Nebulous Earth: The Origin of the Solar System and the Core of the Earth from Laplace to Jeffreys

ISBN-13: 9780521441711 / Angielski / Twarda / 1996 / 326 str.

Stephen Brush

Opis

During the past 200 years, astronomers and geologists have developed and tested several different theories about the origin of the solar system and the nature of the Earth. Together, the three volumes that comprise A History of Modern Planetary Physics present a survey of these theories. Nebulous Earth follows the development of Laplace's Nebular Hypothesis, its connection with ideas about the interior of the Earth, and its role in the establishment of the "evolutionary" worldview that dominated science in the latter part of the nineteenth century. Brush also explores Saturn's rings, Poincare's contributions to ideas about cosmic evolution, the use of seismology to probe the earth's core, and explanations of the Earth's magnetic field. This series will interest historians and philosophers of science as well as earth scientists and geologists.

Recenzje

"I recommend this work highly for those with interests in the history of geology or astronomy, the development of scientific ideas, or the role of the individual within the scientific community." Michael Thayer, Science Books and Films

Spis treści

Preface; Part I. Nebular Birth and Heat Death: 1. Introduction; 2. The Founders: Laplace and Herschel; 3. Followers and critics; 4. The Nebular Hypothesis and the evolutionary worldview; 5. Thermodynamics and the cooling Earth; 6. Saturn's rings (with C. W. F. Everitt and Elizabeth Garber); 7. Revisions of the Nebular Hypothesis, 1860–85; 8. Poincare and cosmic evolution; 9. The Nebular Hypothesis in the 20th century; Part II. Inside the Earth: 1. A journey to the center of the Earth; 2. Nineteenth-century debates: Solid, liquid or gas?; 3. Discovery of the Earth's core; 4. Chemical history of the core; 5. Geomagnetic secular variation (with S. K. Banerjee); 6. Time and tide; Index.