How old is the Grand Canyon?

[jackola]

Washington, DC — Grand Canyon National Park is not permitted to give an official estimate of the geologic age of its principal feature, due to pressure from Bush administration appointees. Despite promising a prompt review of its approval for a book claiming the Grand Canyon was created by Noah's flood rather than by geologic forces, more than three years later no review has ever been done and the book remains on sale at the park, according to documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).

“In order to avoid offending religious fundamentalists, our National Park Service is under orders to suspend its belief in geology,” stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. “It is disconcerting that the official position of a national park as to the geologic age of the Grand Canyon is ‘no comment.’”

In a letter released today, PEER urged the new Director of the National Park Service (NPS), Mary Bomar, to end the stalling tactics, remove the book from sale at the park and allow park interpretive rangers to honestly answer questions from the public about the geologic age of the Grand Canyon. PEER is also asking Director Bomar to approve a pamphlet, suppressed since 2002 by Bush appointees, providing guidance for rangers and other interpretive staff in making distinctions between science and religion when speaking to park visitors about geologic issues.

And people voted for this administration twice?

Comments

[thespos]

That's interesting... because if you take a guided tour of Oak Creek Canyon in Sedona, just a few hours south of the Grand Canyon, the tour guides and locals are more than happy to tell you how the canyon was formed.

Stoopid fundies.

[ipwnbsu.livejournal.com]

Have you been there? I've been and remember they mentioned the scientific age on display and the tours guides never gave anything but.

[jackola.livejournal.com]

Was that before 3 years ago when our fascist government stepped in, or after?

[billionbucks.livejournal.com]

noah's ark? havent heard that one before...

I think someone at the PEER website is pulling your leg...

[gavin.livejournal.com]

Or just trying to stir up trouble for trouble's sake.

Although I could certainly see that idiot George Bush and his equally idiotic cronies trying to put a plan like that into action, the government is not pressuring the NPS to keep mum about the Grand Canyon's geologic age, and the official position is definitely not "no comment" when it comes to the question of the geologic age of the Grand Canyon.

From the Grand Canyon National Park Information Page:
"Scattered remnants of Precambrian rocks as old as 2,000 million years can also be found at the bottom of the canyon."

Check out the geologic story at grand canyon (http://www.grand.canyon.national-park.com/info.htm#geol) page of the park's website.

The National Park Services .gov website states the Grand Canyon is a great chasm that was carved over the course of Millenia (http://www.nps.gov/grca/index.htm), and that human artifacts have been found that date back nearly 12,000 years (http://www.nps.gov/grca/historyculture/index.htm) (Christian theology tends to date God creating the earth about 6,000 years ago).

Part of the article you read is true, in the fact that Tom Vail did write a book (http://www.beliefnet.com/story/138/story_13842_1.html) which puts forth the (ludicrous) theory that the Grand Canyon was formed by the supposed great flood of Noah's time (which would make the Grand Canyon only a few thousand years old). I do believe that the book was sold, although I could not find it on the NPS book store website.