The Continental Drift Theory and Earth Forming Processes
The origin of the planets and how they came to be what they are today has been a topic of contention for ages. Many geologists and scientists have come up with theories explaining how the continents came to be and have gone further to provide evidence to support their theories. The continental drift theory by Alfred Wegner is one of the theories. The paper will give an overhaul of Alfred’s theory. Alfred proposed that once the earth was a single unit but forces which acted upon the earth caused it to break up and split to form continents.
Alfred came up with his theory in 1912. The society strongly disagreed with him. People could not see the viability of the theory. The theory received criticism from fellow scientists and geologists. According to Sant (2002) the ideas of the theory were contrary to what the scientists knew at the time and thus, Alfred received negative criticisms to the extent that discussions and debates on the theory were stopped. However, debates continued in the student community and in 1960, the theory was restarted and received support from the society.
The differences in the points of view were brought about by the fact that Alfred came up with a theory that had not been thought of before. The people’s mindsets were fixed to what they already knew and they did not have room for change. To the scientists, Alfred seemed to pose a challenge and changing and convincing the minds of the scientists was an equally hard task. The theory seemed to downgrade the theories which already existed and the society was not ready for such a thing.
Internal processes that shape the earth are those which originate from the earth’s crust. The forces which cause the processes get their drives from the crust itself. Such processes include earthquakes and tsunamis. External land shaping processes are those which originate from without the crust. Such processes may include withering and landslides, which are caused by factors which are outside the earth’s crust, in this case weather and climatic changes. Intrusive igneous rocks are formed inside the earth’s crust while extrusive igneous rocks are formed outside the crust. The earth developed and the fact that civilization developed on it is a true statement. The earth had to first develop to its form and afterwards, allow room for civilization. Civilization took and takes part on the surface of the earth. Hence, without the earth, no civilization could take place.
According to McDouggal (n.d.) porosity is the extent of open space in between the particle forming a rock while permeability is the measure of how easily a fluid is able to percolate in a given rock. Therefore, for a rock to be permeable, it must be porous. When setting up water supplies, the porosity and permeability of rocks must be taken into account. Water supplies should be set up in porous rocks so as to ensure that water is available to the supply.
References
Sant, J. (2002). Wegener and Continental Drift Theory. Retrieved from http://www.scientus.org/Wegener-Continental-Drift.html
McDouggal, L., (n.d). How does water move through the ground? Porosity and permeability. Retrieved from http://www.classzone.com/books/earth_science/terc/content/investigations/es1401/es1401page04.cfm
