Talk:Earth science
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[edit] List of Earth Science topics
The list of Earth Science topics - this is at risk of just becoming one huge list of anything that's related. Should we perhaps weed it down only to include the Earth Science disciplines (i.e. geology, oceanography, geochemistry, geophysics etc)? cferrero
- This isn't my area, but I suggest you Be bold in updating pages :-) -- Tarquin 17:50 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)
I agree that a list of quite specialised discliplines (-ologies) is unhelpful here, especially without any context i.e. general field under which they fall. These lists of topics need at least to be organised into which sphere of the Earth they apply to (i.e. geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, cryosphere etc.) or possibly removed to pages covering that general area. Otherwise people new to this field will just get put off.
- Since no-one objected to this suggestion above, I'll have a go. You can all pull me apart afterwards ;) Tonderai 18:51, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)
- These are the aspects changed:
- Position Earth Science as a subset of planetary science (which covers all planets), and a special case because it is the only known life-bearing planet.
- Introducing the major topic areas based on the '-spheres' of the Earth - I think this is the clearest way to set out the main areas. Tonderai 19:39, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)
- Also introduced major areas of systems approaches to Earth science
- Hopefully I've introduced some kind of logical framework to this now, whether it is the right one I don't know. Should provoke some debate anyway. Also, the subject list is heavily biased towards geology, and many of the links are non-existant or very short stubs. I think this area needs some work ;) Tonderai 21:58, 3 Dec 2003 (UTC)
I removed It is analogous to the term "Life Science" because it isn't. Life sciences includes things like optometry and psychology. Earth sciences does not. Source: [1]. Angela 18:18, Sep 19, 2003 (UTC)
Should we actually title a list "partial list of"? Surely we should put "list" if we aspire to list all (and put a note in talk so the rest of us can fill them in) or if it is intended to stay selective "list of major"... or whatever // (talk)--BozMo 19:59, 10 May 2004 (UTC)
[edit] Formatting issue with Opera
Hi: In Opera 7, the top of the Earth Science page (language listing) spills into the logo - I don't know that this is an editable issue but may be more of a coding issue - haven't checked out many other pages but the couple of others I viewed seemed to be ok. Jules (julian@jrickards.ca.nospam)
[edit] Earth science and geology
To me, these two names are synonyms, just like bioscience and biology (geology = Earth study/science). I was always tought that atmospheric sciences and all that was a category of geology. When did this change, who chose the name and why? --Friðrik Bragi Dýrfjörð 10:28, 21 October 2005 (UTC)
- It's quite possible to be an earth scientist, work in an earth sciences department, be typing on a computer in one right now in fact, and not be a geologist! Mineralogy and mineral physics, for instance, has much more in common with solid-state physics and inorganic/crystal chemistry, particularly at the theoretical end of the subject (we publish in Physical Review B, Journal of Physical Chemistry, Chemical Physics Letters, Acta Cryst... not in geological journals, which is a decent rule of thumb for working out where the boundaries are crossed; in fact, the mineralogy degree at the University of Cambridge crosses over with the Materials Science course, not with the Geological Sciences course (which isn't a pre-requisite or even very helpful for the mineralogy courses). Of course, there is substantial overlap with the mainstream of the geological sciences, particularly in mantle chemistry (eg the olivine-spinel transition and the 410 discontinuity in seismology), but any field which tries to embrace atmospheric chemistry, deep-earth seismology, paleontology, petrology and fundamental solid-state physics (ferro/piezo/pyro-electricity, elasticity, percolation theories of radiation damage, etc etc etc) is necessarily going to be an extremely broad church. -- sorry, no user account, 24th October 2005
- I understand the difference, but the naming is terrible. You see, when you say: "It's quite possible to be an earth scientist, work in an earth sciences department, be typing on a computer in one right now in fact, and not be a geologist!", you are practically stating that an earth scientist is not the same thing as earth scientist, because earth-science = geo-logy. It's like making physics a category of interaction sciences or something similarly stupid. The only reason you see a difference is because historically geologists where just people that gathered rocks and named them. There is no reason to make it a subcategory of earth science (which either way, is bad naming), just because the science has change dramatically in the last 50 years. We didn't change the name of physics because we can use computer simulation and math alone to study things, we just talk about experimental and theoretical physics. --Friðrik Bragi Dýrfjörð 17:03, 1 November 2005 (UTC)
- I am afraid that geology as a terms is probably now used more in the sense of this article than the way you were taught. All words even in science are malleable. As long as we are consistent in the article it is OK IMHO. Oh and there is always the problem of lunar geology - if we take the original meaning of geology this is a contradiction in terms. (oh and the atmospheric science people at the University of Cambridge work in the Department of Applied Maths and Theoretical Physics, Chemistry department and Geography and not earth which shows how useful traditional definitions are these days) --NHSavage 16:19, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
I was always thought that geology studies the solid earth while others like hydrology, pedology, athmospherical sciences study the other spheres and everything is systematized in physical geography. The scientific terms are never right. The term geography comes from the greek words Earth and to describe, which is much older origin (first used by Erathostenes 2000 years ago) while the term geology was firstly used by Jean-André Deluc in the year 1778.GeoW 08:49, 14 April 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Earth System Science
I think this article needs some careful thought about the conection from interdisciplinary science to Earth system science. I doubt for example that many oceanographers consider the ocean in complete isolation from meteorology (winds play an important role in ocean currents for example) or hydrology (fresh water). In the past each discipline has tended to see these as external forcings but as the models and scientific understanding improves it becomes harder to ignore all the feedbacks. Climate models are central to this but many other fields are recognising it. I'll work on an improved draft but if anyone else has ideas let me know or make changes.--NHSavage 16:19, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
- I have modified the structure somewhat to try and make things better but any feedback welcome.--NHSavage 22:40, 19 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Converging sub-domain terminology
RJBurkhart 14:42, 15 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] What a mess
This article is faulty. Geophysics is not a subdiscipline of geology. Geomagnetism is a subdiscipline of geophysics, not geology. Mining is engineering, not a subdiscipline of geology. Do not confuse mining geology with mining. Physical geodesy is a subdiscipline of geodesy, not geology. Seismology is a subdiscipline of geophysics, not geology. I can see that the earlier versions of the article correctly categorized geology, geophysics and geodesy as separate earth sciences, which is how they should be kept. Geology is not a synonym for earth sciences (or geosciences). Any geologist or geophysicist can tell you that.
- OK - how's it look now? Reshuffled a bit and called it solid Earth instead of geology, does that stomp on anyone's turf toes :-) To me it's all geology, but I'm just a bit biased. And - geology is interdisciplinary, moved mineralogy up and atmos sciences too. Vsmith 02:32, 17 January 2006 (UTC)
[edit] New user box and category of possibe interest
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This user is a geoscientist or is specializing in geoscience. |
Perhaps a WikiGeoProject could be organized sometime. I agree with the above unsigned comment, geophysics is another example of a geo-related article in need of serious attention. - Eagleamn 05:56, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Earth science footer
I've put together a template for the earth sciences. Please do the WP thing. Template:Earth science Cheers, Daniel Collins 22:50, 21 March 2006 (UTC).
[edit] Environmental science?
I was wondering why Oceanography is considered part of Earth science while Environmental science is not? Thank you. — RJH (talk) 15:09, 22 February 2007 (UTC)
[edit] The solar system
whats the perpose of it oh and don't get me wrong I happen to love science infact tomorrow I'm going to take a test on it and make an A on it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 168.11.79.148 (talk) 17:50, 6 March 2007 (UTC).
