• Biography:

He was born in 1880. He was a german meteorologist and geophysical, and he is so popular because he proposed the theory about continental drift.

Before the 1st World War, Wegener worked as a teacher. During this time he started to think about his theory about the continental drift  which he shared in 1912. But he didn’t worked just as a teacher.  Wegener was also working as a meteorologist in the army. After the war and during his life he was focused on hi ideas and he published some books about it until he died in 1930.

• Wegener’s theory:

Wegener proposed his theory in 1915. It was based on the similitudes of the shapes of the continents, how they could fit (for example Africa and South America). He also took into account that if we look at the fossils found in different places in the Earth, they are very similar. Some geologist at that time explained it saying that some bridges were there to join the continents, but it means that huge masses of land were able to appear and disappear during the history, and this is why Wegener rejected. He said that the explanation to those fact was that, once, continents were joined in a biggest one called Pangea.

In his original thesis, he said there was a biggest mass more dense than the Earth and the continents were moving like a carpet on the floor, but he explained that it was caused by the movement of rotation of the Earth and because of the effects that the moon and sun cause in tides.

But at first this theory was rejected by a lot of geologists because of the force that is needed to move the continents that was invisible.

 

Nowadays, this theory is accepted and called “the theory of the sea-floor spreading”. Both are included in the “theory of the tectonic plates” since 1960. This theory says that this is a phenomenon which occurs since million years ago and it is caused because of the movement of the mantle.

Posted by: Silvia and Carla