Contents of 11.4 How do we know ... why some rocks break and others flow?

Here we see the results for three different rock deformation experiments. Rock A shows a brittle strain (breaks) while B and C show plastic strain (deforms, shows plastic flow) under the same stress.

11.4 How do we know ... why some rocks break and others flow?

Drawing to compare brittle strain and plastic strain. Rock breaks during brittle strain and flows during plastic strain.

Second diagram shows Elastic strain and the levels of stress.

Fig 11.18