Contrast the philosophies of Catastrophism and Uniformitaria

Contrast the philosophies of Catastrophism and Uniformitarianism. What are the major differences in how each philosophy addresses the age of the Earth? Finally, while neither philosophy should be taken too literally, which philosophy has been deemed more accurate by the scientific community? Why?

Solution

Catastrophism is the doctrine that Earth\'s history has been dominated by cataclysmic events rather than gradual processes acting over long periods of time. For example, a catastrophist might conclude that the Rocky Mountains were created in a single rapid event such as a greatearthquake rather than by imperceptibly slow uplift and erosion.

Catastrophism developed in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. A prominent British theologian, Bishop James Ussher (1581