Nebulous Earth: The Origin of the Solar System and the Core of the Earth from Laplace to Jeffreys (A History of Modern Planetary Physics Volume One)

During the past 200 years, astronomers and geologists have developed and tested several different theories about the origin of the solar system and the nature of the Earth. Together, the three volumes that comprise A History of Modern Planetary Physics present a survey of these theories. Nebulous Earth follows the development of Laplace's Nebular Hypothesis, its connection with ideas about the interior of the Earth, and its role in the establishment of the "evolutionary" worldview that dominated science in the latter part of the nineteenth century. Brush also explores Saturn's rings, Poincaré's contributions to ideas about cosmic evolution, the use of seismology to probe the earth's core, and explanations of the Earth's magnetic field. This series will interest historians and philosophers of science as well as earth scientists and geologists.

Nebulous Earth follows the development of the 19th century's most popular explanation for the origin of the Solar System, Laplace's Nebular Hypothesis. This theory supposes that a flattened mass of gas extending beyond Neptune's orbit cooled and shrank, throwing off in the process successive rings that in time coalesced to form the several planets. Throughout the century, the hypothesis also played an integral role in suggesting the theory of evolution's respectability in biology. Scientists long suspected that the Earth's interior is the seat of powerful forces that shape the Earth's surface and can threaten our lives with earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. From fiery fluid to rigid solid to electromagnetic dynamo, Professor Brush recounts their theories about what actually occurs in the Earth's interior.