Strickler’s Laws of GeoFantasy

I love being a geologist. Along with being able to spend my life outside and in nature (and drink a lot of beer in my salad days — it’s one of the requirements for a degree in Geology), I also get to satisfy my lifelong rebellious nature — I was, after all, a flower child of the 60s.

One of the problems I always had (and still do) with the more traditional sciences is all the damn rules that control what happens. Consider physics and the Law of Gravity. Pick up a rock and let go. What happens? It falls to the earth… every time! One can even calculate to the nanosecond how long it will take to hit the ground… every damn time! How boring is that?

Geology has no hard and fast rules, much less Laws. If physics worked like Geology, every now and then the rock would hover in mid-air for a bit and then launch itself towards someone and bonk them on the nose. How cool would that be? I had a student several years back who was driven absolutely crazy by this loss of guidance and predictability, but for myself I find the lack of control to be comforting.

Geology does have some quasi-principles that work — at least most of the time. Some of the traditional favorites include: Uniformity (“the present is the key to the past,” and the fundamental basis of my soon-to-be-released novel); the Principle of Superposition (lots of exceptions to this one); the Principle of Original Horizontality (even more exceptions); and my personal favorite (because it nearly always works), the Principle of Cross-Cutting Relationships. There are a few more, but for the most part that’s about it. (I have a discussion of these on my GeoMania website. Click here if you are interested.)

The good news is that there actually are some Laws that can work within the Earth Sciences. Since I discovered them I get to name them, so we have Strickler’s Laws of GeoFantasy that let us assume a bit of predictability in nature. There are six so far, and you can click here if you want a more complete description of what they are and how they help keep us sane in a bewildering world.

But for now, here’s a short summary of each:

The 1st Law of GeoFantasy:

“All regional theories break down at the local level”

This relates to the forest and trees concept. In any study of earth, it is often valuable to define a regional model for a specific situation (such as plate tectonics as a unifying concept for the internal processes of our planet). Unfortunately, the earth is such a complex organism that attempts to define “the big picture” often fail to hold up when viewed at the local level. The 1st Law of GeoFantasy tells us that this is okay… and even expected. All geologic work is really just a progress report, and subject to revision.

The Roche Corollary: “There is some concern that Strickler’s 1st Law of GeoFantasy effectively negates all of his other laws. If there are exceptions to all rules, then by definition there can be no rules. Therefore, there MUST be catastrophic processes, some things must exist that NEVER make it to the beach, sooner or later water HAS to lose, and so forth. Basically, Strickler is a bozo and needs to do additional research.” Thank you, Derek!

The 2nd Law of GeoFantasy:

“There are no catastrophic processes, only catastrophic events”

Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, tsunamis, and other natural “disasters” all seem to be such potent catastrophes. And they are… at least to the humans who get in the way. But a catastrophe implies a sudden and generally negative event. In every case, earth processes are very slow in building (at least in our view of earthtime). In general, all most of us see or appreciate is the “catastrophic” culmination of the process — a shake, an eruption, a flood, or whatever.

The geologist’s favorite expression may be: “The mills of the gods grind slowly, but they grind exceeding fine.” This pretty much sums up the 2nd Law of GeoFantasy (and in only twelve words to boot).

The 3rd Law of GeoFantasy:

“The earth breaks what it makes and puts it in the ocean”

The earth makes lots of stuff: minerals, rocks, mountains, giant pandas, baby bunnies, even people. Because of the way water works, it is able to weather and/or dissolve anything and everything… if given enough time (and the earth surely has plenty of this!). All this weathered and dissolved stuff moves downhill into a stream or river, and, over the course of geologic time, finds it’s way to the ocean.

The 4th Law of GeoFantasy:

“Water always wins”

If there is magic anywhere on earth, it’s got to be in the water. Not only does water make a great liquid refreshment, it also has the power to dissolve anything and everything… again, if given enough time. NOTHING can withstand the power of water, and everything that exists will ultimately be dissolved, broken into little pieces (and then dissolved), or in some other way altered into new and different forms. Water ALWAYS wins!

The 5th Law of GeoFantasy:

“The earth is not your mother”

Moms are remarkable, and not least among their many traits is their love for their offspring, their never-ending support and devotion, and their fierce determination to make sure that their kids are safe and well and happy and that nothing really bad ever happens to them. It doesn’t matter if you’re a good kid or a rotten kid or an out and out bozo, your mom is the one creature who will always care for you.

It may not make you feel warm and fuzzy, but the earth really doesn’t care about you at all. If something nice happens and you think that “Mother Earth” did it just for you… sorry, but it didn’t. The same goes for all the bad stuff that can happen – earthquakes, floods, volcanic eruptions, and so forth. These things are natural earth processes, and will happen no matter where you are or what you do. If you happen to get in the way, well, it’s nothing personal. Call it bad luck, call it karma, call it anything you want – just don’t blame the earth. The planet really doesn’t think about us one way or the other. Like the 5th Law of GeoFantasy says, the earth is not your mother.

The 6th Law of GeoFantasy:

“Nature knows what it’s doing”

I once heard a local weather dude report that “Mother Nature is confused today.” I find it highly unlikely that the earth, or nature, could ever be confused. Nature may appear angry, or even moody from time to time, but confused? I think not. There may be occasions when our interpretations fail us, and there are probably even more times when we just don’t understand what’s going on, but nature is governed by the rigid, yet infinitely flexible Rules of Reality, and always knows what it is doing.

Click here for a full discussion of the Laws of GeoFantasy from my GeoMania website.