[tacticalogic]

There are many forms of erosion, some near instant, others over thousands or millions of years. In any case, it's rapid as opposed to the usual erosion process. Boulders can and do break free from cliff sides rather rapidly as a result of freeze-expansion.

Does the process of getting that boulder to the bottom of the cliff include all the prior erosion it took to get it exposed at the cliff face?

[ETL]

Not as a storm, flood or earthquake might. But even there, a landscape has always been previously modified by earlier periods of erosion. It’s an ongoing, continuous process.