Table of Contents
Why did Wegener travel to the atmosphere?
Why did Wegener travel to the atmosphere in a balloon? because he wants to take measurements of the atmosphere.
Why did Alfred Wegener want to go to Greenland?
With the idea of continental drift fresh in his mind, Wegener was enthusiastic for another trip into the polar climate. The expedition’s purpose was reach the crossing of the inland ice of Greenland from east to west—an aim they had failed to reach in the first Greenland expedition.
Where did Wegener go to school?
Philipps-University Marburg1909
Humboldt University of Berlin1905Humboldt University of Berlin1899–1904Heidelberg University1899–1904University of Innsbruck1899–1904
Alfred Wegener/College
What else did Alfred Wegener do?
Alfred Wegener, in full Alfred Lothar Wegener, (born November 1, 1880, Berlin, Germany—died November 1930, Greenland), German meteorologist and geophysicist who formulated the first complete statement of the continental drift hypothesis. He made three more expeditions to Greenland, in 1912–13, 1929, and 1930.
Why was Wegener’s theory rejected first?
Wegener also suggested that India drifted northward into the asian continent thus forming the Himalayas. This idea was quickly rejected by the scientific community primarily because the actual forces generated by the rotation of the earth were calculated to be insufficient to move continents.
Why did no one believe Wegener’s theory?
The main reason that Wegener’s hypothesis was not accepted was because he suggested no mechanism for moving the continents. He thought the force of Earth’s spin was sufficient to cause continents to move, but geologists knew that rocks are too strong for this to be true.
What was Wegener’s theory called?
continental drift
In the early 20th century, Wegener published a paper explaining his theory that the continental landmasses were “drifting” across the Earth, sometimes plowing through oceans and into each other. He called this movement continental drift.
What are Wegener’s three observations?
Alfred Wegener, in the first three decades of this century, and DuToit in the 1920s and 1930s gathered evidence that the continents had moved. They based their idea of continental drift on several lines of evidence: fit of the continents, paleoclimate indicators, truncated geologic features, and fossils.
What was the response to Wegener’s hypothesis?
“That was always his response: Just assert it again, even more strongly.” By the time Wegener published the final version of his theory, in 1929, he was certain it would sweep other theories aside and pull together all the accumulating evidence into a unifying vision of the earth’s history.
Why was Pangea not accepted?
Despite having this geological and paleontological evidence, Wegener’s theory of continental drift was not accepted by the scientific community, because his explanation of the driving forces behind continental movement (which he said stemmed from the pulling force that created Earth’s equatorial bulge or the …
What was the major problem with Wegener’s ideas?
The greatest problem facing Wegener was the lack of direct evidence for the movements of continents (no GPS at the time!) and no mechanism was known to be powerful enough to move entire continents.
What caused Pangea to break up?
About 180 million years ago the supercontinent Pangea began to break up. Scientists believe that Pangea broke apart for the same reason that the plates are moving today. The movement is caused by the convection currents that roll over in the upper zone of the mantle.