Specialities, Problems, and Localism the Reception of Continental Drift in Australia 1920-1940

Abstract

Although A.L. Wegener signalled that the Australasian region was an important testing-ground for his theory of continental drift, his views aroused little interest among Australian scientists in the period 1920-1940. I argue that specialization and geological "localism" were important factors in this response. Most scientists were silent or perhaps passively resistant, I suggest, because they saw no particular value in the theory for the problems which occupied them. Those few who did publicly support or oppose the theory often did so with respect to specialist concerns or specific problems. This response has implications not only for the general story of the "modern revolution" in the earth sciences but also for philosophical and social models of their acceptance.

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