New book: The Origin of Rocks and Mineral Deposits

Pioneering Australian geological expert publishes ‘The Origin of Rocks and Mineral Deposits.’  New book is the culmination of a lot of research effort by many people and it contains significant new knowledge.

Author, John Elliston, has been involved in the conduct and supervision of mineral exploration and research for over 45 years. The evidence he presents in this new book is clear and the conclusions commonsense and logical. book

Because it is interdisciplinary a preview edition was printed for evaluation. For that reason it is probably one of the most thoroughly reviewed and verified scientific theses ever published.

The Origin of Rocks and Mineral Deposits – using current physical chemistry of small particle systems” offers new understanding of geological processes of interest to scientists generally and is especially relevant to the work and teaching of all geologists.

Elliston is mindful of the decay in science understanding and abandonment of scientific method. Scientists world-wide are fed up with scientific reports and concepts that rely on surveys of opinion, exaggerated media reports, statistical assessments of likelihood, “it must be the way I think it is because I don’t know of any alternative”, etc.

John Elliston thus is a champion of the scientific method and seeks to explain natural phenomena using natural laws, verifiable and reproducible observations and measurements that validate logical conclusions. Elliston draws on two outstandingly successful Australian research projects based on correct use of the scientific method.   The application of colloid science in this book has embraced the geological sciences in a coherent and compelling way.

Intense competition for research grants has resulted in strong bias towards politically expedient investigations believed favoured by funding authorities. Once thriving geology departments have been downgraded to small divisions in Department of Geography, Department of Environmental Sciences, etc. Success in mineral exploration is harder to achieve.

Author Elliston’s long career as a chemist and consulting geologist began at a progressive mining company in 1956 where studies led to developing an understanding of the nature and origin of the local mineral deposits.  His outstanding talents saw him appointed to the board of the parent company in 1969.

As an Executive Director he was responsible for the activities of a number of technical subsidiaries including Geopeko Limited and he also became a director of several large mining and industrial companies. He directed the exploration and mine geological teams who went on to develop further significant Australian resources.

From the Foreword

“We think when our equilibrium is disturbed”. This truism is attributed to the great Columbia University educator, Professor John Dewey.

John Elliston is a scientist who has never shirked the responsibility all scientists should have of challenging the established ideas, theories and paradigms in our various fields of scientific endeavour. This work is interdisciplinary, based as much on colloid science as on his careful geological observations and meticulous review of the literature in both disciplines. The principles of colloid and surface chemistry are impeccably well represented in the text of this book.

These principles applied to natural particle systems will no doubt disturb the equilibrium of many geologists. If in doing so, John Elliston is able to have scholars follow the structure of the thinking he has outlined in this book, he will have done them and our science a great service. By contrasting Elliston’s views on the central issues in mineral and rock formingprocesses with those in accepted texts, serious scholars will need to re-evaluate their own explicit or perhaps implicit acceptance of the dogmas of traditional earth science.

There is nothing wrong with dogma! There is something quite wrong however, if we = are unwilling to let a fellow scholar challenge our earnestly held beliefs. We need to be secure in our own ability to learn and explore new ideas because in the final analysis the rocks will speak for themselves. Their unmistakable testimony is quite clear from the prolific illustrations in this book.

My introduction to the ideas John Elliston has laid out in this book came when he asked me to explain the then current understanding of how particles aggregated in aqueous, usually concentrated, colloidal dispersions. That role has been and continues to be a labour of love for me. I was able to see the results of all the theories of surface science displayed in the rocks around me. Rock textures and structures reflect colloidal stability, ion and molecule adsorption, and rheology. These are near and dear to my heart as a colloid and surface chemist.

The colloid science that John Elliston uses in this book is all standard textbook stuff. It has been presented in Australian, American, English, Japanese, and European Universities where I have had the privilege of teaching over the last 40 years. Colloid science is experiencing a rebirth; we are now ‘nanotechnologists’ immersed in a nanometric scale world. We are advised to explore the world of ‘nanomachines’, ‘nanostructures’ and the like. I give a lecture each year on “Muds, Slimes, Sludge, and other Uninteresting Materials”. I am thinking of adding the prefix ‘nano’ to ‘Materials’! It may achieve a promotion!

The truth is that the energy stored in surfaces, when specific surface area is large, is a formidable driving force. Electrostatic potential differences of a few millivolts, for example decaying over the length of say the diameters of three or four water molecules (about 10 Ångströms or one nanometre) yields a field strength of millions of volts per centimetre. This is the standard stuff of Colloid Science.
The author, John Elliston, built up and led one of the most innovative and successful exploration teams in the history of mineral exploration. It’s success was substantially due to Elliston’s insistence on attention to proper observation and recording of the evidence in the rocks, which led to the development of revolutionary new concepts of magma formation and mineralising processes.

We need scientists like John Elliston; we need books like this one. Colloid chemists will love it; I believe geologists will learn to love it. Those of us who are not geologists envy you. Your world of mineral, rock and ore forming processes is so exciting. You have a great responsibility to expose the young minds in your care to these ideas. To tell them not to think about new ideas is to condemn your science to oblivion.
— Thomas W. Healy, AO, FRACI, FAA, FTSE, Emeritus Professor of Physical Chemistry
Purchase John Elliston’s important new book at www.connorcourt.com

 

 

Trackback from your site.

Leave a comment

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.
Share via