The Equatorial Bulge and the Oceanic Crust: An alternative Ocean GenesisPaper 4 in a series of 5 papers 'From Geomechanics to Geotectonics'

In the previous paper equatorial conditions, both today and in the geological past, were reviewed and shown to provide justification for an earth model based on relative movement between the brittle crust and the equatorial bulge. The special case of the continental/oceanic interface has been treated in some detail, since it illustrates the interaction between rigid and flexible elements of the earth’s outer shell.

The oceanic crust itself presents a more general condition, comprising two thirds of the earth’s surface. Beneath the sea, weathering and erosion processes which affect the land are absent and hence evidence of past geological events tends to be well preserved – although difficult to obtain.

Information available on the oceanic crust is considered in this paper. Initially, the ocean spreading or mobile plate tectonics approach is outlined and a number of serious contradictions are highlighted. In order to maintain consistancy with earlier papers, the same oceanic data are then interpreted in terms of the author’s earth model. An alternative oceanic genesis is proposed. This is believed to overcome the major objections to the mobilist hypothesis, although it introduces a new factor of polar mobility.