By James Lawrence Powell

Over the process the 20th century, scientists got here to just accept 4 counterintuitive but primary evidence in regards to the Earth: deep time, continental flow, meteorite influence, and worldwide warming. whilst first prompt, every one proposition violated medical orthodoxy and used to be speedy denounced as scientific—and occasionally religious—heresy. however, after many years of rejection, scientists got here to simply accept each one theory.

The tales at the back of those 4 discoveries mirror greater than the attention-grabbing push and pull of medical paintings. They display the provocative nature of technology and the way it increases profound and infrequently uncomfortable truths because it advances. for instance, counter to good judgment, the Earth and the sun process are older than all of human lifestyles; the interactions one of the relocating plates and the continents they bring account for almost all the Earth’s floor gains; and approximately each vital characteristic of our sun method effects from the opportunity collision of gadgets in area. so much mind-blowing of all, we people have altered the weather of a complete planet and now threaten the way forward for civilization. This soaking up clinical heritage is the single booklet to explain the evolution of those 4 rules from heresy to fact, exhibiting how technology works in perform and the way it unavoidably corrects the blunders of its practitioners. Scientists might be incorrect, yet they don't remain improper. within the method, excellent rules are born, demonstrated, and through the years take root.

“James Lawrence Powell breaks new floor. His scholarship is deep, and his tales are well-written and enriched with human aspect. a person with an curiosity in how technology progresses will cash in on analyzing this book.” —Spencer Weart, director emeritus of the guts for heritage of Physics of the yank Institute of Physics, writer of The Discovery of worldwide Warming

“This transparent and well-written booklet deals 4 vintage examples that exhibit how technological know-how progresses—despite tricky competition, quite often approved rules are usually slowly changed via more moderen, greater ones. As an apocryphal clinical institution dean instructed incoming scholars: ‘Half of what we are going to train you within the subsequent 4 years is inaccurate. the matter is that we don’t comprehend which half.’ James Lawrence Powell’s new identify presents a full of life examine how the sciences, consequently the geosciences, relatively work.” —Seth Stein, Northwestern collage, writer of Disaster Deferred: How New technology is altering Our View of Earthquakes within the New Madrid Seismic Zone