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What is Earth Sciences and the History of It
Earth Sciences
The name earth sciences refers in general to all scientific fields that study the earth and its atmosphere. They include geography, geology, geophysics, as well as scientific branches of mineralogy, oceanography, and meteorology. All of them are closely linked not only to each other but also to related sciences. The most important related sciences are chemistry, physics, biology, and history.
Within the framework of various segments, geology deals mainly with the rocks of our Earth (petrography), both on the surface as well as in the interior of the earth. It involves the study not only of the present state but also of how it was in the past and how it has changed during the course of Earth’s history – how it happened, etc. It includes the impact of exogenous forces such as the sun, wind, water, and ice; and endogenous forces such as convective flows in the interior of the earth, volcanic activity, earthquakes, plate tectonics, etc. Paleontology studies plant and animal fossils and thus acquires knowledge of the past. This knowledge provides valuable help for geological dating (historical geology).
Astro-Meteorology and Hurricane Season 2010
Astro-meteorology is the practice of making long-range weather forecasts based on the ancient rules of astrology. One of the 20th centuries foremost astro-meteorologists was G.J. McCormack, known as the weather prophet of Fair Lawn, New Jersey. Back in the 60s when John Campbell was editor of Analog (Science Fiction-Science Fact) magazine, G.J. McCormack participated in an experiment with Analog to see if weather patterns could be predicted on a long-range basis for six consecutive months. McCormack provided long-range forecasts based on astro-meteorological techniques. The United States Weather Bureau’s Long-Range Weather Outlooks were published for the same forecast period along with McCormack’s forecasts. A third random type of forecast was also generated by a spin-the-wheel type of apparatus, which at times resulted in bizarre forecasts of blizzards in mid-July etc.
When all was said and done and the three sets of forecasts were compared with the actual weather patterns experienced, McCormack’s astro-meteorological forecasts were consistently rated 94 percent accurate. The random forecasts were rated 17 percent higher than the Weather Bureau’s Long-Range Weather Outlooks.