The Royal Institution
Continental drift is common knowledge now, but when the idea was first proposed it was revolutionary. Helen Czerski tells the story of how the maps of one of history’s finest cartographers shifted our view of the planet.
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In the early 20th century, Alfred Wegener proposed a revolutionary idea: that the Earth’s continents were once joined together, and had gradually moved apart. The idea contradicted almost everything scientists thought at the time, and it took the detailed work of a brilliant cartographer to prove him right.
Conventional ideas held that the ocean floors were flat, featureless planes. As expeditions started to go around the world collecting ocean depth measurements, Marie Tharp – not allowed to join the expeditions herself – processed the data and began to craft detailed, revealing maps of the hidden ocean depths.
She discovered that the ocean floor was in fact a complex assortment of peaks and troughs. In particular, her profiles revealed stark rift valleys, which supported Wegener’s controversial ideas. Even then, it took a long time to convince the scientific community that her findings were correct. Eventually, however, she was proved right, and Marie Tharp took her rightful place as one of history’s finest cartographers.
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I wonder where the idea of a woman onboard a ship brought bad luck came from?
Girl talk?
Great video had not heard of Marie Tharp. Nice to hear Helen again I thought it was her narrating. 🙂
Left handed – very sinister – not to be trusted on a boat
Excellent video about stuff I've never heard about. Would love to see more in this style.
Well done to all involved. 😀
". . . A pattern of scars that spanned the Earth's oceans – permanent wounds torn into existence through the process of continental drift."
That sounds so poetic and beautiful. However, we should also consider that the drift didn't CAUSE the "scars", perhaps the energy lines where the scars appear are DRIVING the continental drift.
great video… thank you for bringing her story to public.
Bravo…Rosalin Franklin and Lisa Mietner…
Um….I'd hate to break this to all the "smart" people out there, BUT….the continents are still connected. This is not "science", it's a religious belief. *
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great topic and narration, but the video had too much vibration in it. please don't do that ever again, it was distressing to the eye.
There is also the lesser-known Continental Drip theory. The continents were formed by pouring liquid continent over the globe, as in a Sherwin-Williams Paint logo https://goo.gl/afpPWH . If you will notice, virtually all peninsulas point south.
great video
A salute to the Heroine of Geology.
You are my idol as geologist 😘
Loved this! Marie Tharp appeared in the BBC Earth Story from the 80s (or was it 90s?) It is a fabulous series including the development of the theory (then) of continental drift. Narrated by biologist Aubrey Manning, rocks never sounded so interesting! Where David Attenborough's Life series told us about the evolution of life on earth, Earth Story provides the geological angle.
Continental drift is false. The ocean map which this video (never showed!) debunks continental drift and Pangae! The real secret of the Ocean Floor Map is, it shows that all continents where connected as a smaller sphere! Look at the map!
Love the statement "turn the tide". She's wrong though.
6B vital brazil
She's really inspiring
Chinese, Portuguese and Spanish, these are the three languages that this video has been translated into by our talented and generous YouTube friends!
Why was this not taught to me in school!?!?
Here is a 2006 NYT video about her https://www.nytimes.com/video/magazine/1194817114284/marie-tharp-b-1920.html Such an inspiration!
the irony of men doing hard science, whilst saying it's bad luck to bring a woman on a ship…