I found this story to be interesting (and, for me, local):
U. ROCHESTER—In 2005, a gigantic, 35-mile-long rift broke open the desert ground in Ethiopia. At the time, some geologists believed the rift was the beginning of a new ocean as two parts of the African continent pulled apart, but the claim was controversial.
Now, scientists from several countries have confirmed that the volcanic processes at work beneath the Ethiopian rift are nearly identical to those at the bottom of the world’s oceans, and the rift is indeed likely the beginning of a new sea.
The new study, published in the latest issue of Geophysical Research Letters, suggests that the highly active volcanic boundaries along the edges of tectonic ocean plates may suddenly break apart in large sections, instead of little by little as has been predominantly believed. In addition, such sudden large-scale events on land pose a much more serious hazard to populations living near the rift than would several smaller events, says Cindy Ebinger, professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Rochester and coauthor of the study.
It brings up a couple points:
- Does the fact that this is happening so quickly make the theory of plate tectonics more believable to young earthers?
- Thank God this wasn’t Kenya or they’d be looking for a birth certificate in there.
Update. This is good news for conservatives.
gwangung
Speaking as a former geologist (with a paper or two to his name):
Wow.
Blue Raven
Can we tell Taitz it’s there anyway and see if she jumps?
eric
to the contrary, it shows that the earth does not need to be that old for the continents to move about….that was an easy one, give me another….
Dreggas
Damn. Bet i could make a killing if I could figure out where the split would stop, can anyone say beach front property?
Brachiator
Would this mean that a Deity was still doing creatification?
Either way, cold comfort for young earthers.
benjoya
what shoreline ethiopia had was lost when eritrea split off, so this is probably good for ethiopia
Leelee for Obama
Well, that’s kinda freaky, ain’t it? I keep hearing the Native American poet I saw on PBS a few years back saying we shouldn’t forget that nature bats last. Isn’t volcanic and earthquake activity nature’s way of cooling the planet? It seems unfair as all hell that it’s happening in Ethiopia-those poor folks just can’t catch a break, can they? Scary as it is, North America and Europe are more deserving of some punishment.
General Winfield Stuck
Baby Jeevus playing with his toy hammer again.
Dreggas
@Brachiator:
if it did then genesis is full of shit because once god made land he said it was good meaning no sudden changes.
DougJ
so this is probably good for ethiopia
And it’s certainly good news for Republicans.
Bubblegum Tate
Plate tectonics is the LIEbrul atheist science community’s attempt to kill Jebus. Again.
Having said that, this story is incredible. I forwarded it to my friend in Djibouti because combining a story about a giant crack with the fact that she’s presently in Djibouti creates a ridiculous amount of terrible puns.
SiubhanDuinne
Cool, DougJ, didn’t know you were Ethiopian.
soonergrunt
@Brachiator:
you beat me to it.
beltane
This proves that the Lord is constructing a new sea route to the Holy Land in preparation for the Rapture.
DougJ
Cool, DougJ, didn’t know you were Ethiopian.
We’re all Ethiopian if you go back far enough.
SiubhanDuinne
Plus, it could change the entire plot line of Aida which will make a big difference to my opera-going experience.
Moonbatting Average
Speaking as someone who is doing MSc graduate work in geology, in a rift zone, I would just like to ask Jeebus to break a 35-mile long new fault system in my field area. It would make it so much easier to know what to focus on…
Bubblegum Tate
Coincidentally enough, I had just read is funny thing before clicking over here.
Bubblegum Tate
“is funny thing” = “this funny thing”
FYWP
The Grand Panjandrum
This is just a way for liberals to hide all that extra water until they need it around election time next year when they plan to continue the global warming hoax and cause sudden rises in coastal waters around the world.
jharp
I’m with you. Fascinating.
I’m trying to sell my daughter on majoring in Geology next year at college.
What could be cooler than studying stuff like this.
Always regret that I didn’t do it. Though a lack of ability had a lot to do with it.
General Winfield Stuck
@DougJ:
We all slithered out of The Great Rift Valley nekked as J-Birds till Eve ate that goddamn apple. Or, though the story goes.
Brachiator
@Dreggas:
Genesis is meant to be poetry, not cosmology, and as I recall there are actually 2 creation stories merged in the Genesis tale. I also recall a professor in one of my literature classes noting that “Let there be light” actually sounds “weightless” in Hebrew.
And “it was good” is open to all kinds of interpretation, from satisfaction to completeness, and all kinds of stuff in between.
beltane
@The Grand Panjandrum: Al Gore did this with financial backing from George Soros and ACORN.
Royston Vasey
The start of a new ocean it most certainly will be – but not for about 1m years.
That is about 2 1/2 hours of geological time, if the entire history of the Earth (4.5 billion years) is condensed into a “year”.
=)
Brachiator
@General Winfield Stuck:
Oddly enough, no apple in the Genesis story. I think that was Nintendo.
MikeJ
That was always my take on it. The only thing more annoying than christianists trying to tell you that there’s only one proper way to read the bible is having atheists telling you there’s only one proper way to read the bible.
General Winfield Stuck
@Brachiator:
That’s were I learned it. That and too much LSD in my youth.
jeffreyw
Eve ate the Apple and it made her smart, not too unlike the smart ass Apple users today.
Mark S.
@Royston Vasey:
I can’t wait that long. Stupid planet.
RSA
Of course. It makes the Flood all that more plausible.
ellaesther
@The Grand Panjandrum: Man, you are too good at this! I suspect you are a double agent.
Demo Woman
@General Winfield Stuck: You have been reading to much B. O. B. lol.
Royston Vasey
@Brachiator: #5
I wonder if the young earthers use Geosyncline theory instead?
Royston Vasey
@Mark S.: I think we’ll need some kick@ss time machine if we want to go surfing on the Ethiopian Ocean.
Kiril
@MikeJ:
You mean as fiction?
slag
I think you may be misunderestimating the lack of concern young earthers have for empiricism. Do you honestly think that, given all of the scientific discoveries we’ve already made since before Copernicus even, one little volcanic rift in Ethiopia is going to move them in any way?
General Winfield Stuck
@Demo Woman:
Hope you are doing well today, D Woman. Well as can be expected anyways.
ellaesther
I was so anxious to call The Grand Panjandrum out for being a double agent that I forgot to say what I meant to say!
Which was: Holy crow! That is very, very cool!
I like the way that the earth periodically reminds that we’re not really, very much, in control.
MikeJ
@Kiril: Fiction’s probably not the word I’d use, but feel free to use it yourself it it makes you happy. I’d guess less than 10% of the stuff in that collection of books actually happened (and even less happened as described) , but I usually don’t refer to poetry and allegory as “fiction”.
Scruffy McSnufflepuss
God’s just using the rift valleys as an offset for the melting ice caps. Saving us from the nasty consequences of global warming.
Ethiopia’s just taking one for the team.
SiubhanDuinne
Even if it does take several million years (the blink of a geological eye), it must be an amazing feeling for the geologists studying this new Ethiopian Rift to realize that in a real sense they are “present at the creation.”
Assuming there are still any humans or human-like sentient beings around by the time this thing actually does become an ocean (if it does), what would be a good name for it? I’m going to start the conversation by suggesting “Aidic Ocean” just because Aida was Ethiopian and the name has a kind of antiquarian resonance — but I’d love to hear other ideas.
Cain
@DougJ:
More like some kind of primate. Sadly Glenn Beck hasn’t evolved that much from that time and is a perfect example of what neanderthals were back then.
cain
Dreggas
@Brachiator:
can’t I take a dump on the bible literalists in peace? :P
AnotherBruce
Does the fact that this is happening so quickly make the theory of plate tectonics more believable to young earthers?
I find it kinda distressing that we should even give a crap what the young earthers believe. We should pat them on the head like we would a child that believes in Santa Claus and send them on their way.
Midnight Marauder
I was waiting for this obligatory comment, so well played, sir.
Regardless, it really is amazing how conservatism can never fail ever, ever, ever. Dick Cheney could turn himself as the war criminal he is, and somehow, the wizards over at Politico would find a way to tell the world how awesome this was for Republicans.
Demo Woman
@General Winfield Stuck: Much better. I do understand more about the need for surgery. They can’t rule out Leukemia and they want a cleaner biopsy although they still think it’s nhl.. My son seems a tad better. Not accomplishing much at work but he can turn that around. Son’s are good things.
Comrade Darkness
@jeffreyw: It was a fig, sheesh. Eve wanted a higher education. Ain’t that always the way with these women? Never satisfied with what they’ve got.
r€nato
I think this is a seriously cool story. Thanks for posting it.
Comrade Darkness
We can haz election night open thread?
Just Some Fuckhead
I can’t decide which is worse. Your post, or 50 comments on your post. I’m going to have a beer and think on it.
Dream On
Clearly we are in the end times.
Chad N Freude
This is clearly just the Intelligent Designer tweaking the design a bit.
On Marketplace (Public Radio Int’l) this afternoon, they played a voice mail from some guy commenting on a climate change piece in which he said (approxiquoting from memory) that climate changes are the result of natural changes, and since humans are part of nature, any climate change attributable to human activity is natural and artificial measures to prevent it [won’t work|shouldn’t be attempted]. It should be on the podcast of today’s program.
geg6
This is really, really cool stuff. How exciting to be a geologist right now! Much more fun than being a political scientist these days.
bago
In a stunning turn of events, this was NOT good news for John McCain. When told of the fissure replied: “Oh hell! Not again!”
Chad N Freude
@geg6: What about being a geopolitical scientist?
Morbo
What, no “We’re all Mayans now” tag? Surely this is a sign of the coming apocalypse.
General Winfield Stuck
@bago:
Why can’t we a have tectonic separation along the Mason Dixon Line? It’s not fair. A new sea would really be good news where it could do the most good.
Ambergris
So that’s where all the ACORN people are coming from…
burnspbesq
@General Winfield Stuck:
Easier to dig a canal from the Potomac to the Ohio. Course, that would put our genial host on the wrong side of the divide unless he moves to Pittsburgh.
LD50
Ah, now there you’re implying that young earthers pay attention to facts.
celticdragon
@gwangung:
,I.Speaking as a former geologist (with a paper or two to his name):
Wow.,/I.
Speaking as a geology student finishing up my degree…
Wow!
Pretty cool stuff! :)
Montysano
Obviously this was just a cosmic preview for the earth-shattering!!1! events of NY-23. Or maybe it’s just gas music from Jupiter.
celticdragon
@General Winfield Stuck:
Because the east coast is a passive margin dominated by sedimentation, and there is no prospect for any tectonic activity any time soon.
celticdragon
@geg6:
I love geology! =)
It’s a great time to be studying it.
celticdragon
@Royston Vasey:
The term “geosyncline” is somewhat outdated now. You can still find some folks who use the term to descibe thick sedimentary prisms.
General Winfield Stuck
@celticdragon:
Baby Jeevus could make it happen if he wanted to.
kommrade reproductive vigor
That’s all you know! The two countries share a border and on my map they’re less than an inch long. It would be child’s play for the So-called “president” to sneak 658 high-powered drills into Ethiopia and have them dig a trench and claim it was caused by so-called tec -teuc – an earthquake. Then in the dark of night Bill Ayers will throw it in the hole!
/Birfer.
Beauzeaux
@Leelee for Obama:
Cheer up; we may get it. My parents are acquainted with a geologist at one of the University of California schools who is convinced there will be a major volcanic eruption in Yellowstone National Park within the next 50 years. How major? He claims that sunlight will be obscured around the globe for months afterwards. Take that, global warming!
Martin
No. Plate tectonics is slow – you scienceprophets said so. It proves that God is tired of fucking around with you nonbelievers and is ready to show you who’s boss. I mean, if 35 mile long rifts had been opening up for 4 billion years, the planet would be all torn up, wouldn’t it? Huh, wouldn’t it?
35 mile long rift in 4 1/2 years. The earth is 25,000 miles in circumference. If it ripped 35 miles every 4 1/2 years in each direction, that’d make the earth 6428 years old. Proof, bitches!
Nutella
If you look at it on the map, the rift valley runs from Ethiopia to Tanzania by way of Kenya, so maybe that birth certificate is in there after all.
Cain
Dougj,
Please, no richard marx lyrics okay?
Thanks. Bastard.
cain
bjacques
It all sounds very familiar.
This is good news for the Mayans.
celticdragon
@General Winfield Stuck:
Heh!
Mac from Oregon
As a former geologist (ret.), I can state without equivocation that the world is older than 10,000 years old.
I can also state that plate tectonics are real and measurable.
I can prove carbon-14 dating works and why.
I can provide as many scientific proofs as is required by any peer reviewed literature to prove many points of how the world was formed, how life evolved, etc.
All of that is for naught when some YEC (young earth creationist) whips out a bible, a book put out by committee in the 1500’s, declares it to be the word of God, and uses its genealogy to establish the age of the earth of between 6-to 10 thousand y.o.
So, no, sadly they YEC will not accept an extension of a rift as poof of anything, unless it says so in a 3000 year old “science” book.
I hate religion. It tries to make us all stupid.
BillCinSD
@Cain: Nah, as any Mothersbaugh or Casale will tell you, Glenn Beck is a good example of Devolution.
There was a TV movie a couple of years ago about the supervolcano in Yellowstone exploding (and it is likely due geologically any time now). It was called Supervolcano and is considered to be docufiction.