Kelvin’s insights helped to launch a fruitful dialogue between geologists and physicists – a dialogue that eventually resolved even problems related to the length of time needed for Darwin’s theory of evolution to operate. And the oversight that warped Kelvin’s estimate – the possibility that fluid motion could efficiently transport heat within the Earth’s interior – turned out to be critical to understanding plate tectonics and continental drift.
开尔文的洞见帮助引发了地质学家和物理学家间卓有成效的对话——这场对话的甚至解决了关于达尔文的进化论实施起来需要多久的问题。而导致开尔文测算失准的疏忽——流体运动可以在地球内部有效传热的可能性——后来也成为理解板块构造论和大陆漂移学说的关键。