Accretionary Wedge #5: Geological Misconceptions and Pie
Happy National Pie Day, and welcome to the fifth edition of the Accretionary Wedge, the Internet’s premier blog carnival for the earth sciences! First, I have some news for you. Make sure you’re sitting down before you read this:
- Diamonds are not made from coal -
With either [melt catalyst belt or chemical vapor deposition], nitrogen from organic compounds in the coal would impart a yellow-green color in the diamond due to the absorption of the single N defect.
I assume this also holds for the Superman method. - Axial tilt is the reason for the season.
- Santa Claus is, at best, a metaphor.
- Dinosaurs aren’t dead -
In fact there are some rather bewildered-looking avian dinosaurs outside my kitchen window wondering how Bubba the Fat Squirrel managed to steal the fat balls from 1.5m high up on our dispenser.
- Earth’s mantle isn’t molten. No, really, it isn’t. Mantle flow doesn’t drive plate tectonics, either. But the mantle is 3D. In fact, most things are 3D… except, of course, gorgeous illustrations by William Smith.
- Small earthquakes don’t do anything to prevent bigger earthquakes. You see, each magnitude 4 earthquake releases about 30 times as much energy as a magnitude 3… but an odd fact of seismology is that the ratio of M3:M4 earthquakes is constant over time, at about 10:1. This leaves us with a factor of 20 lurking ominously in the shadows.
- California is not going to fall into the sea. No, really, it isn’t.
- The Heisenberg uncertainty principle is neither relevant nor funny at the macro scale.
- Crustal folding doesn’t always mean a thickened crust - though the crust in that counterexample can still be fairly described as “thickening”.
- Lava is not a swimming pool. Oh, and the mantle isn’t liquid.
- The mantle is the most annoyingly least-understood part of this planet.
In other news, Mel discusses a test designed to expose students’ geological misconceptions - and why it might not always work. Saxifraga talks about what glaciers actually do - “The moraine five kilometers in front of the modern glacier margin is not a sad sign of the ice retreat, but a sign of a not climate related natural phenomenon called glacier surge and the retreat from the Little Ice Age moraine is partly an adaptation to warming over the past 100 years.”
In honor of National Pie Day, Callan Bentley shares his favorite baked-goods teaching analogies - but he hasn’t thought of any pielike concepts in geology, maybe you can help? Brian objects to the “layer cake” analogy, suggesting that perhaps we should use lentils instead. Lentils? I guess I’ve seen recipes for lentil shepherd’s pie…
Finally, Lab Lemming has a delicious rocky planet pie chart, and by “delicious” I mean “my dentist told me only to eat gas giant pie charts”.
Yorrike (Chris) wrote:
Wow that’s a lot of posts. Looks like this little carnival is going from strength to strength!
Posted 23 Jan 2008 at 3:04 pm ¶
Yorrike (Chris) wrote:
Oh, and thanks for hosting, Yami.
Posted 23 Jan 2008 at 3:04 pm ¶
Lab Lemming wrote:
Looks great. A couple of questions, though.
When you say the above crust is “thickening”, are you inferring that from mass balance and the shortening component?
And isn’t the core more annoyingly underconstrained than the mantle?
Posted 23 Jan 2008 at 3:55 pm ¶
yami wrote:
Yes, most of the thickening is caused by the shortening. But these things are conventionally done by energy balance calculations.
The core is usually easier to ignore than the mantle.
Posted 23 Jan 2008 at 6:04 pm ¶
Andrew Alden wrote:
Well, it isn’t pie, but I have this page about geologic recipes and another about volcano recipes that mentions soufflé.
Posted 23 Jan 2008 at 6:54 pm ¶
ChrisR wrote:
Brian at Laelaps has also weighed in:
http://scienceblogs.com/laelaps/2008/01/my_least_favorite_geologic_mis.php
Posted 24 Jan 2008 at 12:06 am ¶
Kerr wrote:
Point: It wasn’t actually the joke, which was trite, but the art, and others are better:
http://dresdencodak.com/cartoons/dc_014.htm
Posted 24 Jan 2008 at 2:06 am ¶
Aquinas Dad wrote:
Not to be *too* annoying, but ‘Santa Claus’ is usually a reference to St. Nicholas of Myra, an historical figure. While much legend has grown up around him (oddly more amongst non-Catholics than within the Church) was was a real guy.
Posted 24 Jan 2008 at 10:38 am ¶
yami wrote:
Aquinas Dad, I think you’re overestimating the role of history in the modern Santa myth. Santa isn’t a fourth-century bishop any more than legends must be read rather than listened to.
Besides which, St. Nicholas of Myra fills your shoes with candy on December 6, and Santa Claus puts presents in your stocking on December 25. Totally different guys (and one of them is a plagiarist).
Posted 24 Jan 2008 at 12:30 pm ¶
Kim wrote:
LL: I guess the question is whether the crust involves shortening or butter.
Also, the core(s) are generally left out, at least in apple pies.
(Thank you for organizing this, and I apologize for my entry. I couldn’t even find a pie photo that wasn’t copyrighted, let alone come up with the puns necessary for the occasion…)
Posted 24 Jan 2008 at 2:29 pm ¶
Aquinas Dad wrote:
Yami,
Maybe my view is more skewed because I am a pretty traditional Catholic, but ‘St. Nicholas’ brings candy on Dec. 6th and then we get each other stuff on the 12 days of Christmas. Don’t confuse American/Canadian marketing with what the majority of Catholics/Orthodox world-wide practice! I had to step in when my (very puzzled) children began to explain to a neighborhood kid that of *course* St. Nick is real - he’s just been DEAD for a long time!
Posted 25 Jan 2008 at 1:02 pm ¶
JohnnieCanuck wrote:
Something tells me that without the intercession of the children’s parents, the ‘Saint’ would be powerless to miraculously put candy in shoes.
Posted 27 Jan 2008 at 4:38 am ¶
Aquinas Dad wrote:
JohnnieCanuck,
Well of course not - and the kids know it. Its about those who have giving to those without and the joy of giving surprises, especially to kids.
Posted 27 Jan 2008 at 4:52 pm ¶