Part 2: How geology and society have co-evolved from the 18th century till the 2010s

 

Part 2:

Part 2 of the Scottish Enlightenment, where I focus on how Hutton used ideas from his time, to incorporate  them into his own theories on geology. Here I try to show, that Hutton couldn’t have succeeded without the aide of his friends and how the work of David Hume and James Hutton influenced each other in such a crucial manner. Hutton took the end products of industrial processes just emerging in Scotland and imagined them in the context of nature, such as a volcano being a giant furnace.

This segment was inspired by a BBC Radio 4 broadcast: Early Geology (In Our Time).

The reasoning of James Hutton – Observing Nature away from the texts

One of the key defining features of Hutton, was his interest in individual observation. He was against the idea that one should rely on old texts such as the Bible to come up with theories on how the Earth came to be. He advocated for observing the world in the the present as it is, not as described in old texts. He got this idea from David Hume who also made the same argument about the Bible and our understanding of the world. According to Hume we need to observe the world on our own rather than rely on other’ people’s descriptions.

This encouraged Hutton to study the geology of the area through his own trips and studies. Along with James Watt, this made James Hutton combine laboratory experiments with field observations!

Hutton was the first man to understand the concept of the rock cycle. He stipulated that Earth is a heat engine, with a thin rocky crust at the top. Rocks are created through a cycle which is eternally rotating molten rock to the surface and pushing cold rock back into the heat engine. Hutton liked to compare the Earth’s processes to the steam engine machines of James Watt.

“We know that the land is raised by a power which has for its principle subterraneous heat, but how that land is preserved in its elevated station, is a subject which we have not even the means to form a conjecture.” – James Hutton

 “… in every quarter of the globe, and in every climate of the earth, there is formed, by means of the decay of solid rocks, and by the transportation of those moveable materials, that beautiful system of mountains and valleys, of hills and plains, covered with growing plants, and inhabited by animals.” – James Hutton

James Hutton, the Heat Engine Driving the Planet and the Leith Glassmakers

Leith in its time was a major centre of Scottish industry. One of the large businesses was glass blowing. They used to make glass with sand. James Hutton took notice.

James Hutton did something very amazing for his time. He tried to find mini examples of the evidence for the large processes, he has observed. He observed how granite, is formed of large crystals that could easily be picked up by the human eye. He also got samples of obsidian from Italy. He was convinced that both material got to the Earth as hot material and cooled down after meeting the cold rock of the sediments.

Bellow glass making can be seen. Hutton compared how glass cooled to how lava cooled in the real world. He realized that how fast things cool, that is universal. So volcanic glass happened the same way as human glass. And when glass cools slowly, it forms the same crystals as igneous rocks! James Hutton recognized that at Glen Tilt.

“The volcano was not created to scare superstitious minds and plunge them into fits of piety and devotion. It should be seen as the vent of a furnace.” – JAMES HUTTON (1788)

Charles Lyell and Charles Darwin

Charles Lyell gives a scientific basis for geology, he set up a method based on change through time. He highlighted that Earth wasn’t fixed, it was in an up and down motion. Lyell was born in Angus, his work included the expansion on Hutton’s work and the creation of geology as a serious science based on field evidence. Lyell traveled all over Europe and all over North America.

He was a mentor to Charles Darwin as Charles started out as a geologist from the University of Edinburgh before transferring to Cambridge. He took the work of Charles Lyell with him when he went on his journey around the globe with the ship, Beagle.

Lyell’s work inspired Darwin on evolution.

“But Geology carries the day: it is like the pleasure of gambling, speculating, on first arriving, what the rocks may be; I often mentally cry out 3 to 1 Tertiary against primitive; but the latter have hitherto won all the bets.” – Charles Darwin

Darwin is a very inspiring character:

Adam Sedgwick and Geological Time

Adam Sedgwick divided up the geological timescales into Devonian and Silurian. He along with Charles Lyell traveled around Europe and studied the volcanoes of Italy.