What is a good controversial geology topic to research for an argumentative essay?

Question

I need to be able to support both sides of the argument.

Answer 1

Last semester I had to write a similar paper, and I wound up writing about the 2004 tsunami in Indonesia and the subsequent monitoring of the world's oceans. It was fairly easy to find data on the monitoring stations (cost, length of implementation, information recieved, and speed with which it is decoded), as well as information on how it would help not just the people in highly tectonic regions, but the scientific community as a whole. And of course, there are people who oppose the monitoring because of cost and supposed lack of impact and lack of interest, so it's easy to argue both sides.

Answer 2

Good Controversial Research Topics

Answer 3

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RE:
What is a good controversial geology topic to research for an argumentative essay?
I need to be able to support both sides of the argument.

Answer 4

The effect of weather on volcanoes and earthquakes.

Hurricane Katrina produced a seismic hum more than 1,000 times the strength of the average volcanic tremor which was felt nearly 3000 kilometres away in southern California.

Warmer weather melting the ice sheets reduces the pressure and therefore allows that part of the crust to rise slightly.

Heavier rainfall in areas where it does not usually fall produces in itself a lot of weight. Also water seeping down into a fault could lubricate it enough to cause it to release and cause an earthquake.

Sebastian Hainzl from the University of Potsdam monitored tremors, rainfall and groundwater pressure in south-east Germany. They found that water from a heavy rainstorm can reach spots underground where masses of rock are trying to move past each other but are stuck together by friction. The water can ease the friction, releasing pent-up tension so that the rocks jerk past each other and initiate tremors as deep as 4 kilometres underground.

Robin Crockett from the University of Northampton, UK, and his colleagues monitored tremors and collected tidal data along the Java/ Sumatra trench. They found that major quakes were 86 per cent more likely around new and full moons, when tides are at their greatest. Weather can swell tides even higher and therefore magnify the effect.

Answer 5

Seems like the 65-million year ago "extinction/comet" theory is up for grabs again. Both sides have some very good arguments. Apparently, not all of the evidence for a sudden extinction of dinosaurs due to a cosmic impact of some kind matches up chronologically with the data in the rocks. Check it out. It hit the papers a few days ago.

Answer 6

Try the Whole Mantle Convection against the Layered Mantle Convection . There is a lot of controversy there. Avoid anything dealing with the Age of the Earth or Evolution vs. Creationism, since one side is Science and the other side is Religion.

Answer 7

Anything that can be considered a political debate is a jackpot. Abortion, death penalty, the war in Iraq, all good topics. Being that it's earth day, you could even research environmental issues there are alot of things about that.

Answer 8

The arugment about the age of the Earth. Whether is it 6 billion years old or, like the religious folk think, only a few thousand years old.

Answer 9

What is the primary "driver" of evolution?
1) Natural selection or-
2) Natural mutation

Check references to Stephen J Gould

Answer 10

The origin of rocks