Stepping Stones: The Making of Our Home World

By Stephen Drury

The Earth has been evolving for the past five billion years, the result of the dynamic interplay of astronomical, physical, and chemical forces that range from the vast to the barely perceptible. Now, in Stepping Stones, Stephen Drury illuminates the processes that have formed the Earth, creating the atmosphere, the oceans, the continents, and life itself.
Looking at the astonishing leaps and near catastrophes that have occurred along the way--intermingled with inexorable but slow change--the book interweaves the evidence from geology, physics, biology, and chemistry, to tell an extraordinary story . We discover how the Earth works--the interaction of geothermal and solar energy, the role of the atmosphere, and the impact of tides and rotation. We learn how matter originated in processes in the stars and how it is assembled in planetary systems, and we discover how the Earth came to have a Moon through a giant collision--and its consequences for the evolution of Earth and life. Drury discusses the origin of atmosphere and water by volcanic activity, the paradox of the cold young Sun and the essential role of carbon dioxide in avoiding an ice-bound planet, and he evaluates theories for the origin of life in light of the chemistry of the early Earth. He describes the supercontinents Rodinia and Gondwanaland, the icehouse and greenhouse worlds of the last billion years, the Cambrian explosion of life forms, and finally human origins and evolution.
An original and stimulating account of the history of our home planet, Stepping Stones does for the Earth what Carl Sagan did for the cosmos--it offers general readers an illuminating tour of a fascinating and little-known area of science.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0198502710
• ISBN13: 9780198502715
• Release Date: September 1999
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 432 Pages
• Weight: 1.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.5" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

Fascinating Book

This is one of the best books out of the hundreds I've read on astronomy, earth science and biology. This is the rare book that weaves together these disciplines. If you read one book on how our planet got to where it is, and where it's going, this is the one.

Wonderful Exposition!! As Gripping as a Good Novel.

Dr. Drury has produced a much needed lay-person's exposition of Earth science - Bravo! To paraphrase his words, this book provides the complete story which is sketched out in several contemporary works dealing with life sciences and origins.On the down-side, the reader is forced to read the authors' (short but frequent) political commentary peppered throughout the work. Marx, Engels, Lenin and other economic/political writers are quoted throughout. In most cases, the quotes are forced and read as though they were inserted in spite of the otherwise wonderful text.

Life returns to geology!

Drury has done for geology and the evolution of Earth and life what Carl Sagan did for the cosmos. In Stepping Stones you can see how chemistry, physics and biology combine with the evidence from rocks, and begin to understand the highly complex and extremely long past from which our own evolution has sprung. Heady stuff, but surprisingly easy to read.

Can I be a geologist, please!

For years I have been interested in geology and the evolution of life, but have rarely found any general book aimed at the non-specialist. Stepping Stones breaks completely from the single-topic approach and takes on probably the broadest scope of any book I have read - the entire evolution of our home planet, the life upon it and our own emergence from a history of quiet change interspersed with unimaginably violent events over almost 5 billion years. It links geology through physics, chemistry and biology to astronomical factors. Forget the Whole Earth Cookbook; Stepping Stones tells our story. Like all good reads, it contains a sting in the tail and blends fact, theory, speculation and some wry humour. I can't say that it is an easy read, but truly found it hard to put down. What I particularly like about it is the way that the author has divided the text into more than 20 chapters, each of which is almost self-contained and possible to read in an evening. I don't know how he did it, but the huge amount of content links together wonderfully. My favourite passage - where he jokingly links our irritating cough reflex to the survivors of a volcanic holocaust 25 million years ago when the atmosphere was thick with noxious fumes, and 90 percent of all life perished. Every living thing today descends from those survivors, and I laughed to think we may owe our being to the plague of concert halls. What I learned most - how humans evolved through a repeated sequence of huge climate and environmental shifts, which helped hone our ancestors survival skills, and generally how evolution is as much a product of outlandish chance as it is of slow change governed by genes pitted against surroundings. If I were younger, I would enroll for a geology course, and would feel confident that I could master any specialist detail thrown at me, now that I have grasped the fullest possible context from Stepping Stones!

Excellent, thoughtprovoking, but slow

I just finished it. It was a really great book. It is somewhat technical, as of course is must be, without going over the top.But not being trained in neither geology, chemistry or biology it was slow work on my part. 5-10 pages max. per sitting. Too much info to digest.But well worth the effort.