DS9 fangirling
I'm intrigued by Kira/Garak, and I'm not sure why. They're my two favorite characters, they can both make a scene very interesting and emotional, but there's something... else, and I can't put my finger on what it is. Of course, I realized that I'd be just as happy if they became friends, and only jumped to romance because I'm pretty sure that's the only way Garak would even think of returning to the station ever.

*sigh* Not going to read any Garak fic, though. When half of it is Bashir/Garak and sounds like stereotypical romance, it's going to be much more miss than hit, and the ficcers almost certainly wouldn't get him right in the way that made him so fascinating in the series.

BTW, favorite canon pairing? Sisko/Defiant. ~~And yes, it is canon. He practically tears up when he finds out his new ship is almost exactly like the Defiant, down to the name.~~

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umistar
2008-02-25 07:31 am UTC (link)

This made me think of you, probably because you're one of the few people I know who might be interested in the topic:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjgidAICoQI

This probably isn't the first you've heard of it, but I was curious about your thoughts on it.

~Umi

I was going to leave this anonymously, but that didn't seem right. I hope it was okay to comment with this, seeing as it's completely unrelated to any sensitive subjects, but if you'd prefer I just went away again, I'll understand.

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agent_hyatt
2008-02-25 06:31 pm UTC (link)

First off, I want to punch his face in for that "talking down to the idiots" tone. nnng.

In a nutshell, he's using some real facts and coming up with a bunch of bullshit. He doesn't mention that oceanic crust gets reworked and accreted onto continents, or that we have samples of ancient ocean crust preserved on land thanks to accretion.

I think his main points are that there's no ocean crust anywhere near as old as the continents, ocean crust cannot sink into the mantle so there's no subduction, and Earth is the only planet with subduction which is just like the old Earth-centric cosmology. The first point, see above paragraph.

As for ocean crust sinking into the mantle, density and temperature both play a role. Ocean crust is thicker than the mantle, but it also cools, while the mantle stays warmer. At some point, the temperature drops enough for the old ocean crust to sink. What happens after is still contested, but there's plenty of seismic evidence showing cold oceanic plates sinking into the very top of the mantle.

For the other planets, I'm not as sure on this, but I think the theory is that in the past the terrestrial planets did have plate tectonics like we have on Earth, but for whatever reason, they reached one-plate status before Earth did (probably because of internal heat of radioactive decay). BTW, that's probably the fate of Earth; the amount of continental crust is increasing because of igneous reworking and accretion, continental crust can't be subducted, so at some point there will only be one plate and there won't be any room for new oceanic crust.

He claimed that plate tectonics violates fundamental laws of the universe, but his theory has an even bigger violation: conservation of mass. He gives no explanation for where the mass needed for the expanding Earth comes from. There's also no explanation for why the Earth sat as one continent for billions of years, then a few million years ago decided to start expanding.

What's true in his video are the images of the mid-ocean ridge with the faults; they do track the spreading. He didn't point out the obvious trenches near the subduction margins, though. The species distribution stuff is also true. However, both of these work with the plate tectonics model, and the species distribution (especially tropical creatures in Antarctica) was one of the smoking guns in favor of "continental drift".

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	umistar 2008-02-25 07:41 pm UTC (link)
	Cool, thanks. I know the basics you get in high school, but I'd never learned much beyond that; I don't know enough to credit or discredit him on my own, and I thought it was interesting, but I wasn't sure how valid it was. So I figured I'd get an informed opinion. Thanks for the info. (Reply to this)(Parent)