Re: Jet Propulsion Laboratory Honored By Scientific American

From: George William Herbert (gherbert_at_retro.com)
Date: 12/06/04 

Date: 06 Dec 2004 06:26:42 GMT

Henry Spencer <henry@spsystems.net> wrote:
>George William Herbert <gherbert@retro.com> wrote:
>>Don, the plates move. We have rather strong documentation on this
>>point, as we have seen earthquake faults move large and measurable
>>distances since scientific observation began, and there is historical
>>evidence that is rather well founded and easy to follow such as
>>offsets in creekbeds and the like.
>
>To say nothing of the fact that plate motions can be measured directly
>with VLBI and precision GPS, and have been.
>
>>We also have rather good evidence that plates subduct. Even ignoring
>>plate movement firsthand evidence, we have rather good evidence
>>that what's coming out of Mt St Helens right now is neither melted
>>North American Plate rock nor mantle material, but is instead melted
>>Juan de Fuca plate rock which is subducting under...
>
>To say nothing of the seismic tomography work which does direct (albeit
>noisy and low-resolution) imaging of mantle structures, including
>subducting plate ends.

I'm arguing with someone who is clearly a kook. Shame on me.

However... the easiest and most certain way to argue with
a kook effectively is to stand and point to an obvious and
well documented physical effect or feature and say
"See, this is here, and you can't explain it any other way".

He could claim that the VLBI and precisiou GPS were tainted
by math errors or physics errors, and that the tomography
was equally hypothetical and flawed.

It's a little harder to argue with "This earthquake fault
here, it's moved, this road was straight before 1906,
and this fence, and this creek, and...".

It's also harder to argue with "that's the wrong sort of
lava for it to be anything but the plate out to sea
subducting under this one". Requires some more analysis
but is also very physically real and impossible to fake.

Plate tectonics is not a subtle, hard to detect effect.
There is much subtlety and hard to detect stuff going
on associated with it, but the bulk motion is so glaringly
obvious once people thought to look for it.

-george william herbert
gherbert@reto.com

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