Jean-Baptiste Élie de Beaumont

Jean -Baptiste Armand Louis Léonce Élie de Beaumont, called Élie de Beaumont, ( born September 25, 1798 in Canon in Caen, Calvados DPTM; . † September 21, 1874 ) was a French geologist. When his most important contribution to science is now the first geological map of France. Essential aspects of his theory of the origin of the Cordillera and its cause ( suspected contraction of the Earth) were instrumental for the most part of the 19th century, but are now considered outdated.

Life

His education was Élie de Beaumont at the Lycée Henri IV, where he won first prize in mathematics and physics; at the École Polytechnique, where he passed the final exam as the best; and from 1819 to 1822 at the École des Mines ( School of Mines ) in Paris, where he developed a decided preference for the geology. In 1823 he was, together with Pierre Armand Dufrenoy selected to participate in a research trip to England and Scotland. Their joint professor Brochant de Villiers wanted a hand visit the mining and smelting of the country, on the other hand, study the principles by which George Greenough's geological map of England (1820 ) was made ​​because it was intended a similar card for France to create.

1829 Élie de Beaumont was even appointed professor of geology at the École des Mines. He was succeeded by Brochant de Villiers, whose assistant he had already been since 1827. In 1832 he also took on Georges de Cuvier's chair at the Collège de France. His lectures of the years 1843 to 1844 were published in two volumes. From 1833 to 1847 he has also held the office of chief mining engineer of France, after which he was appointed general inspector. It was made in 1852 to a French senator By a decree of the President; and after the death of François Arago in 1853 he was elected permanent secretary of the Académie des sciences ( French Academy of Sciences). 1861 he was appointed Vice- President of the Conseil général des Mines and the Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour. In 1868, he became the first director of the newly established Land Survey Office. His growing reputation secured him membership in the Prussian Academy of Sciences in Berlin (now the Berlin- Brandenburg Academy of Sciences), and the Royal Society in London. In 1860 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina.

Work

Under the influence of the journey of Alexander von Humboldt in South America ( 1799-1804 ), on who had taken care of Humboldt with the spatial distribution of the local mountain ranges, Élie de Beaumont presented a paper in 1829 read before the Academy of Sciences, and he further elaborated to 1852. As a follower of Cuvier, he represented in the view that the contact surfaces on which package of rocks, often collide with a distinctive angle, and where often observed a striking change in the fossil content is ( unconformities ), were caused by catastrophic upheavals in the earth's history. This " revolution ", he said, could be traced back to particular phases of the orogeny. On the other hand, the study of the position of unconformities within the stratigraphic rock sequence would allow the relative dating of this mountain building phases. Based on ideas of René Descartes, Élie de Beaumont saw the cause of the orogeny in the steady cooling of the once red-hot molten earth system and the resulting shrinkage of the earth's crust.

In his first presentation, he distinguished four different " systems " (or orogenies, as we would say today). Although he now encountered in the course of its further field work on so many unconformities that he had to increase the number of required orogeny phases considerably, he stayed with his katastrophistischen basic concept: The sudden Empor shoot the mountain masses of the ground must have triggered devastating tidal waves that then great mass extinction of flora and fauna led. Although the katastrophistische approach since the mid 19th century, was displaced by the actualism, with its slow, steady development of the Earth's, it turned Élie de Beaumont's idea of ​​the shrinking earth body to the early 20th century, the tectonic basic idea to explain the formation of mountains dar.

In his search for regularities in the course of formation of mountains ( even by Humboldt had speculated that the main directions of the first mountain could represent a kind of " crystal lattice " on the surface of the solidifying Earth ) came Élie de Beaumont to the view that all the mountain chains to same mathematical great circle on the earth's surface are parallel, should also have arisen at the same time. He also believed that there was a symmetrical relationship between these great circles, in the form of a network of pentagons ( pentagonal dodecahedron, one of the five Platonic solids ), which shall overlay the entire earth's surface. Because of its prominent position in the then academia Élie de Beaumont was this daring theory argue for a while, but she was already not widely accepted by his contemporaries. A sophisticated critique of the theory practiced already William Hopkins, as part of his birthday address to the Geological Society of London 1853. Indirectly, they proved to be of great value to the geology, as their advocate, she to prove their ( unsuccessful ) attempts on the ground significantly contributed to the increase of knowledge of the structure of chain mountains.

Today, instead, applies the publication of the detailed geological map of France 1: 500 000, as his greatest work. She appeared in 1840 ( with two text volumes in 1841 and 1878). During this time also Élie de Beaumont published many important memoranda on the country's geology, and after his retirement at the École des mines he supervised the issuance of the cards almost until his death.

Aftereffect

It seems in the history of geology no matter how outdated and discredited theory to give than that not a few of its elements could unexpectedly appear later. In the context of today's plate tectonics one goes not more of a shrinking earth body, but from a largely stable radius of the Earth, but some theorists looking back to fixed points under the earth surfaces, such as the hot spot under Hawaii and Iceland, where Heated jacket material in convection rises, and strive to connect them with other features, such as in Vietnam and Peru, where this material is to go back. The geometric patterns which connect such hypothetical fixed points together would, Élie de Beaumont probably fallen. Also, mathematical models for calculating Seebodenspreizung describe the individual sections of the volcanically active mid-ocean ridges as parts of great circles, and it is believed that the opening of each ocean leads elsewhere on the Earth's surface for the simultaneous formation of a new mountain range.

The 3117 m high Mount Elie de Beaumont in New Zealand and the moon crater Beaumont are named after him.

Writings

• Léonce Élie de Beaumont: Recherches sur quelques - Unes of Révolutions de la surface du globe. Annales des Sciences Naturelles, vols 18, and 19; From 1829 to 1830.
• Léonce Élie de Beaumont: Leçon de géologie pratique; Lectures, 1845-1849
• Léonce Élie de Beaumont: Notice sur les systèmes of montagnes. 3 vols, Paris, 1852.