The revolutionary impact of the Deep Time concept: Geology’s modernity and societal implications

This is a Preprint and has not been peer reviewed. The published version of this Preprint is available: https://doi.org/10.2110/sedred.2022.1.1. This is version 1 of this Preprint.

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Authors

Andrea Fildani

Abstract

I propose throughout this short op-ed that Geology, as one of the most recently established core sciences, is the one most at risk of societal misinterpretation precisely because of its innovativeness. The discovery of ‘deep time’ and the revelation of temporal change were triggered by the advance of geological methodology, which pushed the boundary of the scientific establishment of the time (1). These discoveries had profound societal implications that are deeply embedded into the scientific progress of the last few centuries but we, at times even geologists ourselves, still struggle to fully embrace the historical aspect of geology, instead accepting it as a ‘derivative’ of the physical sciences (2). By the end of this op-ed I will reason that geology expands on the physical sciences and should be involved at all decision-making levels, and that geologic literacy should become a top priority in terms of public education and policy making.

DOI

https://doi.org/10.31223/X5SD12

Subjects

Education, Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Keywords

Deep time, philosophy of science, Geology, Earth history, philosophy of geology, History of geology, policy and geology

Dates

Published: 2022-02-05 01:13

Last Updated: 2022-02-05 09:13

License

CC BY Attribution 4.0 International

Additional Metadata

Conflict of interest statement:
None

Data Availability (Reason not available):
Not available