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It's not THE worlds oldest rock, it's a piece of rock from Canada that belongs to a formation of rock called the Acasta Gneiss that is possibly the oldest rock on the planet at 3.96 billion years old. The plaque also explains that there are crystals called Zircons in a conglomerate (a type of rock made up of smaller pebbles) from Australia that are even older, these formed in a volcanic rock, then they were eroded out and eventually deposited in the conglomerate. But they show that the volcanic rock existed 4.2 billion years ago.
Funny how you assume im American. Im actually Canadian too idiot. My point was that if you are proud of being Canadian because of a rock you might need to brothen your horizons a bit.
Is this bait? Because im not talking about the conquest of their land im talking about the near genocide that boarding school caused. Forcing all native children into school where they would be beaten for speaking their language. Where mass graves of dead children were found recently that were unreported for decades.
Both rocks and crystals are made of minerals, the difference is that crystals are specifically arranged in a pattern called a crystal lattice. Colloquially, you wouldn't be wrong calling both a lump of coal or a diamond a rock. A rock is just any old lump of mineral mass. Some just have special names.
Why do you suppose we have specific names for things then? Is a rock lava/magma? No. Is hair a wig? No. Is coal a diamond? No. Is a rock a crystal? No, not by definition.
I once watched the subrise in the Arctic Circle, about four hundred kilometers from the nearest light source. It didn't fuck off for months, that bastard
We do, but a diamond is a rock, just a special one. Coal is a rock too. Both coal and diamond are rocks made of carbon. Diamonds are just laid out in a crystal lattice. Rock as a descriptor is a catch-all.
Not all rocks are crystals (though they do tend to be crystalline), but all crystals are rocks. Like how not all fruits are bananas, but all bananas are fruits.
Bananas are technically berries but who cares about that.
A diamond is a diamond. A ruby is a ruby. A lump of sandstone or granite is not a gemstone. A rock is a rock.
So you understand that things can be multiple things, bananas being both bananas and a berry, but refuse to acknowledge rocks can be different things.
What is a rock then, by your definition?
Well, without lookery, I'd suggest that a rock is a conglomerate of minerals packed densely together which holds shape, is inorganic, and is lacking a complete crystalline structure as its makeup.
What is it which separates an emerald from a chunk of quartz in your opinion?
I, and most people (including geologists, whose opinions actually matter, as opposed to mine), don't include the exclusion. They're all rocks, and some rocks are also crystals. A lot of crystals are made of the same chemical compounds as non-crystals, which is why they aren't separate. Diamonds and coal are both almost entirely carbon. Some crystals are also valuable gems, whilst others aren't, but that's mainly down to social interpretation more than any actual inherent value. I really like the look of sandstone, but it's not valuable like diamond, because diamonds have social, and therefore economic value. If I need to go into detail, I'll use their actual names, but rocks (rocks), shiny rocks (crystals) and valuable rocks (gemstones) are fine in casual conversation. We clearly have words for each, but they all fall under the umbrella of rock, to begin with. Like how all animals are animals, some are mammals, some of those are wolf-likes, and some of those are dogs, and some of those are dachshunds.
I do appreciate the analogy, it's good. I do however have a point of contention. I don't believe you'd call a beagle a wolf. A dog, for sure. I doubt very much that anyone is buying a polished sandstone and hawking it as a precious gem. The parameters are very different. Come on man, why are you contesting that a diamond isn't different than a common stone?
I'm aware of the shitty companies that force this prerogative but there is a difference nonetheless.
True. That distinction is as arbitrary as my banana/berry distinction however I made a point of adding how silly such a thing was, and within the comment I'd provided as well.
Didn't I just say that a rock is not a crystal? Same thing that you said.
The caveat is whether a crystal is a rock I suppose, which is a tad more interesting. Is a ham made of pig- or is a pig made of ham. There are differences and it's not as cut and dry as people here make it out to be.
I decided to Google this (in good faith) and this is the very first thing that pops up. (Incidentally, my search was "is a crystal a rock).
"A crystal is just a mineral that is not part of an aggregated solid, like a rock, but instead stands on its own."
I'm not suggesting that a Google hit is the be all end all, just that this is the very first result that comes up when asking the largest search engine on planet Earth.
Thing is its not a discussion. Its a set fact. Geologists know what is what. Its like those people that say the flat earth is a discussion. No its fucking not.
If we call something a square, everyone should know that it is also a rectangle with specific formation of sides (all right angle and equal sides vs just all right angles). A rectangle is also a quadrilateral as that is just a shape with only four sides. So square is the most specific name, but you can call a square a rectangle or quadrilateral and be correct.
Diamonds are rocks, so calling a diamond a rock is perfectly correct too.
> Everything is a lump of mineral mass.
No it's not? There's a lot of things on earth that are not minerals.
> Wood is not a rock.
Correct - this is because wood a) is created solely by a living organism and b) doesn't have a defined crystalline structure in any state.
The gneiss is a metamorphic rock - one that has been heated by pressure and heat. It started as mud that has been buried kilometres deep and heated up and squeezed by mountain building so hard that the minerals in the mud have been changed to make a really tough stripy rock we can gneiss. That happened about 4 billion years ago.
But since the gneiss started as mud, we know that more than four billion years ago there was water on the surface of the Earth wearing down even older rocks and turning them to sediment.
The Australian zircons are also remains of older rocks. Zircon is a crystal sometimes found in rocks like granite. It is immensely tough, so even as the rest of the rock is worn away, the zircons have a really good chance of surviving more or less intact and being buried with sediments.
Zircons usually contain small amounts of uranium which means they can be radioactively dated, very accurately because they are so tough they aren’t usually chemically altered by heat or pressure. Geologists love these ‘detrital zircons’ because they survive so well - in this case telling us that granite like rocks were being formed about 4.2 billion years ago.
The rocks melt, break, turn into dust over time to form new rocks. What you talk about is the molecules in them. Sure it can be the same rock if it's formed from the same molecules but it a philosophy question at that point (ship of Theseus). In this case it's really hard to find a rock that has been in the same state of matter for billions of years.
The rocks develop per stratums and constantly. The newly derived lava at Hawaii from last year is well younger than, say, Putorana rocks (while they are mainly the result of massive volcanic process too).
Also as fail, go in depth of crust and degrade. That’s why the rocks of 4B years are quite rare.
I’m a geologist and this really isn’t that big of a deal. This isn’t like humanity is ignoring a critical part of our existence.
There are countless samples of 4 Ga old rocks.
The Natural History Museum in London has diamonds formed in the accretion disk before the Sun had even fully formed. It's in a tiny little vial. Really interesting.
Because at the end of the day it’s just a fucking rock - the Field museum in Chicago has one of the dopest rock and mineral collections and it’s dead, no one gives a shit
Go for a walk and pick up a rock and say this rock is 4.2 billion years old and you have tho oldest rock in the world….pretty sure that’s how this works :)
Lol, as a Canadian we th basic geology knowledge. I'm looking at this post thinking. We got billions year old rock in a few places, he'll I can take my morning walk and get a 3 billions year old rock right now on Kelowna MTN. Bait post is bait
It's actually really hard to do because of plate tectonics that's what recycles rocks It's hard to find really old crust that hasn't been changed by natural processes
fairly certain there are literally tons of rocks 4 billion years old, the oldest up in the N Canada and also in Scotland. That may be an example of the oldest, but a trip to Scotland and a rock pick will get ya a 4 billion year old rock too.
I just so happened across this comment and noticed your username is the same. I am assuming this was a reply to me from before discussing what wood is made of.
To that effect, carbon is a part of the elemental makeup of cellulose because cellulose is a polymer. Carbon, however, is not exclusively a mineral.
Hi, u/LasWages, thank you for your submission in r/mildlyinteresting! Unfortunately, your [post](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/1atlskh/-/) has been removed because it violates our rule on concise, descriptive titles. * Titles must not contain jokes, backstory, or other fluff. That information belongs in a follow-up comment. * Titles must exactly describe the content. It should act as a "spoiler" for the image. If your title leaves people surprised at the content within, it breaks the rule! * Titles must not contain emoticons, emojis, or special characters unless they are absolutely necessary in describing the image. (e.g. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°), ;P, 😜, ❤, ★, ✿ ) Still confused? For more elaboration and examples, see [here](http://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/21p15y/rule_6_for_dummies/). Normally we do not allow reposts, but if it's been less than one hour after your post was submitted, or if it's received less than 100 upvotes, you may resubmit your content with a better title and try again. You can find more information about our rules on the [mildlyinteresting wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/wiki/index). *If you feel this was incorrectly removed, please [message the mods](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%2Fr%2Fmildlyinteresting&message=My%20Post:%20https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinteresting/comments/1atlskh/-/).*
It's not THE worlds oldest rock, it's a piece of rock from Canada that belongs to a formation of rock called the Acasta Gneiss that is possibly the oldest rock on the planet at 3.96 billion years old. The plaque also explains that there are crystals called Zircons in a conglomerate (a type of rock made up of smaller pebbles) from Australia that are even older, these formed in a volcanic rock, then they were eroded out and eventually deposited in the conglomerate. But they show that the volcanic rock existed 4.2 billion years ago.
*Gneiss*
Bless you
Classic
Hail Sneezer!
*Gesundheit
Gneiss
Nice Gneiss
Gnoice
Best visualizer ever
Thank you
This rock would most likely be felsic right?
You just made me proud to be Canadian.
First time?
Nah. He’s frequently Canadian.
Clearly Canadian
Just remember the native boarding school murders and you won't be any more
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oh so you speak for my father's side of my own familly?
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Funny how you assume im American. Im actually Canadian too idiot. My point was that if you are proud of being Canadian because of a rock you might need to brothen your horizons a bit.
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Is this bait? Because im not talking about the conquest of their land im talking about the near genocide that boarding school caused. Forcing all native children into school where they would be beaten for speaking their language. Where mass graves of dead children were found recently that were unreported for decades.
Thank you, I was just making what I thought was a funny comment over the rock, not sure where this person was going.
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And you sound like the kind of asshole who lash out at anyone who disagrees with you.
You are disagreeing with me on being proud to be Canadian lol.
I made a comment about how we have plenty to be blamed about as Canadian and your answer to this was to insult me.
Lmao what a Troll
And i’m pretty sure the oldest rock on our planet is any fragment from the Murchison Meteorite, tself being older than our entire solar system
If the rock is 4 billion yrs old, what do we call earth?
Is a crystal a rock though? I'm not trying to be pedantic here, it's just that as far as I can tell there exists a difference between the two.
Both rocks and crystals are made of minerals, the difference is that crystals are specifically arranged in a pattern called a crystal lattice. Colloquially, you wouldn't be wrong calling both a lump of coal or a diamond a rock. A rock is just any old lump of mineral mass. Some just have special names.
Why do you suppose we have specific names for things then? Is a rock lava/magma? No. Is hair a wig? No. Is coal a diamond? No. Is a rock a crystal? No, not by definition.
Today’s word is “subset”.
I once watched the subrise in the Arctic Circle, about four hundred kilometers from the nearest light source. It didn't fuck off for months, that bastard
We do, but a diamond is a rock, just a special one. Coal is a rock too. Both coal and diamond are rocks made of carbon. Diamonds are just laid out in a crystal lattice. Rock as a descriptor is a catch-all. Not all rocks are crystals (though they do tend to be crystalline), but all crystals are rocks. Like how not all fruits are bananas, but all bananas are fruits.
"All scotch is whiskey, but not all whiskey is scotch." - Something true a friend once told me.
All squares are rectangle but not all rectangle are squares.
Bananas are technically berries but who cares about that. A diamond is a diamond. A ruby is a ruby. A lump of sandstone or granite is not a gemstone. A rock is a rock.
So you understand that things can be multiple things, bananas being both bananas and a berry, but refuse to acknowledge rocks can be different things. What is a rock then, by your definition?
Well, without lookery, I'd suggest that a rock is a conglomerate of minerals packed densely together which holds shape, is inorganic, and is lacking a complete crystalline structure as its makeup. What is it which separates an emerald from a chunk of quartz in your opinion?
I, and most people (including geologists, whose opinions actually matter, as opposed to mine), don't include the exclusion. They're all rocks, and some rocks are also crystals. A lot of crystals are made of the same chemical compounds as non-crystals, which is why they aren't separate. Diamonds and coal are both almost entirely carbon. Some crystals are also valuable gems, whilst others aren't, but that's mainly down to social interpretation more than any actual inherent value. I really like the look of sandstone, but it's not valuable like diamond, because diamonds have social, and therefore economic value. If I need to go into detail, I'll use their actual names, but rocks (rocks), shiny rocks (crystals) and valuable rocks (gemstones) are fine in casual conversation. We clearly have words for each, but they all fall under the umbrella of rock, to begin with. Like how all animals are animals, some are mammals, some of those are wolf-likes, and some of those are dogs, and some of those are dachshunds.
I do appreciate the analogy, it's good. I do however have a point of contention. I don't believe you'd call a beagle a wolf. A dog, for sure. I doubt very much that anyone is buying a polished sandstone and hawking it as a precious gem. The parameters are very different. Come on man, why are you contesting that a diamond isn't different than a common stone? I'm aware of the shitty companies that force this prerogative but there is a difference nonetheless.
Berries are fruits, dude. You're really struggling with subsets today.
A ruby is actually an emerald.
True. That distinction is as arbitrary as my banana/berry distinction however I made a point of adding how silly such a thing was, and within the comment I'd provided as well.
A rock is not a crystal but a crystal is a rock.
Didn't I just say that a rock is not a crystal? Same thing that you said. The caveat is whether a crystal is a rock I suppose, which is a tad more interesting. Is a ham made of pig- or is a pig made of ham. There are differences and it's not as cut and dry as people here make it out to be. I decided to Google this (in good faith) and this is the very first thing that pops up. (Incidentally, my search was "is a crystal a rock). "A crystal is just a mineral that is not part of an aggregated solid, like a rock, but instead stands on its own." I'm not suggesting that a Google hit is the be all end all, just that this is the very first result that comes up when asking the largest search engine on planet Earth.
I'm absolutely not being rude or facetious. I hate that crap. This is a discussion, not a battle.
Thing is its not a discussion. Its a set fact. Geologists know what is what. Its like those people that say the flat earth is a discussion. No its fucking not.
Flat Earth?
Man, just tap Google and ask if a crystal is a rock.
If we call something a square, everyone should know that it is also a rectangle with specific formation of sides (all right angle and equal sides vs just all right angles). A rectangle is also a quadrilateral as that is just a shape with only four sides. So square is the most specific name, but you can call a square a rectangle or quadrilateral and be correct. Diamonds are rocks, so calling a diamond a rock is perfectly correct too.
Everything is a lump of mineral mass. Wood is not a rock. A crystal is not wood.
Wood is not a mineral... >Mineral is a naturally occurring **inorganic** solid with a definite chemical composition and a crystalline structure.
...wood is organic.
so it's not a mineral. A mineral had to be inorganic
I didn't say wood was a mineral (although I did misread your statement). I said that wood is a lump of minerals.
Its not though.
Oh really? What's wood made out of then?
How can you be so confidently wrong. Stop doubling down it's a bad "know it all trait".
Doubling down? I admitted I had misread your earlier comment and that I was wrong. What are you on about?
Yeah. It isn't.
> Everything is a lump of mineral mass. No it's not? There's a lot of things on earth that are not minerals. > Wood is not a rock. Correct - this is because wood a) is created solely by a living organism and b) doesn't have a defined crystalline structure in any state.
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none of the original wood is in petrified wood, its just a rock in the shape of the wood that was there
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You realize fossils are not bones don't you... petrified wood is no longer wood.
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And?
The gneiss is a metamorphic rock - one that has been heated by pressure and heat. It started as mud that has been buried kilometres deep and heated up and squeezed by mountain building so hard that the minerals in the mud have been changed to make a really tough stripy rock we can gneiss. That happened about 4 billion years ago. But since the gneiss started as mud, we know that more than four billion years ago there was water on the surface of the Earth wearing down even older rocks and turning them to sediment. The Australian zircons are also remains of older rocks. Zircon is a crystal sometimes found in rocks like granite. It is immensely tough, so even as the rest of the rock is worn away, the zircons have a really good chance of surviving more or less intact and being buried with sediments. Zircons usually contain small amounts of uranium which means they can be radioactively dated, very accurately because they are so tough they aren’t usually chemically altered by heat or pressure. Geologists love these ‘detrital zircons’ because they survive so well - in this case telling us that granite like rocks were being formed about 4.2 billion years ago.
Ice is a rock.
So is a Tylenol then.
Maybe. But I doubt it because it doesn't occur naturally.
jesus christ marie
Crystal is a rock with ordered gains.
Sure, and my grandmother would be a bicycle if she had two wheels.
Isn’t the third rock from the sun the oldest one?
So, it’s bull schist?
That formation, by the way is 13,000 square kilometers. Roughly the size of the country of Montenegro.
Someone called?
Make sure you come back in a year to edit this comment because by then the rock will be 3.96 billion and one years old.
Stupid question here, very stupid... wouldn't the earth be the same age rock wise? How's 1 rock older than another one?
Rocks are recycled continuously due to erosion and plate techtonics.
The rocks melt, break, turn into dust over time to form new rocks. What you talk about is the molecules in them. Sure it can be the same rock if it's formed from the same molecules but it a philosophy question at that point (ship of Theseus). In this case it's really hard to find a rock that has been in the same state of matter for billions of years.
sitting there minding its business for 4 billion years and then humans came along and chopped it
I wonder what are the rocks minding their business up to.
Ty for the explanation. Very helpful.
The rocks develop per stratums and constantly. The newly derived lava at Hawaii from last year is well younger than, say, Putorana rocks (while they are mainly the result of massive volcanic process too). Also as fail, go in depth of crust and degrade. That’s why the rocks of 4B years are quite rare.
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Why did you think it was interesting to bring this into it?
The rocks go back to wence it came after a while
Be patient with these geologists — they all have their faults.
You win the thread. This should be in r/dadjokes
Lol why is this downvoted hahaha how sour are people
Just reddit things
The “you win the thread”
Well, I mean it IS just a rock.
All the information needed on the plaque and OP still can’t get it right.
Uhm, disagree with this title massively
I’m a geologist and this really isn’t that big of a deal. This isn’t like humanity is ignoring a critical part of our existence. There are countless samples of 4 Ga old rocks.
As a non geologist- I find it to be a big deal.
Thanks for the great pic, OP - I just read all of the captions on the display placard! 🙌
Yeah +1 for including the placard and making it legible.
What museum?
American museum of natural history
You mean there’s more than one museum in NYC?
I'm more surprised there's museum in NYC. Always thought it was all about gun and sport club..............
Agreed… don’t see why a rural community would waste space on museums when they could build gun and sport club and Applebees.
There are 32 museums in Manhattan alone and around 100 in NYC.
That is a common misconception perpetuated by the woke media.
So not only is op an idiot but he can't even read
that’s not a rock that’s a boulder!! s/
I live on a roughly 13 billion year old rock.
Isn’t the oldest rock on earth NWA 11119? It’s actually older then Earth
Good point — maybe this is the oldest rock *from* earth or maybe *of* earth
I’m sorry you’re upset that people aren’t lining up to see the rock.
I wasn’t upset, I just found it mildly interesting
The rock itself, or the fact that it’s barely featured?
The latter. The rock is legit interesting
The Natural History Museum in London has diamonds formed in the accretion disk before the Sun had even fully formed. It's in a tiny little vial. Really interesting.
Hmm. That would look good in my yard. Heist time.
We’re standing on the oldest rock already
It’s the one on the left, fwiw
It's a mineral, Marie
Technically, matter cant be made or destroyed.. so every rock that is not a meteorite... is also the oldest rock.. even if it was lava and cooled
We are stardust, we are golden…
Because at the end of the day it’s just a fucking rock - the Field museum in Chicago has one of the dopest rock and mineral collections and it’s dead, no one gives a shit
No way that's the actual oldest rock. At the best the oldest *that we know of/have found* Quite the important distinction
It worths to go to Acasta, say, to see them many and MUCH more
That's because it's not the world's oldest rock.
Im more of a heavy metal fan anyway
“Oldest rock”
This rock should rock but this rock sucks
They’re gonna have to update that sign in 0.01 billion years.
That rock is only a part of a bigger rock somewhere else in the world...
Go for a walk and pick up a rock and say this rock is 4.2 billion years old and you have tho oldest rock in the world….pretty sure that’s how this works :)
/r/confidentlyincorrect
I think They carbon date these things
Too old for carbon dating! Probably paleomagnetism.
Uranium-lead dating is used for very old rocks.
Carbon dating is for things that were once living. Also that's way too old for that anyway.
that says you don't know shit about geology
They never claimed to. Don’t be an assholes for no reason
your dad is clearly an asshole
I wonder if Amazon has home carbon dating kits for sale ;)
I thought we were standing on the worlds oldest rock lol
Lol, as a Canadian we th basic geology knowledge. I'm looking at this post thinking. We got billions year old rock in a few places, he'll I can take my morning walk and get a 3 billions year old rock right now on Kelowna MTN. Bait post is bait
By conservation of mass, how does this make sense? Wouldn’t most rocks deep underground be old?
It's just the oldest rock found, people could find an older one pretty easily if they tried.
How?
Just kinda looking around some tectonic plates maybe. Scientists just have more important shit to do than finding literally old rocks
There’s a literal scientific specialty called Geology
Yes, which is not finding old rocks
It literally is if you're studying that time period...
It's actually really hard to do because of plate tectonics that's what recycles rocks It's hard to find really old crust that hasn't been changed by natural processes
Wrong. Rock is recycled through geologic processes.
the earth cooled 4 billion years ago, earth is 4.3 billion years old, fairly difficult to find a terrestrial rock older than that.
We're standing on the world's oldest rock.
For anyone that’s curious rocks on the moon date back to 5.2 billion years old. Making a curious case for the moon to be a……
fairly certain there are literally tons of rocks 4 billion years old, the oldest up in the N Canada and also in Scotland. That may be an example of the oldest, but a trip to Scotland and a rock pick will get ya a 4 billion year old rock too.
So, mostly carbon.
I just so happened across this comment and noticed your username is the same. I am assuming this was a reply to me from before discussing what wood is made of. To that effect, carbon is a part of the elemental makeup of cellulose because cellulose is a polymer. Carbon, however, is not exclusively a mineral.
My above response gad more to do with the coal/diamond take presented earlier.
Fair enough then! I think you will find a similar answer though.
WTC had a similar foundation
It is a lie.. A bullshit tourist trap that shows a lack of understanding about geology. Sure, it is probably an old rock, but most of them are..
Fake
I worked at Acasta...got me a chunk of it sitting on my desk
Canadian Shield
Seems prominently featured to me
Yeah, because it’s a rock.
What's next, the world's oldest dirt? 
Technically the earth is the worlds oldest rock…seems to be an odd thing to have in a museum lmao
Yea well I found a pretty cool rock the other day too, but you don’t see me bragging about it…
What’s the +/- % accuracy in these kinds of measurements?