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Saturday, October 12, 2013

Geology: What is a rock cycle?

Earth Floor: Cycles
A very easy definition of a rock cycle is quite simple...everything you see around you, mountains or sand dunes, everything will eventually turn into a sedimentary rock. 





However that statement has its flaws...let me explain further. The rock cycle is not as easy as a simple diagram...there are many variables that can come into play.
The first image was the best I could find to explain my first definition. If you look at the arrows there happen to be green arrows all pointing to sediments. Then the only blue arrow shows the sediments turning into rocks and the cycle perpetuates, but that is only one way of seeing the full circle. You can take into account the yellow and orange lines for instance but notice how the magma will always be an igneous rock and that rock will eventually be another igneous rock. Therefore the circle of life is never ending for a rock.  
     

And there we have it....I have found interesting circles in the science of geology. Circles that show seismic activity and circles that display the matrix of a crystalline structure.

The hunt began...




The Rock Cycle

However this last one struck me as a transmutation circle of the present day.


It also gives us the most definite answer of what makes a sedimentary rock. Many different processes go into making the different rock cycles. For instance, sometimes some metamorphic rocks will never make it to the surface to start their journey over and will be stuck forever deep withing the earth. Other sedimentary rocks may never turned back into magma...only to be broken apart and mushed together again.

If you take away the block lettering this idea looks like something I have seen before...it would be possible to make everything inside the circle more symmetrical and balanced

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