[Bass (OP)]

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2009-07/ci-hit072409.php

Say it ain't so!  JimBob should be a hard-rocker! [)]

[frethack]

Youve turned him, Bass.  Now instead of carbonate sequences and oil deposits, he spouts this gibberish about epithermal minerals and precious metals...whatever those are!  []

[JimBob]

Don't worry, Swine Flu Boy, it has nothing to do with  the present or past weather so you don't need to worry about it.

[JimBob]

Nothing new here - Alexander von Humboldt first proposed this in 1804. And before that "Abraham Gottlob Werner and the proponents of neptunism in the 1700s believed basaltic sills to be solidified oils or bitumen." (Wikipedia - abiogenic oil))

And then there is this - took me a bit to find it.

What are now called extremophiles. When this paper was published in 1994 there was no name for them.

http://www.pnas.org/content/91/5/1810.full.pdf?ck=nck

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siljan_(lake)

It doesn't mean that it COULDN'T ever happen but it has been kicked around for a very long time - before the commonly accepted theory was formulated.

The first question that needs to be asked - do faults that exist at great depth, a depth great enough to reach the deep mantle, allow enough pore space to exist for hydrocarbons to accumulate - and migrate upwards -  in masses great enough to produce what we know as natural gas?

The second - How do long chain hydrocarbons (we call it oil) become attached to each other when we know that long chain hydrocarbons are found above short chain hydrocarbon, hydrocarbons less than ~C₁₅? Or, the other way around - Why does the length of the hydrocarbon chains decrease with depth?

And no, I have not been turned - I am not a vampire but a geologist that is is competent in many fields of geology, not just one.

So there!

 

[frethack]

Don't worry, Swine Flu Boy, it has nothing to do with  the present or past weather so you don't need to worry about it.

Aww JimBob, most climatologists are still geologists!  Some are chemists, but I cant hold it against them for loving an inferior science. 

And dont make me send you an anonymous letter thats been coughed on!