While lurking the GHMB, I noted a classic example of the
fictional evidence that alternative "scientists" often
careleesly incorporate, without bothering to verify, into
their models and theories. In thread "The 6500 Year Old
Sunken Forest article..." and on September 17, 2004,
the alternative "scientist" wrote:

"(The mountains rose at the close of the Flood, as
evidenced by the lack of tension cracks in the
now folded sedimentary layers of the mountains.)"

This quote was posted at:

[www.grahamhancock.com]

and in another post in "The 6500 Year Old Sunken Forest
article..." thread, another person stated:

"And what you stated regarding the "folding of
sedimentary rocks" is very interesting. This
can only happen when the sediments were "soft",
therefore having no signs of cracking or breaking.
Therefore the conclusion: the sediments were
laid down all at once and folded through
earthquakes and upheavals, not over long periods
of time, but a short period."

This quote is from another post at:

[www.grahamhancock.com]

I characterize both of the above statements as being nothing
more than scientifically bankrupt fiction because if a person
takes the time to either look at an actual outcrop or any of
the research that has been written and illustrated in the
published literature about folding, he or she would find the
above statements to be completely wrong.

First, even basic textbooks and papers on structural geology,
i.e. Currie et al. (1962), Davis and Reynolds (2004), and
Ramsey (1967), described and illustrate features, i. e.
foliation, kink banding, cleavage, keystone grabens, d
elaminated beds, joints, fractures, etc., that are typically
associated with folded sedimentary and other strata. Often
this deformation is accompanied by the physical crushing of
the grains of silt, sand, and gravel comprising the folded
sedimentary rock. Because such features and the crushing of
associated grains can only be produced by the deformation of
**lithified** rock, the ubiquitous presence of some
combination of these features in direct association with folds
demonstrates beyond all reasonable doubt that the large-scale
folded strata found in mountain ranges, as also in the Grand
Canyon and Colorado Plateau region, were solidly lithified
rock when folded. The presence of these features refutes
beyond any reasonable doubt the proposition that these rocks
were "soft", unlithified sediments, when they were folded.
Davis and Reynolds (2004) and Ramsey (1967) explain in great
detail how the folding of **lithified** rock creates these
features.

Examples of features that could have **only** been produced
by the folding of solidly lithified sedimentary rocks are
illustrated and discussed in "Types of Internal Deformation
in the San Rafael Monocline" by K. M. Johnson (3.8 MB PDF
file) at:

[www.eas.purdue.edu]

Examples of a type of "crack", called cleavage, which the above
quotes claim as being absent in folded strata, a person can go
look at:

[seis.natsci.csulb.edu]
[earth.leeds.ac.uk]
[earth.leeds.ac.uk]

On another web page, the Cleavage and Fold" web page,
[earth.leeds.ac.uk] ,
directly contradicts the claim about the lack of cracking in
folded rocks by stating:

"Cleavage often goes hand in hand with folding."

Folded sedimentary rocks also commonly contain cracks in the
form of joints and faults. Spectacular examples of such cracks
have been studied, described, and illustrated in detail from a
large fold that comprises Oil Mountain in Wyoming by Hennings
et al. (2000). Innumerable other examples of cracks, in, the
form of joints and faults, associated directly with folds
sedimentary rocks have been described in innumerable geologic
publications as summarized by Davis and Reynolds (2004) and
Ramsey (1967). Each of these publications show that the claim
about folds in sedimentary rocks lacking "cracks" is pure
fiction that completely ignorant of facts repeatedly documented
by direct field observations made by uncounted conventional
geologists.

Second, in some folds, the folding of the strata occurred by the
plastic deformation of the rock. This type of deformation was
caused by the flowing and folding of the rock at stresses above
their elastic limit at high confining pressure and/or
temperature. The fact that these folded rocks found in mountain
ranges were lithified rock, not soft sediments when folded, is
demonstrated by the fact that the individual grains of sand,
silt, gravel, and other particles comprising the rock are
stretched in the direction in which the rock has been folded.
Had the rock been soft when folded, it would have been
physically impossible for such grains to have been deformed at
all. In addition, fragile and brittle objects, i.e. fossils, in
soft sediments would have been fragmented instead of being
deformed. The deformation (stretching) of smaller grains can
be directly seen using thin sections and microscopes. The
plastic deformation of solid rock within folds is also seen by
the naked eye by the presence of deformed (stretched) pebbles,
oolites, fossils, and other clasts and features within folded
rocks. Again, Davis and Reynolds (2004), and Ramsey (1967)
describe and illustrate in great detail how these features are
created by folding.

For an example of stretched pebbles, a person can go look at
"Stretched pebbles in the Raft River metamorphic core complex,
Idaho." at:

[pangea.stanford.edu]
[pangea.stanford.edu]

Finally, soft-sediment folding does occur. However, such
folding is often limited to single beds or sets of beds with
flat bedding lying above and below it. Because of the lack
on any sort of tensile or compressive strength, soft sediments
when folded, the layering within them quickly pulls apart and
breaks down into a jumbled mess of contorted and fragmented
beds lacking any lateral continuity. "Wild Flysh" is an example
of such deposits. With additional deformation, soft sediments
degrade into a mass of blocks within an amorphous matrix
without any distinguishable bedding. Thus, the development of
large scale folding, in fact in itself, often is an indication
that the sedimentary layers were fairly well lithified, not
"soft" when folded.

The fact of the matter is that the folds found in mountain
ranges have cracks, fractures, and features that formed as a
result of the strata being folded. The vast majority of these
structural features only could have formed if the strata
forming them was solid rock when folded. The crushing of the
sedimentary particles, i.e. sand, silt, and gravel, which is
commonly found in folded sedimentary rocks could only have
formed only if the sediments have been lithified when folded.
Also, where plastic deformation has occurred in the formation

of folds, this type of deformation, is demonstrated by the
deformation of the particles comprising these rocks. The
deformation of these particles could only have occurred if
the strata was lithified rock, not soft sediment, when folded.

The above false claims about folds lacking cracks and lacking
"signs of cracking or breaking" is just a symptom of a general
inability on the part of many "alternative scientists", in this
case a Young Earth creationist, even to get their basic facts
straight and the mindless use of obviously false information in
their alleged models. The use of large amounts of grossly
inaccurate, often completely false, data and observations is a
major reason why various "alternative" ideas, in the case a
"Global Flood Model", about Earth history are regarded with
great amusement and readily dismissed by conventional
geologists. It should take a rocket science to understand if the
alleged field observations / data on which a model is based are
utterly inaccurate to the point of being worthless falsehoods,
then any model based upon them is nothing more than boring
fiction. It is the old cliche "Garbage in, garbage out

References cited:

Currie, J. B., Patnode, H. W., and Trump, R. P., 1962,
Development of folds in sedimentary strata. Geological
Society of America Bulletin. vol. 73, pp. 655-674.

Davis, G. H., and Reynolds, S. J., 2004, Structural
Geology of Rocks and Regions. John Wiley and Sons,
New York, 491 pp.

Hennings, P. H., Olson, J. E., and Thompson, L. B., 2000,
Combining outcrop and three-dimensional structural modeling
to characterize fractured reservoirs: an example from
Wyoming, American Association of Petroleum Geologists
Bulletin, vol. 84, no. 6, pp. 830-849.

Ramsay, J. G., 1967, Folding and Fracturing of Rocks.
McGraw-Hill, New York

Best Regards,

Paul
Baton Rouge, LA