The Earth's Shifting Crust by Charles Hapgood - wire of information

CONTINENTS AND OCEAN BASINS 135
referred to as the principle of "isostasy." We shall see, later,
that there are some serious difficulties with the general theory
of isostasy, as a consequence of which it cannot be regarded
as definitely established. Still, on the whole, there is much to
be said for it. And so the geophysicists ask how can anything
alter the major concentrations of lighter or heavier rock,
must determine
which, according to the theory of isostasy,
the locations of continents and ocean basins? A continent
could not be destroyed without getting rid of a large amount
of lighter granitic and sedimentary rock, and a new continent
could not be raised up without producing a vast amount
of new rock of that kind. Since these things are impossible,
and the less said
changing continents around is impossible,
about it the better.
3. The Views of the Biologists
While the geophysicists were developing these ideas, based
upon laboratory experiments and principles of physics, the
biologists and paleontologists were busily engaged with an
entirely different question, which led them to diametrically
opposite conclusions. They were classifying and comparing
plants and animals from all parts of the world, those living
today and those that lived in ages past. They were soon confronted
by the fact that in many cases the same species of
plants and animals could be found on lands separated by
whole oceans. How was this to be explained? It could not
be maintained that all these forms of life snails, grasshoppers,
ferns, fresh-water fish, and elephants had all built
rafts, like Kon~tiki, in which to cross the Pacific. Nor was it
possible to explain the distribution of all sorts of species by
means of ocean currents, migratory birds, or winds. Behring
Strait would not do either, because the plants and animals
of the warm climates could hardly be tempted to chance the
rigors of the Arctic merely to reach America or to escape
from it.