Evolution, Pangea and the Big Bang

Has anyone else noticed that three independant sciences have all reached similiar conclusions with all of their evidence? Biology takes us from a single celled organism to man, Geology takes us from a single continent to the tectonically drifting modern world and Physics takes us from a concentrated point of matter to the current varied, expanding universe.

Is this real, or a fallacy that will be mocked in the future?

Why do we need to regress this way from variety (present) to simplicity (past)? Why can't there have always been variety?

Mods: why is there no science section in D&D?

Entropy.

Original post by The_Last_Melon

Geology takes us from a single continent to the tectonically drifting modern world

I just want to pick you up on this point, because the tectonic history of the Earth is far, far more complex than that. Pangaea existed from around 300 million years ago to 200 million years ago. In comparison to the entire history of the Earth, it's a relatively recent event. Before its existence, the continents drifted separately as they do today. Pangaea was by no means the first supercontinent, and it won't be the last.

Reply 3

Joinedup

Contenents don't mean all that much really anyway - there's still a hard surface under the sea, continents are just bits that stick out of the water.

Reply 4

Kaiser MacCleg

Original post by Joinedup

Contenents don't mean all that much really anyway - there's still a hard surface under the sea, continents are just bits that stick out of the water.

In geology, the term "continent" has a different meaning - large areas of continental crust. Continental crust is fundamentally different from oceanic crust as it has a primarily granitic, as opposed to basaltic, composition. This means that it is less dense, allowing the Earth's surface to reach higher elevations.

So in this sense, the edges of the continents are not coterminous with the coast; the continental shelves are also a part of the continents, which makes perfect sense if you're a geologist, as the amount of continental shelf that's actually submerged at any given time varies wildly with changes in sea level. There are geological "continents" that exist today and which are almost entirely submerged, such as Kerguelen and Zealandia.

But there's a very clear difference between the continents and the oceans, as the Earth's hypsometric curve shows.

Reply 5

Hype en Ecosse

Original post by The_Last_Melon

Mods: why is there no science section in D&D?

I think this is actually a good idea.

Reply 6

Hal.E.Lujah

I definitely think that there are strong social aspects in alot of scientific theory. I'm happy for science to be used by myself and others despite this, but it's really quite frightening reading novels and poems written a century before Darwin that no doubt planted the idea in his mind. Or fictions which contain elements of relativity from the 1850s no doub influencing Planck.

Don't get me wrong, I can't contest the validity of most of these. I just find it strange that nobody is willing to acknowledge that science is also a social manifestation.