On the Origin of Continents and Oceans: Book 2: The Earths Rock Record

By James Maxlow

ON THE ORIGIN OF CONTINENTS AND OCEANS is a completely new way of looking at and understanding modern scientific evidence about the origin of Earth's continents and oceans. Since the 1960s this evidence has traditionally been gathered in support of Plate Tectonic studies and as such, until now, has rarely been looked at other than from a convention

• Language: English
• Publisher: Terrella Press
• Release date: Jan 1, 2015
• ISBN: 9780992565237

James Maxlow

James Maxlow was born in Middlesbrough, England, in May 1949. His passion for geology was inherited from a family history of "ironstone workers" who supplied iron ore extracted from the Eston Ironstone Mine to the foundries and rolling mills of Middlesbrough, during the early 1800s to mid-1900s. He immigrated to Australia with his parents in 1953 where he grew up in Melbourne. He studied Civil Engineering at the then Swinburne College, but soon became disillusioned with engineering and redirected to geology at the then Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, graduating in 1971. During his academic years James met and communicated with many like-minded scientists from all the world. James received his Master of Science in Geology in 1995, followed by a Doctorate of Philosophy in 2001 at the Curtin University of Technology in Perth, Western Australia, including a letter of recommendation from the University Chancellor for original thought provoking research into tectonics.

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The moral rights of the author to publish this book have been asserted and all rights are reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, or photocopy without the prior permission in writing from the author Dr James Maxlow, at [e-mail] except for brief quotes and excerpts in connection with scholarly analysis and discussion.

First published in Australia December 2014 by Terrella Press, Perth, Western Australia.

ISBN 978-0-9925652-3-7

Copyright © 2014 James Maxlow

Photography by Anita and James Maxlow.

Graphics by Anita Maxlow of Terrella Press.

Permission was granted by the Commission de la Carte Geologique du Monda, Paris to use and digitise the Geological Map of the World at 1:25,000,000 M scale (1990), published by the Commission for the Geological Map of the World and UNESCO © (1990).

Digitising of the Geological Map of the World (1990) © was originally carried out by Simon Brown of Geoviz International.

Front cover photograph by Norman Bailey.

About the Author

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James Maxlow was born in Middlesbrough, England in May 1949, exactly 23 years after the birth of his good friend and fellow expansionist Klaus Vogel. James’ passion for geology was inherited from a family history of ironstone workers supplying iron ores mined from the Eston Ironstone Mine to the foundries and steel rolling mills of Middlesbrough during the 1800s to mid-1900s.

James immigrated to Australia with his parents in 1953, where he grew up in Melbourne. He studied Civil Engineering at the then Swinburne College, but soon became disillusioned with engineering and redirected himself to a degree in geology at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology, graduating in 1971. It was in Melbourne where he later met and married his lovely wife Anita and during their work and travels throughout Australia they had three children, Jason, Karena, and Jarred.

James’ interest in the expanding Earth theory stems from working in the Pilbara region of Western Australia during the late 1970s where he first read the book The Expanding Earth written by Professor Samuel Warren Carey. The Pilbara region is a huge, Precambrian domal structure, several hundreds of kilometres across. It occurred to James that this relatively undisturbed domal structure may have been a fragment of a much smaller radius ancient Earth.

James gained his Master of Science in geology in 1995, followed by a Doctorate of Philosophy in 2002 at Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Western Australia, including a letter of commendation from the university Chancellor for thought provoking research into Expansion Tectonics.

During his academic years James met and communicated with many wonderful expansionists from around the world. Most notable of which was the late Professor Samuel Warren Carey from Tasmania, the father of modern Earth Expansion, Jan Koziar from Poland who was the first scientist to measure and calculate the ancient Earth radius, and Klaus Vogel from Germany, the father of modern Expanding Earth modelling studies. It was during James’ academic studies that Professor Carey recognized the potential of his research into Expansion Tectonics. Carey then kindly passed on his Expanding Earth baton to James, an honour that James deeply cherishes to this day.

Summary of Book One

If 50 million believe in a fallacy, it is still a fallacy. Carey, pers. comm. 1995

In Book 1 of this two-part E-Book series, heavy reliance was made on bedrock geological mapping of the oceans and continents to both measure the ancient radii of the Earth and to establish a formula to determine ancient Earth radius at any moment in time. This bedrock mapping and measured ancient radius data was then used to construct small Earth models extending from the Archaean Era, some 4,000 million years ago, to the present-day plus one model extended to 5 million years into the future.

Throughout this extensive small Earth modelling study, the origin of the ancient supercontinents and seas was discussed, along with the modern continents and oceans, in the context of an Earth progressively increasing its surface area through time. In order for the Earth to increase its surface area, it was stressed that the relatively thin outer continental and seafloor crusts must stretch and distort as the surface curvature of the Earth progressively flattens throughout history. It was considered that this distortion of the crusts during change in surface curvature has given rise to all of the known geological and geographical features that are now familiar to us on Earth today.

The Expansion Tectonic modelling studies presented in Book 1 demonstrate conclusively that the crustal plates, when reconstructed on small Earth models, coincide fully with the seafloor spreading and geological data and accord precisely with the derived ancient Earth radii for each model constructed. This coincidence applies not only to the more traditional oceans, such as the Atlantic Ocean where conventional reconstructions agree in principle, but also to the Pacific Ocean where the necessity for subduction of all or part of the seafloor crusts generated at spreading ridges is refuted. The small Earth modelling studies instead demonstrate that the mechanism of seafloor spreading, as highlighted by seafloor geological mapping, provides a definitive means to accurately quantify an Expansion Tectonic Earth process.

By progressively removing seafloor volcanic lava from each of the small Earth models in turn it was shown that the plate fit-together along each mid-ocean-ridge plate margin achieved a better than 99% global fit for each model constructed. This unique fit-together was considered to empirically demonstrate that a post-Triassic Expansion Tectonic Earth is indeed a viable process and therefore justified extending modelling studies back further to the early-Archaean. Extending modelling studies back to the Archaean demonstrated firstly that all remaining continental crusts assemble as a complete Pangaea Earth at approximately 50 percent of the present Earth radius during the late-Permian. Secondly, by extending this modelling philosophy back in time to the Precambrian times, remnant ancient Proterozoic and Archaean continental crusts were shown to assemble together as a primordial Earth at approximately 27 percent of the present Earth radius.

From this small Earth modelling study it was shown that, prior to the Triassic Period, the ancient supercontinents had existed as a complete continental crustal shell for 94 percent of early Earth history, lasting for some 3,750 million years. This supercontinental crust covered the entire Earth with no large intervening oceans. During that time large bodies of water were instead restricted to a network of relatively shallow continental seas. The evolution of the supercontinents during pre-Triassic times simply involved a progressive and evolutionary crustal process during a prolonged period of crustal stretching, accompanied by changes in both Earth surface area and surface curvature through time. The outlines and configurations of the supercontinents were then dictated by changes to the ancient sea-levels and coastal shorelines, primarily as a result of changes to the surface areas of each of the ancient seas.

In strong contrast, the modern continents simply represent the fragmented remains of the ancient Pangaea supercontinental crustal shell. This fragmentation and subsequent breakup occurred because the ability for the continental crusts to continue to stretch during on-going increases in Earth surface area was finally exceeded during the late-Permian Period. As a result, during the late-Permian the continental crust then ruptured and broke apart to form the modern continents. During that time the ancient continental seas were also disrupted and progressively drained from the continents into the newly opening modern oceans.

Quantification of an Expansion Tectonic Earth process back to the early-Archaean required an extension of the fundamental cumulative seafloor volcanic crust premise to include continental crusts. Continental crust was reconstructed on pre-Triassic small Earth models by considering the primary crustal elements cratons, orogens, and basins. In order to achieve this, consideration was given to an increase in Earth surface area occurring as a result of crustal stretching and extension within an established network of continental sedimentary basins.

By removing all basin sediments and magmatic rocks, as well as reducing the surface area of each sedimentary basin in turn, an ancient primordial small Earth with a radius of approximately 27 percent of the present Earth radius was achieved during the early-Archaean. This primordial Earth comprised an assemblage of the most ancient Archaean cratons and Proterozoic basement rocks; all other rocks were simply returned to their places of origin.

In Book 1, answering the fundamental question regarding a causal mechanism for Earth expansion was intentionally left unanswered, regardless of when this most fundamental of questions first arose. This question will be discussed here in conjunction with additional geological, geophysical, geographical, and biogeographical evidence presented in this book. This has been done to allow all empirical evidence to be presented in a logical manner, without biasing any outcomes of the evidence. The causal mechanism proposed in this book, while speculative, is based on a proposal put forward by Eichler in 2011. In promoting this causal mechanism Eichler first posed the question Does plasma from the Sun cause the Earth to expand? and by presenting arguments based on known physical phenomena, he suggests that this might indeed be the case.

Book 2 will now progressively introduce new geological, geophysical, and geographical evidence to further test and quantify the validity of the Expansion Tectonic small Earth modelling studies.

Contents

Summary of Book One

1 Geological Implications

1.1 Historical Overview

1.1.1 Changing Earth Surface Curvature

1.1.2 Geosynclines

1.1.3 Mountain Formation

1.1.4 Orogeny

2 Relief of Surface Curvature

2.1 Primary Crustal Mechanisms

2.2 Enduring Strength and Super-Elevation

2.3 Relief of Surface Curvature

2.4 Orogenesis and Mountain Building

2.5 Expansion Tectonic Crustal Model

3 Palaeomagnetic Evidence

3.1 Palaeomagnetics

3.2 Palaeomagnetic Dipole Formula

3.3 Understanding Apparent-Polar-Wandering

3.4 Palaeomagnetics on an Expansion Tectonic Earth

3.5 Present-day Palaeomagnetic Poles

3.6 Magnetic Poles on Small Earth Models

3.7 Ancient Earth Radius Using Palaeomagnetics

3.8 African Palaeoradius Determinations

4 Geographical Evidence

4.1 Ancient Coastal Shorelines

4.2 Ancient Continental Sedimentary Basins

4.3 Rise and Fall of Sea Levels

5 Climate Evidence

5.1 Ancient Climate Zones

5.2 Ancient Limestone and Coral Reefs

5.3 Ancient Glacial Record

5.3.1 Distribution of Ancient Polar Regions

5.3.2 Early-Archaean and Proterozoic Glaciation

5.3.3 Late-Proterozoic Glaciation

5.3.4 Precambrian Expansion Tectonic Glaciation

5.3.5 Early-Palaeozoic Glaciation

5.3.6 Late-Palaeozoic Glaciation

5.3.7 Late-Cenozoic Glaciation

6 Biogeographic Evidence

6.1 Evolutionary History of Life

6.2 Mass Extinction Events

6.3 End-Ordovician Extinction Event

6.3.1 Late-Devonian Extinction Event

6.3.2 End-Permian Extinction Event

6.3.3 End-Triassic Extinction Event

6.3.4 End-Cretaceous Extinction Event

6.3.5 Mass Extinction Summary

6.4 Mesozoic Dinosaurs

7 Space Geodetics

7.1 Space Geodetic Data

7.2 Continental Plate Motion

8 Causal Mechanism

8.1 Historical Considerations

8.2 Solar System

8.2.1 Coronal Mass Ejection

8.2.2 Plasmasphere

8.2.3 Ionosphere

8.2.4 Plasma

8.2.5 Aurora

8.3 Proposed Causal Mechanism

9 What the Earth has to Say

9.1 Pre-Archaean Earth-Moon

9.2 Primitive Atmosphere and Hydrosphere

9.3 Archaean Crust-Mantle

9.4 Proterozoic Earth

9.5 Palaeozoic Earth

9.6 Mesozoic Earth

9.7 Cenozoic Earth

10 Paradigm Shift in Understanding

11 References

1 Geological Implications

Why should a body which is expanding develop huge diapiric extensional basins with a very deep source, as testified by the earthquake foci pattern, while elsewhere, very shallow extensional ridges with an associated shallow seismicity implies a great complexity of the global expansion process? Scalera, 1990

In each of the chapters in Book 1 of this E-Book series the adopted approach was to use published bedrock geological mapping of the oceans and continents to construct small Earth models of the past crustal assemblage on an Expansion Tectonic Earth. This published mapping was not available to early researchers, or small Earth model makers, prior to the 1980s. Because of this, early model makers were limited to visual refitting of the continents across vast areas of ocean. Even though this was feasible, otherwise they would not have considered doing it, the continental assemblage’s on their models were not always convincing. Most other researchers of the time were only just accepting the fact that continents were capable of moving—as proposed in Continental Drift—so to go the next step and also consider that the Earth is expanding was a very difficult concept to accept. History shows that the less than convincing small Earth models of these early researchers eah contributed to rejection of the concept of Earth expansion leading to subsequent adoption of the seemingly more convincing theory of Plate Tectonics.

By far the single most important contribution to modern scientific understanding of the concept of Expansion Tectonics has been completion of the bedrock geological mapping and age dating of all the continental and seafloor crusts during the early 1990s. This bedrock mapping has now enabled assemblage of crustal plates to be accurately constrained on models of an Expansion Tectonic Earth, and, for the first time, has enabled small Earth modelling studies to be extended back to the earliest Archaean times. This mapping has also provided a means to mathematically define an increase in Earth radius over time, which, in turn, has provided a means to investigate additional related physical phenomena.

Each of the Expansion Tectonic small Earth models presented in Book 1 demonstrate that, by using this modern bedrock geological mapping, an Archaean to present-day Expansion Tectonic Earth process is indeed viable. From this small Earth modelling, it was then intimated on a number of occasions that an increase in Earth radius is simply transferred from the mantle to the outer crusts as continental and seafloor crustal stretching and extension. This crustal stretching process was shown to have been operative throughout Precambrian and Palaeozoic times prior to supercontinental crustal failure and rupture during the late-Permian. Crustal rupture then gave rise to break-up of the Pangaea supercontinent to form the modern continents and rifting and opening to form the modern oceans.

As Shields so astutely wrote in 1997, Ultimately world reconstructions must be congruent not only with the data from geology and geophysics, but also with palaeobiogeography, palaeoclimatology, and palaeogeography—where the word palaeo simply means ancient. What Shields was referring to here is that it doesn’t matter how well or how convincing a tectonic theory or model is, if the theory doesn’t agree with the physical evidence preserved in the rock-record, it is the theory that is incorrect, not the physical evidence.

In the following chapters I will now move on to investigate the geological implications of what the seafloor and continental crustal data are showing, in particular, by way of additional geological, geophysical, geographical, and biogeographical evidence. That is, evidence that is still preserved in the rock-record from all continents and seafloors throughout the world for all to see and study. This evidence is also collectively referred to in conventional plate studies as global tectonic data.

When correctly interpreted, this physical evidence can provide an extensive amount of information about the past geologic history, past geography, biogeography, and ancient climate, along with additional physical parameters such as atmospheric conditions, sea levels, location of the ancient equator and poles, Earth radius, and so on. For Expansion Tectonics to be seen as a truly viable concept, the evidence preserved in this rock-record must therefore fully support and substantiate the empirical small Earth crustal evidence that has so far been investigated in Book 1.

1.1 Historical Overview

Acceptance of the theory of Earth expansion—Expansion Tectonics—was, and still is, regarded by many researchers as being thwarted by major obstacles. These obstacles were originally considered by the researchers to outnumber the evidence in favour. It must be stressed, however, that these concerns stem from times dating back to the 1950s, well before the advent of modern tectonic studies and well before modern understanding of these perceived obstacles. Included in these concerns was the need to explain the existence of two very different extensional structures observed on the seafloors. These structures included the mid-ocean-ridges and the trench-arc and back-arc zones—Plate Tectonic terms relating to the various island-arcs, mainly located within the Pacific basin—characterised by very different seismic activity and volcanism. As well as this, concerns were raised regarding an explanation for the perceived problem of accumulating the atmosphere and ocean waters on an Expansion Tectonic Earth, as well as the adaptation of palaeomagnetics—the study of remnant magnetism preserved in rocks—to a constantly changing Earth radius.

Brunnschweiler in 1983, in a paper dealing with the evolution of modern tectonic concepts, considered that "Earth expansion was essentially a radial movement and therefore its tangential plate displacements are only apparent, not real." In 1990 Scalera asked, ...why should a body which is expanding develop huge diapiric extensional basins with a very deep source, as testified by the earthquake foci pattern, while elsewhere, very shallow extensional ridges with an associated shallow seismicity implies a great complexity of the global expansion process? Similarly, the possibility of orogenesis—the compression and folding of rocks to form mountain belts—developing under conditions of radial expansion was also discounted by Rickard as early as 1969 because he considered, ...the necessary vertical movements did not appear to explain the observed compressional features.

What should be realized is these early discussions about crustal mechanisms on an Expansion Tectonic Earth relate to times when it was considered that continental crusts acted as rigid bodies and hence any subsequent break-up of these crusts only involved simple crustal fragmentation. This consideration continues, to some extent, through to present thinking where conventional Plate Tectonic modelling studies continue to treat supercontinental assemblages as amalgamations of previously fragmented and accreted crusts. Since these early times though, modern global geology now shows that the continental crusts have, in fact, had a long and complex geologic history, a history that must be strictly adhered to during all crustal modelling and theoretical studies.

Bailey and Stewart in 1983 further considered that, ...for an Earth undergoing expansion with time, the bulk of the oceans would have to be outgassed since the Palaeozoic, requiring fundamental changes in atmosphere, climate, biology, sedimentology and volcanology. In 1986 Weijermars also considered that, ...for a pre-Jurassic small Earth with a continuous continental crust, a large expansion process implies that the entire Earth would have been covered by an ocean with an average depth of 6.3 kilometres. This implication of Weijermars is contrary to the evidence preserved in rocks, hence his concern. In fact, Weijermars introduces yet another meme whereby he assumes that the volume of ocean water has been constant, or near constant with time.

Palaeomagnetic studies have long been considered the cornerstone of Plate Tectonic studies. These studies have supplied an immense amount of data about past locations of continents and oceanic plates. These data have also provided evidence about motion histories of the various continental crusts and continental growth, as well as measurements of the Earth’s ancient radius. Analyses of ancient Earth radii were made by van Andel and Hospers in 1968 and similarly McElhinny and Brock in 1975. McElhinny and Brock considered ...within the limits of confidence, theses of exponential Earth expansion, or even moderate expansion of the Earth, are contradicted by the palaeomagnetic evidence. This then led McElhinny and Brock to conclude, ...there has been no significant change in the ancient radius of the Earth with time.

As mentioned, many of these perceived concerns stem from times dating back to the 1950s, well before the advent of modern tectonic studies and well before a full and modern understanding of these phenomena. Most of the problems envisaged by these researchers have now been resolved, rejected, or accepted as common knowledge within Plate Tectonic studies. It is only through additional research that these same problems will be resolved and accepted from an Expansion Tectonic Earth perspective.

Subsequent literature, such as Smiley in 1992, indicates there is also an increasing awareness of a number of perceived problems confronting Plate Tectonics, as modelled on a fixed radius Earth. Smiley considered that these perceived problems continue to be simply ignored, or are overcome by invention of new ad-hoc fixes. This is similar to what Kuhn had to say in 1970 where he talks about normal versus extraordinary science. In so-called normal science, a problem tends to be discounted as probably explainable in terms of what is known but not at the current state-of-the-art. The outcomes of empirical small Earth modelling studies detailed in Book 1 then lend substance to these concerns that the present concepts of Plate Tectonics, including Continental Drift and palaeomagnetic based polar wandering studies, may indeed need to be ...re-evaluated, revised, or rejected as Smiley suggests.

The intention of the following sections of this chapter is to reconsider the evidence and proposals presented by a number of these early authors in order to see whether their ideas and concerns still apply to the modern global evidence. Much of this evidence and proposals have also been extensively researched and published in Polish by Jan Koziar and Stephan Cwojdzinski. This evidence will then be further discussed in the following chapters by incorporating some of the evidence and ideas in understanding relief of surface curvature on an Expansion Tectonic Earth.

1.1.1 Changing Earth Surface Curvature

Understanding how both the continental and seafloor crusts behave and adjust for changing surface curvature during an increase in Earth surface area throughout time is crucial towards understanding the mechanisms behind Expansion Tectonics. During the 1960s, there was a lot of active debate in the literature regarding a perceived incompatibility of the continental crusts during changes in Earth curvature through time. This incompatibility reflected the prevailing view that the Earth’s continental and seafloor crusts acted as rigid bodies. It was further considered that the continental crusts could not change shape without undue fragmentation or distortion. These considerations were, in reality, artefacts of the presumption that Earth radius has remained constant throughout time and this view has since been used in the literature to justify rejecting any theories that consider otherwise.

Other researchers though were a little more imaginative. Some considered that crustal distortion on an increasing radius Earth should be possible because the complex folding, faulting, and shearing that are now seen in the present-day continental rocks would lead one to expect continental fragmentation and distortion in any event. Others suggested that the outline of continental margins may have changed in time as a result of accretion of the continents, by loss of continental crust, or both. What these authors were talking about is a Plate Tectonic concept whereby new crusts are added to or removed from the margins of old crusts during periods of continental collision or break-up.

On an Expansion Tectonic Earth, in particular during pre-Triassic supercontinent times, accretion by continental collision could not occur because during pre-Triassic times the supercontinental crusts covered the entire Earth as a single continental crust. Instead, a variation of this accretion theme occurred within intervening sedimentary basins during an increase in surface area. In these areas new sediment was deposited in low-lying areas as each of the basins continued to enlarge or rift apart. In contrast, loss of continental crust on an Expansion Tectonic Earth can only occur during post-Triassic crustal break-up times. However, this is only an apparent phenomenon as crust lost from one continent was generally retained on its adjoining continental margin—a phenomenon referred to in Plate Tectonics as displaced terranes.

These perceived problems revolve around not only a lack of appreciation of what crusts are made of, but also a lack of appreciation of the extensive amount of time involved during an expansion of the Earth. In addition, there was also a lack of appreciation of the extremely small annual increases in radius that have occurred each year with respect to the dimensions of the Earth itself. It must be further understood that during the pre-1970s there was a general lack