Study Groups

Non-fiction Book Study Group

Tuesday mornings, 10:30-11:45 am, UCX room 303

The Middle Ages
by Bishop Morris

Video Study group

Tuesday mornings, 10:45 - 11:45 AM, UCX Room 304

The Nature of Earth, An Introduction to Geology
Presented by Professor John Renton, University of West Virginia

The drama of geology is all around you. Have you ever been to Yellowstone? If so, you have stood on a catastrophe in the making. The central region is inside a collapsed volcanic crater that pulses with the hidden energy of magma below that will eventually explode in an eruption surpassing any in recorded history. Or have you ever driven in the rolling hills of the Piedmont region that extends from New Jersey to Alabama? Then you have crossed the core of an ancient mountain range that once rivaled the Himalayas. Now almost completely eroded away, these peaks were created 300 million years ago in the collision of tectonic plates that formed the supercontinent of Pangaea.

Wherever you live or travel, geology is everywhere. Wouldn't you like to know how to read the rocks and landscape or how to make sense of debates over natural resources? No other science deals more practically with our world, telling us where to dig a well; when to add lime to soil; how gold, oil, and other valuable minerals are formed and where to find them; what kinds of structures are safest in an earthquake zone; and why some active volcanoes are deadlier than others—far deadlier.

Geology is surprisingly intuitive, accessible, and concrete. At the same time, it has the excitement of a never-ending detective story, replete with clues to the complex past of our planet. You will find Dr. Renton spontaneous, easy to follow, funny, and extremely well organized. He has a gift for picking simple analogies that make complicated concepts clear and memorable.

These lectures take you to some fascinating places—from the bituminous coal fields of Dr. Renton's home state of West Virginia to the mid-ocean ridges, the most prominent feature on our planet (if you drain away the water). But you also explore your own backyard in lectures that focus on soils and groundwater, issues that are important to everyone. The ability of grain crops to flourish in some areas and not others will suddenly make sense, and so will the rising, falling, and sometimes puzzling behavior of the water table.