The New Catastrophism The Importance of the Rare Event in Geological History [Paperback]

A re-examination of earth history in terms of rare and violent events through geological time.Rare and violent events through geological time, from hurricanes to episodic evolution, colliding continents to asteroid impacts, are the theme of this thought-provoking view of the Earth's history, presented with evidence gleaned from the author's world travels.Rare and violent events through geological time, from hurricanes to episodic evolution, colliding continents to asteroid impacts, are the theme of this thought-provoking view of the Earth's history, presented with evidence gleaned from the author's world travels.Rare and violent events through geological time are the theme of this readable and thought-provoking view of the Earth's history. The evidence for episodes and rare catastrophic happenings have been gleaned from the geological record in the author's travels all over the world. Such events are shown to dominate over the gradual and continuous processes that we see in the record of the history of the Earth. From hurricanes to episodic evolution, from colliding continents to asteroid impacts--the importance of these events are presented with many illustrations, both pictorial and anecdotal.Introduction; 1. A much misunderstood man; 2. Magnolias and marigolds: hippos and hiatuses; 3. Modern terrestrial deposits; 4. Ancient terrestrial deposits; 5. Modern shorelines; 6. Ancient shorelines; 7. Ancient platform deposits; 8. Off-shore deposits, ancient and modern; 9. Sudden storms are short; 10. Evolution by accident; 11. Periodic plutonism; 12. It's the only present we've got!; 13. Jupiter or Pluto? The writing is jargon-free, which makes the book accessible to a wider public than just students and professionals. Tony Hallam, New Scientist His new work shares with its predecessor the qualities of originality, readability and seminality. I thoroughly recommend it....a feet-on-the-ground, sweat-in-the-eye encounter with an abundance of actual geological siteslcÇ