Nov 14– From “Uniformity of Change” by Sir Charles Lyell (1830)
Summary: Stuff moves in different ways. Some of that helps show evolution. Some explains earthquakes. (Honestly a bit of a grab bag tonight.)
Commentary: This is the second Lyell reading (I think these are from the same book, but not the same lecture) and I'm colder on him than the other science bits in 15MAD. He's less accessible, these very much feel like geology lectures for geologists, compared to the more layman/student perspective of some of the others. He makes a lot of references to other books/lectures that I haven't read, unlike the mostly stand alone other selections. Geology is also just less interesting. Gravity, electricity, vaccinations, these are all things that effect our day to day life in a very concrete way. Yes, the shapes of land masses and stuff effect us, but you don't actually see it happening (there's a reason they call them geologic time scales).
There is some evolution in here. As always, it's interesting to see how much people had figured out about evolution pre-Darwin. He was kind of more of a Steve Jobs than a Steve Woz (not that that doesn't have value).
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