Hotspot (geology) Puns

A few disclaimers before I dive in: I am a geologist, but my main specialties are mapping, engineering geology and petrology, so feel free to contradict or question my speculation. I know Kyle Hill could do it better, but I am who I am. Also, I loved the movie, so this is written as a sort of fun discussion of the real-life implications of some of the events, not in an attempt to excoriate the movie.

The Eternals, specifically the idea of a Celestial being seeded and then beginning to arise from the earth, gave me a lot to think about geologically.

First, the seed: The Celestial seed being implanted in the earth was shown as sort of a minor crater hitting the earth, but I can't see a way of anything with mass making it all the way to the core. Even a very heavy metal would likely melt and become incorporated and mixed with all the other heavy elements towards the center of the earth, losing its integrity. Now, if the seed were essentially without mass, like a photon or some type of radiation, that could possibly work.

Second, the "global earthquakes." In normal cases, a global earthquake is impossible, because earthquakes originate from one place - the hypocenter - and no amount of energy could cause the strain of an earthquake to transfer from the adjoining plates to other plates. Even a tremendous amount of movement along the Alaskan subduction zone, for example, could not transfer its strain to the mid-Atlantic ridge because they occur on their own discrete plates.

So at first I dismissed the idea of a global earthquake outright - until I realized that this earthquake presumably would be caused by Tiamut beginning to stir and grow, and so there would be multiple hypocenters - multiple plates shifting at the same time. Thus, a global earthquake with one hypocenter - not possible, but global earthquakes with multiple hypocenters occurring at the same time - sure, why not?

Now, to the big one: Tiamut's emergence. Like some others, I thought that Sersi was freezing the surface of Tiamut until the news report mentioned he was marble. This is because native ("in the wild") marble usually does not have the beautiful, perfect appearance of carved marble as seen in the movie. But Sersi can create whatever type of marble she wants, and I want nothing more than to climb Tiamut's head and hands.

I appreciate the movie showing a good sense of scale with Tiamut with the little islands being completely swallowed up - however, as others have mentioned, with an ev

I (27F) PhD candidate in geology, who studies structural geology and plate tectonics, had a tinder date (30-ish M) lecture me on tectonics for over an hour and then post-date sent me several 10+ minute videos of quacks on Joe Rogan talking about how everything we know about geology is wrong. Bro, know your audience. I do this for a living.

Edit for FAQs: since I keep getting comments. I am a PhD candidate, not student. Its the end of your PhD when you have passed your qualifiers you are no longer a student and just do research. Also, in most sciences in the USA, we get paid to be PhD students and candidates. We get tuition, a living stipend, and are employees. I'm in my last 6 months and working as a research fellow, so it's my profession. Not just school.

Geography is where it’s at

Doing a re-read of WoR, and while I did it to focus on Shallan and figure out some things from her flashbacks, I'm noticing some things relating to geology and cartography.

Two different threads here: First the Horneater's origin stories, when mixed with what WoB states tell the story of a group like the Lost Legion who also fled mainstream humanity during ages past. Unlike the Listeners, the Horneater's ancestors intermarried with humans enough their listener origins are mostly obscured. However, their story also involves fleeing into their mountains where the three gods together made their peaks habitable.

Specifically one god provided the mountains and heat, one the water, and one the life.

A second thread goes into old maps of Roshar from the Silver Kingdoms that Shallan examines related to the search for Urithiru. She notes that the Silver Kingdoms in the maps are bigger than today. She puts it down to bad surveying techniques. But both Jah Keved and Alethkar are specifically noted as being bigger than today.

I propose these two stories are linked to a third story. Each of these different ancient maps places Urithiru in a different place. All in high mountains.

I believe that Urithiru is mobile, and part of the reason Urithiru is mobile is in several past desolations, Odium triggered massive volcanic eruptions and horrific seismic damage. I believe also the Horneater Peaks are strong evidence for them.

The Horneater peaks are Volcanic Crater lakes. That is lakes within volcanic craters. The peaks remain habitable due to the heat produced by the volcanos they sit upon. However, sizable volcanic crater lakes are somewhat rare, and tied to a recentish eruption. Two of the most notable are "crater lake" in Oregon, which is 6 miles long by 5 miles wide while the much larger Lake Toba is ~62 miles long by 19 miles wide. Oregon's Crater Lake was crated 6-8k years ago with the violent destruction of Mount Mazama when it lost nearly 1 mile of height during its destruction.

Lake Toba, otoh, was a super volcano whose massive destruction is believed to be responsible for a genetic bottleneck in humans due to the eruption causing a volcanic winter of 6-10 years, and 1,000 years of cooling.

I propose that these earlier maps were quite accurate, and they're off as a result of multiple different major seismic events Odium caused (or was blamed for) which ignited volcanic eruptions on Roshar. The Horneater Peaks became livable in the aftermath due to the high

...really seems to have a lot of faults

So I told him, "Geology rocks, and geometry rules, but geography is where it's at!"

Edit: shoutout to u/brocko33 for fixing my joke.

I’m a sophomore pursuing a bachelor’s degree in geology but I’m not sure what I’d like to do when I graduate. I think I’m interested in hydro geology. I’m planning on getting my master’s degree. I’d like to hear what you guys do/have done in your careers.Also, any advice would be greatly appreciated!

I can't take this field anymore. I'm only a few months in but I can tell it's not for me. I posted a few months ago about working as a geologist and, as always, got some good advice.

Those of you who left the field, how did you do it and where did you go? Why did you leave?

Hi everyone! First time poster here. I’m at that point in my life where I’m not sure what the next steps are quite yet. I just graduated about three weeks ago from University of IL at Chicago and have no immediate plans to pursue graduate school (financially and mentally impossible right now).

I have no idea of what direction to go in. I have a huge interest in anything to do with soil science, geology in relation to plants, and mineral/rock science. What types of careers/jobs could I pursue, and would it be mandatory for me to get an MS or PhD to continue in this field? I was hoping to seek out an internship by summer and to see where that leads me.

It’s been a long and difficult road for me. If anyone has any advice, I’d appreciate it!

I hope it’s okay to ask advice here. As a kid and honestly still at almost 30, I loved rocks (and fossils!). I would collect them from a very young age. I am still notorious to family friends as the rock girl. Even now people still gift me cool rocks and sometimes the trendy fake crystals (thought that counts). My family had a very small mining company so I spent a lot of time rolling around in Marcellus shale and filling my pockets with rocks lol. I recently went back to college to finish just an associates degree, just to prove it to myself basically. I did it all online because of work so I will have an AA in general studies basically. I always wanted to have a science degree but couldn’t figure out what I wanted that was realistic and didn’t want to take off work for in person classes.

My dad passed away recently and as I was mentioning to a family member that I might want to get a BS geoscience degree when i am financially able, specific geology but that isn’t a great fit for my area unless I go into O&G basically like most of my family and against my values. My family member told me that my dad always wanted to go to school to get a Geology degree, it felt like fate.

Will a BS in Geology get me anywhere? Idk if I could go on for a masters financially and I would be like 40. I would probably be 35 by the time I graduate with the BS since I will need to do core science classes I think and I still have 2 jobs, 1 full time. Maybe environmental studies would be better for my area (Tx)? I am just conflicted I’m sorry for this rant.

I was thinking of maybe looking for a few good geology text books or self teach books to get me prepared for possible coursework (I’m a perfectionist in school which is another reason I avoid going back)

Evening all!

This week I cut my vacation in hot springs short after my hotel room was entered/scoped and we discovered the was valet driving our car- all this for the privilege of paying over $300 per night on bathhouse row.

I'm greatly conflicted because of all the potential I saw in Hot Springs: along with the beauty it seems the place is soured by an unsavory underbelly. I've heard, and certainly believe, there's a meth problem (no place is immune, I get it), but it seems to me there's much more to the story then that and I'm curious to learn more about what's preventing Hot Springs from thriving.

I couldn't help but notice the large number of derelict/abandoned buildings (with the medical arts building standing foremost in my mind), and this implies a bigger story. What role does the local and state government have to play in all this? What is it that's keeping investors away? Are there any particular entities (be in government or business) that are benefiting from suppressing economic development? Or is it the local population themselves (as gentrification isn't good news for everyone) standing in the way? Is the crime problem part of the problem or a symptom of a different issue?

Hi there,

So in the past couple of years, I have had a whirlwind of a career I never imagined or planned out for myself. I graduated with a geology degree in 2014 in hopes of getting a job like any other graduate. I graduated as an international student in Canada, got my post-graduate work permit and applied for multiple geology and geo-tech jobs for months after graduation but I didn't get a single interview or call back.

I was working in retail at the time to maintain my cost of living which I kept going while applying for jobs. I eventually got frustrated and gave up on applying for geology jobs about 8 months in. I decided to focus on something more achievable which was getting my permanent residence (PR) to stay in Canada permanently. In order to do this, I needed a job, so I worked in retail for 3 years to get my PR. After getting my PR, I was mad, pissed off, and honestly frustrated from the whole experience of getting a 6-year degree I never got to use for even at least a week.

I then had the brilliant idea of returning to school to get a second bachelor's degree in nutrition to become a dietitian. I figured that I would get a job if I studied something in the healthcare field. I've volunteered and worked part-time in the past 3 years. I'm completing the bachelor's in nutrition in 4 months but, I still feel very sad that I never got a chance to use my geology degree. I feel overqualified and underpaid in this aspect of my life and I'm in my 30's which is very frustrating now.

Is it still worth it to try having a career as a geologist, should I give up on the degree, or try getting a related master's?

I am a geology B.Sc undergrad and although I enjoy learning about rocks, I wouldn't want to work in a lab studying rocks or a mine.

I am more interested in applied/engineering geology or Hydrogeology, however I see that people here don't even consider them as "true geology" career paths. Am I wrong or do people here just think geology=rocks

I'm currently 17 and finishing high school, in Portugal. I'm thinking of pursuing a career in geology, but also have options like IT for example. I would like to know some opinions from people who have experience in the field and hopefully get a better understanding of everything surrounding this area. One of the reasons I am considering other options is because of money. Most of the people I talk to say that I will end up doing something else because this field doesn't pay enough, is this true? Is this something to consider? I really like geology and is something that makes me very happy. Thanks in advance!

But i do not want the books to feel to much like Textbooks. If the books can be both educational while having some artistic flare that would be the ideal(for me) As i don’t intend to study either of these fields i do just want to gain new perspectives and creative impulses from reading things that i have never read before

I'm interested to hear from you all about the field of Planetary Geology. For instance, how much time at college would you have to spend to get in the field, and what can you do to stand out to employers. Would you need to get a Masters or PhD to enter the field? I've heard NASA has planetary geologists, and I think would be an awesome career to have. Thanks everyone!

EDIT:

Thanks so much to everyone who took their time to comment and help me out! I really value this kind of advice, it's brought me closer to making a decision - I think engineering is gonna be the best path for me personally!

Hi there, if any Australians in the mining industry could take a few minutes to read this that would be amazing

I am in Year 12 of high school IN AUSTRALIA, and I am highly interested in pursuing a career in geology or engineering, since I love chemistry, physics, and maths and want to do some field work as part of my job.

However, I am unsure as to which career would be a better option for me. (I know that I could probably be doing FIFO work in both these careers, which I am fine with because I have researched and thought about this for quite a long time).

I have researched both uni degrees (mineral geoscience) and engineering and I am pretty keen on both of them, as they fit my interests and lifestyle. I'm just not sure which one will have more career opportunities and growth for me in the future.

Even though I have researched for a while, I just wanted to hear some different opinions from people on the pros and cons of each career, so that I can make the most informed choice possible.

Thank You!

My son is a geologist, and I'd like to start a quilt for him that speaks to that. I'm a beginner; this will be my first full-sized quilt. I've done some crafty type items and several wall hangings and table runners. If you have any ideas for pattern sources or patterns than come to mind for geology/rocks/layers/etc., I would love any advice! TY.