Earth science or geoscience includes all fields of natural science related to the planet Earth. This is a branch of science dealing with the physical, chemical, and biological complex constitutions and synergistic linkages of Earth's four spheres: the biosphere, hydrosphere/cryosphere, atmosphere, and geosphere. Earth science can be considered to be a branch of planetary science but with a much older history.
The rocky side of a mountain creek in Costa Rica
Layers of sedimentary rock in Makhtesh Ramon
A volcanic eruption is the release of stored energy from below Earth's surface.
The magnetosphere shields the surface of Earth from the charged particles of the solar wind. (image not to scale.)
Natural science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and repeatability of findings are used to try to ensure the validity of scientific advances.
Onion (Allium) cells in different phases of the cell cycle. Growth in an 'organism' is carefully controlled by regulating the cell cycle.
Plato (left) and Aristotle in a 1509 painting by Raphael. Plato rejected inquiry into natural philosophy as against religion, while his student, Aristotle, created a body of work on the natural world that influenced generations of scholars.
Johannes Kepler (1571–1630). Kepler's Astronomia Nova is "the first published account wherein a scientist documents how he has coped with the multitude of imperfect data to forge a theory of surpassing accuracy", therefore laying the groundwork for the scientific method.
Isaac Newton is widely regarded as one of the most influential scientists of all time.
