What did Wegener hypothesize happened to the continents?

In 1912 Alfred Wegener (1880-1930) noticed the same thing and proposed that the continents were once compressed into a single protocontinent which he called Pangaea (meaning “all lands”), and over time they have drifted apart into their current distribution.

What did Wegener’s hypothesis happened to the continents?

Alfred Wegener first presented his hypothesis to the German Geological Society on 6 January 1912. His hypothesis was that the continents had once formed a single landmass, called Pangaea, before breaking apart and drifting to their present locations.

What did Alfred Wegener discover about the continents?

What were Alfred Wegener’s contributions? Wegener noticed the similarity in the coastlines of eastern South America and western Africa and speculated that those lands had once formed a supercontinent, Pangaea, which had split and slowly moved many miles apart over geologic time.

Why did Alfred Wegener think the continents moved?

Wegener suggested that perhaps the rotation of the Earth caused the continents to shift towards and apart from each other. (It doesn’t.) Today, we know that the continents rest on massive slabs of rock called tectonic plates. The plates are always moving and interacting in a process called plate tectonics.

How did Alfred Wegener explain the movement of continents?

Wegener’s continental drift theory introduced the idea of moving continents to geoscience. He proposed that Earth must have once been a single supercontinent before breaking up to form several different continents.

What did Wegener notice about fossils on different continents?

In the early 1900s, the German scientist Alfred Wegener noticed that the coastlines of Africa and South America looked like they might fit together. He also discovered evidence that the same plant and animal fossils were found along the coasts of these continents, although they were now separated by vast oceans.

How did the continents move?

Today, we know that the continents rest on massive slabs of rock called tectonic plates. The plates are always moving and interacting in a process called plate tectonics. The continents are still moving today. Some of the most dynamic sites of tectonic activity are seafloor spreading zones and giant rift valleys.

Why was the Wegener’s theory forgotten?

Why was Wegener’s theory forgotten? He could not explain how the continents could move. Why is Earth not growing in spite of sea floor spreading? because of subduction the Pacific Ocean.

What forms the basis of Wegener’s continental drift theory?

Explanation: Alfred Wegener came upon the idea of the Continental Drift Theory by noticing that the different large landmasses of the Earth almost fit together like akin to a jigsaw puzzle.

What evidence did Wegener rely on in the formulation of his theory of continental drift What evidence did he lack?

Alfred Wegener, in the first three decades of this century, and DuToit in the 1920s and 1930s gathered evidence that the continents had moved. They based their idea of continental drift on several lines of evidence: fit of the continents, paleoclimate indicators, truncated geologic features, and fossils.

What were Wegener’s conclusions?

Wegener took the areas that had been covered by ice sheets and fitted them together around the south pole. HIS CONCLUSION – the continents were once part of a single larger continent that then split apart, drifting to their present positions over the last 300 million years.

Who is Wegener and what did he do?

In 1912, he presented the idea of “continental displacement”—which would later become known as “continental drift”—to explain how the continents moved toward and away from one another throughout the Earth’s history. In 1914, Wegener was drafted into the German Army during World War I.

What happened after Alfred Wegener died?

Upon Wegener’s death, leadership of the Greenland expedition passed to his friend Fritz Loewe. Loewe had trained as a lawyer in Berlin, but developed a passion for science and exploration, earning a PhD in physics. He became a meteorologist and understudy to Alfred Wegener.