GeologyRocks

Like maths and science - it depends how interested you are in it! But don't forget geology is a science in fact. One good thing is that at high school level there is little maths - but an awful lot of new words to remember and apply!

John

Well I'm not that wild about Maths to be honest, will that be a huge problem? :?

But you didn't tell me how tought it's going to be.

There will be little to no maths. You may have to weigh things, measure strata in the field, learn to use a clinometer for dip readings (angles), and use a compas in degrees. Depending on the course you may have to measure the angles of crystal faces or calculate the angles from diagrams, but that will be about it. Really nothing you haven't learnt in maths already - just applying it to something now.
As I say the topughness of any subject depends on your interest in that subject. I find it easy to absorb data on minerals, but when it comes to fossils these Latin names simply won't stick in my mind. If I'd wanted to speak Latin I'd have joined the Roman Army. To me fossils are for dating rocks. Other people live and breathe them. Each to his own. You have to decide if you think you are going to like it. If you do, you'll find it easyish. But there is a lot to learn so I won't tell you its a breeze.
John

That's quite a load of my mind actually, thanks. Like my nick says I really am a geo noob. er.. one another thing. Does Physics or Biology feature much in Geology?

Hi Geo Noob,

Without having sight of the syllabus for your course it is difficult to answer that. Many science subjects tend to overlap each other at least slightly. You must remember that your question was 'How difficult is geology?' Thats like saying 'How difficult is maths?' Some is easy and basic, other concepts are more difficult. Geology is the study of earth sciences - a very broad subject with many facets. I suspect you will cover things in the broadest sense, so probably very little ( if any) physics. Biology may feature a little more, because you almost cetainly will cover evolution and fossils, but mostly marine fossils, in a general sort of way. You may have to know the various parts of bivalves (cockles, mussels etc) and echinoids (sea urchins) - or at least I had to learn that. But syllabus's change, and I suspect that since you mention 'high school' you are in America. Your syllabus is bound to be slightly different to ours in England.

I always think that the hardest thing to get your head round is geological time. The vastnes of it is bewidering, but it breaks down into Periods (best remembered with a numonic - such as Camels Often Sip Devon Cream Perhaps Trying to Justify Creation = Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous, Permian, Jurassic, Cretaceous. After that stick PreCambrian on the beginning and Quaternary on the end and you have names for 5000,000,000 years!)
Nearly every walk of life now has its own jargon and geology is no exception. Trawl through this site and you'll find new words you've not heard of before. There are so many that there is a geology dictionary, but you get used to them the more you use them.
Have a look round the United States Geological Survey web site (put USGS into Google to get to the home page). It covers a very broad spectrum and is generally in lay-mans terms. Another is www.about.com - when you get to it put geology in the 'search'. Thereis an amazing amount of info there, again in lay-mans terms.

Good luck!

John

Hi Geo-noob,

Geology courses vary a lot, depending on the level of study (high school, college, etc) and who teaches them.

Generally, as John said, geology is the study of the Earth system. This means you will have to do some maths, physics, biology and chemistry in one form or another.

My undergraduate degree was in geophysics, but the first three years were mainly geology. As a postgrad I now help with teaching the undergrads, so I'll give you a break down on what is expected of undergrads at Edinburgh Uni.

Maths:
o Trigonometry (sin, cos, tan, etc)
o Basic algebra - rearranging equations
o Understand simple differential equations, i.e. rates of change

Most of the above is also taught in a UK University if you don't have those skills.

Chemistry:
o Understand chemical equations
o Rearrange chemical equations
o Phase diagrams (the amount taught on this varies, but at Edinburgh this is heavily emphasised and very difficult!)

Again, most of this is taught if you don't have the skills needed

Physics:
o Understand simple equations, such as v=d/t etc
o Understand SI units and can manipulate them (turn years into millions of years, for example)

This kind of thing is not taught at Edinburgh and students either know it already or pick it up as they go along. Some struggle constantly with it, no matter how many times you tell them how many metres are in a kilometre

Biology:
o Evolutionary theory
o Palaeontology, including naming families (possibly genera) and identifying body parts

All this is taught and will be in your courses. It is not very difficult at all, apart from learning all the names - that depends on you. I have trouble with these still.

Like John said, the trickiest thing is understanding time. The ability to visualise in 3D comes in handy, but you will pick this skill up. The terminology is difficult at first, but you soon get the hang of it.

As for comparing to high school level, I can't answer that as I'm from the UK. Assuming high school is equivalent to our A-levels (which we do 16-18) then the first year of a college course is pretty straight forward. You learn the terms, name and start to get your head around the processes, scales and times involved. The rest of the years will depend how the first year goes!

Anyway, I hope this helps!

Jon

Hey mate!

I guess it also depends on what part of geology you do!
Geophysics is lots of maths and physics (hence the 'physics' in the name) but nobody does geophysics!!! (haha, not at my university anyway, i think there are 2-3 geophysics majors and 7-8 leacturers!!!)

But in geology its easy (maths and physics wise)! I'm hopeless at maths, im two thirds through my degree, and find i can still get A's (if i get off my butt).
i think alot of geology involves logic and reasoning more than anything, and you learn that through your degree.

I find the hardest part is to remember all the names (minerals, fossils, ages) so get into it! Its a whole lot of fun!

Thanks you guys! Your information was very helpful and I'm feeling better about taking a course ... whenever that might be. I'm also taking a look round the site.

Hi,

There's not much else I can add to the stuff the rest of you have put on here except to say that in most courses at undergraduate level - as Jon has previously said - you will need to cover the basics of most parts of geology, but opportunities to specialise in areas you enjoy - e.g. palaeontology, applied geology - are there at most (but not all) universities if you want them.

One thing I would make clear is that at undergraduate level, again as Jon has mentioned before, maths, chemistry (and to a lesser degree physics and biology) are going to be involved - how much they are involved depends on the course, and what you are interested in - .e.g there won't be all that much physics or maths in a paleontology undergraduate course, but expect a fair amount of chemistry and lots of biology (although from my experience, increasing amounts of maths are being used in palaeontology now as well). Whatever happens, don't be put off by this - geology is unlike other sciences in that once you have got past the basic levels if you aren't enjoying the biology, physics or chemistry involved there are generally other areas of the science that you can look into.

There are a number of websites around - e.g.http://www.bgs.ac.uk/vacancies/studying.htm, http://www.geolsoc.org.uk/template.cfm?name=geocareers_careers&home=false, http://www.palass.org/pages/careers.html, http://www.uk-rocks.net/ etc...plus all the university sites which will give you more information