The Scientific Method Essay

The theory of sea- floor spreading was introduced by Herny Hess in 1960s. Hess came with the idea that new oceanic floor formed at the mid oceanic ridges. Ridges is a crack in the earth’s crust through which spreads rock rises to the surface. The Melton rock spreads out and adds new material to the ocean floor. The new materials are carried away from the mid oceanic ridges. Sea floor spreading explains the existence of pillow lava near the ridges and the absence of thick layers of sediments on the ocean floor. In fact, near the ridges, sediment is not found. One of the most important contributions of the theory of sea- floor spreading was that it could explain how continent moved. (Silver Burdelt & Ginn 301-302)

The Theory of Plate Tectonics. The Theory of Plate Tectonics states that the lithosphere is divided into dozens of plates float on the asthenosphere and the plates move by convection currents. The theory was proposed in 1912 by Alfred Wegener, a German scientist. I will be discussing the evidence on the theory how we are able to better understand it, along with how we are able to prove his theory more accurate with modern technology. I will also be discussing how natural things such as, mountains, volcanoes, and cracks in the earth’s crust help to validate it.

In general, magnetic minerals such as magnetite and hematite are studied to gain more insight on our magnetic field. When the minerals are formed, their magnetism is lined up with the Earth’s. This important, and many times, permanent, form of evidence can help scientists understand the history of the rock formations in question. The magnetism can not only be used to understand the past rotation of continents, but also the latitude that the rock formed at. This is due to the inclination of the specific magnetic field. The inclinations of the lines of force of the magnetic field get steeper at higher latitudes near the geographic North Pole (top of the axis of rotation of the earth), as well as the geographic South Pole. This vital fact lets scientists determine North-South motions of the past locales of the Earth’s continents. An important distinction that they found between today and the past is difference in positioning between the current magnetic North Pole and the one in the past. In the present day, groupings of minerals dated to the same time period at specific continents have common magnetic field characteristics, and their fields are often not lined up with our current Magnetic North pole. The older the minerals, the more drastic difference they have between our current Magnetic North. Scientists can calculate from this that these large groups of minerals, the continents, must have moved over time so that their magnetic fields were different in the past. Also, when comparing different continents they found that the pathways were strikingly different, indicating local changes in trends. Therefore, the differing magnetic fields of minerals found within our continents can help prove the theory of Continental

The convection currents move up in the center and then down on the outside in each case, which allows matter to be moved up from the interior of Earth to the mid-ocean ridge where this material is deposited. This pushes the two plates out to the left and to the right from the center. Refer to the video segment Mantle Convection to review the process of mantle

The Scientific Method is the standardized procedure that scientists are supposed to follow when conducting experiments, in order to try to construct a reliable, consistent, and non-arbitrary representation of our surroundings. To follow the Scientific Method is to stick very tightly to a order of experimentation. First, the scientist must observe the phenomenon of interest. Next, the scientist must propose a hypothesis, or idea in which the experiments will be based around. Then, through repeated experimentation, the hypothesis can either be proven false or become a theory. If the hypothesis is proven to be false, the scientist must reformulate his or her ideas and come up with another hypothesis, and the experimentation begins again. This

Molten material comes out of the mid ocean ridge. The molten material hardens on each side of the ridge ,the new material pushes the older rocks aside. The older rocks move farther away from the ridge.the coninents which are connected to the ocean floor move along with them.

As more and more of the seafloor was mapped during the 1950s, the magnetic variations turned out not to be random or isolated occurrences, but instead revealed recognizable patterns. When these magnetic patterns were mapped over a wide region, the ocean floor showed a zebra-like pattern. Alternating stripes of magnetically different rock were laid out in rows on either side of the mid-ocean ridge: one stripe with normal polarity and the adjoining stripe with reversed polarity. The overall pattern, defined by these alternating bands of normally and reversely polarized rock, became known as magnetic striping.

This Mid Atlantic Ridge was discovered in the 1950s and is very important to the globe because the discovery of the ridge led to the theory of seafloor spreading. Seafloor spreading is where new ocean lithosphere gets created through eruptions and also how the basin of the ocean becomes wider. Its discovery also allowed many people to accept Wegener’s theory of the continental drift. The Ridge separates the North American Plate form the Eurasian Plate in the Northern part of the ocean. In the South Atlantic, the ridge separates the South American and African Plates. These plates continue spreading, causing the Atlantic to

It all starts with plate tectonics. A theory by Alfred Wagner said that Pangaea, which is a land mass of all the continents combined, had been moved by continental drift to form the positions our continents are in now. This led to the theory of plate tectonics. This theory stated that pieces of the Earth 's lithosphere are in slow, but constant motion, driven by convection currents in the mantle. A reason that backed up this theory was

Divergent and convergent plate margins are both studied in plate tectonics; which is the study of the plates that makeup the lithosphere, their movements and how these movements has influenced changes in the surface’s topography (Strahler, 2011, 389). The driving force that causes these plate movements is the gradual movement of the semi-molten rock that makes up the asthenosphere (Kious, 1996, 28). Features observed at these margins share some similarities but, also vary quite largely. These differences are caused by the different movements displayed at

Earth surface if ever changing. There are earthquakes and volcanoes that happen every year all over the Earth. The theory of plate tectonics helps to explain how these changes happen. Plate tectonics is the scientific theory that describes the movement of Earth’s lithosphere which is the outer crust or Earth’s surface. The Theory of Plate tectonics states that the Earth’s crust is divided into many large and some smaller plates that move horizontal to each other. These plates move across the asthenosphere, which is a more pliable surface compared to the lithosphere (Kious). The theory is relatively new and was developed in the 1950’s and early 60’s. The theory builds off of Alfred Wegners concepts of continental drift.

The opening of the Atlantic ocean and the separation of the African continent from the South American plate lead to the deposition of thick successions of sedimentary deposits at the continental margin and southwards onto the oceanic crust as it was cooling (Solomon et al 2007).

Numerous extinct spreading centres are found within the world’s ocean basins and these record instances of spreading cessation or migration that provide valuable insights into the mechanism of heat-loss from the mantle and plate tectonic behaviour. This study presents the first comprehensive review of all reported extinct ridges and investigates their characteristics and regional distribution and frequency of occurrence over the last ~170 Myr as recorded in present-day preserved oceanic crust. The axial morphology, gravity signal and crustal structure of extinct ridges are evaluated by generating across-axis profiles through global datasets (IHO - IOC 2014; Sandwell et al. 2014) for individual ridge segments. Information on the spreading-rates, time of cessation and duration of spreading prior to cessation was collating information from previous studies. The potential geodynamic influences on the lifespan and activity of mid-ocean ridges were investigated by evaluating the relationship of extinct ridges to hotspots at their time of extinction using GPlates (Boyden et al. 2011) and a global reconstruction (Seton et al. 2012).

Plate tectonics is the theory that explains the structure and motion of the Earth’s lithosphere. The theory states that the Earth’s crust is split into large sections called tectonic plates, and these move relative to one another creating boundaries at which plates converge, diverge and move past each other. Alfred Wegener pioneered the theory of continental drift in the early 1900s which he supported with multiple pieces of evidence. Perhaps the earliest indicator of the theory was the apparent fit of some of the Earth’s continents; analysis of these coastlines, notably the eastern edge of South America and the western edge of Africa, has shown that they are very similar geologically suggesting that at some point in the Earth’s history the landmasses were joined together. Another indicator that the continents were once distributed differently was geological evidence of glaciation in India – it is unlikely that glaciers could ever reach such low latitudes, but this problem can easily be explained by continental drift. Fossil distribution also provided some of the earliest evidence for plate tectonics – certain land-dwelling fossil species have been found in areas that are now separated by ocean, which indicates that those areas were at some point joined together. However at the time of Wegner’s work many of the geophysical tools that are used today did not exist making the theory much more difficult to support.

Plate tectonics, plate tectonics are a theory explaining the structure of the earth and rarely resulting in the interaction of stiff lithospheric plates that move slowly over the lurking mantle below. Plate tectonics has been around for about 3.2 million years, and still continues now. What does it do? Well plate tectonics are several plates that skim the top of the mantle´s bumpy interior layer on top of the core. The plates act like a solid and stiff frame in comparison to earth's mantle. The outer layer of the earth is called the lithosphere; the lithosphere is the strongest, toughest layer of the earth. Plate tectonics are a stylish way of continental drift. Continental drift is an assumption of the continents once moving around earth created by Alfred Wegener. Although we don't physically observe plate tectonics happening, it has definitely affected many things, created many things, and destroyed many things. Over time we see what plate tectonics have done. I am going to be explaining how plate tectonics have shaped volcanoes, how plate tectonics has shaped mountains and also how it has constructed earthquakes.