Lord Kelvin and the Age of the Earth [electronic resource

Burchfield charts the enormous impact made by Lord Kelvin's application of thermodynamic laws to the question of the earth's age and the heated debate his ideas sparked among British Victorian physicists, astronomers, geologists, and biologists."Anyone interested in geologic time, and that should include all geologists and a fair smattering of biologists, physicists and chemists, should make Burchfield's commendable and time-tested volume part of their personal library"—Brent Darymple, Quartely Review of Biology Front Matter....Pages i-xii Introduction....Pages 1-20 Kelvin and the Physics of Time....Pages 21-56 Kelvin’s Influence: The Initial Reception....Pages 57-89 The Triumph of Limited Time....Pages 90-120 Opposition and Controversy....Pages 121-162 Radioactivity and the Age of the Earth....Pages 163-211 Conclusion....Pages 212-218 Back Matter....Pages 219-260 Charlie is a young boy with a real talent for writing, but one day he notices that words have appeared in his notebook that arent his. What is the story his notebook seems so desperate to tell? Why does his creepy headmaster seem so desperate to get the notebook from him? This chilling book will keep readers guessing until the last page.