Earth's mineralogy unique in the cosmos

Science Daily ^ | 8/26/2015 | Carnegie Institution, Robert Hazen

[JimSEA]

New research from a team led by Carnegie's Robert Hazen predicts that Earth has more than 1,500 undiscovered minerals and that the exact mineral diversity of our planet is unique and could not be duplicated anywhere in the cosmos.

Minerals form from novel combinations of elements. These combinations can be facilitated by both geological activity, including volcanoes, plate tectonics, and water-rock interactions, and biological activity, such as chemical reactions with oxygen and organic material.

[pricilla]

I’ll have half a pound of dilithium crystals please....

[JimSEA]

There is some hyperbole here but an exact match is rare if not unlikely just due to the time and rate of mineral forming combinations. An exact match to the conditions found on earth over 4.5 billion years won’t be found.

[MUDDOG]

Another very interesting work on geology is Simon Winchester’s “The Map That Changed the World.”

It’s about the first geological map of Britain (circa 1820).

I had known that geology was a national craze in England in the late 18th-early 19th centuries, but I didn’t know why until I read this book.

The answer — coal. It was the oil of the day. As industrialization multiplied the need for coal, English landowners wanted to find coal deposits on their properties to exploit.

So you need to know what kind of surface geology indicates coal deposits.

Also, as more and more coal mines were dug, it was noticed that the underground layers occurred in regular patterns, and contained similar fossils in similar layers, that also showed a pattern.

Good book.

[JimSEA]

William Smith’s map!! Great story.

[Slambat]

Did you know that there are clouds of alcohol in the
universe.

“An exact match to the conditions found on earth over 4.5 billion years won’t be found.”

Honestly I doubt you or anyone can prove that or even
whether it could or couldn’t be proven at all.

[JimSEA]

Statistically wouldn’t it be very unlikely? I do t think proof is possible but under what conditions would a duplicate earth be created and how would the same results be produced.

[Slambat]

“what conditions would a duplicate earth be created”

I would guess, because that’s all I can do, is by the
same conditions this earth was made. Even then the same
organic and inorganic compounds could be made by other
means and under different conditions like methane or
alcohol. To believe that life only exists here on Earth
alone and no where else is weak faith at best. What we see
of the universe outside of our own solar system is at
least
four years and possibly five billion years old. I’d say odds
are there are probably a million earth like planets with life
on it and most inhabited by intelligent life.

[JimSEA]

I don’t doubt that there are many planets with life. Some might well be similar to earth but not the same. Our pattern of life seems to have its basic organic compounds spread pretty wide. But for plate tectonics, we could have been a snowball without much free oxygen in the atmosphere. I think this is the sort of probability Hazen was going for. I know that he believes life is very widespread in the Universe.