At 4:01 -0500 4/1/06, TFT Digest wrote:
Huge holes can not exist underground. Given time the rocks will flow and fill them in, or fracture and cave in. I always looked on this as an example of "Tolkien is no Scientist". I guess I am just saying that I am a bit more bothered by "huge hollows underground" than most people would be.
In general, I agree, but there are some exceptions. Magma chambers and lava tubes, for volcanically active regions, and water-hollowed chambers and galleries, in more water-soluble (sedimentary) types of rock. In the *long* run Rick is right, they'll be full of something, but it can take quite a while.
Meantime, though, neither the Misty Mountains nor Caradhras seemed to be volcanically active, nor composed of sedimentary rock, from anything I could find in the books, so in this specific case I find myself in agreement with Rick yet again.
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