.......Subducting
subduction
(...where it belongs, ..down the gurgler..)
.......Subducting
subduction
(...where it belongs, ..down the gurgler..)
| "...The seismotomographic image (Figure 3) <below> shows that the “descending plate” or “cold slab” (with faster seismic velocities) is missing under the Java Trench and the Indonesian arc. A higher-velocity feature only starts to appear below 400 km, but takes a subvertical attitude, clearly in conformity with the deep-seated SWJ tectonic zone. Furthermore, the supposed subducted slab becomes subhorizontal below 700 km, and is separated into several layers. “This tomographic image alone,” says Choi, “is enough to bury the subduction models.” |
Tomographic image across the Java trench showing 'fast' (blue) and 'slow' (red) zones of seismic velocity. The blue zones equate with the slabs of Plate Tectonics which here can be seen not to descend, but to turn flatly under the South China Sea, ..i.e., no return to the deeper mantle.
| "Dong Choi’s battle with
the plate-tectonic establishment came to a head in the late 1980s, when
he was working for the Australian Bureau of Mineral Resources (now Geoscience
Australia). He prepared a manuscript presenting evidence that Precambrian
continental crust was present under the northwestern Pacific, and that
a paleoland had existed there in the Paleozoic to Mesozoic. He based this
conclusion on dredging and deep-sea drilling data, seismic profiles, paleogeography,
and the geology of the Japanese Islands. However, the Chief of his Division
told him that if he published the paper, he would have “no room to stay
with us,” while the Chief Scientist accused him of doing “bad science”
and reminded him that he was on contract. Choi published his article in
the Journal of Petroleum Geology (Choi, 1987), and quit the organization
soon afterwards (personal communication, May 2005). An editorial comment
described the article as “quite revolutionary ... almost certainly the
precursor of the future in seismic exploration and tectonic interpretation.”
(Extract from the Journal of Scientific Exploration, vol. 19, no. 3, pp. 490-495, Fall 2005) |