Giant’s Causeway – When Nature Became A MathematicianWhen nature became a mathematician, Ireland’s c

Giant’s Causeway – When Nature Became A MathematicianWhen nature became a mathematician, Ireland’s coast produced the uncanny sight of a symmetry in stone.Nature’s symmetry is something we take for granted in flower, insects and the like. In geology, however, it is rarer and its occurrence is something to marvel at. In the Giant’s Causeway, Nature has spectacularly revealed her mathematical genius, producing tens of thousands of multisided columns of rock packed together like a giant-sized handful of hexagonal pencils.From a distance, this looks like just another part of Country Antrim’s enchanting coast, but suddenly the eye is caught by a strangely chequered promontory. It leads out from the base of cliffs and descends gently into the sea like a huge, crudely fashioned slipway. This extraordinary geological feature has an ancestry dating back some 60 million years, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.The continents of North America and Europe, which had been joined together, began to split apart. The Atlantic Ocean opened up between them, and gradually spread out from a central volcanic rift on the ocean floor. Lava areas in Ireland and Scotland were produced on the rift as the continents began their slow journey.40,000 Basalt ColumnsAs lava poured forth in Country Antrim it formed the largest lava plateau in Europe. The basalt content of some of the lava was unusually consistent. As it solidified, it contracted, but the forces were so evenly distributed that it cracked with geometric precision. The same process can be seen with a thick layer of mud in the bottom of a puddle as it dries in the sun.On Giant’s Causeway the basalt columns average 460mm (18in) across and vary from 1m to 2m (3ft to 6ft) high. The causeway is about 180m (200yds) across at its widest, extends 150m (170yds) into the sea and consist of some 40,000 columns. Over millennia, erosion by glaciers in the Ice Age and relentless battering by the Atlantic have shaped it into the form see today. Each column of basalt actually consists of a series of segments about 360mm (14in) long which have been welded together, but which separated under stress. Now and then exposed sections are sheared off by the waves at the fault line between segments. This has given the Causeway its stepped effect.There are also many other basalt features in the cliffs behind the Causeway and in neighbouring bays. Has anyone ever been? If so, please share your photos in the comments for others to see.~JMImage Credit: http://science.nationalgeographic.com/wallpaper/science/photos/rocks/giants-causeway/Further Reading:UNESCO: http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/369National Trust: http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/giants-causeway/Official Guide: http://www.giantscausewayofficialguide.com/ -- source link

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