"Fundamentals of Hydrology" Book Review
By: Maryellen Elizabeth Hart
Geology 110 Summer 2018 Bz 220 Evolution
June 24, 2018 and June 12, 2019
Quick summary: Edited version of my book review of "Fundamentals of Hydrology" By Tim Davie, and my hypothetical assertions that earth's revolution within the galaxy and the galaxy through the universe affects climate and biological evolution creating periodic cycles in climate and evolutionary trends.)
"Fundamentals of Hydrology" is a required textbook for all Hydrology and Climatology majors. Tim Davie's thoughtful, sequential approach in presenting the basic concepts of Hydrology are extraordinarily clear, factually supported and well explained. Excellent diagrams and data.
Tim Davie raises extremely provocative evidence contained in his presentations of Paleoclimatology (historical geological records of earth's climate from the beginning of time). Tim Davie's evidence points to challenging perspectives of atmospheric carbon being affected by earth's force majeure (volcanoes, plate tectonics, meteor impacts, etc.), more than the given human being's careless mismanagement of by-products of civilization.
Tim Davie's presentation of earth's historic temperature variations reveals challenging perspectives of cyclical (regular periodic) variations between earth's ice age and tropical atmospheres, with a subordinate effect of atmospheric carbon influencing the earth's biosphere's temperature. Tim Davie's paleoclimatological evidence reveals that the temperature changes of the earth's surface (Biosphere) is impacted by something greater than carbon emissions. (Yikes, what could that be???) The evidence points to earth's revolution (three hundred plus some million years) through the universe periodically pulls earth away from the sun and causes regular periodic climate change. The other influencing variables: carbon emissions, ozone, various pollutants, regular periodic meteor impact, volcanic activity, plate tectonics are subordinate variables influencing earth's surface temperature (and resulting climate and resulting evolutionary trends.)
Meteor impact not only caused great clouds of dust and ash, but also causes volcanic activity and an increase in the degree of crustal movement (called plate tectonics.) Resulting in the movement of earth's continents and re-positioning the continents toward new climatic zones (ex. equatorial tropical, temperate or polar freeze). Dust clouds created by meteor impact clears within a decade, plate tectonic movement affects the climate of the continent across many millennium (in contrast with the three hundred plus some millions of earth's revolutionary path around the sun). Distance from the sun is the greatest factor influencing planet earth's biosphere and temperature. And the distance from the sun is also influenced by meteor impact (earth is slightly moved (shifted) from its' axis and from its revolution around the universe.) Meteors are in earths' revolutionary path around the universe and earth regularly passes through meteor belts, and those impacts influence the climate (temperature) and biological evolution. Biological evolution may be regularly set back by these periodic revolutions through the universe and the resulting force majeures and patterns of evolution cyclically restarted for both microscopic and macroscopic evolutionary origins as earth travels with its galaxy through the universe.
The greatest influence of climate change is earth's distance from the sun (force majeure) affected by a three hundred plus some million year revolution. (With periodic change in climate flip-flop occurring about every one hundred fifty to two hundred million years (tropical>ice age>tropical>ice age.)) However, human being's stewardship of planet earth requires human beings to monitor and adjust carbon emissions, ozone, atmospheric toxins, etc. appropriately with great care. Tim Davie's research shows the cyclical climate changes evidenced in paleoclimatology and earth's geological record are influenced in subordinate ways by human life's emissions, waste and management.
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1xw8yYxrZBtlvGG-tAp5_4UXnk3IEz2yIoWSvH6AkvsE/edit?usp=sharing Fundamentals of Hydrology.
Paleoclimatology and Evolutionary Trends
Maryellen-
Long-term climate changes are caused by variations in Earth's orbital and rotational motions: its eccentric orbit, axial inclination, and precession. These are collectively called Milankovitch cycles; see this Wikipedia summary:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
Hope this helps.
Well,
I quote from the attached pdf (Evolution on Planet Earth).
Temperature and its geological controls Although the direct effects of high temperatures on physiology, populations, and chemical cycles in the biosphere have important implications for evolutionary potential, as discussed in the preceding section, the full story of the role of temperature in evolutionary history can be told only when we have taken full account of the geological factors that control temperature on the Earth's surface. Surface temperatures in the photic zone, that part of the biosphere where primary production of organic carbon through photosynthesis is taking place, are affected by the movement of materials and heat among the atmosphere, water, soil, crust, and mantle. These movements and relationships, which involve a host of positive and negative feedbacks, are far from being understood completely (for a review see Raven, 1998). Instead of dealing with this subject in all its complexity, I shall try to show that the geological processes and conditions which bring about an increase in temperature or a broadening of warm belts magnify the effects of the higher temperatures themselves on evolutionary opportunity. One mechanism that can trigger global warming is the addition of such greenhouse gases as carbon dioxide (CO2), water vapor (H2O), and methane (CH4) to the atmosphere, where these gases trap heat (see Crowley and North, 1991). The mantle is the principal source of new CO2 for the biosphere. Volcanic eruptions, underwater hydrothermal activity, and the metamorphism of carbonate rocks as the latter sink and are heated in the mantle, liberate CO2 into the ocean and atmosphere. These mantle sources become increasingly important during times when continental blocks break apart and then separate along mid-ocean ridges (see McLean, 1985; Larson, 1991b; Kaiho and Saito, 1994). As heat rises up through the mantle into the crust, the mid ocean ridges displace large amounts of seawater onto low-lying parts of adjacent land masses, with the result that sea level rises (see also Arthur et al, 1985; Nance et al, 1986; Veevers, 1990). In these shallow coastal or inland seas, sediments collect rapidly and productivity is high. Meanwhile, the open ocean receives relatively little sediment and may become relatively unproductive (Fischer and Arthur, 1977; Hallock and Schlager, 1986; Garzanti, 1993).
Regards
I do not believe that the forces of the Universe greatly influence our climate, rather the Sun by its radiation and power of attraction and the Moon in the tides, by its proximity.
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