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Plate Tectonics Versus Earth Crust Displacement???

Critics of earth crust displacement (ECD) have frequently tried to belittle Albert Einstein’s enthusiastic support for Charles Hapgood’s theory of earth crust displacement. If the theory of earth crust displacement is silly, as the ECD critics imply, then does that make Professor Einstein silly? They don’t want to say that. So instead they try to put words into Einstein’s mouth. They say Albert Einstein was not a geologist and if he had lived that he would have recognized that the theory of plate tectonics superseded Hapgood’s theory. They falsely assume that Hapgood’s theory is in conflict with plate tectonics. On page 3 of the first edition of When the Sky Fell we explained the actual relationship between plate tectonics and earth crust displacements:

“Plate tectonics and earth crust displacement both share the assumption of a mobile crust. The ideas are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary. Plate tectonics explains long-term, slow changes like mountain building, volcanic activity, and local earthquakes. Earth crust displacement accepts that these processes are gradual but posits a much more dramatic and abrupt movement of the crust that can explain different problems such as mass extinctions, glaciation patterns, and the sudden rise of agriculture.”

Moreover, Albert Einstein did not have to be a geologist to understand that Hapgood’s theory was addressing significant, long-standing, unsolved problems. For instance, the rapid, violent melting of the former ice sheet on North America some 11,600 years ago is something that plate tectonics is incapable of explaining. But there is even a more serious objection to the assumption that you have to be trained in the field of geology in order to be able to make contributions to the field. Alfred Wegner, the early pioneer of plate tectonics, was trained as an astronomer not a geologist. Under the criteria that the ECD critics make about Albert Einstein, Alfred Wegner wasn’t qualified to create his theory. Looking at the history of science in a broader perspective we see that Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions demonstrates again and again that major paradigm shifts are typically initiated by investigators untrained in the field where they make their breakthroughs.

While Albert Einstein may not have the geological credentials demanded by ECD critics, the other prominent scientist who ALSO wrote a Foreword to Hapgood’s book most certainly did. It is curious that ECD critics fail to report Professor Kirtley Mather’s support for Hapgood’s theory of earth crust displacement.

Kirtley F. Mather (1888-1978) was one of the most prominent geologists of the twentieth century. He was the Head of the Geology Department at Harvard University and served as the President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He was elected four times to be the President of the American Academy of Arts and Science. He was one of the few scientists who stood up to Joseph McCarthy. He prepared the geological deposition for Clarence Darrow in the famous “Scope’s Monkey Trial” when the theory of evolution was challenged in the courts. Stephen Jay Gould regarded Professor Mather as his mentor. In his Foreword to Hapgood’s book, Mather wrote:

“The numerous unsolved problems to which Mr. Hapgood directs attention should be the subjects of intensified debate among scientists in very part of the world.”

Both Mather and Einstein knew something of the philosophy of science. They understood that the unsolved problem is the basic unit of scientific exploration. Theories are like nets designed to capture and explain problems. Hence the importance that Mather gave to the earth crust displacement theory’s ability to address “numerous unsolved problems.”

A brief look at some of the chapter titles of Hapgood’s Path of the Pole demonstrates the unsolved problems that he was addressing:

Chapter 2: The Failure to Explain the Ice Ages.

Chapter 3: The Failure to Explain Climatic Change.

Chapter 5: The Violent Life of the Great Ice Sheet.

Chapter 6: The Sudden Melting of the Ice Sheet.

Chapter 10: The Extinction of the Mammoths and the Masodons.

Chapter 11: The Evidence of Violent Extinction in South America.

None of these problems can be adequately explained by plate tectonics. That doesn’t mean that plate tectonics is wrong. It simply means that in order to address serious unsolved problems, like those listed above, we need an additional theory of how the earth works. Plate tectonic explains gradual changes and earth crust displacement explains abrupt changes. “The ideas are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary.”