Comment on the evidence to suggest

plate theory exists.

The Earth's crust is broken up into a

series of large areas or tectonic plates. These
plates move slowly on top of the currents in
the semi-liquid mantle below them. These
plates are the reason that the earth is
changing, and why mountain ranges such as
the Himalayas are continually growing

It is theorised that, many millions of

years ago, there wasn’t the land masses and
continents we know today, rather one
supercontinent known as Pangaea. Slowly as
the millennia passed the bits of the earths
crust on which these plates began to move,
and the continents drifted apart, until they
reached the positions they are today. This
can be seen in the sequence of pictures down
the right hand side of the screen, this is the
theory of continental drift and is closely
linked to plate tectonics. A lot of people take
the fact that if you look at a current world
map you can clearly see that it could fit
together like a jigsaw; the east coast of South
America and the west coast of Africa fit, as
does the north coast of Africa and the South
coast of the Eurasian Plate. Evidence such as
this leads to the conclusion that plate theory
does exist.

Another piece of evidence is the chain

of Hawaiian Islands that stretch some 1,500
miles through the pacific plate. The islands
are an archipelago of eight major islands,
several atolls, numerous smaller islets, and
undersea seamounts in the North Pacific
Ocean, the set of islands are the most
isolated islands on earth. They have been
formed over millions of years by the constant
activity of a hot spot under the earths crust.
As the pacific plate has moved along over
the top of this hotspot the range of
Hawaiian Islands has been slowly formed
where the hotspot has been. This can be
seen because the islands are in such a
straight line, and tests have been done to
date the rocks as you move along the islands, as you move from the
one end, to the current active volcano of Mauna Loa on Hawaii, the
rocks are dated to be younger. New sea mounts are currently being
formed further on up the chain the Hawaii itself and this is evidence
of plate theory, because the
plate is moving over the
hotspot.
Alfred Wegener first
proposed the theory of
continental drift in 1912, when
he noted how the continents
fitted together like a jigsaw.
Continental drift is the
movement of the Earth's
continents relative to each
other. There is evidence for
continental drift as seen in the
picture to the left, where matching fossil types have been found all
across the continents. It would have been impossible for these
animals to get across todays huge expanses of water without
walking, so in theory they had to have walked it. This is also
evidence to suggest that plate theory exists, ands fits very nicely
with the jigsaw analogy as well.