The first recorded person to discover any geological concepts was Herodotus (500BC). He observed how the Nile deposited silt, but he believed that most features of the earth were formed as a result of short but violent processes. It was not until the 4th Century BC that Aristotle made his observations, that these geological features were in fact the result of change over vast amounts of time. Over time more people contributed to the initial thoughts about the Earth’s features, including Eratosthenes who was the first to calculate the circumference of the Earth (in 250 BC); and even Leonardo da Vinci around the 16th Century, who discovered how sedimentary rocks were formed, how they were then uplifted into fold mountains, and concurred with Aristotle’s earlier findings that fossils were the remains of ancient life. Without these basic geological concepts, our understanding of problems such as global climate change, changes in compositions of rocks and the exhaustive supply of our energy sources, would be near to worthless.
As a result of these discoveries we are today better prepared to face these challenges of tackling global climate change, by exploring the fluctuation of the abundance of certain elements in the composition of the earth in the past. This helps us to track if the current problem is just of cyclical means, or if the problem is because of our human intervention.
In our current societies we depend on having access to energy. If we are deprived of it for any amount of time, our productivity decreases extremely. Geologists have played a pivotal role in calculating how quickly we are using up our energy resources and explaining to other scientists the importance of being prepared for when we run out of our current resources left. Geologists have also taken a major part in discovering the changes in the abundance of ‘Greenhouse gases’ in our atmosphere, compared to the past, and have explained the effects that it has on it. This has led to the invention of new greener methods of travel and energy production.
However the idea that geologists alone could save the planet in my mind is a little far-fetched. I do believe that it is true that geologists can play a crucial role in helping us to save our planet, but I do not think that their role is the only one.
