Abstract
FOR many years past geologists have turned wistfully to the moon in the hope of gaining from a study of its surface some insight into planetary evolution, and more especially into some of the stages in the history of our own globe. It must be confessed, however, that as yet few satisfactory data have been obtained, either in the facts observed or in the deductions drawn from them. The great majority of those who have studied the subject have formed the opinion that our satellite was once a liquid mass, such as we believe the earth itself to have also been, and that its so-called “craters” represent extensive and prolonged volcanic activity, when the gases and lava of the heated interior escaped to the surface, probably on a scale of magnitude greatly surpassing that on which subterranean energy has ever been manifested in the geological history of our planet. But another explanation has been proposed for these lunar features, according to which, as worked out by Mr. G. K.Gilbert, of the United States Geological Survey, the moon was formed by the aggregation of a ring of meteorites which once encircled the earth, and the “craters,” instead of arising from the escape of volcanic energy from within, were produced by the impact of the last meteoric bodies that fell from without. These bodies, arriving with planetary velocity, would be melted or reduced to gas, while a portion of the lunar surface around them would also be liquefied. Mr. Gilbert believes that the lunar topography bears witness to such a meteoritic bombardment rather than to gigantic volcanic explosions.
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GEIKIE, A. GEOLOGY OF THE MOON . Nature 71, 348–350 (1905). https://doi.org/10.1038/071348a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/071348a0