Prof. A. Wegener was a German meteorologist. He proposed this hypothesis to explain the climate of the past. Prominent evidence is available that tropical India, Brazil (South America), South Africa, and Australia were glacierized in the coal epoch.
This is possible only when it is assumed that in the past the distribution of climate belts on the continents was different. Geologists proposed a vast continent. He determined the idea that there is horizontal movement inside the continental sim.
Related-
- Explain the meaning of Physical Geography. Explain its Scope and Importance.
- Explain the composition of the Earth’s Womb.
- Write the Main Hypotheses Related to the Origin of the Earth.
All the continents were joined together in the coal cycle. The name of this combined land area was named Pangea. The rest of the earth was covered by a vast ocean called Panthalassa. Pangea was a small continental ocean on the horizontal. In the Proto-Great Age, Australia, Antarctica, the Indian peninsula, Africa and South America were together called the Gondwanaland of the southern group. On the other hand, North America, Europe, and Asia were the land parts of the northern group, Laurasia. Between the land parts of these two groups was the Tethys sea.
The combined land parts of these two groups were named Pangea. Wegener made it clear that the present continents were interconnected as one wide part. Apart from this, Wegener also assumed that the South Pole was located near the southern coast of Africa, but the current distribution of continents is due to the breakup and displacement of Pangea. Due to displacement force, Wegener said the effect of differential gravitational force on Siel. Due to this force, the continents were shifted in two directions, one due to the effect of the difference in gravity, the continental displacement towards the equator, and due west due to tidal. Thus it is seen that the land part of Africa and the European group was displaced by the influence of the first power, as a result of which the distribution of land and water part is seen on the earth’s surface in the present era. Not only this, but the said scholar has also tried to show which part of Pangea broke apart under his continental displacement hypothesis.
The first form is of the Coal Age, the second form is of the Adi New Age and the third form is of the fourth Mahakalpa.
Criticisms by Scholars
In opposition to the hypothesis, some scholars have presented the following points
Contrary to the Hypothesis –
1. Under this hypothesis, no such force has been told, which can cause displacement in the continents. According to Begner, tidal force is the cause of the westward displacement of continents. But only if it is 10,00,00,00,000 times the current power, it can be able to move the continent. But if so much power was used in continent displacement, then it would have completely stopped the rotating power of the earth in a single year.
2. The equatorial force stated by Wegener is also not capable of such continent displacement. If there was such a power that is capable of continent displacement, then under the influence of that power, the terrestrial parts would have gathered near the equator. But Holmes has explained this by saying that the terrestrial part could not converge at the equator because of another force that was acting opposite to the displacement force.
3. The third main thing concerning the above hypothesis is that part of the continent which Wegener has considered to be made of Siel, how can it flow on Simai, while according to Willis Simai is considered to be more rigid than Siel. According to Bobby, Siel is more powerful than Sim, so Siel cannot make a turn by swimming on it.
4. In opposition to Wegener’s hypothesis, geologists say that according to the ‘Jig Saw Fit’ theory, Africa and South America fit together and Australia and New Zealand fit in the Arabian Sea, but West Greenland, Bayfinland, and between them The oceanic parts of it do not sit anywhere.
Fundamentals of the hypothesis
1. Under this hypothesis, the continental displacement towards the west and the equator appear difficult, but this type of continental displacement was estimated by F. V. Taylor before Wegener. He accepted Wegener’s idea of displacement from the two poles to the outward and radial motion, as a result of which the formation of many mountains and islands in the northern hemisphere has been considered. The French scholar Snyder also made the same suggestion.
2. Here within a few years, the followers of Wegener have presented much evidence in favor of continental displacement, by which the horizontal movement of the land’s crust is proved. According to the ideas of the present era, hundreds of kilometers of wide speed are required in the formation of mountains. Thus it is inferred that the formation of mountains may have done a lot of work of continental displacement, so Wegener’s idea of displacement seems to be correct.
3. Wegener was an astrologer, but he presented much evidence regarding continental displacement from geophysics, geophysics, etc., whose basis is as follows-
(a) There is a similarity between the coasts of the North and South Atlantic Oceans. According to the ‘Jig Saw fit’ principle, North America and Greenland are merged into Europe and East of South America.
The eastern coast is well connected with the western coast of Africa.
(b) The surface structure of both the coasts of the Atlantic Ocean is similar. The mountains of Western Europe and the Appalachian Mountains of North America are known to have formed at the same time. The Arabian plateau, the plateau of southern India, and the plateau of western Australia are known to be made of hard rocks of the same age.
(c) Fossils of ancient flora and fauna found on either side of the Atlantic Ocean are similar to each other. The coal rocks found in both parts are similar in that coal mines are present. The same type of coal is found in Western Europe, the British Isles, and the Appalachian regions of North America. The similarity is also seen in the vegetation sequence from the northern rocks. Dutoit sir explained these things.
Views of four scientists on the origin of continents and ocean floor
Lapworth, Jeans, Daly, Jolie, Wegener, and Arthur Holmes have different views regarding the process of origin of continents and oceans.
According to Lapworth, the contraction and contraction of the earth’s surface caused large-scale compression and contraction. As a result of which continents and oceans were formed.
Jaffray propounded the thermal contraction hypothesis and suggested that the contraction of the Earth and the decrease in its rotational speed helped in the origin of the continents and oceans.
According to Daly, there was a continent on Earth, Pangea, and the ocean Panthalassa. But due to the excess of gravity, the continents got fragmented and the oceans formed between the broken fragments. He named this theory the continental drift hypothesis.
In Wegener’s hypothesis, the current description of different continents and oceans is given due to the dislocation and break-up of the old Pangea continent.
Holmes’s convection current hypothesis is based on radioactivity. This is a more settled hypothesis. According to this, where the currents rising above and below the continent separate from each other, the continent becomes thin and breaks up.
The long Sacred Sea is born. In this, the depressions of the continents accumulate and then concave and give birth to mountains. During the formation of mountains, the terrains move away from each other and then come closer. In this way, the continents keep on shifting and this is possible by the convection current.