The Earth Book
From the Beginning to the End of Our Planet, 250 Milestones in the History of Earth Science
Published on 2. April 2019
528 pages
978-1-4549-3555-1 (ISBN)
Description
A beautifully illustrated presentation of 250 milestones in the history of our home planet, from celebrated geologist and planetary scientist Jim Bell.
Spanning Earth's entire history, from its birth 4.6 billion years ago to its inevitable destruction billions of years into the future, this stunning volume chronicles the life of our home planet in 250 well-chosen milestones. Jim Bell leads us on a tour of the events, processes, people, and places that have shaped our growing knowledge of Earth, from the oceans' formation and the first perilous polar expeditions to deadly volcanoes and Earth "selfies" from space. He covers relevant topics in a range of fields, including physics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, geology, mineralogy, planetary science, life science, public policy, atmospheric/climate science, and engineering, along with notes on key scientists and inventors. At a time when it's crucial to understand Earth as a complex interdependent system, and our role in that system, The Earth Book will enhance your appreciation of our home.
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Jim Bell
The Earth Book
From the Beginning to the End of Our Planet, 250 Milestones in the History of Earth Science
Book
04/2019
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€50.95
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Person
Dr. Jim Bell is a professor of geology and planetary science in Arizona State University's School of Earth and Space Exploration in Tempe, AZ, and an adjunct professor in the Department of Astronomy at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY. Jim is a member of the American Geophysical Union and the Geological Society of America. As President of The Planetary Society, he is a prolific public commentator on science and space exploration, earning the 2011 Carl Sagan Medal from the American Astronomical Society for excellence in public communication of planetary science. Jim has appeared on numerous radio and television shows, including NBC's Today Show and PBS's NewsHour, as well as programs on the Discovery, National Geographic, and History cable channels, and has been interviewed for several space-related documentary films. He is the author of The Ultimate Interplanetary Travel Guide, The Space Book, Mars 3-D, Moon 3-D, The Interstellar Age, and Postcards from Mars.
Content
- Intro
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Contents
- Introduction
- Acknowledgments
- c. 4.54 Billion BCE Earth Is Born
- c. 4.54 Billion BCE Earth's Core Forms
- c. 4.5 Billion BCE Birth of the Moon
- c. 4.5 Billion BCE Earth's Mantle and Magma Ocean
- c. 4.5-4 Billion BCE The Hadean
- c. 4.1 Billion BCE Late Heavy Bombardment
- c. 4.5 Billion BCE Continental Crust
- c. 4 Billion BCE Earth's Oceans
- c. 4-2.5 Billion BCE The Archean
- c. 4-3 Billion BCE? Plate Tectonics
- c. 3.8 Billion BCE? Life on Earth
- c. 3.7 Billion BCE Stromatolites
- c. 3.5 Billion BCE Greenstone Belts
- c. 3.4 Billion BCE Photosynthesis
- c. 3-1.8 Billion BCE Banded Iron Formations
- c. 2.5 Billion BCE The Great Oxidation
- c. 2 Billion BCE Eukaryotes
- c. 1.2 Billion BCE The Origin of Sex
- c. 1 Billion BCE Complex Multicellular Organisms
- c. 720-635 Million BCE Snowball Earth?
- c. 550 Million BCE Cambrian Explosion
- c. 500 Million BCE Roots of the Pyrénées
- c. 480 Million BCE The Appalachians
- c. 470 Million BCE First Land Plants
- c. 450 Million BCE Mass Extinctions
- c. 375 Million BCE First Animals on Land
- c. 320 Million BCE The Ural Mountains
- c. 320 Million BCE Reptiles
- c. 300 Million BCE The Atlas Mountains
- c. 300 Million BCE Pangea
- c. 252 Million BCE The Great Dying
- c. 220 Million BCE Mammals
- c. 200 Million BCE Triassic Extinction
- c. 200-65 Million BCE Age of the Dinosaurs
- c. 160 Million BCE The First Birds
- c. 155 Million BCE The Sierra Nevada
- c. 140 Million BCE The Atlantic Ocean
- c. 130 Million BCE Flowers
- c. 80 Million BCE The Rockies
- c. 70 Million BCE The Himalayas
- c. 66 Million BCE Deccan Traps
- c. 65 Million BCE The Alps
- c. 65 Million BCE Dinosaur-Killing Impact
- c. 60 Million BCE Primates
- c. 35 Million BCE Antarctica
- c. 30 Million BCE East African Rift Zone
- c. 30-20 Million BCE Advanced C46 Photosynthesis
- c. 30-10 Million BCE Cascade Volcanoes
- c. 28 Million BCE Hawaiian Islands
- c. 10 Million BCE The Andes
- c. 10 Million BCE First Hominids
- c. 7 Million BCE Sahara Desert
- c. 6-5 Million BCE The Grand Canyon
- c. 6-5 Million BCE The Mediterranean Sea
- c. 5.5 Million BCE The Caspian and Black Seas
- c. 5 Million BCE Galápagos Islands
- c. 3.4 Million BCE to 3300 BCE The Stone Age
- c. 3 Million BCE The Dead Sea
- c. 2 Million BCE Death Valley
- c. 400,000 BCE Lake Victoria
- c. 200,000 BCE Homo sapiens Emerges
- c. 70,000 BCE The San People
- c. 50,000 BCE Arizona Impact
- c. 40,000 BCE The First Mines
- c. 38,000 BCE La Brea Tar Pits
- c. 30,000 BCE Domestication of Animals
- c. 10,000 BCE Invention of Agriculture
- c. 10,000 BCE End of the Last "Ice Age"
- c. 9000 BCE Beringia Land Bridge
- c. 8000 BCE The Great Lakes
- c. 7000 BCE Fermentation of Beer and Wine
- c. 6000 BCE Fertilizer
- c. 3300-1200 BCE The Bronze Age
- c. 3200 BCE Synthetic Pigments
- c. 3000 BCE Oldest Living Trees
- c. 3000 BCE Stonehenge
- c. 3000 BCE The Spice Trade
- c. 2500 BCE The Pyramids
- c. 2000 BCE Magnetite
- c. 1200-500 BCE The Iron Age
- c. 800 BCE Aqueducts
- c. 600 BCE First World Maps
- c. 500 BCE The Earth Is Round!
- c. 500 BCE Madagascar
- c. 300 BCE Quartz
- c. 300 BCE Great Library of Alexandria
- c. 280 BCE A Sun-Centered Cosmos
- c. 250 BCE Size of the Earth
- 79 Pompeii
- c. 700-1200 Polynesian Diaspora
- c. 1000 Mayan Astronomy
- c. 1370-1640 Great Wall of China
- c. 1400 Native American Creation Stories
- c. 1500 The Little Ice Age
- c. 1500 Civil Engineering
- 1519 Circumnavigating the Globe
- 1541 Amazon River
- 1600 Many Earths?
- 1600 Huaynaputina Eruption
- 1619 Laws of Planetary Motion
- 1669 Foundations of Geology
- 1686 Tides
- 1687 Gravity
- 1747 Feldspar
- 1769 Transit of Venus
- 1788 Unconformities
- 1789 Olivine
- 1791 Desalination
- 1794 Rocks from Space
- 1798 Population Growth
- 1802-1805 Platinum Group Metals
- 1804 Charting North America
- 1811 Reading the Fossil Record
- 1814 Sunlight Deciphered
- 1815 Mount Tambora Eruption
- 1815 Modern Geologic Maps
- 1830 Uniformitarianism
- c. 1830 Industrial Revolution
- 1837 Discovering Ice Ages
- 1845 Birth of Environmentalism
- 1851 Proof that the Earth Spins
- c. 1855-1870 Deforestation
- 1858-1859 Natural Selection
- 1858 Airborne Remote Sensing
- 1859 Solar Flares and Space Weather
- 1862 The Age of the Earth
- 1864 (Geo) Science Fiction
- 1869 Exploring the Grand Canyon
- c. 1870 The Anthropocene
- 1870 Soil Science
- 1872 National Parks
- 1879 The US Geological Survey
- 1883 Krakatoa Eruption
- 1892 The Sierra Club
- 1896 The Greenhouse Effect
- 1896 Radioactivity
- 1896 Structure of the Atmosphere
- 1896 Women in Earth Science
- 1900 Galveston Hurricane
- 1902 Controlling the Nile
- 1906 San Francisco Earthquake
- 1906 Hunting for Meteorites
- 1908 The Tunguska Explosion
- 1909 Reaching the North Pole
- 1910 Big Burn Wildfire
- 1911 Reaching the South Pole
- 1911 Machu Picchu
- 1912 Continental Drift
- 1913 The Ozone Layer
- 1914 The Panama Canal
- 1915 Exploring Katmai
- 1921 Russian Famine
- 1925 Tri-State Tornado
- 1926 Liquid-Fueled Rockets
- 1926 Exploration by Aviation
- 1933 Angel Falls
- 1934 Geology of Corals
- 1935 Dust Bowl
- 1936 The Inner Core
- 1937 Landfills
- 1943 Exploring the Oceans
- 1943 Sky Islands
- 1945 Geosynchronous Satellites
- 1946 Cloud Seeding
- 1947 Weather Radar
- 1948 Tracing Human Origins
- 1949 Island Arcs
- 1953 Ascending Everest
- 1954 Nuclear Power
- 1957 Mapping the Seafloor
- 1957 Sputnik
- 1957-1958 International Geophysical Year (IGY)
- 1958 Earth's Radiation Belts
- 1960 Weather Satellites
- 1960 Understanding Impact Craters
- 1960 Mariana Trench
- 1960 Valdivia Earthquake
- 1961 Humans in Space
- 1961 Terraforming
- 1963 Reversing Magnetic Polarity
- 1966 Endosymbiosis
- 1966 Earth Selfies
- 1967 Extremophiles
- 1968 Leaving Earth's Gravity
- 1970 Meteorites and Life
- 1970 Earth Day
- 1972 Earth Science Satellites
- 1972 Geology on the Moon
- 1973 Seafloor Spreading
- 1973 Tropical Rain/Cloud Forests
- 1973 Global Positioning System
- 1975 Insect Migration
- 1975 Magnetic Navigation
- 1976 Temperate Rainforests
- 1977 Voyager Golden Record
- 1977 Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vents
- 1978 Wind Power
- 1979 A World Wide Web
- 1980 Mount St. Helens Eruption
- 1980 Extinction Impact Hypothesis
- 1981 Great Barrier Reef
- 1982 Genetic Engineering of Crops
- 1982 Basin and Range
- 1982 Solar Power
- 1982 Volcanic Explosivity Index
- 1983 Gorillas in the Mist
- 1983 Plant Genetics
- 1984 The Oscillating Magnetosphere
- 1985 Underwater Archaeology
- 1986 Chernobyl Disaster
- 1987 California Condors
- 1987 Yucca Mountain
- 1988 Light Pollution
- 1988 Chimpanzees
- 1991 Biosphere 2
- 1991 Mount Pinatubo Eruption
- 1992 Tundra
- 1992 Boreal Forests (Taiga)
- 1993 Oceanography from Space
- 1994 Hydroelectric Power
- 1995 Earthlike Exoplanets
- 1997 Large Animal Migrations
- 1998 Ocean Conservation
- 1999 Earth's Spin Slows Over Time
- 1999 Torino Impact Hazard Scale
- 1999 Vargas Landslide
- 2004 Sumatran Earthquake and Tsunami
- 2004 Grasslands and Chaparral
- 2007 Carbon Footprint
- 2008 Global Seed Vault
- 2010 Eyjafjallajökull Eruption
- 2011 Building Bridges
- 2011 Temperate Deciduous Forests
- 2012 Lake Vostok
- 2013 Savanna
- 2013 Rising CO46
- 2016 Long-Duration Space Travel
- 2017 North American Solar Eclipse
- 2029 Apophis Near Miss
- ~2050 Settlements on Mars?
- ~2100 End of Fossil Fuels?
- ~50,000 Next Ice Age?
- ~100,000 Yellowstone Supervolcano
- ~100,000-200,000 Loihi
- ~500,000 Next Big Asteroid Impact?
- ~250 Million Pangea Proxima
- ~600 Million Last Total Solar Eclipse
- ~1 Billion Earth's Oceans Evaporate
- ~2-3 Billion Earth's Core Solidifies
- ~5 Billion The End of the Earth
- GSA Geologic Timescale
- Notes and Further Reading
- Photo Credits
