Geoscientist Online

Dear Editors, To my delight the Société Géologique de France sent me their geologically themed face coverings for €5 each or €15 for all four of these smart designs for non-medical use. Postage should be around €3 to the UK. They can be worn for 4 hours and are machine washable at 60° C, even though my local chemist says simple handwashing with soap and drying will kill viruses including Covid-19.  

They provide a much more distinctive alternative to regular masks, featuring:  the Carboniferous forests of the Saint-Étienne coalfield in the Loire imagined in 1877;  a theoretical vertical section showing the sediments of the Paris Basin produced in 1832;  a pair of cream on black illustrations of the ammonite laevigatus (James Sowerby) from southern England;  and a fine reproduction of the first geological map of France published in 1841 by Dufrénoy and Elie de Beaumont.    

David Nowell

Dear Editors. I am saddened to hear the society is reducing the number of magazine issues per year.

From my perspective, all this will mean is that I engage less with the magazine and the Society, as I already receive a torrent of digital communications and offerings—getting the print magazine cuts through this and means I actually read it.

All that a move towards digital provision will result in from my perspective is less of my attention I'm afraid.

Chris Jack

The Society is acutely aware of the decline in the popularity of geology over recent years. This is most noticeable in the drop in student numbers applying for and studying geology at undergraduate level, something we are genuinely concerned by.

Ideally, we want every person to be familiar with geology as an area of study and aware of the applications of geology to our everyday lives. However, this ideal is nuanced. There are old-fashioned perceptions of what geology is and what geologists do, as you rightly point out, especially around geology’s association with the extractive industries.

This complex problem is not one the Society can fix alone. We are therefore partnering with a number of other organisations and stakeholders to widen the appeal of geology. Two notable organisations are:
1.    University Geoscience UK, the subject association of geoscience departments based within British universities. We co-organised the June 2020 student enrolment summit, which led to the development of a strategy and a plan of action is currently being pursued to increase interest.
2.    Diversity in Geoscience UK, a recently established charity looking at ways to improve diversity and inclusion for all within the community. They are currently assessing potential projects and fundraising opportunities, and we can work together with them to improve access to field locations throughout the country.

Our goals may not be realised overnight, but they will go some way dusting off the perception of geology as just the study of old rocks. Given the gravity of the situation, it is essential for the community to address this task together and we welcome additional support.

To anyone who wishes to continue this conversation please get in touch by emailing [email protected]  

George Jameson (Diversity and Inclusion Project Lead, Geological Society of London)

Dear Editors. I am most concerned by recent articles citing the decline in the teaching of geology and its adverse impact on the profession. Despite essentially leaving the subject after my graduation, I believe that a geological degree gives one a wonderful start to a career.

The profession must reach out beyond the known world of geology. I come from an island where, in my school days, the age of the unfossiliferous slate was wrongly categorised and, while there were a number of inaccessible old mines, the only fossils were those in the Carboniferous limestone. Perhaps not surprisingly, geology was not taught in schools. Yet, geology seemed an obvious choice for a degree, given it combined all the subjects I studied at A Level: physics, chemistry, botany and zoology. I enjoyed my degree and later obtained a PhD studying geological processes as they happened in the Thames Estuary. This allowed me to pursue a very satisfying and enjoyable career in civil engineering, though not in geotechnics, as one might expect, but as a maritime civil engineer.

I try to keep abreast of the developments in geology, time allowing, and have always been most impressed with the amount of scientific development there has been. Indeed, it has left me feeling very ignorant when attending recent meetings at Burlington House and on line.

These developments have taught me that my slates were deposited in the South Atlantic, not too far from South Georgia, and they have thus had a long and eventful life surviving moving plates and rising plumes. They are also younger than I had understood. The science behind these advances in our knowledge is not only fascinating and to be congratulated, but also shows how the subject has developed and is developing. Clearly, geoscience has much to contribute to the future development of the world—not just increasing our understanding of our planet and other space debris, or in locating our dwindling resources, but also in tackling major issues like global warming and geohazards, such as where the next earthquake, volcanic eruption or tsunami might originate.

The profession has always changed as it moved forward, not only for the few, but for the many. Indeed, the comment from the Editor’s desk in the October issue that “Geology has a way of capturing the imagination, whatever level of detailed understanding you reach” should also be exploited to its full potential.

I firmly believe therefore that as a profession we should be more proactive and perhaps the slogan for universities should be ‘Kick Start your Career with a Geology Degree’.

Dr Roger Maddrell

One clue to the conundrum has to lie in the complexity of the subject and a perception that the public is unwilling to engage with lengthy explanations. Watch almost all TV documentaries about the ‘natural world’ and the opening sequences that show either plate tectonics, mountain building, mass movements, floods, or ice caps etc. will rapidly give way to the urge to feed the universal public interest in animal behaviour. Almost invariably, film directors seem to believe the physical world is merely a setting for the organisms that inhabit it. They acknowledge the physical world to be important, but, because it requires a long, complicated explanation, it is dismissed fairly quickly. Besides this, much of it is static, and, therefore, difficult to make videogenic.

So, would education help increase public awareness and interest in geoscience, and, perhaps thereby, encourage greater funding of the geoparks? Melvyn rightly bemoans that “so little is generally known about the Earth sciences” and he points out that, in “the pre-university education system, mention of geology by name is rare”. But this may be an unintended consequence of curriculum development in secondary education. In science, geology is incorporated as a minor component, though perhaps too fleetingly to impress young minds. There is an opportunity that should have been, and still could be, exploited in the geography curriculum. But, here, the window might be closing: even geomorphology may be fighting a rear-guard action to preserve its long-standing space as relative newcomers such as climate change, environmental despoliation etc. crowd out the time available.

Whatever means are used to elicit public awareness and unlock financial support, I wish the Scottish Geology Trust every success in its aim to nurture the geoparks.

Emeritus Prof. Ian Reid