Category
Earth Science
Explore the 21 entries currently assigned to this category. These counts describe this curated catalogue, not the size or rate of change of the field itself.
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Not a fact anymore
Volcanic hotspots are perfectly fixed points in the mantle and therefore provide an absolute reference frame for plate motion.
What we know now
Hotspots are relatively stable compared with moving plates, but some can migrate, interact with mantle flow, or change position. Different hotspots do not define one perfectly rigid reference frame.
- Status
- Narrowed
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈30 years
- Changed approximately
- 1990s–present
Not a fact anymore
Earth’s continents and ocean basins occupy essentially fixed positions.
What we know now
Earth’s rigid outer layer is divided into tectonic plates that move relative to one another. Continents form parts of these plates and are carried along as the plates move.
- Status
- Superseded
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈115 years
- Changed approximately
- 1950s–1960s
Not a fact anymore
The ocean floor is as ancient and permanent as the continents.
What we know now
Oceanic crust is continuously created at mid-ocean ridges and destroyed at subduction zones, so it is generally much younger than continental crust. The oldest surviving ocean floor is only a small fraction of Earth's age.
- Status
- Superseded
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈113 years
- Changed approximately
- 1950s–1960s
Not a fact anymore
Meteor Crater in Arizona was formed by a volcanic or underground steam explosion.
What we know now
Meteor Crater formed about 50,000 years ago when an iron-nickel asteroid struck northern Arizona at high speed.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈75 years
- Changed approximately
- 1900s–1960
Not a fact anymore
Mountain ranges form mainly because a cooling Earth contracts and wrinkles.
What we know now
Most major mountain belts form because tectonic plates move and interact. Continents can collide and thicken the crust, one plate can sink beneath another at a subduction zone, and faulting, volcanism, uplift, and erosion then shape the resulting mountains.
- Status
- Superseded
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈110 years
- Changed approximately
- 1910s–1960s
Not a fact anymore
Ice sheets are static blocks of ice resting motionless on the land.
What we know now
Ice sheets flow under their own weight. Ice moves from the interior toward fast-flowing outlet glaciers and ice streams, while snowfall, melting, fracture, and ocean interaction continually change the system.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈107 years
- Changed approximately
- 20th century–present
Not a fact anymore
Earth's magnetic field has always pointed in roughly the same direction.
What we know now
Earth's magnetic field has reversed polarity many times. Rocks preserve intervals when magnetic north and south were opposite their present orientation.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈100 years
- Changed approximately
- 1920s–1960s
Not a fact anymore
Earth's entire metallic core is liquid.
What we know now
Earth's core has two main layers: a liquid outer core surrounding a solid inner core. Earthquake waves reveal the difference because different kinds of seismic waves travel differently through solids and liquids.
- Status
- Narrowed
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈21 years
- Changed approximately
- 1936–1970s
Not a fact anymore
Earth is only tens or hundreds of millions of years old.
What we know now
Earth formed about 4.54 billion years ago. Radiometric dating of meteorites, lunar material, and Earth's oldest minerals and rocks all support this age.
- Status
- Corrected
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈75 years
- Changed approximately
- 1890s–1950s
Not a fact anymore
Earth's magnetic field is produced by permanent magnetism in its iron-rich core.
What we know now
Earth's main magnetic field is generated by a geodynamo in the liquid outer core. Hot, electrically conducting metal moves through the core, creating electric currents that continually sustain the magnetic field. The core is far too hot to behave like an ordinary permanent bar magnet.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈269 years
- Changed approximately
- 1910s–1950s
Not a fact anymore
Global sea level is essentially fixed through geological time.
What we know now
Sea level has repeatedly risen and fallen by tens to more than 100 meters as ice volume, ocean temperature, seafloor shape, and tectonics changed.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈110 years
- Changed approximately
- 19th–20th centuries
Not a fact anymore
Earthquakes are generated mainly by subterranean winds, gases, fire, explosions, or related volcanic processes.
What we know now
Most damaging earthquakes result from sudden slip on tectonic faults as accumulated stress overcomes friction. Volcanic processes can generate earthquakes, but they are only one specialized source.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- Not quantified
- Changed approximately
- 19th–20th centuries
Not a fact anymore
Beyond the Arctic belt of ice lies a large, navigable open sea surrounding the North Pole.
What we know now
The central Arctic is an ocean historically covered by extensive sea ice, although the ice is seasonal and rapidly declining under modern climate warming. Polynyas and local open water do not imply a permanently open polar sea.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈28 years
- Changed approximately
- Late 19th-century Arctic exploration
Not a fact anymore
Vast ice sheets never covered northern Europe and North America.
What we know now
During repeated Pleistocene glaciations, continental ice sheets thousands of meters thick covered much of northern North America and Eurasia.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈40 years
- Changed approximately
- 1830s–1870s
Not a fact anymore
Volcanic eruptions are driven by underground combustion or chemical fires involving substances such as sulfur, coal, or other combustible materials.
What we know now
Volcanoes are driven by molten rock and expanding gases, not by underground fires. Magma forms within Earth and can rise because it is buoyant. As pressure falls during ascent, dissolved gases come out of the magma and expand, sometimes powering explosive eruptions.
- Status
- Superseded
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- Not quantified
- Changed approximately
- Late 18th–19th centuries
Not a fact anymore
Most major rocks, including granite and many volcanic rocks, precipitated from a primordial ocean that once covered Earth.
What we know now
Rocks form in several fundamentally different ways. Igneous rocks such as basalt and granite crystallize from molten rock; sedimentary rocks form from deposited material or substances precipitated from water; and metamorphic rocks form when older rocks are transformed by heat, pressure, or fluids.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈23 years
- Changed approximately
- Late 18th–early 19th centuries
Not a fact anymore
A vast southern continent must exist to balance the large landmasses of the Northern Hemisphere.
What we know now
Earth's continents are products of plate tectonics and geological history; there is no physical requirement for land area to be symmetrically balanced between hemispheres. Antarctica exists, but it is not the enormous temperate Terra Australis imagined on early maps.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- Not quantified
- Changed approximately
- 18th-century Pacific exploration
Not a fact anymore
Thunderstorms and lightning are produced by the ignition or explosion of sulfurous, nitrous, or other combustible vapors in the atmosphere.
What we know now
Lightning is a large electrical discharge produced after charge separation creates sufficiently strong electric fields within storms or between clouds and the ground. Thunder is the acoustic shock produced by rapid heating and expansion along the lightning channel.
- Status
- Superseded
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈52 years
- Changed approximately
- Mid-18th century
Not a fact anymore
California was an island separated from mainland North America.
What we know now
California is part of mainland North America. Baja California is a peninsula bounded by the Pacific Ocean and the Gulf of California, while the modern U.S. state of California is continuous with the continent.
- Status
- Corrected
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- ≈83 years
- Changed approximately
- Kino's overland expeditions, 1698–1701; peninsula map published in Europe in 1705
Not a fact anymore
Some shell-, bone-, or organism-shaped stones are generated inside rocks by mineral or 'plastic' forces rather than being the remains of once-living organisms.
What we know now
Fossils are preserved remains, impressions, traces, or other evidence of past life. They typically form when organisms or traces are buried and preserved in sediment, sometimes with later mineral replacement.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- Not quantified
- Changed approximately
- Late 17th–18th centuries
Not a fact anymore
The equatorial 'torrid zone' is too hot for humans to inhabit.
What we know now
Humans live throughout the tropics and near the equator. Equatorial regions are generally warm, but habitability depends on rainfall, altitude, ecology, infrastructure, adaptation, and many other factors. There is no lethal solar heat barrier around the equator.
- Status
- Overturned
- Category
- Earth Science
- Accepted for
- Not quantified
- Changed approximately
- Late medieval–15th-century travel and exploration
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