Preface to the second edition

A few years ago, Professor David Hilton of the University of California, San Diego mentioned to me that he was still using my book, The Earth: Its Birth and Growth, as suggested reading in his class. The book was published in 1979 by Cambridge University Press. Amazed by its longevity, I became curious about how this seemingly plain small book could have survived in the recent swarm of the media world, in which there are a flood of books on astounding findings in Earth and planetary sciences with colorful pictures and illustrations. I read the book once again, and I was convinced that it was worth revising it by incorporating recent developments.

The new edition has therefore attempted to keep the original style of the first edition: that is, to maintain readability without sacrificing scientific rigor. The concise style of the book is important so that readers can see the big picture without being drowned by a formidable amount of information. Obviously many of the materials in the first edition needed to be updated. Also, given recent developments, I wanted to emphasize in the new edition the importance of integrating a vast range of geophysical and geochemical data to develop a coherent view of Earth’s evolution.