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Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
#1

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
I knew Kent Hovind wasn't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed, but a while ago, he said something in a debate with EmperorAtheist that I had to rewind a couple of times to make sure I'd heard him right.  He claimed that after the extra water for the infamous flood emerged from under the Earth's crust, it forced the crust itself downward.  Since rock is denser than water, this meant a concentration of mass closer to the Earth's center.  So apparently, in the same way that a figure skater spins faster when he/she draws his/her limbs inward, this made the Earth spin faster.  Hovind expressed a belief that a year was originally about 360 days long, and it only gained the additional 5 days after the floodwater caused it to gain rotational speed. 
Facepalm

Even granting the dubious physics of this flood "theory," it's still a remarkable feat of ignorance.  He managed to be wrong on two levels at the same time!  First of all, the speed of the Earth's rotation about its axis determines the length of a day, not a year!  So if anything should've gotten longer, it should've been the average length of a day!  Secondly, even if he had gotten the day/year thing right, an increase in speed would've caused the relevant time unit to get shorter, not longer!  
ROFL2

I'm reminded of his debate with King Crocoduck, when he actually argued that our inferences about the stars' ages are unjustified because a lightyear is a unit of distance rather than time!  It took an astonishing amount of time for KC to convince him that the very definition of a lightyear compels the veryinferences he was trying to argue against!
The only sacred truth in science is that there are no sacred truths. - Carl Sagan
Ἡ μόνη ἱερᾱ̀ ἀληθείᾱ ἐν τῇ φυσικῇ φιλοσοφίᾳ ἐστὶν ἡ ἱερῶν ἀληθειῶν σπάνις. - Κᾱ́ρολος Σήγανος


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#2

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
Is he the guy who spent several  years in jail,  or am I getting him confused with some other dimwitted, fucked up asshole of an ignoramous  preacher man?
                                                         T4618
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#3

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
I've struggled to come up with an apt illustration of what the religionists do when they use science (ignorantly) to prove science is wrong - much like Trumpism's condemnation of the press is damning the most crucial instrument of Trump's success - and the best I can do so far is to say it's like a guy using a bullhorn to tell a crowd that bullhorns will never work because the hydraulic pressure they produce would require a V-belt 80 miles long to generate the necessary sound volume.

The word absurd is far too weak a word to describe the absurdity involved here.
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#4

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
(10-22-2018, 10:01 PM)Dancefortwo Wrote: Is he the guy who spent several  years in jail,  or am I getting him confused with some other dimwitted, fucked up asshole of an ignoramous  preacher man?

Yes, that is him.  The full story of Hovind's "Imperial entanglements" is long and complex.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_Hovind

He was a busy little criminal.
I am a sovereign citizen of the Multiverse, and I vote!


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#5

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
(10-22-2018, 09:00 PM)Glossophile Wrote: First of all, the speed of the Earth's rotation about its axis determines the length of a day, not a year!  So if anything should've gotten longer, it should've been the average length of a day!  Secondly, even if he had gotten the day/year thing right, an increase in speed would've caused the relevant time unit to get shorter, not longer!

A year is the time it takes for the earth to travel once around the sun.  If the speed of rotation of the earth increased, then it would have completed more rotations as it traveled once around the sun and therefore it would have taken more days.  Yes?  No?
No gods necessary
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#6

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
I read reports that there is a considerable amount of water deep under us. But it's not about to pop out.
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#7

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
(10-22-2018, 11:12 PM)brunumb Wrote:
(10-22-2018, 09:00 PM)Glossophile Wrote: First of all, the speed of the Earth's rotation about its axis determines the length of a day, not a year!  So if anything should've gotten longer, it should've been the average length of a day!  Secondly, even if he had gotten the day/year thing right, an increase in speed would've caused the relevant time unit to get shorter, not longer!

A year is the time it takes for the earth to travel once around the sun.  If the speed of rotation of the earth increased, then it would have completed more rotations as it traveled once around the sun and therefore it would have taken more days.  Yes?  No?

That's actually a good point!  In a roundabout way, then, I guess Kent was right, though I suspect it was by accident.  If this is what he had in mind, one has to wonder why he wouldn't have just mentioned the shortening of the day first rather than skipping straight to the resultant lengthening of a year, the latter of which would've been superfluous to his point.
The only sacred truth in science is that there are no sacred truths. - Carl Sagan
Ἡ μόνη ἱερᾱ̀ ἀληθείᾱ ἐν τῇ φυσικῇ φιλοσοφίᾳ ἐστὶν ἡ ἱερῶν ἀληθειῶν σπάνις. - Κᾱ́ρολος Σήγανος


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#8

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
Hovind is nothing more than a stand-up comedian and has no scientific accreditation whatsoever. His Ph.D. is a fake, acquired from a diploma mill. Dodgy
“I expect to pass this way but once; any good therefore that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any fellow creature, let me do it now. Let me not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.” (Etienne De Grellet)
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#9

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
If the speed of the Earth's rotation increased it would move into an orbit farther from the Sun. That would put it closer to the giants, and their attraction would increase Earth's orbital distance from the Sun. With the reduced gravitational attraction the Earth's orbital speed would move it still farther from the Sun and the giants would have still more pull.

So, Hovind just proved we're in orbit between Mars and Jupiter.
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#10

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
(10-22-2018, 11:12 PM)brunumb Wrote:
(10-22-2018, 09:00 PM)Glossophile Wrote: First of all, the speed of the Earth's rotation about its axis determines the length of a day, not a year!  So if anything should've gotten longer, it should've been the average length of a day!  Secondly, even if he had gotten the day/year thing right, an increase in speed would've caused the relevant time unit to get shorter, not longer!

A year is the time it takes for the earth to travel once around the sun.  If the speed of rotation of the earth increased, then it would have completed more rotations as it traveled once around the sun and therefore it would have taken more days.  Yes?  No?

Yes.  And those days would be shorter.

However, days have actually gotten longer due to the drag of the moon's gravitation slowing the rotation down.
“Religion is excellent stuff for keeping common people quiet. 
Religion is what keeps the poor from murdering the rich.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte
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#11

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
TL;DR version: Rocks fall. Everybody dies.

A few things about the "oceans of water in the mantle" BS:

What was actually measured was the chemical composition of a ringwoodite inclusion within a diamond from deep within the mantle. The ringwoodite inclusion was 40 microns along its largest dimension and was found to contain 1.4 to 1.5 wt% water. That makes for an impressively small ocean.

If one extrapolates from this single ringwoodite grain to the entire 520 - 660 km deep transition zone within which ringwoodite is stable then you can easily come up with mantle reservoirs for several times the Earth's oceans worth of water. Clearly there are some problems with extrapolating from a 40 micron inclusion to a 140 km thick, globe-spanning layer. The least obvious of these to a non-geologist is that diamonds are brought to the surface by a very peculiar form of vulcanism called kimberlites. Kimberlites are rich in volatiles and are infamous for causing all sorts of bizarre alteration to the rocks that they pass through. As a result, minerals belched up by them really shouldn't be viewed as representative of normal geological conditions. The ringwoodite inclusion might have been armoured within the diamond and may in fact represent to composition of typical mantle ringwoodite. Or it may represent the very odd composition of metasomatized mantle that spawns kimberlite. The truth is we simply don't know.

OK, that's the scientific angle, now on to Hovind's hogwash:

What part of "the water is still 520 - 660 km below your feet!" did you miss? The ringwoodite inclusion proves that the water is still in the mantle. Unless you want to invoke magic extraction and reinsertion.

The "water" is bound into the crystal structure of ringwoodite as hydroxyl ions. It isn't just sloshing about. You've seen the same phenomenon if you've ever looked at a granite countertop. The black, shiny mineral in granite is a mica called biotite and it typically contains ~5 wt% water bound as hydroxyl ions. To extract that water you'll need to heat the granite to around 700 C. That means that the only way to get the "oceans of water" out of the mantle is to superheat that 140 km thick layer of mostly ringwoodite. And most likely a whole lot of the mantle around it. Can you see this getting bad yet?

So assuming that you can liberate the water contained in ringwoodite, it's going to be a little warm. Thousands of degrees. Celcius or Farenheit, it doesn't really matter at this level of absurdity. Imagine a volcanic eruption so hot that it glows blinding white blanketing the entire Earth to a depth of tens of km. Gopherwood isn't going to cut it. Rain will have to wait a while for the atmosphere to cool to the point where the clouds no longer outshine the sun.

Amazingly, this is not the end of Kent's problems. Adding water to the mantle lowers its melting point in much the same way that adding salt to ice lowers water's melting point. That's what causes the vulcanism in the Ring of Fire. Subducting mantle slabs release water into the overlying mantle, which melts, ascends, and erupts. Remember how we had to superheat the mantle to get the water out of the ringwoodite? Now we're going to add a bunch of water and drop its meting point, which we already passed just getting the water out. There's going to be a flood alright and it may well cover the mountains but it won't be water. The best part is that the vast volumes of lava now erupting from every crack and crevice in the ground is full of pressurised water vapour. That means it won't be the gentle, effusive style of eruption that tourists like to snap photos of but the explosive variety that takes the top off of Mt. St. Helens. Except this will be enough to pretty much resurface the planet.

The final result is a shattered crust, covered by tens of km of lava, covered again by a blanket of superheated steam. The finest forensic analysis would be unable to detect to trace impurities that are all that remain of the ark and its inhabitants.

Thank you Kent, you've once again managed to kill all life as we know it. Please don't muck about with the fountains of the deep. Geology is not a forgiving science.
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#12

Kent Hovind Doesn't Get Middle-School Math/Science
You could get that by sending another Thea at the Earth.

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