How did the continents and islands appear? What determines the name of the largest plates of the Earth? Where did our planet come from?
How it all began?
Everyone at least once thought about the origin of our planet. For deeply religious people, everything is simple: God created the Earth in 7 days - and that’s the point. They are unshakable in their confidence, even knowing the names of the largest lithospheric plates formed as a result of the evolution of the planet's surface. For them, the birth of our stronghold is a miracle, and no arguments of geophysicists, natural scientists and astronomers can convince them.
Scientists, however, are of a different opinion, based on hypotheses and assumptions. If they make guesses, put forward versions and come up with a name for everything. The largest plates of the Earth are also affected.
At the moment, it is not known for certain how our firmament appeared, but there are many interesting opinions. It was the scientists who unanimously decided that once there was a single gigantic mainland, which, as a result of cataclysms and natural processes, split into parts. Also, scientists came up with not only the name of the largest plates of the Earth, but also designated small ones.
Theory on the Edge of Fiction
For example, Immanuel Kant and Pierre Laplace - scientists from Germany - believed that the Universe emerged from a gas nebula, and the Earth is a gradually cooling planet, the earth’s crust is nothing but a cooled surface.
Another scientist, Otto Yulievich Schmidt, believed that the Sun, when passing through a gas and dust cloud, captured part of it. His version is that our Earth was never completely molten matter and was originally a cold planet.
According to the theory of the English scientist Fred Hoyle, the Sun had its own twin star, which exploded like a supernova. Almost all the fragments were thrown over vast distances, and a small amount remaining around the Sun turned into planets. One of these fragments became the cradle of mankind.
Version as an axiom
The most common history of the occurrence of the Earth is as follows:
- About 7 billion years ago, a primary cold planet formed, after which its bowels began to gradually warm up.
- Then, during the so-called “lunar era”, red-hot lava in gigantic quantities poured onto the surface. This led to the formation of the primary atmosphere and served as an impetus for the formation of the earth's crust - the lithosphere.
- Thanks to the primary atmosphere, oceans appeared on the planet, as a result of which the Earth was covered with a dense shell, representing the outlines of oceanic depressions and continental ledges. In those distant times, the area of water significantly prevailed over the area of land. By the way, the earth’s crust and the upper part of the mantle is called the lithosphere, which forms lithospheric plates that make up the general “appearance” of the Earth. The names of the largest plates correspond to their geographical location.
Giant split
How did continents and lithospheric plates form? About 250 million years ago, the Earth looked completely different from what it is now. Then on our planet there was only one, just a giant continent called Pangea. Its total area was impressive and equal to the area of all existing continents, including islands. Pangea was washed from all sides by the ocean, which was called Pantalassa. This huge ocean occupied the entire remaining surface of the planet.
However, the existence of supermaterial turned out to be short-lived. Processes raged inside the Earth, as a result of which the mantle substance began to spread in different directions, gradually stretching the mainland. Because of this, Pangea was first divided into 2 parts, forming two continents - Laurasia and Gondwana. Then these continents also gradually split into many parts, which gradually diverged in different directions. In addition to new continents, lithospheric plates appeared. From the name of the largest plates, it becomes clear in which places giant faults formed.
The remains of Gondwana are Australia and Antarctica known to us, as well as South African and African lithospheric plates. It is proved that these plates are gradually diverging in our time - the speed of movement is 2 cm per year.
The fragments of Laurasia turned into two lithospheric plates - North American and Eurasian. Moreover, Eurasia consists not only of a fragment of Laurasia, but also of parts of Gondwana. The names of the largest plates forming Eurasia are Hindustan, Arabian and Eurasian.
Africa is directly involved in the formation of the Eurasian continent. Its lithospheric plate slowly approaches the Eurasian plateau, forming mountains and elevations. It is because of this "union" that the Carpathians, Pyrenees, Ore Mountains, Alps and Sudetes appeared.
