{"id":28284,"date":"2022-02-24T22:13:48","date_gmt":"2022-02-25T06:13:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=28284"},"modified":"2022-02-24T22:13:48","modified_gmt":"2022-02-25T06:13:48","slug":"geology-geography-in-an-ever-changing-world","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/geology-geography-in-an-ever-changing-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Geology, Geography, In an Ever-Changing World"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

Some people may say we experience peace and harmony in the world, or at least until recently. Although, I personally did not experience the Second World War, I have passionately engaged with the history of that time period. The books, the people, the places and the events have impact on my world view. In my many travels throughout Europe, before GPS, I used various maps. Most of those maps are obsolete today. I love to observe the changes in landscape as I travel. One of my favorite road trips is from my town in Southern Poland to Bratislava, Vienna, or on to Switzerland. Most of the highway is a deep valley with high out cropping on both sides. Speckled along those high points are castles, monasteries, and ruins. While I have often thought about the people who once occupied these places, I have never considered the influence of what lay below the surface, or the fourth dimension. [1] It is hard to imagine how one map can impact the world for decades, yet the events of the last twenty-four hours have that potential.

It is difficult for me to not be distracted by the map of Central Europe, as so many of the people I care so deeply about are scrambling to make sure their basic needs are met, as they work to help those women and children who are seeking refuge in Poland, while their men are left behind. I cannot help but look at Simon Winchester\u2019s The Map that Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology,<\/em>\u00a0[2] in the light of the map that is being altered yet again at this moment.

Simon Winchester is a journalist and author of more than twelve nonfiction books. While The Map that Changed the World,<\/em>\u00a0[3] reads more like historical fiction it covers the genre of History, Biography, Geography, and Geology. This enjoyable read explores the developmental history of the Industrial Age, while weaving in the difficult yet unexceptional life [4] of William Smith, his observation of strata and the impact that discovery had on how humanity sees the world.

William Smith\u2019s passion, persistence, and love for the elements of the earth is inspiring. His childlike inquisitive nature, joy of discovery, together with his detailed observation skills and systematic meticulous note taking provided [5] the substance for the map that changed the way humanity looks at the earth. Smith discovered that the earth\u2019s surface layers actually have meaning and purpose. His observations of the fossils within those layers revealed that older layers were on the bottom and the newer layers toward the top of any given piece of land. This information became the \u201ccornerstone of all geography.\u201d [6]

These discoveries called into question the dominate thinking of the time, which permeated from the church which determined that the earth came into being exactly as described in Genesis, \u201c9 A.M., Monday, October 23, 4004 B.C.\u201d [7] I can imagine that this created a landslide of questions about God, the teachings of the church. How did the changed perceptions of the age of the earth impact people\u2019s understanding of God\u2019s sovereignty?<\/strong> At this same time James Hutton, also understood that the earth is in a constant state of change. [8] If this is true, I wonder how much the earth has actually changed since the beginning of creation and what is the proportion of that change in relationship to the time period of global warming?<\/strong> The Creation story tells us that humanity has a responsibility to steward the earth (Genesis 2:15) [9] but if it is always changing is it possible to stop global warming? If humanity remained in a closer partnership with the Creator, would we be better able to manage our ever-changing resources with integrity?<\/strong>

The idea that this one map changed the world is a bold statement, however it did impact thinking in regard to Creation and the church. It impacted and streamlined industry by making the excavation of resources more predictable. I have heard it said that natural resources are one of the main reasons for war. I do not know much about how all these things connect but where the resources are and who has control of those resources do play a role.

_________________________________________
[1] J. M. Bridgeman, \u201cThe Beguiling Magic and Mystery,\u201d January Magazine, October 2001, http:\/\/www.januarymagazine.com\/nonfiction\/mapthatchanged.html.
[2] Simon Winchester and Soun Vannithone, The Map That Changed the World: William Smith and the Birth of Modern Geology, 2016.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Bridgeman, \u201cThe Beguiling Magic and Mystery.\u201d
[5] \u201cThe Map That Changed the World,\u201d Kirkus Reviews Issue, May 20, 2010, https:\/\/www.kirkusreviews.com\/book-reviews\/simon-winchester\/the-map-that-changed-the-world\/.
[6] Chris Lavers, \u201cCharting the Underworld,\u201d The Guardian, July 6, 2001.
[7] Winchester and Vannithone, The Map That Changed the World, 13.
[8] Ibid., 69.
[9] Richard Sasanow, The NIV Study Bible\/10th Anniversary Edition (Place of publication not identified: Zondervan, 1995), 9.

<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Some people may say we experience peace and harmony in the world, or at least until recently. Although, I personally did not experience the Second World War, I have passionately engaged with the history of that time period. The books, the people, the places and the events have impact on my world view. In my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":140,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2228,2230,2229,1950,1044,59,39,354],"class_list":["post-28284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-geology","tag-simon-winchester","tag-william-smith","tag-biography","tag-creation","tag-geography","tag-history","tag-resources","cohort-lgp11"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/140"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28284"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28284\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28287,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28284\/revisions\/28287"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}