Naked Science Forum
On the Lighter Side => New Theories => Topic started by: Chips on 17/01/2011 09:55:08
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Hi. I'm not sure if this is the correct place to post this.......
I'm intrigued by the impact and exit event theory. Has anyone else read/heard of it?
It was difficult to grasp the details because it covers a lot of ground, but I'm really interested by what
it suggests may have occurred to our solar system in the past.
It has made me think but I'm no geologist so I'm asking what you guys think?
Chips
[:)]
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I've been asked to update this a bit.... I'll try.
I did a search for "The impact and exit event theory".
All results eventually led me to this website:
theimpactandexitevent dot com (it turns out that The Naked Scientists Forum really doesn't like it when I use this link)
A quick web search pulled up other science forums that were posted on, some by the original author.
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081223151949AA5jmTf
http://scienceforums.com/topic/19769-the-impact-and-exit-event/
http://www.sciencefile.org/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1229515858/0
http://www.sciforums.com/showthread.php?p=2121061
Most of the earlier comments are quite critical, although reading further, it depends a bit on the website. But, real information is still sadly lacking.
Part of the theory centers around a Theia-like event, although it seems to indicate an asteroid passing through the earth, and exiting somewhat intact. Then it seems to get into other planets. Something about a tangential impact onto Mars 2000km long that follows a crooked course. But, again, many of the details just seem to be dropped.
Personally I found the website frustrating. That it really didn't given any useful information, or enough information that I would have any specific confidence in the theories.
The following quotes came directly from the website. It seems as if the writing style over emphasizes the naivety of the author.
It's author has never written a book
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The author readily admits he has only a basic knowledge of the subject matter
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for reasons I do not understand, my hugely insignificant brain put together a series of thought processes
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and to be perfectly honest, thousands of individuals far more qualified than myself
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For the past two hundred years the very foundation upon which much of today's Science was developed has been seriously flawed.
This morning, I did run into this page... that has some interesting information. But, it still seems to be a little terse.
theimpactandexitevent dot com / takla_makan_screenshot html (The NakedScience Forum really doesn't like my posting the actual link).
I also hunted for the author's name on the website. It used "I" a lot, but never said who "I" actually was. When the author had posted on the other websites, it was always using a pseudonym.
Amazon doesn't seem to sell the book, and it is apparently only available in E-Format from the above website.
So..
I just get a bit suspicious when I see a posting by a "newbie" that has very little real information, and sends one off hunting for the information. And, the only place that seems to have it is a commercial website.
If I'm going to ask something on a website as a first post.
"What do you think about "X" theory". If it is a widely known and discussed theory, that is one thing. But, if it is a tightly guarded secret, that is something entirely different. And, in that case, one can still discuss it, but the theory has to be clearly defined.
The book is only £5.99.
Not a bad price to unravel all of life's mysteries.
But, I think I'll choose to hunt for my own answers to life's mysteries.
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Thanks for the links, CliffordK. I have seen a couple but not all of them. I've been trying to come up with a way of responding that doesn't sound 'self serving' / or like spam without mentioning the name or content of the theory. It is very difficult! I think I'll just take it that in response to my question nobody has read/heard of the theory.
As I said, I found it very interesting and was only looking to read comments from others who had read it and maybe share my thoughts on it.
FYI the authors name is 'Peter McRae' (not sure if that is his real name) and in the book he mentions that he is in northwest England.
About the price: I'm not soft with my cash. Yes, it was a low cost purchase but I don't feel like I wasted a few hard-earned dollars.
In my opinion "choosing to hunt for my own answers to life's mysteries" also means exploring new ideas in addition to supporting existing ones. Thats why I bought the book.
I hope this doesn't sound like a rant because it isn't [:D]
Chips
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Ok,
I figured it was British as the price didn't list $
Well... you are always welcome to share the conclusions that you've made, and will likely get some comments, as people are here to bounce ideas around. And, the price is a lot less than most of my undergraduate textbooks were, but I'm not heading out to buy any $100 textbooks in the near future either.
I'm sorry if I seemed a little critical, but it is hard to comment on something that is very much hidden.
I suppose that is the challenge of the new millennium. How to make money in the Wiki-Age.
Paraphrasing and reviews and continuing research are normally not discouraged, but perhaps the author has his reasons.
As far as Impact theories, as I mentioned, there is the Theia hypothesis, in which the moon is believed to have been created by a deep impact of a small planet.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giant_impact_hypothesis
There have also been many other meteor impacts in the past which may have driven the development of the planet and life.
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CliffordK: The information on the link you posted is also mentioned in the theory as supporting evidence.
Where the Giant Impact hypothesis wikipedia article adds "several unanswered issues surrounding this hypothesis. Lunar oxygen isotopic ratios are essentially identical to Earth's, with no evidence of a contribution from another solar body.[4] Also, lunar samples do not have expected ratios of volatile elements, iron oxide, or siderophilic elements, and there is no evidence to suggest that the Earth ever had the magma ocean implied by this hypothesis." ...the author of the impact and exit event actually uses these 'unanswered issues' of the Giant Impact hypothesis as further examples of evidence supporting his claims.
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To the wise guy: Insulting this 'newbie' by altering my original question to have me appear to be the author not only appears childish - it also denigrates what is a very good website. Surely this is NOT the work of responsible moderators?
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CliffordK - because of what has happened I'm not sure if its worth continuing. It is now my turn to be confused... [:(!]
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Chips, if you read the acceptable use policy (AUP) you'll find that titles of new threads should be formulated as questions. The title was changed to reflect that.
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Chips, if you read the acceptable use policy (AUP) you'll find that titles of new threads should be formulated as questions. The title was changed to reflect that.
Ok - I get that. Thanks for the explanation.
'Are you interested in this theory?' would be better.
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Chips, if you read the acceptable use policy (AUP) you'll find that titles of new threads should be formulated as questions. The title was changed to reflect that.
Ok - I get that. Thanks for the explanation.
'Are you interested in this theory?' would be better.
Done. I adjusted it to "this".
BTW, as the OP, I think you can still edit the title of the topic by modifiying your first post.
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Thanks for your help, Geezer.
CliffordK - The impact and exit event theory basically states that there were originally 4 planets in the solar system. Venus, Earth Mars and another one which the author says collided with Mars.
The upshot of this was the release of debris and gases that went on to form the rest of the planets in the solar system, with a chunk of one of the two collidiing planets veering off into space and impacting with earth with such velocity that it passed through and burst out at the site of the taklamakan desert. He also suggests that at that time the Earth was smaller than it is today, and that the aftermath of the impact caused the surface of Earth to fracture, releasing magma from below. It is, he says this 'fracturing' and subsequent release of Earths internal pressure that enabled the Earth to expand to its present size leaving behind the evidence associated with 'continental drift'.
He also suggests that the emissions/debris from the impactor as it burst out of Earth at the taklamakan desert can be seen as the large expanse of deserts to the west, covering the regions of saudi arabia and northern Africa.
Finally the theory suggests that during the 'exit event' a large section of Earths internal magma was jettisoned into space to become the Moon - hence his assertion that the content of the Moon and its similarity with that of Earths interior is a natural consequence of the impact and exit event.
Thats about as much of a summary as I could put together without filling the whole page!
Chips
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Ahh...
Ok.
Saturn?
Jupiter?
What about the big planets?
I believe that both Saturn and Jupiter are growing. While Earth can't hold onto Helium, Jupiter will pick up any stray helium molecules that happen to fall into its gravity well. However, to do so it had to start with a larger gravity well than Earth.
Keep in mind that nothing is flat. So, say an asteroid created the 2000km Valles Marineris on Mars, either the trench would have a variable depth (deeper in the middle), or the asteroid had succumbed to Martian gravity, in which case there would be no escape. You would also expect it to loose tremendous amounts of material. If the valley is 100km wide, how big was the asteroid?
What was this rambling asteroid made of? Pure tungsten Carbide? What speed was it travelling at? If it was travelling at a high fraction of the speed of light, then it would not be orbiting around the sun, but rather made a single pass through the solar system. It would slow down with the first planetary collision, but if not, the chances of a second planetary collision would be zero.
Nature heals itself. Sometimes it takes time. We have some lava flows in Oregon that are a few thousand years old that are just now getting a few small trees. If the volcano doesn't erupt again, in 20,000 years, it will be forested.
Likewise, the great deserts aren't created by an event that happened a billion years ago, but rather the local weather patterns which are influenced by where they are located on the globe.
For example, if you look at Google Earth, you will notice that the "Great Deserts" are not at the equator, but rather at the Tropic of Cancer and to a lesser extent the Tropic of Capricorn. In fact, the equator is where the rainforests are located. I believe the weather patterns are complicated, but it has to do with low pressure zones forming over the equator, causing winds to pick up moisture from the areas around the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn and dump it over the equator.
http://library.thinkquest.org/26634/desert/formation.htm
The size of the continent also makes a difference, with drier regions often in the middle.
Also note, the moon is more similar to Earth Crust material than earth core material (less iron, lower overall density).
I had once considered the planets having a variable speed of spinning, changed by tangential asteroid impacts. However, without doing the calculations, everything I read indicates that the amount of energy required to say double the rate of spinning of a planet is pretty extraordinary, and would essentially be sufficient to destroy the planet in the process.
Earth expanding?
I see some notes about a currently expanding Earth, but it seems to be refuted. Some indications are that the core is slowly cooling, and causing the earth to actually be contracting.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expanding_Earth
And, it doesn't seem to fit with a primordial earth hypothesis either. What would have caused a density spike?
Anyway, it sounds like the book, or perhaps we should call it a story, presents a lot of radical ideas. But, most of them seem pretty far fetched. I suppose one would just have to read it.
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Saturn?
Jupiter?
What about the big planets?
I believe that both Saturn and Jupiter are growing. While Earth can't hold onto Helium, Jupiter will pick up any stray helium molecules that happen to fall into its gravity well. However, to do so it had to start with a larger gravity well than Earth.
Keep in mind that nothing is flat. So, say an asteroid created the 2000km Valles Marineris on Mars, either the trench would have a variable depth (deeper in the middle), or the asteroid had succumbed to Martian gravity, in which case there would be no escape. You would also expect it to loose tremendous amounts of material. If the valley is 100km wide, how big was the asteroid?
What was this rambling asteroid made of?
Thats quite a lot of observations CliffordK. I'm not in the position to answer them personally, but I'll quote some of the associated content of the book.
The author states that Saturn and Jupiter were created in much the way you describe. He says that it was the remnants of the obliterated planet that collided with Mars (not an asteroid) and it was other large sections of the colliding planet that drifeted off ito space attracting gases released into space following the collision. If your assumptions regarding the gravitaional well are correct, it could also be reasonable to assume that the disintegrated planet did have a large gravity well (that's my guess - its not in the book).
There are many references to the evidence of after-effetcs on the surface of Mars. The authors mentions the vast amount of scatterd, broken pieces of rock on the surface of Mars that are situated where no previous volcanic activity has ever taken taken place.
I have looked at the maps he suggested (using geoplayer.com) and there are what appear to be vast 'scraping marks' in an east/west direction in direct corrolation with the Valles Marineris.
I remember something to do with the ring formations on the gas planets. I'll take another look at the book and reference this and anything relating to your other comments...
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Likewise, the great deserts aren't created by an event that happened a billion years ago, but rather the local weather patterns which are influenced by where they are located on the globe.
For example, if you look at Google Earth, you will notice that the "Great Deserts" are not at the equator, but rather at the Tropic of Cancer and to a lesser extent the Tropic of Capricorn. In fact, the equator is where the rainforests are located. I believe the weather patterns are complicated, but it has to do with low pressure zones forming over the equator, causing winds to pick up moisture from the areas around the Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn and dump it over the equator.
CliffordK: This was one of the elements of the impact and exit event theory that gave me the idea to start this post. The author suggests that (because of the direction taken by the impacting body under the surface of the Earth), the fallout' debris was naturally going to be west of the exit event. I have looked at his 'evidence' using a variety of online maps and - surprisingly to me - there does appear to be a lot of sense to what he says. For instance, he talks about 'super magma columns' that erupted upwards as the impacting mass exited at the area of what is now the taklamakan desert. He suggested that we (the readers) look again at the mountainous regions to the west of this area and imagine where the suggested 'super magma columns' would have been likely to have fallen.
Westwards from the apparent 'exit site' are what do appear to be elongated 'fallout' mountainous areas stretching as far as Ireland and northern Africa. He also mentions the way in which (to him) the coastal definition of western Europe appear similar ...as though the landmass had been created as fallout from an eastern direction. France, Norway, Portugal and all of the British Isles (even Iceland) do appear to have an east/west (fallout) configuration. Italy also looks like a 'fallen magma column'. It's difficult for me to explain this any better without the pictures in the book - I hope my efforts were worth it [???]
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Oh.
Google Earth was taking me to Africa when looking for the Takla Makan desert, in the wrong Continent :(
There was a discussion of the multitude of semicircles and parabolic shapes around East Asia.
http theimpactandexitevent com takla_makan_screenshot.html
There seem to be a lot of those curves around Asia.
However, if they were shockwaves, one would expect a single focal point. The photos on the page above showing the parabolic/semicircular "shock waves" seem to indicate multiple focal points.
A parabola tends to indicate movement around a restriction point (or two).
For example, you can create a good parabola by taking a piece of paper. Hold the two edges and bending upwards.
You see a similar shape between South America and Antarctica (Google Earth Image).
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I suppose the question then is whether these land features were created by a single traumatic event, or slowly over time.
We know of the continuing seismic activity in South America (there was another earthquake in Chile recently), with the Pacific Plate subducting under South America. So that formation (South Sandwich Islands) is likely due to plate tectonics which is still continuing today.
The areas around Asia and the South Pacific are also seismically active, and I would anticipate a similar mechanism. Alaska and Russia share a boundary somewhat similar to what is found between South America and Antarctica, and so I would assume a similar mechanism. There is also continuing seismic activity in India and the Himalayas. So, dynamic structures on the surface of earth seems most plausible.
I don't see your magma columns. However, if those were true, then there would most certainly be evidence with terrestrial inspection, as all the "columns" would have similar structures, fairly homogeneous rock, and would be all the same age. It would thus be reasonable to anticipate that the proponent of the hypothesis would have toured Europe and Asia collecting samples of these magma columns for a comparative study, in the same way that when an impact crater site is proposed, people will search for meteorites, microdiamonds, and other confirmations of the impact.
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I've just spent some time reading through the posts at http://scienceforums.com/topic/19769-the-impact-and-exit-event/ (the link was posted earlier). The discussion over there was/is feisty to say the least - with differing opinions, from different sources.
Its a pity what appeared to be a good dialogue between differing outlooks ended up in aggressive 'bullying' by those who come across as 'scientists', which is a shame. I thought about registering to comment but decided that I would be inviting similar negativity.
From what I could see the person supporting the idea ain't the author, just someone interested in the theory.
Science is all about questioning perceived reality, right?
Chips.
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Science is all about questioning perceived reality, right?
Chips.
I would say it is all about explaining and understanding perceived reality. New scientific theories must make testable predictions - lots do not, they merely make a lot of sense in a handwaving manner. New theories that contradict currently held theories that have been tested, must also provide mathematically confirmed correlation with already performed experimental data.
The reason that many scientists and science discussion arenas seem dogmatic is the hurdle to overthrow the current theory is high - and it cannot be passed without a combination of rigorous theoretical reasoning, accepted mathematical logic, coincidence with all empirical data (or a good reason why not), and an alternative explanation for all data that matches with current theory. This seemingly gargantuan task is accomplished at times - but is very difficult.
People can be quite scathing when they have spent decades understanding the myriad complexities of a modern involved scientific theory - only for a parvenu to claim it is all wrong, because it doesn't make sense, doesn't explain something it wasn't intended to explain, or is counter-intuitive to the layman. They feel it is a prerequisite to understand the current theory before trashing it - and too many representations by "new theorists" of the current thinking is just miles off the mark.
Please note I have not intended any of the above to apply to you or the theory you are asking about - merely to explain actions which can appear dogmatic and illogical but are in fact rational and correct.
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imatfaal, I reckon you must be gettin' on a bit [:)] I mention this because I have never read a more exact, mature - even pertinent - explanation of the ways in which the oftentime hostile exchanges between those with new ideas and science occur. Science (and therefore progress) depends upon wacky ideas, IMO. Even wacky ideas are a constant (ha,ha), but where would humankind be without such apparent 'madness'? Is it the 'reality' or 'perceived reality' which, when all is said and done affects scientific progress? The author of the impact and exite event questions the fundemental assumtions made in the early 1900's, which (he says) are allocated significance way beyond scientific progress beyond 2000.
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I found this link on another discussion board (mostly critical of the theory), and it has been noted over there that there does appear to have been some 'event' that affected the northern hemisphere from the takla makan - himalaya region heading westwards to northern Africa. I can see why, too. The brownish/cream area could be taken as 'fallen debris' if an exit event had taken place, IMO. Interesting? The image may take a short while to load buts it is a great view of earth anyway [:)]
http://veimages.gsfc.nasa.gov/7106/world.topo.bathy.200407.3x5400x2700.jpg
Once downloaded the image can be enlarged considerably by clicking on it.
Chips.