The Earth [antikvár]

Serious study of the earth began with increasing world industrialization, largely through the need for more and more mineral raw materials -coal, oil, metals, building materials and water supplies. From this practical and fairly recent beginning, the earth sciences have matured into a history of the earth. This knowledge and these concepts constitute an essential part of the intellectual background of today's understanding and esthetic appreciation of nature and of man's place in it. This book is not, nor does it pretend to be, a scientific treatise. Nevertheless, its superb photographs and stimulating text combine to make it a fine introduction to the earth and its processes for the nonprofessional person who wishes to "reád this Book of Earth aright" and, in doing so, to see more clearly man's unceasing efforts to discover greater order, meaning and beauty in the chaos of detailed fact that makes up the natural world. The story of the earth through the immensities of time is at once difficult and easy to read. No one can comprehend it fully, yet no one can fail to be rewarded for closely observing the scraps of records that lie everywhere about us. Every rock that crops out along the country roadside or in a city park and every feature of the natural landscape offer a host of clues to their origin. This erratic glacial boulder, that exposure of fossiliferous limestone, the alluvial valley of this river, that distant rangé of mountains-all will yield a wealth of information about various aspects of their history. To be sure, finding the answers to somé questions that might be asked about their origin challenges all one's ingenuity, but the meaning of much of the evidence is readily apparent. To become aware of such questions about the way the earth was förmed-and aware of the perspective of geologic time-is to add a new dimension to one's mind. The earth sciences are astir. The techniques and concepts of geophysics, geochemistry, biochemistry and other disciplines are being brought to bear increasingly on old questions about the history of rocks and landscapes and on broader problems of the origin of life, the causes of mountains, continents and oceans, and the earth's place in the solar system and the universe. Surprising new facts and unsuspected relationships between facts are being discovered at an increasing rate. Somé of the old problems are beginning to yield-at least a little. Man, with his inborn fire, his passión for meaning and order in all things, illuminates the record, and the story of the earth grows more fascinating every year. wllliam W. Rubey Prof es sor of Geology and Geophysics University of California Los Angeles, California