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

EARTH'S SHIFTING CRUST
cap is largely or entirely uncompensated isostatically. The
other assumption is that at some point below the crust a weak
layer exists that will permit the displacement
of the crust
over it. The first assumption is capable of verification, and
may even be verified in the course of the current Geophysical
Year. This will depend, however, on whether the new gravity
data that are to be collected during this year are reduced by
formulas based on correct assumptions. There is no present
prospect of direct verification of the second assumption.
However, the body of geological evidence presented in this
book provides very strong indirect support for both these
assumptions.
As to the mechanics of crust displacements, Campbell has
provided the necessary constructions. To some, the simplicity
of his thought may be unnerving, but I feel assured that in
the end this simplicity itself will be the justification for reposing
wide confidence in this theory. For it appears that no
recondite principle can vitiate it. Who can argue with formulas
so simple that a high school student can, and usually
does, master them?
In addition to the support provided by evidence from the
field, our theory receives support from logic. It has been
recognized
that one characteristic of sound new theories is
the simplicity of their basic assumptions, and another is their
capacity to explain a greater number of facts or a greater
range of problems than previous theories. It was the sim-
plicity of this theory that first aroused the interest of Einstein,
in whose philosophy of science simplicity was a prime con-
sideration. It appeared to him also that it might explain a
far greater number of facts than were explainable by the
various theories that have been produced to explain the lead-
ing problems of the earth separately.
I shall have to admit that the full development of the im-
plications of crust displacements, for all the affected fields,
has carried me much further than I originally expected.
When I resurvey the structure that has now been erected on
the basis of the simple basic theory, I feel exactly as Sir James