Tuesday, August 13, 2013

Is It Possible To Predict The Past

.. is the name of an article published in Lithosphere (open access) by Chris Paola of the University of Minnesota. It begins like this:

On p. 343–354 of this issue Engelder and Pelletier (2013) argue that relatively long-term autogenic variation in the degree of channelization of gravel-transporting fluvial systems can result in cycles of aggradation and incision that can reduce the slopes needed for gravel transport and hence allow for unexpectedly long distances of gravel runout.

In case your eyes have already glazed over I request a little patience and suggest you read the entire article, for at the heart of it is a thoughtful defense of uniformitarianism , one of most fundamental concepts in geology.

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