Introduction

Abstract

Such is the scope and versatility of magnetic studies that the same apparatus can be used, within the span of a single day, to probe the orienting behaviour of living organisms, trace the origin of suspended stream sediments, provide estimates of particulate pollution, and explore, through measurements of palaeomagnetic intensities and pole positions, the dynamics of the Earth’s fluid core. This very diversity presents us with a formidable challenge at the outset, the more so since in most of the disciplines touched on, few workers are familiar with either the principles of magnetism involved or with the methods of study employed.

Its purpose is to be suggestive to him rather than didactic; to put him in the way of intelligently observing for himself.

Archibald Geikie 1879

Outlines of field geology

London: Macmillan