Principles of Geology

Wow. When I bought this book I wasn't expecting much because it is so old but wow. It really enjoyed it.

Lyell's contribution to science is most often reduced to a bullet point in a list titled "Influences on Darwin". In fact, Lyell stands as a bridge roughly halfway between Newton and Darwin. Call him, if you will, the missing link. But it seems a funny thing happens when you contribute to one of the greatest breakthroughs (evolution) in the history of thought: your work is only seen in relation to its intellectual cousin and, thus, much of the heart of your contribution is overlooked. This might even be expected, but what is a little more surprising is that even those Lyellian insights of major importance for Darwin never make it into the bullet point. * Lyell 1830: deep time, gradualism, 'present key to past' A variety of scientists, including Lyell's (and Darwin's) forerunner Hutton, were already discussing gradualist change over deep time spans, by the time Lyell came on the scene. Lyell presented more empirical evidence than his predecessors -- an unabridged copy of 'Principles' is a hefty package. You might never get through it unless you're stuck on a sailing ship for three years. And, at least as importantly as the extensive cataloging of evidence, Lyell did a wonderful job at articulating the reasoning behind a different kind of science. Much of the discourse on Earth history before Hutton and Lyell was basically either Biblical literalism or unrestrained fancy: both kinds of "cosmogony" worked with an understanding that prehistoric Earth operated on "principles" very different from those at work presently. In consequence, anything went in making up stories about the past. Lyell argued that, instead, scientists needed to restrict themselves to testable hypotheses. Testability for Lyell was about observation, not experimentation, but the principle at work, as with experimentation, was that science had to be empirical. The historical science of Lyell actually required a philosophical point which Newton's didn't: that not only is everything we see now acting according to repeatable patterns, but anything we can suppose about former states falls under the same restrictions. This difference might seem trivial or even imaginary to a 21st-century perspective. But Newtonian physics was an accepted system within the 18th century, whereas gradualism in Earth history was not accepted until later. It could only have been the case that people accepted the universality of Newtonian laws across human experience without having also accepted that all material events, including the primordial past, could be explained by present conditions. Lyell titled his work after Newton's 'Principia' because his goal was to establish "general principles". But, unlike Newton, Lyell didn't mean universal ... just general. This difference was what made it so important for Lyell to travel so very widely as he did -- the example he set is still indispensable in geological training, and is forcefully argued by Lyell early on in his book. He shows how seve

It was on reading Darwin's The Voyage of the Beagle that I became aware of Charles Lyell. Darwin went to the trouble (in the 1830's) of having the volumes of Principles of Geology sent out to him in South America as they were published. Lyell's seminal importance was hammered home when Darwin in The Origin Of Species, could only advance his ideas thanks to Charles Lyell's insights. In this volume we are treated to Lyell's razor-sharp intellect cutting through prevailing humbug to construct an amazingly accurate picture of the history of the earth's crust. Above all he challenged (with all due respect) religious orthodoxy of a Creation in recent times. Lyell also takes up and successively demolishes many of the erroneous, flabby-thinking, and sometimes cranky theories put forward by various researchers in the field. Lyell's argument for the immense antiquity of the earth is persuasive and provided the foundation for Darwin's argument for evolution, which required immense periods of time to work. He points out how, as rocks get more ancient, so the proportion of extinct marine creatures increases. This was the second insight to inspire Darwin: that in the history of the earth, most species that have ever lived have become extinct. Lyell struggled with the notion that species could die off and others "be called into existence", yet he had the courage to follow his logic to the correct conclusion. He even said that: "In the universal struggle for existence, the right of the strongest eventually prevails...", a phrase that Darwin picks up and paraphrases 20 years later in his Origin of Species. Lyell successfully argues the amazing idea that some rocks now found at the tops of mountains were originally laid down in the oceans. He works out how, through analysis of earthquakes and volcanoes, how this could have happened. The Lisbon earthquake showed how land could sink too - 600 feet below the waves. Of course he had no idea of the help given by plate tectonics - a notion that took another 130 years to be evidenced let alone accepted. This edition is in fact an abridged version of the original. However, by cutting out heavily detailed supporting evidence which, in today's world we do not need to convince us, is a boon for the general reader. The editor puts in an explanation of what he has cut out in the appropriate point in the text. Lyell writes with erudite elegance and illustrates his points with quotations from the classics. He expected the reader of the time to know them but our editor here has helpfully supplied the citations. All the way Lyell anticipates objections to his theories and carefully and accountably meets them and disposes of them. In this, Lyell shows the way for Darwin to do the same thing in the Origin 25 years later. Today we are taken aback by some of the prejudices he has to dispel. For example the prevailing belief in Noah's flood and the believers' obsessive searching for proof of it in the geological record. Lyell

This book essentially launched geology as a science. A welcome addition to the library of anyone who cares about how curiosity generates science.

I have to be honest with you guys: I have not read this book yet (although I will soon). However, if we keep in mind that this book was written by one of the most famous British geologists of the XIX century, we will certainly find it great. It is good to mention that this was the book that Charles Darwin took with him in his famous trip around the world aboard the Beagle, around 170 years ago. After having read it, Darwin witnessed the effects of an Earthquake in South America, and confirmed the teachings of Lyell. Lyell and Darwin actually met and shared their findings on the Earth's physics. I think that rather than considering this book as a novelty in the Earth Sciences, what is most valuable are the original descriptions of the dynamic forces shaping our planet, seen from the point of view of one of the pillars of the Geology as a Science. If you like Earth Sciences, don't miss the chance of reading this jewel of the history of Geology.