Talk:Continental drift
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Continental drift term
The best out of this material would suit the 'history' subsection at Plate tectonics instead of being isolated under this antiquated expression, IMO. More findable I think. Wetman 04:42, 12 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Article topic is Wegner's time period
I think that this term is important for its historical value. It is anachronistic to discuss Wegner's theory as plate tectonics, since the term was invented over 30 years after his death. This article should be about the development of the concept of continental drift separately from that of plate tectonics. Although this article needs further work (e.g., Various data) Gwimpey 23:16, 5 May 2004 (UTC)
- I am going to add some info on pre-Wegner continental drift hypotheses based on info in Geology in the Nineteenth Century by Mott T. Greene Gwimpey 23:54, 9 May 2004 (UTC)
Ocean size
I think that the ocean in fact does not get bigger because of plate tectonics. If the magme spreads the plates apart and creates more oceanic crust, then the oceanic plates will just go below other plates and the ocean will get new crust and lose old crust. I do think, however, that the land masses will get bigger from the rifts on the land and the land plates will go over all the oceanic crusted plates.
- Whether ocean gets bigger depends upon everything else. India merging with Asia surely takes less surface area than did a separate India. But various volcanic islands have grown, rivers have dumped sediment, the South Atlantic has moved Africa and South America apart, the Rift valley in Africa is opening, etc. (SEWilco 02:45, 28 Apr 2005 (UTC))
First proposed by...
(William M. Connolley 20:38, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)) The article currently starts:
- The concept of continental drift was first proposed by Alfred Wegener. In 1912 he noticed that the shapes of continents on either side of the Atlantic Ocean seem to fit together (for example, Africa and South America). Benjamin Franklin and others had noted much the same thing earlier. The similarity of southern continent fossil faunas and some geological formations had led a relatively small number of Southern hemisphere geologists to conjecture as early as 1900 that all the continents had once been joined into a supercontinent.
This is, at least apparently, inconsistent. Was it first Wegener, or was it a bunch of people who never became famous? It should be clarified. e.g. http://pubs.usgs.gov/publications/text/historical.html
- Well, I stated above my intention to improve this article, but I haven't done it (yet). You're right, that passage is not clear. Gwimpey 22:56, Jan 3, 2005 (UTC)
