"Geology has not brought losses in any country of the world" (Antoine de Saint-Exupery, the author of "The Little Prince").

Geoscience is the study of the earth's history and how it functions and interacts with

the surrounding biospheres. Geoscientists study the earth's many different facets, including its geological composition, processes, and history.

The demand for specialization exists and the crisis we are experiencing does not mean that the specialization is not important.

The search for energy and alternatives will continue, whether petroleum, fossil fuels, or otherwise.

A matter of time and prioritization.

A good signal

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It would imply that there is need to modify the course by integrating current demands. Or burrow skills from other discipline.

Yes, I think that.

I agree with doctor Sadiq Kadhem Abd Ali , I think its a positive sign

Regards

Yes, I think that

There are many other subjects one could occupy besides oil which covered the planet with pollution and weather problems.

I found out children get very excited with geology, so education is a subject that needs new recruits.

My group had some success with diamonds recently, yet we are unable to find experts to help us with interpretation. Thus, gems and gem-hunting is another subject of new interest.

Lets take the positive side of opening new channells and future educational opportunties in geoscience and other sciences.

I was taught in 1961 that Geologists had been ignoring refractive indices (RIs) to their own disadvantage. I was also taught that some subjects had been completely removed from the literature. I decided to study the RIs displayed by powdered mineral separates anyway. That led to studying RIs displayed by whole-rock powders. My work is intended to do for liquid-immersion, double-variation work on powders what Felix Chayes did to make thin-section studies statistically significant. Difficulties publishing have suggested that such work truly may have been mostly removed from the literature.

The trick to creating statistically significant RI data sets is to abandon (at least for that part of an optical study) the traditional approaches of Optical Mineralogy, which involve orienting each particle to a known optical direction before comparing its RI to that of a previously calibrated immersion liquid. Using the Becke line (see videos on Web), one can simply count a bunch of RIs as L, E, or G (Lesser, Equal to, or Greater than), compared to the RI of the liquid at the given temperature and light wavelength; given total count at each location, L% and E% are quickly calculated and G% is then known and can be mostly ignored.

Given some simple microscopes and a few adaptations, the counting is something that could be done by alert grade-school students, in a course that would combine an introduction of Geology with introductions also to fundamental statistical comprehension via normal-probability paper; or, to using computers to generate detailed RI plots in 3D.

Production-line applications of the method could rather rapidly generate standards that would permit Geologists to picture mineral and rock chemistries, insofar as those are closely related to RIs.

There is no reason for Geology courses to be on the decline. There is a need for Geologists not to be afraid to count. ;-)

If this has created any interest at all, I hope that you will see at least these three (3) files

Preprint#4: https://tinyurl.com/y76yba6n

(Click Download to get 4 May 2020 PREPRINT#4)

Raw data: https://tinyurl.com/v9u4hkf

Video: https://tinyurl.com/uajcnxx (open in a video player)

and maybe some of these

Supplemental materials: Folder https://tinyurl.com/to8tsbt

I also hope that you will share with me any thoughts you may have about how I could improve any aspect of my work and tell me how my work relates to yours.

Please enjoy the attached art, which was created during study of the above-referenced video.

With all best wishes for your own continuing successes! :-)

Sincerely, -Steve- [email protected]

It is understandable why studying the geosciences – particularly for careers in petroleum – might strike a student as a bad idea. This concept is not new, and it is hogwash !!! I graduated from the Colorado School of Mines with a Professional Degree in Geophysics in 1958, and every so often, this idea arises.

Petroleum exploration is tremendous and pays a lot of bills, but so does coal exploration and mine planning, sulfur too, site characterization, road construction – anything that requires scientific measurement has a positive effect on society. Besides, the contribution of geology and geophysics to the academic understanding of the earth, specifically Plate Tectonics, is useful in too many ways to list.

Bravo, Ernest Berkman! Well said!! :-)

Sincerely, -Steve- [email protected] ... https://tinyurl.com/to8tsbt

"Geology has not brought losses in any country of the world" (Antoine de Saint-Exupery, the author of "The Little Prince").

Whereas it is true that there's a paradigm shift towards renewable energy alternatives, and an increasingly integration of computer-aided simulations and modelling across fields of Geosciences, none of these can truly substitute for the place of field-based geological studies. We need these softwares and models but to complement the traditional geological techniques not necessarily to replace them! When we apply this approach of integrating traditional and computer-aided techniques, our datasets and interpretations are not only robust but become more reliable!

I fully agree, Edafe Ominigbo ... so long as you have no objection to carrying new tools into the field. ;-)

I have applied my own approaches on a hilltop during a snow storm near Elko, Nevada, uSA, using a portable microscope and plastic film for polarizers. You can see the apparatus at https://tinyurl.com/y7xyndkx and can learn more by visiting at least these four (4) files,

1. Preprint#4: https://tinyurl.com/y76yba6n

(Click Download to get 4 May 2020 PREPRINT#4)

2. Raw data: https://tinyurl.com/v9u4hkf

3. Video: https://tinyurl.com/uajcnxx (open in a video player)

4. 20200512 1325 Final E% COORDINATES & MORE .pdf, https://tinyurl.com/y9lrmnec

and maybe also visiting some of the other Supplemental Materials in folder https://tinyurl.com/to8tsbt .

I also hope that you will share with me any thoughts you may have about how I could improve any aspect of my work.

With all best wishes for your continuing successes! :-)

Sincerely, -Steve- [email protected]

It may strike a student as a bad idea to study petroleum but fortunately fundamental field geology is not restricted to petroleum, water resources, paleoseismology, river dynamics, natural hazards such as landslide, volcanos, earthquakes, floods also require going on the field and mapping! Tech has its limitations (many satellite photographs were misinterpreted for instance, it's hard to distinguish a cliff from a fault scrap just with a slope interpolation). Going on the field is very important. And rock study, if not for natural resources, is far from complete many geology maps are poorly detailed. Students are well aware that natural processes linked to global warming need studying. Fundamental geology is far from dead, for many reasons.

Thank you for your excellent response, Maureen Llinares!

-Steve- [email protected]

I agree /endorse many prev. scientists who replied the question. Consider this downtrend as opportunity as petroleum and Mineral exploration is going to be there in long future.

Thank you very much for sharing that perspective, Sudhir Shukla!

Sincerely, -Steve- [email protected] ... https://tinyurl.com/to8tsbt