Planet Earth

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Front Matter

 * Introduction
 * About the Book

Section 1: EARTH’S SIZE, SHAPE, AND MOTION IN SPACE

 * a. Science: How do we Know What We Know?
 * b. Earth System Science: Gaia or Medea?
 * c. Measuring the Size and Shape of Earth
 * d. How to Navigate Across Earth using a Compass, Sextant, and Timepiece
 * e. Earth's Motion and Spin
 * f. The Nature of Time: Solar, Lunar and Stellar Calendars
 * g. Coriolis Effect: How Earth’s Spin Affects Motion Across its Surface
 * h. Milankovitch cycles: Oscillations in Earth’s Spin and Rotation
 * i. Time: The Invention of Seconds using Earth’s Motion

Section 2: EARTH’S ENERGY

 * a. Energy and the Laws of Thermodynamics
 * b. Solar Energy
 * c. Electromagnetic Radiation and Black Body Radiators
 * d. Daisy World and the Solar Energy Cycle
 * e. Other Sources of Energy: Gravity, Tides, and the Geothermal Gradient

Section 3: EARTH’S MATTER

 * a. Gas, Liquid, Solid (and other states of matter)
 * b. Atoms: Electrons, Protons and Neutrons
 * c. The Chart of the Nuclides
 * d. Radiometric dating, using chemistry to tell time
 * e. The Periodic Table and Electron Orbitals
 * f. Chemical Bonds (Ionic, Covalent, and others means to bring atoms together)
 * g. Common Inorganic Chemical Molecules of Earth
 * h. Mass spectrometers, X-Ray Diffraction, Chromatography and Other Methods to Determine Which Elements are in Things

Section 4: EARTH’S ATMOSPHERE

 * a. The Air You Breathe
 * b. Oxygen in the Atmosphere
 * c. Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere
 * d. Green House Gases
 * e. Blaise Pascal and his Barometer
 * f. Why are Mountain Tops Cold?
 * g. What are Clouds?
 * h. What Makes Wind?
 * i. Global Atmospheric Circulation
 * j. Storm Tracking
 * k. The Science of Weather Forecasting
 * l. Earth’s Climate and How it Has Changed

Section 5: EARTH’S WATER

 * a. H2O: A Miraculous Gas, Liquid and Solid on Earth
 * b. Properties of Earth’s Water (Density, Salinity, Oxygen, and Carbonic Acid)
 * c. Earth’s Oceans (Warehouses of Water)
 * d. Surface Ocean Circulation
 * e. Deep Ocean Circulation
 * f. La Nina and El Nino, the sloshing of the Pacific Ocean
 * g. Earth‘s Rivers.
 * h. Earth’s Endangered Lakes and the Limits of Freshwater Sources
 * i. Earth’s Ice: Glaciers, Ice Sheets, and Sea Ice

Section 6: EARTH’S SOLID INTERIOR

 * a. Journey to the Center of the Earth: Earth’s Interior and Core
 * b. Plate Tectonics: You are a Crazy Man, Alfred Wegener
 * c. Earth’s Volcanoes: When Earth Goes Boom!
 * d. You Can’t Fake an Earthquake: How to Read a Seismograph
 * e. The Rock Cycle and Rock Types (Igneous, Metamorphic and Sedimentary)
 * f. Mineral Identification of Hand Samples
 * g. Common Rock Identification
 * h. Bowen’s Reaction Series
 * i. Earth’s Surface Processes: Sedimentary Rocks and Depositional Environments
 * j. Earth’s History Preserved in its Rocks: Stratigraphy and Geologic Time

Section 7: EARTH’S LIFE

 * a. How Rare is Life in the Universe?
 * b. What is Life?
 * c. How did Life Originate?
 * d. The Origin of Sex
 * e. Darwin and the Struggle for Existence
 * f. Heredity: Gregor Mendel’s Game of Cards
 * g. Earth’s Biomes and Communities
 * h. Soil: Living Dirt
 * i. Earth’s Ecology: Food Webs and Populations

Section 8: EARTH’S HUMANS AND FUTURE

 * a. Ötzi’s World or What Sustainably Looks Like
 * b. Rise of Human Consumerism and Population Growth
 * c. Solutions for the Future
 * d. How to Think Critically About Earth's Future