More nonsense of plate tectonics.
(...Plates are 'ziplocked'... - ....clunk! )
More nonsense of plate tectonics.
(...Plates are 'ziplocked'...
- ....clunk! )
| 'Plates' are mutually dependent entities, 'ziplocked' by their obvious symmetry across the ridge, ...not as plate tectonics would have it, "jostling independently about". This dependence of plates across ridges precludes any connection with 'independent' convection cells. |
Fig.1. Gravity map of the Indian Ocean showing spreading ridge symmetry. Simple zip analogue for transforms; transforms are the 'teeth'. (India in the top right corner) -
| Another perspective on the
nonsense of plate tectonics is provided by the architecture of the spreading
ridges themselves, which show a symmetry both across the ridges and along
them which is like that of a zip, i.e. both sides of the ridge are, in
a sense, 'tied' to each other. They are 'zipped', with the
transforms being the teeth. There is no independence, no autonomy,
as plate tectonics' concept of "plates jostling with each other" would
have us believe. If one plate is so fixed across the ridge,
then, as the ridges are traced around the Earth, globally they are all
tied, and there is only effectively one plate being broken and pulling
apart. And this is precisely what the emergent GPS data shows.
If, however, like an unzipped zip, both sides of the ridge might detach and become independent, then plate tectonic's notion of independent plates would have some validity, but there is no ridge that shows any axial detachment or asymmetry across the ridge, and independence of movement therefore of opposite sides of the ridge. In fact the whole of ridge dynamics acts to prevent this - each time the ridge (zip) works open it is again clamped by the teeth (transforms). Transforms act to keep the 'plates' tightly 'zippered', with the plates on each side of the ridge wholly dependent entities. This stands in direct opposition to the notion of convective overturn, where cells on both sides of the ridge must indeed be independent entities, with cooling cycles entirely dependent on the irregularities in their path. Therefore, whilst there is certainly uplift and spreading of ridges, the analogy of convection to account for it, is conclusively false. |
The inadequacy of convection
as a model is highlighted by the presence of 'hot spots' or 'mantle plumes'
such as Hawaii, where the line of islands shows successively younger magmatism
to the south. The idea that an anomalous heat source in the
mantle may remain spatially fixed whilst the crust moves over the top of
it is extrapolated to account for the massive outpourings of lavas on submarine
plateaus such as Ontong - Java (Pacific).
However a local heat source would naturally develop a radial pattern of
convective
rise and magmatism, yet Hawaiin magmatism is distinctly linear.
If there is any 'convection' related to the 'hotspot' its impression is
insignificant in relation to that attributed to the ridge of the East Pacific
Rise.
Further, if hot spots are fixed sources, why aren't the fields of 'hotspot lava outpourings' ridge - related, as results of the biggest mantle rupture of all, instead of (as would appear to be the case) being transform-related (Ontong-Java link above)? Also, if convection applies,
what sort of a heat source in the lower mantle is it that makes a linear
ridge - where every transform-divided sector is as uniformly active as
the next? Depletion in any sector would lead to a relative apparent
increased activity in the next, and a tendence locally towards polar diapiric
rise, but there is none, not even a hint. The ridge remains
a ridge,...and tightly 'zippered', not at all like 'convection cells',
whether experimental or real.
|
Convection as a mechanism for ridge growth? Surely not. In Earth expansion the spreading ridges are clearly related to global torsion acting on the shells of the crust and the mantle (which we can see), ..not to any imagined convection (which we can't). In relation to the generation and growth of transform fault, torsionwist rules (!).
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Fig.2. Convection cells. Right and left are natural examples of granulation due to thermal convection. The one in the middle is due only to the fervid imaginings of convectioneers, deprived of the real deal.