A History of Modern Planetary Physics: Volume 1, The Origin of the Solar System and the Core of the Earth from LaPlace to Jeffreys
Nebulous Earth
Published on 11. January 2009
Book
Paperback/Softback
328 pages
978-0-521-09321-7 (ISBN)
Description
Where did we come from? Before there was life there had to be something to live on - a planet, a solar system. During the past 200 years, astronomers and geologists have developed and tested several different theories about the origin of the solar system and the nature of the Earth. Did the Earth and other planets form as a by-product of a natural process that formed the Sun? Did the solar system come into being as the result of catastrophic encounter of two stars? Is the inside of the Earth solid, liquid or gaseous? The three volumes that make up A History of Modern Planetary Physics present a survey of these theories. Nebulous Earth follows the development of the nineteenth-century's most popular explanation for the origin of the solar system, Laplace's Nebular Hypothesis. This theory supposes that a flattened mass of gas extending beyond Neptune's orbit cooled and shrank, throwing off in the process successive rings that in time coalesced to form several planets.
Reviews / Votes
"...a major work, large in scope and splendid in execution....This will be a standard work for a long time to come." Curtis Wilson, Physics Today "The three-volume A History of Modern Planetary Physics by Stephen G. Brush is a amjor work, large in scope and splendidin execution....Brush's account of many of the episodes is enhanced by his personal correspondence with the scientists involved....Brush's text...is workmanlike and probingly thoughtful. This will be a standard work for a long time to come." Physics Today "I recommend this work highly for those with interests in the history of geology or astronomy, the development of scientific ideas, or the role of the individual within the scientific community." Michael Thayer, Science Books and FilmsMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
8 Halftones, unspecified; 3 Line drawings, unspecified
Dimensions
Height: 234 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 18 mm
Weight
500 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-521-09321-7 (9780521093217)
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Cambridge University Press
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12/2008
Cambridge University Press
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Content
Preface; Part I. Nebular Birth and Heat Death: 1. Introduction; 2. The Founders: Laplace and Herschel; 3. Followers and critics; 4. The Nebular Hypothesis and the evolutionary worldview; 5. Thermodynamics and the cooling Earth; 6. Saturn's rings (with C. W. F. Everitt and Elizabeth Garber); 7. Revisions of the Nebular Hypothesis, 1860-85; 8. Poincare and cosmic evolution; 9. The Nebular Hypothesis in the 20th century; Part II. Inside the Earth: 1. A journey to the center of the Earth; 2. Nineteenth-century debates: Solid, liquid or gas?; 3. Discovery of the Earth's core; 4. Chemical history of the core; 5. Geomagnetic secular variation (with S. K. Banerjee); 6. Time and tide; Index.