Age of the Earth

Check out Dr. Singham's personal recommendations!

• The Chronologers' Quest: Episodes in the Search for the Age of the Earth by Patrick Wyse Jackson (2006)
  • Jackson (Trinity College Dublin) informatively traces the ideas and evidence for Earth's age, starting from ancient civilizations and concluding with the best scientific evidence that Earth is 4.5 thousand million years old. The book's goal is to bring together diverse ideas about Earth's age from the perspectives of religion, geology, and astronomy. The first three chapters examine estimates of age and origins of Earth from the earliest writings and myths, to "Biblical calculation," the most well known the estimate of Archbishop Ussher, who in 1650 CE calculated that creation started in 4004 BCE. Chapter 13 pays tribute to Arthur Holmes, pioneer in using radioactive decay to develop physically sound estimates of ages of various rock units, showing that Ussher's calculations were incorrect by several orders of magnitude. (Choice, excerpt)
• The Age Of The Earth by Brent Dalrymple (1991)
  • Very few subjects in science have been debated for so long and so hard as has the age of the earth. It is one of the most fundamental topics for scientists, philosophers, and theologians. This excellent book serves as a single, complete source of explanation for all of the methods, ancient and modern, used to derive that age. The book is, in fact, the culmination of a long odyssey of science to decipher the time of the earth's beginnings. It hammers home the fact, supported by many thousands of scientists working many tens of years, that the earth began as a planet 4.6 billion years ago. Anyone reading and comprehending this book will understand why scientists are so firm in that belief. (Choice, excerpt)
• Lord Kelvin And The Age Of The Earth by Joe D. Burchfield (1975)
  • Burchfield charts the enormous impact made by Lord Kelvin's application of thermodynamic laws to the question of the earth's age and the heated debate his ideas sparked among British Victorian physicists, astronomers, geologists, and biologists. "Anyone interested in geologic time, and that should include all geologists and a fair smattering of biologists, physicists and chemists, should make Burchfield's commendable and time-tested volume part of their personal library (Quarterly Review of Biology)

Additional titles for your enjoyment!

• The Story Of The Earth In 25 Rocks: Tales Of Important Geological Puzzles And The People Who Solved Them by Donald Prothero (2018)
  • As he has done so well in the past, Prothero (The Story of Life in 25 Fossils), professor of geology at Cal Poly Pomona, uses the geological record to answer many important questions about planet Earth. In 25 short and enjoyable chapters, he explores issues that have been at the center of geology since long before geology was a science. For example, he discusses the age of the Earth, the nature of continental drift, the characteristics of early life, and the cause of the demise of the dinosaurs, among many other topics. (Publisher's Weekly, excerpt)
• The Abyss Of Time: A Study In Geological Time And Earth History by Paul Lyle (2016)
  • This slim volume serves as a fine introduction to the concept of deep time. The author's purpose is to provide the reader with an understanding and appreciation of the age of the Earth. Throughout, Lyle emphasizes the necessity for understanding the immensity of the time involved, particularly with respect to the formation of the Earth's resources, which humans are using faster than they are being created ... profusely and vividly illustrated with photos and diagrams. (Choice, excerpt)
• Into The Heart Of Our World : A Journey To The Center Of The Earth : A Remarkable Voyage Of Scientific Discovery by David Whitehouse (2016)
  • Our planet appears tranquil from outer space. And yet the arcs of volcanoes, the earthquake zones and the auroral glow rippling above our heads are testimony to something remarkable happening inside. For thousands of years, these phenomena were explained in legend and myth. Only in recent times has the brave new science of seismology emerged. One hundred and fifty years after the extraordinary, imaginative feat of Jules Verne's Journey to the center of the Earth, David Whitehouse embarks on a voyage of scientific discovery. (Book summary, excerpt)
• The Story Of Science : From The Writings Of Aristotle To The Big Bang Theory by Susan Wise Bauer (2015)
  • The Story of Science shows us the joy and importance of reading groundbreaking science writing for ourselves and guides us back to the masterpieces that have changed the way we think about our world, our cosmos, and ourselves. Able to be referenced individually, or read together as the narrative of Western scientific development, the book leads readers from the first science texts by the Greeks through 20th-century classics in biology, physics, and cosmology. (Book summary, excerpt)
• From Stars To Stalagmites: How Everything Connects by Paul Braterman (2012)
  • The book begins with the age of the earth, and concludes with the life cycle of stars. In between, there are atoms old and new, the ozone hole mystery and how it was solved, synthetic fertilisers and explosives, reading the climate record, the extraction of metals, the wetness of water, and how the greenhouse effect on climate really works. (Book summary, excerpt)
• Earth in 100 Groundbreaking Discoveries by Douglas Palmer (2011)
  • Putting the mechanics of tectonics among the first few discoveries he presents, Palmer notes their role in ensuing subjects, from their rearrangement of the continental jigsaw puzzle to their effect on environments and life through such manifestations as mountain building and volcanism. In turn, life's profound symbiosis with planetary geology recurs in Palmer's presentation of such events as its oxygenation of the seas and atmosphere to humanity's contemporary influences on climate. Palmer will provoke the inquisitiveness of his readers, setting them an agenda for further exploration of the evolution of the earth. (Booklist, excerpt)