November GEOLOGY and GSA TODAY Media ...(n. Pages 1051-1054. Pliocene glaciati...)

Pliocene glaciation set up deep-water coral mounds. The Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 307 revealed that the growth of the 155-m-thick Challenger Mound in the northeast Atlantic was related to major changes in Plio-Pleistocene paleoceanography, because of the sensitivity of the mound-building corals to food supply, temperature, and sediment. Favorable conditions occur in the density gradient above the high-saline intermediate water from the Mediterranean. Mound establishment coincides with the start of modern northeast Atlantic stratification at ~2.6 million years ago. The mound then grew rapidly until ~1.7 million years ago and a second growth phase started at ~1.0 million years ago.

What do you think this is? "Conceptual uncertainty" in geoscience interpretation
C.E. Bond et al., Department of Geographical and Earth Sciences, University of Glasgow, Glasgow G12 8QQ, UK, and Midland Valley Exploration Ltd., 144 West George Street, Glasgow G2 2HG, UK.

If you ask 10 geoscientists to interpret a geological data set, you'll get 10 different answers. This is because geological data is inherently uncertain. Geoscientists piece together bits of information to build a picture of what they think is below our feet or of what happened many millions of years ago. To do this, they apply concepts that are based on rocks seen at Earth's surface and the systems that create themfrom volcanoes to rivers and beaches. But how do the concepts we apply to scientific data sets affect our ability to correctly interpret them" This is the question addressed in the November 2007 GSA Today by Clare Bond and Zoe Shipton of Glasgow University and colleagues Alan Gibbs and Serena Jones at Midland Valley Exploration. They focus on the scientific contradiction of unbiased interpretation of data whilst applying known concepts. How do we know what concepts to apply" And by applying known conc
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