The Earth is Growing?

I just watched part 2 of the series (yes, I'm aware of all the other things I could be doing with my time!), about the Alps and Himalayas. The narrator has committed a major strawman fallacy here. He asks how India could have uprooted itself from the ocean floor, and on the impossibility of this he dismisses as "stupid and even preposterous" the idea that the Himalayas were caused by the collision of India and Asia. The problem is that nobody suggests that the Indian subcontinent was uprooted from the ocean floor. The creator of this movie has obviously done at least a little research into geology, so it's especially irritating when he deliberately misrepresents conventional thought in this way.
The narrator acknowledges that "the stacked-up mountains are there, and still they grow." Then he goes on to contrive a vague explanation for their formation involving crustal extension. That's right - he attempts to attribute the folding and thrusting of the Himalayas to extension of the subcontinent to the south, but he doesn't even hint at a mechanism. It seems that the target audience of this material are expected to be satisfied by polished animations and hollow dogma.

 

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And here's another thing: if the Earth's mass is increasing, then how is it that the Moon is receding?

 

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Well, when something expands internally, is guess what you call "lateral extension" is just exactly what does happen at the surface. It happens when you bake certain types of pudding! If you get hold of good maps of Europa, you will find that the features Adams describes are not limited to "some areas".

When features suggestive of internal expansion can be found on a series of celestial bodies you have to choose between two possibilities:
1: internal expansion has taken place
2: a strange coincidence of circumstantial evidence is being observed.

In regard to India, Prof Warren Carey always enjoyed especial support from geologists in that country who said that time after time, when local features were studied, they pointed at the effects of tension rather than compression; i.e. they were more compatible with an Expanding Earth than with the idea that India rammed into the Himalayas.

I do not follow the point you are making regarding the Moon receding from the Earth.

 

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I have, and found nothing of any worth. If you know of a good site about EE, point me towards it.

or 3: extension is balanced by compression elsewhere.

If the earth is increasing in mass, the increased gravity should be pulling the moon in, and yet the distance between us is increasing.

 

Yes, of course the surface expression of global expansion will be lateral extension. But the linear features on Europa do not necessarily imply that extension has occurred simultaneously all over the moon. The narrator scoffs at the notion that, as matthyaouw just pointed out above, lateral extension is balanced elsewhere by crustal shortening. I don't know why he is so opposed to this idea; this paper is about just such shortening on Europa.

Nonsense, for the same reason given above. Internal expansion is suggested only when local extension is mistakenly extrapolated to a global scale, and evidence of shortening is ignored. Furthermore, why are these features only observed on a select "series of celestial bodies"? Neal Adams says that "you may fairly ask how this matter can be created. It’s created at the plasma core of all planets, moons, and suns by a process that is so common that science has a name for it, “pair production!” It’s how all matter is made from energy." Ignoring the obvious physical absurdity of this statement, I have to ask why it is that only the surfaces of Earth, Mars and certain moons of Jupiter show the scars of the supposed expansion?

I would very much like to see a reference to Carey's work, if you have one. The bottom image on this page shows a cross section through the Himalayas. The consequences of continental collision are clearly visible: folding and thrust stacking.

matthyaouw has addressed this above. The orbital radius of the Moon is known to be increasing due to tidal interactions. If the mass of the Earth has increased so much in the last 180 Ma (I am assuming that in Adams's theory the density of the Earth stays roughly constant), then the Moon would be expected to orbit more closely.

 

I am sorry you have not found satisfaction with any of the Expanding Earth sites you have visited, but may I invite you to get to grips (via the Internet -- but if necessary with a physics textbook) with the reason that the Moon is receding from the Earth. The simplicity of your reasoning on this matter will actually reveal itself as somewhat naive once you have researched and understood the issue. And after all, you probably do not imagine that the Moon is getting further away because the Earth is getting lighter!

 

River Ape, since you have encouraged us to consult conventional literature regarding the Moon's recession from the Earth, I assume that you accept tidal interaction as the method by which Earth's rotational energy is being transferred to the Moon. But if you subscribe to Neal Adams's expansion theory, then you also presumably believe that the Earth has increased in volume by more than a factor of 6 in the last 200 Ma. Supposing that the Earth has kept a constant density through its expansion, then Earth's gravitational field strength has increased by the same amount. I'm not a physicist, and I don't know exactly how such a massive gain in energy by the Moon translates to a slowing down of the Earth's rotation - especially when the issue is complicated by new (presumably initially static?) mass added constantly to the cores of these bodies. By the condescending tone of your last post, I gather that you have a better grasp on the situation, so perhaps you could enlighten us.

 

As I said in my initial post: "I take issue with Adams on various details of his theories. He has tried to educate himself in physics and produced explanations which I regard as without validity."

Adams cannot free himself from the psychological imperative of producing a (physics) explanation. If you look for relatively unbiased articles on the Expanding Earth Theory on the Internet or elsewhere, you are likely to come upon sentences like: "The theory ultimately foundered on the failure of its followers to produce a plausible explanation for expansion." The truly wise man is prepared to accept that he sometimes does not know! My own explanation (conversion of dark matter) I offer merely to suggest that there is scope for imagination. Whether it will ultimately prove to contain the seeds of probably truth I have no idea. Nor am I much worried.

Well, it is not clear to me how Venus, Jupiter, Saturn or Uranus could bear visible scars. Sorry there aren't videos for a few more moons!

Carey (motto: "We are blinded by what we think we know; disbelieve if you can") developed his ideas in academic journal or conference papers, and enjoyed a large following circa the 1960s, which seems to have been based at least in part on his attactive, energetic and impressive personality. "The Expanding Earth" was published in 1976 and is an expensive item to acquire as EE enthusiasts cheerfully stump up $250 for a copy. There's plenty about him and his ideas on the Internet, but reading his original words requires access to a top grade library.

Please show me your calculations.

PS I feel that all the followers of this thread bar two are coming round to my point of view!

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Yeah. "Just google it" is a really convincing argument

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Fair enough. I can let the lack of a cause go for the time being - after all, the driving force beind plate tectonics was also once a mystery.

Clearly, we can exclude the gas giants, but why wouldn't Venus show evidence of expansion? It has a similar mass and composition to the Earth, and its surface is apparently older than the Earth's oldest oceanic crust, so where are the rifts?

Mercury has an ancient, heavily cratered surface which, if anything, shows signs of global contraction. Why?

The lack of craters in the lowlands of Mars's northern hemisphere is given by Adams as evidence of youth. Yet scientists have recently found that under a covering of lava and sediment, these regions are as crater-saturated as the 'older' southern regions.

According to Adams, expansion on Earth, Mars, Europa and Ganymede is expressed as linear rifts. Why then has it been accommodated on our Moon as generally circular maria?

On Earth, as has already been posted but not addressed, subduction zones are clearly visible, and convergent plate boundaries are apparent from studies of actual plate motion. Also, as matthyaouw pointed out, ancient oceanic crust has been preserved on the continents.

Never mind the lack of videos, it's the lack of evidence that bothers me. If Europa and Ganymede show evidence of expansion, why is it absent on Io and Callisto? What about Titan? Titania? Triton?

 

The only calculations I've done are simple ones to arrive at the proposed volume (and hence mass and gravitational field strength) of the Earth before the creation of the ocean crust. I took the percentage of the Earth that's land as a proxy for continental crust (unsatisfactory, since as matthyaouw commented, this disregards the submerged continental crust), then worked out the volume. I don't know how to apply this to the rate of energy transfer from the Earth's rotation to the Moon's orbit.

 

Well, I am sorry about that -- but if you are waiting for me to explain the physics behind the recession of the Moon then you are expecting me to expend considerably more time and effort than I am prepared to do.

 

I never asked you to give detailed explanations of the physics behind the moon's orbit. I asked why we see ophiolite suites and accreted terranes. Search engines did not bring up anything useful, so if you know of a resource that deals with it, point me towards it.

 

You guys are arguing somewhat above my head, but I did have these observations:
1)River Ape seems to be correct in saying that the expanding earth hypothesis was a seriously considered explanation for some of the gross tectonic features of the Earth. I ran across a discussion of it in an old text book from the 60s, Structural Geology by de Sitter.
2) My understanding is that it was abandoned because plate tectonics offered a much better explanation, of more features, along with a mechanism.
3) I don't see why River Ape thinks Venus is going to 'conceal' signs of expansion. We have perfectly good renditions of its surface feature a t resolution that would reveal any that were to be seen.
4) For me the decisive item is that we have measured continetal movement by satellite. The movement is consisten with plate tectonics, not with an expanding Earth.

 

I feel that I do not have enough time to keep up my side of the argument (anyone out there want to help?

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. . . thought not

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) -- and it's actually a few years since I studied EE. However, here's five minutes worth:
matthyaouw: re. your request for EE sources. I really don't have time to read what's out there and endorse one EE website over another on ophiolites, etc. I know there's plenty of pro-EE stuff I would find questionable. I used to follow the EE threads on the Bad Astronomy Bulletin Board, now taken over by bautforum. I was always impressed by the case put forward and defended by ExpErdMann. I don't know if there have been any recent threads. I think there has to be plenty of archived stuff.
Laika: I think your claim that the EE case demands that expansion should be demonstable on Triton, etc, is unreasonable. Moons are of such diversity that I see no reason why internal expansion (if it has taken place) has to be detectable in particular surface features. / The paper you referenced on Europa seems to require subscription. Seems to me that anyone who studies the best maps of Europa and cannot see the evidence of expansion is in denial.
Hipparchia: Venus has no "visible scars" for no better reason than we cannot see its surface. We still have very limited knowledge of the planet: let's say we know 1% of 1% as much about Venus as we know about Mars. To conclude that Venus has not expanded on the basis of our existing knowledge seems premature.

 

The claim that all planets and moons undergo expansion is made by Neal Adams, not me. How strangely inconsistent it would be for this process to be recorded so vivdly on two of Jupiter's moons (Europa, Ganymede) and not on their similarly-composed neighbour (Callisto). Especially since Callisto's surface appears all the more ancient. A similar case can be made for Venus: the planet has been mapped with radar at a resolution that would reveal Earth-like rifts if they were there. And why wouldn't they be, since Venus and Earth are so similar?

Europa's surface features certainly hint at relatively violent tectonics, but can be explained by local, incremental movements. It seems to me that the real denial is exhibited by those who are blind to the demonstrable subduction process on the Earth.

 

But River Ape we can 'see' its surface. Detailed radar mapping of Venus was carried out by the Magellan probe. I do not recall the resolution of this mapping, but it was certainly sufficient to allow researchers to identify dozens of classes of surface feature, interpret the geology and come to an understanding of the tectonics. For example, from analysis of the crater count they have deduced that Venus underwent a massive resurfacing event around 500 million years ago.
I have looked again at the detailed topography and with the best will in the world I cannot see anything that looks remotely like an expansion feature.

 

Laika, Hipparchia: I think you two should settle the dispute between you before you have another go at me!

Laika thinks that "Venus and Earth are so similar".
Hipparchia thinks that Venus "underwent a massive resurfacing event . . ."

I think it is unlikely that you are both right!

 

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One of the biggest problems of all for those who deny that the Earth has grown and its gravity increased is the size of the great sauropods and theropods of the Jurassic and Cretaceous era. Gravity is one of the great constraining factors in the design of Earth creatures. To a considerable extent, a creature’s weight defines its shape. This is something we all know, and most of us understand.

By the time we reach African elephant size, we have a creature with massive legs, a very vertical stance, relatively slow-moving. It will walk half as fast again as a man. In danger, it will feign to charge – but very rarely actually do so, because of the danger of injury. It is vegetarian. Study it, and you begin to find many special adaptations that allow it to cope with its immense weight.

T rex, among the largest of the Creataceous hunters, was of similar mass to the modern elephant. Yet is stood on only two legs, which in each step moved far from the vertical position which minimizes stress. It is surmised that it ran at a faster pace than an Olympic sprinter. Yet it does not have the uprightness of features even of the ostrich. Explanation: it did not weigh six tons!

Among the herbivores, there were creatures ten times the size of T rex. There were sauropod necks which drawf the dimensions of the giraffe’s. Among the flying dinosaurs, there were again massive creatures which dwarf the albatross. The list is endless. Those who deny that gravity has increased have a lot of explaining to do! The last of the silhouettes above does not belong to the same planet and era as the rest. It is out of pattern.

 

If increasing gravity is the only reason you can think of why subsequent animals may not have become as large as the biggest dinosaurs then frankly you're being rather naive.