ANT 100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Overproduction, Zygosity, Uniformitarianism
Document Summary
Living things were thought to have undergone no change since they were divinely created. There was a fixed number of kinds of living organisms. The beings on earth represented a great chain of being. Unilinear gradation (based on divine perfection higher archy of meaning) The earth was thought to be very young. Using passages of the bible, irish archbishop james usser (1581-1656) The creation of the earth to sunday, oct. 23 in 4004 b. c. Earth was less than 6000 years old. Scientists could clearly see that the earth had changed enormously. Scientists could also see that the earth was much older than 6,000 years. They do not explain the slow change. They tend to suggest fast or abrupt change. Features of the earth are the result of periodic geologic revolutions. Catastrophism is not a religious idea (ie: great flood, red river) Cuvier model: slice of a land and see what happened over time (revolutionary)