INTRODUCTION/MAIN
Introduction/Main
BACKGROUND
Seafarer's Challenge
Why This Interest
Continental Drift
Oppositions to Drift
Craftsman's Approach
EMPIRICAL MODEL
The Empirical Model
Expansion Basics
Model Construction
Expansion Basics
Model Construction
Model Demonstration
Riverbed Formation
Video Demonstration
CONCLUSIONS
Conclusions
Summary of Evidence
The Mid-Oceans Crests
Making Mountains
& The Pacific Ocean
Moon Expulsion
Earthquakes
An Impact Vision
EXPANSION CARTOGRAPHY
Expansion Cartography
The Big Picture
Waterworld
Inland Evidence
EXPAND HOW?
Expand How?
Owen's Plasma Core
Continental Shelves
EPILOGUE
Epilogue
BOOK INFO
Book Info / Feedback
Continental Drift Theory
The currently accepted, but still debated, theory that the continents have drifted across the Earth's surface to their current locations. According to this concept, the continents were originally part of a single landmass, or supercontinent, called Pangaea.
Granted, Alfred Wegener is deserving of considerable merit. To convince an uproarious community of insiders of the fact of conjoined continents is quite an achievement. As well, his theory of continental drift has enjoyed wide-spread acceptance and spurred the development of other theories to support it. At the time, Wegener met with such scorn and ridicule that had he been of weaker mental and physical condition he may have given up. Yet, opposition was inevitable and necessary. Many arguments were presented, backed by hypotheses which declared Wegener's suppositions unfounded. No wonder, as it is an untenable hypothesis with fundamental errors. Since then, much criticism has also been launched and not only by geologists as other faculties are affected. It is unfortunate that most of these critics have been silenced. Among the few who have voiced their doubts publicly are Dr. Paul S. Wesson (published with his co-writers in the Journal of Geology, 1972) and Dr. Hugh Owen. Australian geologist Professor S. Warren Carey also maintains his conviction in promoting an expanding Earth. One cover of Spectrum shows the continental assembly of the drift concept and the close fit of the sides along Pangaea's rupture line. The cartographic information is confusing and the subject, as the live model suggests, imaginary. Pangaea surely never existed, nor has there been an Atlantis. The mysterious "Lost Continent" may have been the vanishing contours of America's east coast, as seen from the Old World. The model presented here offers expansion as the plausible course for the Earth's development. The expansion concept completely solves four basic contradictions of continental drift.
From a craftsman's point of view, with knowledge of heat distribution (having burned the fingers often enough to believe it), it is difficult to understand why a turning, cooling planet -- for that matter, any planet turning on its axis for more than three billion years - would develop a crust one third of which (Pangaea) was 10 times thicker than the remaining two thirds, the ocean floors. 
A turning, cooling planet is not likely to develop a lopsided crust. This is a basic error of Wegener's theory and no valid reason for the formation has ever been proposed. The more recent hypothesis of looser-fitting continents is subject to the same criticism. With its greater sprawl of land masses, the hypothesis attempts to overcome the weakest point of the Pangaea concept. It is unsuccessful however; regardless of how loosely assembled the continents are, the thesis remains based on the assumption of a concentrated development of crust. The assembly illustrated in the National Geographic Society's 1992 Atlas of the World Ref 2 should not have existed. This recent enhancement seems a desperate effort to defend an antiquated theory and diffuse its weaknesses. The idea that the continents were once joined is itself an asset for the concept of expansion; that the continents originated from a unified mass is accepted as fact. However, the model suggests that rather than a
supercontinent, or a concentration of continents, the surface was once an equally solidified crust of a smaller planet, the continents of which fit together on all sides, excluding the Pacific Basin which is void of continental matter. Furthermore, in a normal cooling process the heat-absorbing coefficiency of water is greater than that of air, so things cool faster in water than in air. This would produce an oceanic crust thicker than the continents, not thinner. Wegener's theory is founded on an Earth which developed contrary to known natural laws -- one with thicker continents. It is also difficult to understand why such a formation would rupture at its thickest part rather than at its thinnest and weakest, the ocean floor. For some unexplained reason, Wegener's Pangaea cracked. This is another basic point neglected in Wegener's theory and by its advocates.
Of all the Earth's continents, Wegener's theory can account only partially for the perimeters. Any rupture of the supercontinent would have produced a correlation only in the perimeters created along 
the break. The theory offers no explanation for the shape of the remaining continental perimeters. Yet, on today's globe, the continental perimeters are clearly correlated. Their relationships are such that the continents themselves could not logically have originated from a Pangaea whose perimeters are undetermined. The consequence of expansion is that we observe an exploded view of a smaller planet's crust, its pieces -- the continents -- systematically separated by expansion. There is no question about the origin of the continental perimeters. They exist today as they were created at the onset of expansion and expansion accounts for all of them. Expanded, the model shows the continents in their current locations on the planet. By deflating the model, each continent returns along its mathematical tangent line to its original position, to produce an equally solidified crust. The continents fit together in a spherical jig-saw puzzle, their perimeters matching along all sides. This reformation is allowed simply by shrinking the simulated planet, without manual manipulation of the continents. Expanding the model restores their current positions.
One assumption of the continental drift theory is that, in order to move, the continents must have a propelling force. Magma currents are claimed to be these forces, spreading the tectonic plates by convection in a movement described by some as similar to that of thick, simmering soup. Such movement is incapable of propulsion in a specific direction. According to continental drift, the movement of the continents to their current positions rests upon a process of intricate causality -- one without a guiding mechanism. That the random forces of continental drift could produce the precision in the pattern of continents seen today is beyond the probability range. The odds are astronomical. The theory thrives on the observation of isolated points without looking at the whole picture. The precision of continental placement can logically be attributed to global expansion, as a singular event. The model answers: Why are the continents where they are?
The mid-ocean crest system is a series of mountains, or ridges, running through the centre of the planet's oceans, with the exception of the Pacific Ocean (see Map of the World). Continental drift assumes two main features of the mid-ocean crests. One is that the tectonic plates are generated at, and spread out from, these crests. Another is that the crests must be acted upon by a compound movement in order to remain centred. The purpose of the crests is not logically explained with plate tectonics, nor could random drift centre these crests precisely between the continents. To assume that blind chance would uniformly centre the plates' dividing lines is a grave error. Expansion indicates that the crests mark the locations where the Earth's crust broke apart -- the continental division lines. The model shows that during expansion, the crests remain systematically centred between the continents. Their original positions are left unaffected. They simply stretch longitudinally into their current-day pattern as the continents are pulled away from them. Thus, in today's view of the exploded planet's crust, the mid-ocean crests are positioned precisely between the continents.
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