Plate tectonics is one of the greatest scientific achievements. It is one of the few scientific blueprints with great predictive and descriptive powers. This single comprehensive theory explains the causes of volcanic eruptions and earthquakes and where we expect them to occur. It tells us from which geologic settings we expect petroliferous, metalliferous, and auriferous deposits. It explains where and how mountains, rifts, and oceans have formed and where we expect these features to form in the future. Plate tectonics is indeed a great showcase of the present scientific strides as well as the driver of the geo-centered economy.
The development of plate tectonics shows that sometimes the scientific conclusions we reach could be counter intuitive. It is not an easy task to imagine and experimentally show the gigantic plates that make up the oceans and continents move over plastic like thick layer of rock called the asthenosphere. But, then to move one step up and say these plates actually move into, away from, and past each other ever so slowly over millions of years creating new oceans, mountains and basins is like discovering a new planet like our own but with unique attributes of its own. This was to geologists what the revelation of time dilation and space contraction of space-time universe was to classical physicists.
What is even more amazing to geologists is the regularity of the process. Without any considerable expansion of the globe, for at least one billion years, Earth has been able to release its heat causing the amalgamation and dispersal of supercontinents through the process of subduction and rift-drift reactions triggered by mantle dynamics. The supercontinent in the recent past being Pangea. For how long would this continue?
Was this process, which is referred to as the Wilson Cycle, unavoidable through the course of Earth’s evolution? What was before plate tectonics and what made this transition possible? Could there be any better comprehensive theory that could explain and predict the geodynamic processes of the Earth better than the theory of plate tectonics? We have much to learn.
For now, the trend of the geoscientists has been characterizing the processes of plate tectonics in detail by translating the conceptual models of plate tectonics into tectonophysics while expanding the scope of plate tectonics itself. These endeavors are extremely important to predict earthquakes, isolate ideal geo-storage settings, discover resources, and monitor and predict volcanic eruptions, and associated geo-hazards.
We have come a long way from the Earth model that was thought of as resting on the back of four elephants that are resting on the back of a turtle. Beyond all the scientific and material benefits, I think plate tectonics has played a crucial role in redefining our philosophical views through which we view the Earth.
© Authored by Luel Emishaw, Burst of Insights
