UNIT I: ORIGIN AND STRUCTURE

OF THE EARTH

I. Theories on the Origin of the Universe

II. The Origin of the Solar System
III.Life on Earth
IV.Earth and Subsystems
 I. Theories on the Origin of the Universe
 THEORY OF CREATION
-God separated light from Darkness,
created the sky, land, sea, moon,
stars, and every living creatures
(book of Genesis)
 Hindu text Rigveda
- describes the universe as an oscillating universe in which a
“cosmic egg” or Brahmanda containing the whole universe-
which expands out of a single concentrated
point called Bindu, which the mandala is created, representing the
universe.
GREEK PHILOSOPHERS
1. Anaxagoras
– believed in a primordial
Universe, the state of the
Universe preceding the
Big Bang, existed in infinitesimally
small fragments of
themselves
2. Leucippus and Democritus
- believed in an atomic universe
composed of very small, indivisible and
indestructible atoms.
FRENCH PHILOSOPHERS
3. Renέ Descartes
-The vacuum of space was not
empty but rather filled with
matter that swirled around in
a large and small vortices.
-”gravitational
effects”
4. Sir ISAAC NEWTON
-Published his book “Principia”
, which describes a static, steady-state
nfinite universe. This theory is agreed and
Supported by Albert Einstein.
5. Edwin Hubble
- believed that the universe
was not static, that the
universe expands.
6. Georges Henri Joseph Edouard
Lemaitre
-Belgian Roman catholic priest also
The father of Big Bang Theory.
-Describes the universe as
originating from an infinitely
tiny particle.
7. Fred Hoyle and Thomas
Gold and Herman Bondi
(The Austrians)
“Steady-state theory” – predicted a
universe that expanded but did not
change its density.
8. Alan Gruth
-proposed model of the universe based on the
Big Bang theory.
What is BIG BANG THEORY?
Did something really explode?

Nothing explodes in the Big Bang. Big Bang

is described by a hot, dense state that simply
expands and cools.
9. Andrei Linde
- a Russian-American physicist who
developed the inflationary universe with
this chaotic inflation theory in 1983
- sees our universe as just
one many bubbles that grew
as a part of multiverse.
10. Hugh Everett III and
Bryce DeWitt
-developed and popularized
the “many worlds”
formulation
of the multiverse in the
1960’s and 1970’s
 II. The Origin of the Solar System

1. Geocentric model
-states that the earth is the center of the
Solar System.
-proposed by Claudius Ptolemy
2. Heliocentric model
-which states that the sun is
the center
of the Solar System
-proposed by Nicolas
Copernicus
Scientific Theories of
Angular Momentum
1. Nebular Hypothesis
Immanuel Kant (1724 -1804) and
Laplace (1749-1827)
– presumes that the solar system
began as a cloud of dispersed
interstellar gas called nebula. This
is how the earliest theory of the
solar system originated.
– In addition, this theory
presumes that the solar system
began as a cloud of dispersed
interstellar gas called nebula. This
is how the earliest theory of the
solar system originated.
2. Planetesimal and tidal theories
(Chamberlin and Moulton)
- proposed that a star passed close
enough to the sun, creating huge tides
and causing materials to be ejected.
These smaller masses quickly cooled
and became numerous smaller bodies
called planetesimals.
- while, tidal’s theory suggested that
when a huge tidal wave was created
from sun’s collision with another star,
a long filament was drawn out and
detached from the principal mass.
3. Protoplanet Theory
(Kuiper and Weizacker)
- the dense area of nebula and
the gaseous matter surrounding it
ceased to rotate uniformly. Under
the influence of turbulence and
tidal action, the nebula broke into
whirlpools of gas within rotating
mass called protoplanet.
-
Read about Life on
Earth and Earth and
it’s Subsystem

-Sir Ensoy