Plate tectonics

Plate tectonics in geology is an attempt to explain the apparent relative movement of large areas of the outermost layers of the earth, including the continents, over long periods of time. Until the early 1960s, with the exception of a very few people such as Alfred Wegener and Arthur Holmes, most scientists believed the large-scale surface of the earth to be unchanging with the exception of local vertical crustal movements which formed mountain ranges, which could be understood by the geosyncline concept elaborated in the 19th century.

Significant arguments for an early "super-continent" which split apart over eons were put forward by Alfred Wegener, a German physicist born in 1880, in his book Die Entstehung der Kontinente und Ozeane (The Origin of Continents and Oceans - first edition 1915). The theory was not taken seriously until 40 years later, after discoveries such as seafloor spreading.