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Andes Mountains Are Older Than Previously Believed
ScienceDaily ^ | Sunday, May 17, 2009 | Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, via EurekAlert!

Posted on 05/25/2009 4:20:13 PM PDT by SunkenCiv

The geologic faults responsible for the rise of the eastern Andes mountains in Colombia became active 25 million years ago -- 18 million years before the previously accepted start date for the Andes' rise, according to researchers at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama, the University of Potsdam in Germany and Ecopetrol in Colombia...

The team integrated new geologic maps that illustrate tectonic thrusting and faulting, information about the origins and movements of sediments and the location and age of plant pollen in the sediments, as well as zircon-fission track analysis to provide an unusually thorough description of basin and range formation.

As mountain ranges rise, rainfall and erosion wash minerals like zircon from rocks of volcanic origin into adjacent basins, where they accumulate to form sedimentary rocks. Zircon contains traces of uranium. As the uranium decays, trails of radiation damage accumulate in the zircon crystals. At high temperatures, fission tracks disappear like the mark of a knife disappears from a soft block of butter. By counting the microscopic fission tracks in zircon minerals, researchers can tell how long ago sediments formed and how deeply they were buried.

Classification of nearly 17,000 pollen grains made it possible to clearly delimit the age of sedimentary layers.

The use of these complementary techniques led the team to postulate that the rapid advance of a sinking wedge of material as part of tectonic events 31 million years ago may have set the stage for the subsequent rise of the range.

(Excerpt) Read more at sciencedaily.com ...


TOPICS: Astronomy; Science
KEYWORDS: andes; catastrophism; ecuador; peru; tiahuanaco
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To: Fred Nerks

If geologists can’t tell the difference between native stone and a man made aggregate they can hardly have any credibility regarding the age of the mountains can they?


21 posted on 05/25/2009 7:32:38 PM PDT by TigersEye (Cloward-Piven Strategy)
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To: TigersEye
Maltese concrete (Torba)

Ggantija, Malta - The temples on Malta are claimed to be some of the oldest free-standing temples in the world. A. Service (6), mentions the 'contemporary cement of the floor' in the pavement of the Ggantija temple on Gozo, Malta (see left), and although the idea was not accepted for a long time, Maltese archaeologists are now of the opinion that Torba (as it is called on Malta), was formed by compacting crumbled rock and rock dust then adding water (7), creating a tough and durable rock-like material on-par with the best and strongest concrete used today.

ANCIENT CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES link

22 posted on 05/25/2009 8:05:54 PM PDT by Fred Nerks (fair dinkum!)
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To: Red_Devil 232
Well at least these “researchers”, as in scientiests, know where the 6000 year time line is located in a 25 million year old deposit of sediment.

Do they now? How are they coming on that whole Pluto-is-a-planet/Pluto-is-not-a-planet thing?

23 posted on 05/25/2009 9:10:03 PM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all. -- Texas Eagle)
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To: bert
Is everyone in Texas an idiot or just you?

There are idiots in every state. Seeing as how I live in California, it would be hard for me to speculate the idiot to non-idiot ratio in Texas.

I know here in California the idiots seem to have us vastly outnumbered.

That being said, I'll take your answer as a, "Yes. These researchers are scientists."

I congratulate them on their ability to admit what they've thought about the age of the Andes was wrong.

It'll take some time, but I'm sure they'll come to the same conclusion about evolution, global warming, Pluto, etc.

24 posted on 05/25/2009 9:16:01 PM PDT by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all. -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Fred Nerks

That is an interesting theory for the temple floor in Malta and the limestone blocks of the pyramids of Egypt. But the stones found in Puma Punku are granite and diorite. Being the hardest two types of stone next to diamond it would be a little difficult to pulverize it and then concretize it into something as dense as the original.


25 posted on 05/25/2009 10:17:08 PM PDT by TigersEye (Cloward-Piven Strategy)
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To: TigersEye
Being the hardest two types of stone next to diamond it would be a little difficult to pulverize it and then concretize it into something as dense as the original.

Right you are. All the more reason to ask, why and how were these multi-faceted shapes created?


26 posted on 05/25/2009 11:54:34 PM PDT by Fred Nerks (fair dinkum!)
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To: Fred Nerks

There was some weird stuff going on in the past. It seems that building and sculpting with huge stones was popular all over the world some thousands of years ago. And then it all petered out all over the world.


27 posted on 05/26/2009 12:35:37 AM PDT by TigersEye (Cloward-Piven Strategy)
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