Journey to the Centre of the Earth

Well, I've just finished Verne' Journey to the centre of the Earth. What a great, pleasant, enthralling and exhilarating read. I find the recommendation from Authur C. Clark on the sleeve particularly apt. Clark was the master of science-fiction and in a strange way this book is also science fiction. We have come used to the idea that sci-fi is related to something up there in the stars. But really its someone wondering what if... its the little piece of knowledge that opens up possibilities to the imaginative mind. That precisely what Verne do here, except he does it primarily with geology. The book was written in 1864 an interesting time when people were on the verge of understanding yet still steep in religion. It was a time when naturalists were finding strange bones in quarries and developing the extent of geological time.













Verne takes pieces of information that geologists then accepted as fact, large prehistoric animals, the alteration of rock type with depth and age. But perhaps before the full impact of darwins evolution (published 1854) were appreciate, before continental drift, while there was still discussion on whether the centre of the was hot molten mass or a deep cavernous sea.













Its seems from the text that Verne doesn't really agree with the then aging concept of the hallow earth but it makes for a much better story, as opposed to the other option....

In this way the book is similar to Gulliver's Travels which, as you might recall from a previous post, Swift uses a little bit of knowledge to imagine what if. And despite the fact this information in now proved incorrect, it still makes for a good read.

So yeah its a good book, I flew through it, I could well recommend it. The two main characters are very endearing.

Other things this weekend included a trip to the BT young scientist exhibition.http://www.btyoungscientist.ie/f_version/mediacentre_winner2008.html Which was interesting, saw duncan cleary giving a not so interesting talk about cfl bulbs. Sick of hearing about it now.

Also went to see the exhibition of Polish Art in the National Gallery - Very Good.