Abstract

The historical retrospective and the current state of knowledge on the various branches of geology evince an evolution from a pre-scientific geology (15th - 18th century) to a concise and multidisciplinary sciences based on vigorous concepts and application of specific principles and methods that developed since the 19th century. In about one century, geoscientist have used several tools (physics, chemistry, biology, chronology, mathematics and informatics) to understand the geology and the evolution of the dynamic Earth planet and how its system works in a broader context encompassing the atmosphere, biosphere and hydrosphere and how it evolved to its current state. A revolution in the earth sciences started in 1960s with the emergence of the theory of plate tectonics which have been acknowledged and accepted few years later. In fact, all geologic processes on local, regional and global scales are directly or indirectly influenced by plate tectonics; this latter is also blamed for slowly (and instantaneous) evolving environmental change and for many catastrophes over time (earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis and landslide. The achieved developments resulted in a broad understanding of the Earth planet and led to expand the basis of geosciences education and then, open doors to the exploration and the extraction of major’s natural resources.