[meteorite-list] "150,000 BP claim" or Geofact ??

From: Paul H. <oxytropidoceras_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Tue, 13 Sep 2011 22:24:58 -0500
Message-ID: <20110913232458.H26MJ.539755.imail_at_eastrmwml45>

In "150,000 BP claim" at:
http://six.pairlist.net/pipermail/meteorite-list/2011-September/079784.html
Robert wrote,

""150,000 yrs BP" isn't a typo. The reason I pointed to this website
(http://61.128.162.70/stone/686/686.htm) and mentioned the
supposed antiquity of the rock with the Big Dipper configuration
was to underscore the widespread acceptance in China of this
concept of the evolution of the position of the stars of the Big Dipper
[as repeated in diagrams (A), (b), and (C)]. It's used in teaching
materials, for example. Apparently, the presence of this concept
has led to the accommodation of exaggerated claims of antiquity
as well as more modest claims."

A geologist, who has seen various rounded pebbles and cobbles
with identical circular markings on them, I wonder what evidence
that they have for these markings as having been carved. The
differential weathering of animal burrows in a sedimentary rock
can easily produce circular markings that are identical to the ones
that appear on the stone. The circles with connecting bar is what
could easily be the eroded and differentially weathered cross-
section of animals burrows (trace fossils), of which I have
personally seen examples examples while doing field work.

One real possibility is that someone unfamiliar with how specific
types of trace fossils look like in cross-section on the eroded
and differentially weathered surface of a stone has confused a
natural trace fossil with manmade carvings. If so, this would not
be the first time, that a nongeologist, when finding natural circular
patterns on a stone jumped to the incorrect conclusion that it
was manmade. For an example of how trace fossils have been
confused by nongeologists with manmade artifacts can be seen
in "Artifacts or Geofacts? Alternative Interpretations of Items
from the Gulf of Cambay" at;

http://members.cox.net/pyrophyllite/geofact.html

My impression of this alleged " 8000BC Big Dipper Petroglyph:
Evolution of star positions" is that it very well might be an geofact
that has been misidentified as a petroglyph.

Best wishes,

Paul H.
Received on Tue 13 Sep 2011 11:24:58 PM PDT