Maandelijks archief: januari 2018

After standing there more than four hundred million years, the dolomite would be quarried to become for many miles the concrete surface of Interstate So and to become as well the foundations of most of the tall buildings that now … Lees verder →

Petroleum-the transmuted fossils of ocean algae-forms when the rock that holds the fossils becomes heated to the temperature of a cup of coffee and remains as warm or warmer for at least a million years. The minimal temperature is about … Lees verder →

The odds against diamonds appearing in any given pipe are about a hundred to one. Carbon will crystallize in its densest form only under conditions of considerable heat and pressure-pressures of the sort that exist deep below the thickest parts … Lees verder →

It was on the mechanics of the seafloor that geology’s revolutionary inquiries were primarily focussed in the early days. Harry Hess, a mineralogist who taught at Princeton, was the skipper of an attack transport during the Second World War, and … Lees verder →

We were off on dirt roads now with a cone of dust behind us, which Deffe yes characterized as the local doorbell. He preferred not to ring it. This talkative and generous professor-who ordinarily shares his ideas as rapidly as … Lees verder →

Some of these time lines were bolder than otl1ers, and none more so than the one tlrnt underlined the first appearance of megascopic fossils in abundance in the world. It marked a great and sudden explosion of life, all the … Lees verder →

In age, the blue stone approached five hundred million years. Captain Howard Stansbury, USA, whose name would rest upon the mountains of which the rock was a component, was dpproaching fifty when he came into the Great Basin in i849. … Lees verder →

The Sierra Nevada is renowned throughout the world for its relatively young and absolutely beautiful granite. There is precious little granite in the Sierra. Yosemite Falls, Half Dome, El Capitan-for the most part the “granite” of the Sierra is granodiorite. … Lees verder →

We kunnen de toekomst niet echt voorspellen, omdat technologie niet deterministisch is. Een en dezelfde technologie kan heel verschillende soorten maatschappijen opleveren. De technologie van de industriele revolutie – treinen, elektriciteit, radio, telefoon – kon bijvoorbeeld gebruikt worden om communistische … Lees verder →