Tobias Krüger explores the discovery of the Ice Ages, how the idea was received, and what further research it stimulated. The approach used in Discovering the Ice Ages is uniquely sweeping. The contemporary debates on the subject are compared from an international perspective. Krüger retraces the arguments advanced from the middle of the 18th century to the threshold of the 20th century. The positions held by defenders of the glacial theory as well as those by its most important opponents are set within the context of the then current understanding of geology. In an interdisciplinary overview Krüger then focuses on the impetus gained from early ice-age research. The most prominent examples worth mentioning are the discovery of trace gases and the greenhouse effect.
Tobias Krüger, Ph.D. (2006), University of Berne; MAS in Archival, Library and Information Science (2008). Scientific collaborator State Archives Soleure, Switzerland. He has published on the history of glacial geology, climate perception, administrative history and miscellaneous articles in the Historical Dictionary of Switzerland.
"[Krüger] traces the discovery of the ice ages through the course of the 19th century, and links that scientific effort with current research and public debate over climate change."
- Referenceds & Research Book News, December 2013 (2013-016827), p. 228.
Preface and Acknowledgments
1. Introduction
2. How Erratic Blocks Caught the Eye of Science
3. Glacier Advances and Icy Theories: 1810–1830
4. Glacier and Ice-Age Theories in the First Half of the 1830’s
5. The Grand Synthesis
6. International Reception of Glacial Theory
7. The Search for Causes of the Ice Ages
8. Conclusions
Sources
List of Figures
Index
All intrested in the history of glacial geology as well as anyone concerned with the historical understanding of climate.