Real Science Radio: List of Answers to Hydroplate Objections

Jefferson

Administrator
Staff member
Administrator
Super Moderator
RSR List of Answers to Hydroplate Objections

This is the show from Friday July 26th, 2013

Summary:

* Real Science Radio Answers Walt Brown Critics: On today's RSR program, Bob Enyart responds to Baumgardner, Patton, and Faulkner, three creationist critics of Dr. Walt Brown and his Hydroplate Theory. Just as you can ask three rabbis a question and get four answers, so too, other than the fundamentals, biblical creationists differ on particulars. Partly because of the popularity of Walt's website, his life's work, In the Beginning, is one of the best-selling creationist books, making Dr. Brown's theory widely supported including by many creation scientists and among rank-and-file creationists, by pastors and home school publishers, and among Bible students.

* If Walt Is Wrong -- If Walt Is Right: If Dr. Brown's model of the global flood is incorrect, then he and his supporters have held back the progress of creation science. Conversely, if Walt Brown's Hydroplate Theory is correct, then those who have oppose his efforts have slowed our progress. If Dr. Brown's theory is correct, then various favorite theories of other creation groups, including ICR's catastrophic plate tectonics and canopy theory, and AiG on frozen mammoths and their ice age model, are incorrect.

* On this First Answers to Hydroplate Objections Program: Joining many on both sides, RSR asks everyone to extend grace to everyone else, as we conduct our own investigation into the objections to the HT, which theory we ourselves hold. For our initial program, we will consider three objections from well-known creationists:
- John Baumgardner, of Los Alamos Nat'l Lab and ICR, on voltages generated in granite.
- Danny Faulkner, former Univ. of South Carolina astronomer, now with AiG, on the 360-day year.
- Don Patton, excavated 500-foot long dinosaur track, exposed fraudulent Ark find, on Walt's limestone claims.

* Don Patton Objection on Limestone: While perhaps not in print, Don Patton, creationist geologist and archaeologist and real-life Indiana Jones has long repeated to people that Dr. Brown claims that, as a result of the fountains of the great deep breaking open during the global flood, the Earth's limestone deposits precipitated out of the atmosphere. In preparation for today's program, to address this unlikely claim, one of our RSR researchers obtained printed copies of all previous seven editions of Walt's In the Beginning along with the current 8th edition. Also, we searched the updated version of Dr. Brown's online Origin of Limestone chapter. After confirming that none of these sources ever claimed that limestone deposits formed by raining down out of the atmosphere, RSR spoke directly with Dr. Brown, who confirmed that he has never made such a claim. To Dr. Patton's credit, when we informed him of this, he indicated that it was important for him to hear this information, and he gladly accepted the correction.

For today's show Bob & Fred recommend Walt Brown's
In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood!




* Baumgardner Objection on Voltages Generated in Granite: In a 2011 author-to-author critique in the 1600 page Flood Science Review, Dr. John Baumgardner argued that Walt Brown must be wrong about the ability of granite to produce giga-voltages because, "there is no observational evidence that the quartz crystals in granite have ever been aligned as Brown postulates." And that, "This ought to represent a fatal problem for Brown’s claim that such extreme voltages will essentially arise automatically."

* Baumgardner's Objection Answered: In addition to Walt Brown citing explicit reports of quartz alignment in the scientific literature (#6 & #7 below), the smoking gun is the electrical current produced by earthquakes.
1. A Million Amps. 2013 report from National Geographic estimates the strength of the electrical currents produced by earthquakes: "These currents are huge... They're on the order of 100,000 amperes for a magnitude 6 earthquake and a million amperes for a magnitude 7. It's almost like lightning, underground."
2. USGS, Etc. Since 2010, in the Earthquakes and Electricity section of his online Origin of Earth's Radioactivity chapter, Walt has referenced extensive observational evidence of earthquakes generating electrical currents including as reported by the USGS.
3. Ionosphere Quake Prediction. A 2013 presentation on ionosphere earthquake prediction at the European Geophysical Union conference in Brussels includes among its evidence the actual prediction of a Dec. 6, 2012 earthquake in Greece. Dr. Brown cites this continuing research as additional evidence for extensive quartz alignment (remaining even millennia after the flood). Back in 2008, the BBC reported apparent pre-quake disturbances in the ionosphere over epicenters that scientists considered for a possible earthquake warning system. Since 2011 the U.K. and Russia are jointly sponsoring the TwinSat Project run out of London College University's Mullard Space Science Center, hoping to build the first effective earthquake warning system based on a phenomenon that they admit that they don't understand (but which the HT explains), that earthquake activity is generating crustal voltages of sufficient magnitude to disrupt the ionosphere.

Poling: Dr. Brown's Hydroplate Theory describes the twice daily crustal tension and compression from lunar gravity that produced small electrical fields around quartz crystals, which over the pre-flood centuries tended to align the crystals.

Ionosphere Criticism: Early on, some discounted such earthquake prediction because other ionosphere disturbances were concurrently seen thousands of miles from epicenters. However as NBC News reported in 2012, major earthquakes do in fact set off earthquakes thousands of miles away. RSR has not yet seen but awaits an assessment regarding whether or not these distant disturbances lie above these distant quakes.

4. Electromagnetichttp://www.amazon.com/Electrical-Properties-Rocks-Monographs-Geoscience/dp/1461586119 Quake Prediction: A well-funded private humanitarian earthquake prediction project called QuakeFinder monitors ultra-low frequency electromagnetic emissions in quake-prone areas of California, Peru, Taiwan and Greece and its retrospective analysis so far has revealed apparent earthquake signatures for three significant quakes. QuakeFinder has matured to where they are prepared to alert local authorities if quakes are predicted.
5. Ant Colony Quake Prediction. Nobody wants to be buried alive, not even ants! Three years of unrelated research, videotaping ant colonies in Germany, led to the conclusion that ants can help predict earthquakes. A day before an earthquake, ants evacuate their colony, and they don't reoccupy it until a day after the quake ends. Scientists currently are unsure of how the ants predict earthquakes, but one of their ideas fits like a glove with Dr. Walt Brown's focus on the electrical current generated by continental crust under stress. Researchers suggest that perhaps the ants living near an epicenter sense a pre-quake fluctuation in the earth's electromagnetic field. (Related: Stephen Meyer's bestseller, Darwin's Doubt, on p. 280, describes the ion pumps in cell membranes which generate electromagnetic fields which fields may be of significance in reproduction, which serves as a reminder that organisms can respond to electromagnetic influences.)
6. Tectonophysics reports Alignment: Dr. Brown also quotes a science journal's report: "All quartz-rich rocks (quartzites, granites, gneisses, mylonites) did show [statistically significant] piezoelectric effects when stressed." J. R. Bishop, "Piezoelectric Effects in Quartz-Rich Rocks," Tectonophysics, Vol. 77, 20 August 1981, p. 297. That paper also says, "Piezoelectricity, a polarization of charge produced by an applied stress, occurs in many minerals. It is particularly strong in quartz. Aggregates of piezoelectric grains are themselves piezoelectric if the grains are suitably aligned. ... all quartz-rich rocks (quartzites, granites, gneisses, mylonites) did show piezoelectric effects when stressed" with some of the findings showing "true piezoelectric effects".
7. Geoscience Series reports Alignment: Dr. Brown also quotes from a title in a respected science publisher's Monographs in Geoscience series. "... frequently in quartzite, the quartz occurs as grains with isometric form but shows a preferential orientation in terms of internal crystal structure, that is, in terms of the axes of crystallization." E. I. Parkhomenko, Electrical Properties of Rocks (New York: Plenum Press, 1967), p. 6. [Searchable retitled 1971 edition edition.]

* Consequences and Possibilities: Dr. Baumgardner, with his impeccable credentials, extraordinary accomplishments, and love for the Lord, is rightly widely respected. This HT objection however, even though apparently unjustified, creates great difficultly. If he retracts this particular objection, even while continuing to oppose the HT, RSR will report that retraction on this webpage. The above evidence challenges Dr. Baumgardner's claim that, "In granite, however, the quartz crystals are oriented randomly [and this] ought to represent a fatal problem for Brown’s claim that such extreme voltages will essentially arise automatically." But after an initial starting condition that is consistent with Scripture (an erupting global subterranean water chamber), Hydroplate Theory supporters note that Dr. Brown lays out a sequence of events (including crustal electrical discharges) that are based on testable physical forces. Granite averages 27% quartz by volume so that massive electrical currents generated from quartz during the flood could have been The Origin of Earth's Radioactivity. This would explain:
1. Distribution. Why 90% of earth's radioactivity is in the *continental* crust.
2. Affinity. Why radioactivity tends to concentrate around granite.
3. Origin After Eden. How this lethal danger (crustal radioactivity) appeared on a world created as a paradise.

If theoretical physicist (emphasis on the theoretical) Lawrence Krauss were right, the stars, rather than Jesus, died so that we could live. But by chemical evolution, the Earth's radioactive elements like uranium and thorium should be evenly dispersed globally, at least through the crust and mantel, and certainly not concentrated around granite! The Hydroplate Theory refutes chemical evolution as it explains the distribution of Earth's radioactivity in the continental crust, based on the electric currents generated from crystals aligned in granite. So, while Dr. Baumgardner has presented other objections to the HT which deserve response, we here at Real Science Radio consider this particular criticism to be falsified.

* Danny Faulkner on the 360-Day Year: As recently interviewed on RSR, astronomer Danny Faulkner, in his paper, Was the Year Once 360 Days Long?, rejects that the Earth was created with a 360-day year. "There is a belief among many recent creationists that the year once had 360 days and that the month was 30 days long," he writes. Then Dr. Faulkner says that, "it is difficult to criticize the exact mechanism that might be employed (until someone actually suggests such a mechanism)." This is unfortunate because Walt Brown's flood model provides a mechanism for speeding up the Earth's rotation. Thus Walt is the only leading creationist who presents both a mechanism AND the historical and biblical evidence that the Earth's year was originally 360 days. Just prior to submitting his paper with the above inaccurate claim, Dr. Faulkner had just submitted an entire paper on Dr. Brown's Hydroplate Theory. It would have been helpful for Dr. Faulkner to report and comment on Walt's mechanism, rather than to ignore it.

l

Thus Walt is the only leading creationist who presents both a mechanism AND the historical and biblical evidence that the Earth's year was originally 360 days. Just prior to submitting his paper with the above inaccurate claim, Dr. Faulkner had just submitted an entire paper on Walt's Hydroplate Theory. It would have been helpful for Dr. Faulkner to report and comment on Walt's mechanism, rather than to ignore it.



* Was the Year Once 360 Days Long? Last month, RSR interviewed Don Landis on the Genius of Ancient Man. Contradicting the Darwinian expectation of Homo sapiens clawing their way out of eons of being mere brutes, worldwide evidence incontrovertibly demonstrates that ancient men were brilliant, especially regarding their astronomical calculations, which were intrinsically tied to their very societal existence. If ancient civilizations, separated by continents and centuries, used a 360-day calendar, then there was likely a powerful historical reason for them doing so, especially because such a calendar caused much turmoil. In his paper, along with not addressing the HT mechanism, Danny also does not address whatever primary evidence may exist from ancient civilizations on whether they used 360-day calendars. Rather, Dr. Faulkner disputed a few secondary sources regarding when it was that a couple civilizations switched to a 365-day calendar. That matter, which Danny evaluated, goes to the psychology of cultures regarding the difficulty of changing a calender and the related civil and religious inertia involved, but is only indirectly related to the question at hand. Right here on RSR a few weeks ago, Dr. Faulkner said that he looked forward to seeing the new RSR website, 360DayYear.com, to evaluate the primary evidence, which we are posting there, from history regarding whether or not ancient civilizations used a 360-day calendar. We hope to do a follow up interview with Dr. Faulkner when we make more progress on this new website regarding the length of the created year website.

* Walt Brown's Mechanism for Changing the Calendar: The Hydroplate Theory claims that when the fountains of the great deep broke open, water and rock was ejected into space, which by gravitational attraction, become comets (dirty snowballs) and asteroids (flying rock piles). Further, as what became the floor of the Atlantic rose, the floor of the Pacific sunk, which process melted much of the inner Earth. That melting, like a figure skater pulling in her arms, reduced the size of the Earth by about 180 miles in radius, and thereby speed up the rotation by approximately 5 days per year.

* Perhaps Dr. Faulkner Could Withdraw His Caution: Dr. Faulkner closed his paper saying, "Proponents of an original 360-day year ought to produce their models of how the change might have happened so that we can assess the energy input. Until such models are produced and examined, recent creationists are cautioned against advocating an original 360-day year." Because the leading creationist suggesting an original 360-day year has presented a mechanism for speeding up the rotation of the Earth, Dr. Faulkner could withdraw this particular caution. If he does so, we will report that here. Further, Dr. Faulkner's paper did not address extremely relevant scriptures. In Revelation, in that prophetic context the text explicitly uses a 360-day year. And more significantly, in Genesis 1 we read that "God made two great lights," the Sun and the Moon, for as He said, "Let there be lights in the firmament of the heavens... and let them be for signs and seasons, and for days and years...." And it is the counting of days and the lunar cycle which should have been a "very good" way to track the seasons. For we read in a psalm of creation that God "appointed the moon for seasons" (Ps. 104:19). Yet as Danny admits in his paper, regarding the operation of a calendar, "It is important to note that there is not a single, uniquely satisfying way to do this..." Thus, with the ancient world's social conflict regarding the shifting of the seasons through the calendar, and with even the current calendar situation as described, this all implies a change from the original perfect created order. So, aside from a general caution that is generally appropriate regarding science and claims of the past, Dr. Faulkner did not establish the particular caution that he intended to, and perhaps therefore could withdraw it.
For today's show RSR recommends
In the Beginning
!

Today’s Resources: Walt Brown’s understandable, comprehensive, and meticulously documented resource will give new insight to readers of all backgrounds. In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood takes a different look at a currently hot topic. Evidence that could revolutionize our understanding of origins is carefully explained. You will be challenged to consider fresh ideas in this age-old debate. Also, have you browsed through our Science Department in the KGOV Store? And you can consider our new 6-CD album, The Hydroplate Theory and Walt Brown On the Air!
 
Last edited by a moderator:

Jefferson

Administrator
Staff member
Administrator
Super Moderator
BEST QUOTE OF THE SHOW:
Let me add another Real Science Radio prediction. The prediction is that for all the scientists who are saying that earthquake prediction will not be possible by studying the ionosphere, we predict here that it will be possible. That research will come to fruition.
 

Lordkalvan

New member
If Patton's only objection to Brown's limestone formation theory is a misunderstanding that Brown claimed it precipitated out of the atmosphere, then he can't have been thinking about it very hard.

Brown shows a photograph of the White Cliffs of Dover, almost immediately asserts the claim that -

'Too much limestone exists on earth to have been formed, as evolutionists claim, by present processes on the earth’s surface, such as the accumulation of pulverized corals and shells.'

Source: http://www.creationscience.com/onlinebook/Limestone2.html

- and goes on to account for limestone by chemical precipitation from water.

Given that the White Cliffs of Dover (and many other limestone formations) clearly do not correspond with this model, Brown is being (intentionally?) misleading and Patton appears to be lacking in relevant knowledge.

The White Cliffs of Dover were formed from the fossil remains of billions of micro-fossils, including foraminifera, coccoliths, and calcareous algae. Also included are a range and plethora of macrofossils - ammonites, mollusks, urchins, brachiopods, sponges, corals, crinoids, and sharks' teeth.

ETA Oh, and as Brown's imaginary 'evolutionists' don't 'claim' limestone is formed exclusively or even predominantly 'by present processes...such as the accumulation of pulverized corals and shells', Brown is creating a strawman to attack.
 
Last edited:

Bob Enyart

Deceased
Staff member
Administrator
Let's take this outside... :)

Let's take this outside... :)

If Patton's only objection to Brown's limestone formation theory is a misunderstanding that Brown claimed it precipitated out of the atmosphere, then he can't have been thinking about it very hard.

Hi Lordkalvan! Yes, your observation must be correct. I've noticed that many criticisms of Walt's theory are of this nature. The theory is extensive, and people who prejudge it as probably wrong, rather than carefully evaluate it, grab on to a pretext to reject it. This happens even with well known creationists.

Can I ask you for a favor? I realize that TOL is rather informal. But just in case folks decide to weigh in specifically on our answers to these particular HT objections, could you keep your comments specifically to that topic? A casual visitor might be put off by off-topic (although related) matters. Instead, he might be inclined to participate if the discussion is on topic. Meanwhile, TOL has thousands of threads, many of which can be used for your general criticism of the HT (including any number of threads right here in our BEL forum).

Thanks for your consideration Lk!

-Bob E.
Real Science Radio
 

Lordkalvan

New member
Hi Lordkalvan! Yes, your observation must be correct. I've noticed that many criticisms of Walt's theory are of this nature. The theory is extensive, and people who prejudge it as probably wrong, rather than carefully evaluate it, grab on to a pretext to reject it. This happens even with well known creationists.
Commenting on an obvious factual error, intentional or otherwise, does not constitute a pretext (a purpose or motive alleged or an appearance assumed in order to cloak the real intention or state of affairs - Merriam-Webster) for prejudging (judging before hearing or before full and sufficient examination - ibid.) Brown's hydroplate theory.
Can I ask you for a favor?
Of course.
I realize that TOL is rather informal. But just in case folks decide to weigh in specifically on our answers to these particular HT objections, could you keep your comments specifically to that topic?
Well, as Patton made a comment on Brown's explanation for the origin of limestone that was quite erroneous and as Patton has acknowledged such, there doesn't seem to be much to discuss about this comment other than to point out that it ignores a much bigger problem.
A casual visitor might be put off by off-topic (although related) matters. Instead, he might be inclined to participate if the discussion is on topic. Meanwhile, TOL has thousands of threads, many of which can be used for your general criticism of the HT (including any number of threads right here in our BEL forum).
I don't really see that my comment was off-topic. I have commented elsewhere on Brown's ideas, but don't seem to get many takers for an ongoing discussion, but I am happy to leave this thread to its own devices unless someone chooses to pursue the issue.
Thanks for your consideration Lk!

-Bob E.
Real Science Radio
You're welcome.
 
Top