Page:The origin of continents and oceans - Wegener, tr. Skerl - 1924.djvu/95

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
GEOLOGICAL ARGUMENTS
69

numerous isolated results show the correctness of our assumptions. Thus, for example, B. Wanner explained the deep water between Buru and Sula Besi, which was unexpected tectonically, by the fact that the former has been displaced horizontally about 10 km., a supposition which fits in very well with our ideas.[1] G. A. F. Molengraaff[2] gives a chart of the Sunda islands in which the area with coral reefs elevated more than 5 m. is recorded. This district coincides in an astonishing manner with that in which, according to the displacement theory, the sial must be thickened by compression, that is, the whole of the area lying in front of the Australian block up to and including Celebes, apart from the south-west coasts of Sumatra and Java, as well as the north and north-west coasts of New Guinea. According to Gagel,[3] at Cape King William in New Guinea, and also in New Britain,[4] there are quite recent terraces which have been elevated 1000, 1250, and even probably up to nearly 1700 m. This very striking phenomenon shows that very powerful forces manifested themselves in very recent times, and agrees very well with our conception of the collision of these portions of the earth’s crust.

    Wegener’s Hypothesis and their Bearing upon the Meaning of the terms Geosynclines and Isostasy,” Verh. van het Geolog.—Mijnbouwkundig Genootschap voor Nederland en Kolonien, Geolog. Ser., Deel V, pp. 113–133, 1921. (I cannot in any way agree with the proposed modifications of the displacement theory by this author.)

  1. B. Wanner, “Zur Tektonik der Molukken,” Geol. Rundsch., 12, p. 160, 1921.
  2. G. A. F. Molengraaff, De Geologie der Zeeën van Nederlandsch Oost-Indië (Overgedrukt uit: De Zeeën van Nederlandsch Oost-Indië. Leyden, 1921).
  3. C. Gagel, “Beiträge zur Geologie von Kaiser-Wilhelmsland,” Beitr. z. geol. Erforsch. d. Deutsch. Schutzgebiete, Heft 4, pp. 1–55. Berlin, 1912.
  4. K. Sapper, “Zur Kenntniss Neu-Pommerns und des Kaiser-Wilhelmslandes,” Petermann’s Mitt., 56, pp. 89–123, 1910.