientists. However, in Mortenson’s article, he presents us with a third group of believers, the Christian scientists. Mortenson explores these beliefs and theories of all three groups, and explains to us the importance of the debate then and now. Brief Overview and Main Points Christians in Eastern and Western Europe and the United States believed overwhelmingly that the world was created by God in 6 days, and each day was 24 hours long. Belief in this was steadfast until the late 18th century, when different types of theories were developed. These new theories did not include God’s works (or flat-out denied them), but just focused on the origin and history of the earth (Mortenson 2003). . Three French scientists, proposed that the earth was anywhere from 78,000 years old to that the earth was formed an indefinite amount of time, but very, very long ago. These new theories were just focused on biological and geological ideas. At this same period of time, geology was becoming more a legitimate field of study. Abraham Warner, a German mineralogist, was really the first to state that geologically, the earth was at least a million years old. This continued to build and popularize the idea of old-earth theory (Mortenson 2003). James Hutton, a farmer turned...
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...Introduction: Every aspect of our surroundings, everything we witnessed at the two sites that we visited and everything geologically related can be tied together with a few simple concepts. A central component of those simple concepts is known as the Wilson Cycle. The Wilson Cycle has a massive impact on not only the two sites that we visited, but literally everywhere around the world. By understanding the principles of the Wilson Cycle, we are able to unearth details about a location such as what geologic era it belongs to, what type of plate boundary it is, as well as what type of tectonic activity that was required to allow it to form. In essence, everything relates back to the Wilson Cycle, as evidenced in the following pages. Geologic Background: PALEOZOIC: The Paleozoic era was is the earliest of the three geologic eras and spans from about 542 to 251 million years ago. Numerous events that significantly impacted the overall structure of the earth took place during this time period. The Paleozoic Era is divided into six different subcategories which include: the Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, and Permian. Early in the Paleozoic the continents were far apart but moving tectonic plates caused continents to move together into one large continent called Pangaea. Some of the significant geologic events that occurred during the Paleozoic era includes the evolution of a large number of animals, some of which are distant ancestors to modern organisms...
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...This paper will contain a review of the article “Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century by Dr. Terry Mortenson, 2003”. Brief Overview and Main Points The theme of the article covered the long debated topics of the earth and universe being billions of years old, which was an idea with its origin and roots beginning in the 19th century, and was understandably named “The Genesis- Geology Debate”. Today, it is a very important topic, to science students, Christianity’s history along with science; and is also highly relevant to the current growing debate over evolution and or creation. The dominant view of the earth’s age in the 1800’s was mostly the creation theory that God created the earth in six 24 hr. days. However, by the end of the 1800’s, theories sought to prove earth’s existence only through natural and evolutionary means. This change in theory was mainly due to 3 French scientists, whose work revolved around natural laws in matter, time, chance and nature itself, leaving God out of the picture. Therefore, during the 19th Century there were 3 dominant earth views: 1) Catastrophists- who believed that creation was “untold-ages” old and that through catastrophic floods many life forms were died off, and God recreated new species. 2) Uniformitarians who ignored origins of life, and believed all geological processes...
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...This document is a journal article review providing a brief synopsis, observed strengths, and observed weaknesses of Doctor Mortenson’s “The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century”. This article is not an attack on Christianity or the Christian ideology. This paper is simply an honest attempt to review Mortenson’s information provided, his hypothesis, and venue chosen for Christian Apologetics. Brief Overview and Main Points The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century, by Doctor Terry Mortenson, is a journal article that claims to be about Old Earth Geology history, and perceived consequences that this ideology has inflicted on our society today. In actuality, this article provides little knowledge or background on the Old-Earth theory. This article utilizes most of its text explaining Scriptural Geology, key individuals of Scriptural Geology, arguing the validity of the Young-Earth belief, and closing with an over generalized assessment of Old-Earth theory’s impact on society. Article Strengths The article clearly identifies the writer’s discontent with the flaws in modern science, and the downfall of modern society. Doctor Mortenson provides, with vast detail, the belief of validity regarding Scriptural Geologist theories, and their credentials. Mortenson provided a section, consisting of seven paragraphs, which discussed the development of Scriptural Geologists, and dynamic backgrounds for various...
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...In my paper I will be talking about article The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for life in the 21st century by Terry Mortenson. I will discussing the main points of the article along with the strengths and weaknesses. This article is a breakdown of a huge debate that has been going on for years. As I mention before this article is based on a debate that has been occurring for years. It is just another argument between the theories of the young- earth and Old-earth. A lot of the information within the article is a based on the creation of earth. Mortenson, uses scientists of religious and non-religious backgrounds which had different philosophies. It is also includes the views of uniformitarianism and catastrophism events and how it was believed to impact the creation of earth. Article strengths in this article are large in number. The author gave us a good outline by the way he broke every paragraph down. Terry used several different scientists that had several different perspectives. These are just a few of the things that I feel were done right. Next I will talk about the points he had clear and if they were writing precisely. We started the article with a section pointing out the new theories on the history of creation. Terry beginning by using the Christian view that has been teach from thousands of years. Let us know that in the 4000 BC God created the world and everything in it within six 24-hour days. The same world he created was the same one he destroyed...
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...Ashley Dr. Travis Bradshaw PHSC 210 April 7, 2014 Journal Article Review Introduction In this paper I will discuss and review Dr. Terry Mortenson’s article about The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century. I will discuss the many strengths of this article and also the weaknesses that are also involved in Dr. Terry Mortenson’s paper. Brief Overview and Main Points Dr. Mortenson’s paper discussed the many different scientific views of how the Earth was created from the point of view of many different scientists such as scriptural geologists, uniformitarians and catastrophists. Each have their own views on the history of the Earth and how it was created. Dr. Mortenson then goes into explaining how these scientific theories have impacted our society today. Towards the end of the paper, we learn the author’s view of how the Earth was created and how it impacts society today. Article Strengths I think Dr. Mortenson did very well writing this article in many different ways. Everything appeared to be stated in a professional and grammatically correct way, with little to no errors. Dr. Mortenson also does a great job in describing each scientist according to their different theories such as scriptural geologists by providing just enough detail. He didn’t go overboard by boring the reader with too many facts about each scientists, but clearly stated the facts needed and their scientific views without straying from the main topic. Dr...
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...Journal Article Review 1 “The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century” by Dr. Terry Mortenson Introduction This paper is a review of the August 2003 article “The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century” by Dr. Terry Mortenson. After a brief overview of the main points, the article’s strengths and weaknesses will be discussed. Concluding remarks will then be given. Brief Overview and Main Points The theme of the article is the question concerning the age of planet Earth. Mortenson’s main point centers on the debate (which has been going on since the early 19th century) between Christian scientists and new theorists concerning how Earth came into being. In short, Christian scientists believe Earth was a process of divine creation; non-scientists believe Earth came about through a process of evolution (Mortenson, 2003). Article Strengths Mortenson did an excellent job when describing the differences between the beliefs of the scriptural geologists (Christian scientists) and the new theorists. For the most noted ones, he gave a brief description of their background. This allowed the reader to understand a little about the person and the kind of research the person had been doing. When discussing the views of the scriptural geologists, Mortenson talked about how their views stemmed from what the Bible says about the creation of Earth. As far as the new theorists were concerned, he discussed...
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...The overview of the article, The Origin of Old-Earth Geology and its Ramifications for Life in the 21st Century by Dr. Terry Mortenson, is the differing views between the Old-Earth and New-Earth beliefs. The main points given were that there were three views in the early 19th century: Catastrophists, Uniformitarians and scriptural geologists. “Catastrophists believed that several major floods destroyed a large percentage of living creatures and God replaced them with new living beings. Uniformitarians believed that all geological change happened at the same rate, intensity and power over history. And scriptural geologists believe in the biblical account of a literal six-day creation of all things by God, followed by a global flood which created that geological record.” (Mortenson) The strengths in the article are the differing views presented by various scientists and non-scientists both Christian and non-Christian based. Dr. Mortenson summarized these scientist’s views straight to their points of belief. The points that I found clear was that there was not proof to back the “theories” of the Old Earth views expressed and there was proof of the New Earth view, the Bible. I feel the weakness of the article was that there was not much elaboration on the scientist’s findings. There were a lot Journal Article Review One 3 of names and dates given but not a lot of detail. I feel there should have been more backing information on the views that each...
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...Project 2 The Glomar Challenger was a deep sea research and scientific drilling vessel for oceanography and marine geology studies. The JOIDES Resolution (Joint Oceanographic Institutions for Deep Earth Sampling) is a scientific drilling ship. The JOIDES Resolution was the successor of Glomar Challenger. Both vessels would drill and take core samples at specific locations. The samples were used to determine the paleontologic and isotopic dating studies, thus providing conclusive evidence of seafloor spreading hypothesis and plate tectonics. Most earthquakes and volcanic eruptions do not strike randomly but occur in specific areas, such as along plate boundaries. One such area is the circum-Pacific Ring of Fire, where the Pacific Plate meets many surrounding plates. The Ring of Fire is the most seismically and volcanically active zone in the world. The most earthquakes in Europe occur in the collision zone of Eurasian and African plates. The Mediterranean regions where countries like Turkey, Greece, and Italy are located are where the majority of earthquakes in Europe occur. In 1977 scientists discovered hot springs at a depth of 2.5 km, on the Galapagos Rift which is off the coast of Ecuador. It is remarkable that these hot springs can be as hot as 380 degrees Celsius and are home to some of the earth’s most diverse ecosystems in the world. This ecosystem is sustained not by the suns energy but by chemosynthesis. Four types of plate boundaries: A destructive...
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...Victor Manevich 02/25/10 Geology 100 * What are Glomar Challenger and JOIDES Resolution? What do they do? The Glomar Challenger was the first research ship explicitly engineered to drill and collect core samples from the deep ocean floor. The JOIDES Resolution ship was engineered for the same purpose as the Glomar Challenger. The JOIDES Resolution was completed in the 1990s and has more advanced and precise technology than the Glomar Challenger, which was completed in the 1960s. The JOIDES Resolution ship is able to drill far deeper into the ocean floor than the Glomar Challenger. * Using the maps and diagrams on the Web site, where are the major concentrations of the world's earthquakes? Where are most earthquakes in Europe? The major concentrations of the world’s earthquakes occur in countries, which are near the Ring of Fire in the Pacific Ocean. The most earthquakes in Europe occur in the collision zone of Eurasian and African plates. The Mediterranean regions where countries like Turkey, Greece, and Italy are located are where the majority of earthquakes in Europe occur. * What undersea hot springs were discovered in 1977? What is remarkable about these (and other) undersea hot springs? On the Galapagos Rift off the coast of Ecuador scientist discovered hot springs at a depth of 2.5 kilometers. It is remarkable that these hot springs can be as hot as 380 degrees Celsius and are home to some of the earth’s most diverse ecosystems in the world. This ecosystem...
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