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INTRODUCTION TO EARTH SCIENCE

I. Degrees of Scientific Certainty

II. Scientific Method

III. Categories of Earth Science

IV. Why Study Earth Science

V. Practice Questions

I. Degrees of scientific certainty

Hypothesis - is an idea that may or may not be true.

Theory - is a relatively well established explanation or model.

Natural Law - describes a process that never varies.

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II. Scientific Method

Steps in the Scientific Method -

1. Recognize a gap in general knowledge that poses a question.

2. Review any available explanations that might answer the question.

3. Propose many (multiple) working hypotheses that answer the question.

4. Test the hypotheses with objective experiments (tests).

5. Reject those hypotheses that fail the tests until only one is left.

6. Have other researchers repeat the experiments to confirm the conclusions.

Uniformitarianism -

In many instances, earth scientists develop hypotheses and theories by using the principle of uniformitarianism, which states that physical processes that we can observe operating in the universe today have always operated in the same way.

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III. Categories of Earth Science

Earth science consists of four categories of study -

Astronomy - study of the universe.

Meteorology - study of Earth's atmosphere.

Oceanography - study of Earth's hydrosphere (ocean part).

Geology - study of Earth's geosphere (solid Earth).

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IV. Why study earth science -

Understanding the phenomena of earth science and the potential natural disasters that are earth science oriented, allows students to prepare and to cope with such natural disasters when they occur.

Examples are: meteorite impacts, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, earthquakes, landslides, and volcanic eruptions.

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V. Practice Questions

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