Abstract
Experiment, in the traditional sense of some sort of carefully contrived and controlled interrogation of nature in a laboratory, has played in earth science a minor role for much of the past 150 years. Illustrations — the maps, charts, photographs and drawings which form the ‘visual language’ of earth science and which fill its research literature and textbooks — are commonplace. Rudwick (1976) tried to call attention to the neglect by historians, philosophers and sociologists of the visual element in science, particularly in geology, and traced the emergence of the visual language of maps and stratigraphic columns and sections in the 1830s and 1840s. Illustrations are ubiquitous in twentieth-century earth science literature. Much of the activity at earth science conferences and congresses centres on the aptly-named poster sessions. Rare is the lecture or paper which is unaccompanied by frequent use of slide and overhead projectors. These illustrations are not decoration, are not emblematic of a descriptive science, are not devices to break up blocks of texts, but are an integral part of discourse among earth scientists.
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Le Grand, H.E. (1990). Is a Picture Worth a Thousand Experiments?. In: Le Grand, H.E. (eds) Experimental Inquiries. Australasian Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, vol 8. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-2057-6_9
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