THE EARTH SYSTEM

Earth is a unique place, home to 1 millions of organisms, including our selves. No

other planet we've yet discovered has the same delicate balance of conditions necessary to
sustain life. Geology is the science that studies Earth: how it was born, how it evolved,
how it works, and how we can help preserve its habitats for life. Geologists try to answer
many questions about Earth's surface and interior. Why do the continents expose dry land?
Why are the oceans so deep? How did the Himalaya, Alps, and Rocky Mountains reach
their great heights? What process generated island chains such as Hawaii in the middle of
the Pacific Ocean and the deep trenches near the ocean's margins? More generally, how
does the face of our planet change over time, and what forces drive these changes? We
think you will find the answers to these questions quite fascinatingthey will allow you
to look at the world around you with new eyes. Welcome to the science of geology!
We have organized the discussion of geology in this book around three basic
concepts that will appear in almost every chapter: (1) Earth as a system of interacting
components, (2) plate tectonics as a unifying theory of geology, and ( 3 ) changes in the
Earth system through geologic time.
We will also introduce you to a geologist's view of time. You may start to think
about time differently as you begin to comprehend the immense span of geologic history.
Earth and the other planets in our solar system formed about 4.5 billion years ago. More
than 3 billion years ago, living cells developed on Earth's surface, and life has been
evolving ever since. Yet our human origins date back only a few million yearsa mere
few hundredths of a percent of Earth's existence. The scales that measure individual lives
in decades and mark off periods of human history in hundreds or thousands of years are
inadequate to study Earth.
To explain features that are millions or even billions of years old, we look at what is
happening on Earth today. We study our complex natural world as an Earth system
involving many interacting components, some beneath its solid surface, others in its
atmosphere and oceans. Many of these componentsfor example, the Los Angeles air
basin, the Great Lakes, Hawaii's Mauna Loa volcano, and the continent of North America
are themselves complex subsystems or geosystems. To understand the various parts of
Earth, geologists often study its geosystems separately, as if each existed alone. To get a
complete perspective on how Earth works, however, scientists must learn how its
geosystems interact with one anotherhow gases from volcanic systems can trigger
changes in the climate system, for example, or how living organisms can modify the
climate system and, in turn, be affected by climate changes.