“Such a section as never was put together before”: Logan, Dawson, Lyell, and mid-Nineteenth-Century measurements of the Pennsylvanian Joggins section of Nova Scotia
Bibliographic record
Abstract
William Edmond Logan assumed his duties as the first head of the Geological Survey of Canada in June 1843. Two previously overlooked field notebooks provide new insight into his first field project that summer: measurement of the “Joggins section,” a classic Carboniferous locality in Nova Scotia. Inspired by reports of 40-foot-tall fossil trees, Logan spent five days measuring 14 570 feet 11 inches of strata exposed along the shore of the Bay of Fundy. Widely regarded as a meticulous, bed-by-bed measured section, closer examination reveals that many thickness values were calculated using paced distances. Realizing that his measured section was too detailed for scientific journals of the day, Logan published his work in a relatively obscure government publication where it went largely unnoticed for nearly a decade. Unaware of Logan’s measured section, John William Dawson and Charles Lyell visited Joggins in 1852 and measured the section for themselves. Dawson later stated that the two sections contain only minor differences, but careful comparison shows that they have radically different descriptions and measurements for even the most distinctive beds. Dawson disguised these discrepancies in post-1855 editions of his book Acadian Geology by rewriting much of the measured section and abandoning many of his own observations. Although over 200 subsequent Joggins studies build upon these measured sections, the present study represents the first detailed examination of the two historical sections and reveals previously unknown discrepancies between two of the most important early geologic studies undertaken in Nova Scotia. Resumé William Edmond Logan est devenu le premier responsable de la Commission géologique du Canada en juin 1843. Deux carnets de travaux sur le terrain, précédemment négligés, fournissent un nouvel éclairage sur son premier projet sur le terrain cet été-là : le mesurage du « stratotype de Joggins », un secteur carbonifère classique en Nouvelle-Écosse. Inspiré par des comptes rendus de la présence d’arbres fossiles de 40 pieds de hauteur, Logan a consacré cinq jours à mesurer 14 570 pieds 11 pouces de strates affleurant le long du rivage de la baie de Fundy. Un examen plus attentif de l’endroit, largement considéré comme un stratotype méticuleusement mesuré couche par couche, révèle que de nombreuses données d’épaisseur ont été calculées au nombre de pas. Se rendant compte que le stratotype qu’il avait mesuré était trop détaillé pour les revues scientifiques de l’époque, Logan avait publié ses travaux dans une publication gouvernementale relativement obscure où ils sont demeurés pratiquement inaperçus pendant près d’une décennie. John William Dawson et Charles Lyell, qui n’étaient pas au courant du stratotype mesuré par Logan, se sont rendus à Joggins en 1852 et ont mesuré le stratotype eux-mêmes. Dawson a ultérieurement laissé entendre que les deux stratotypes présentaient seulement des différences minimes, mais une comparaison attentive révèle que leurs descriptions et leurs mesures sont radicalement différentes, même dans le cas des couches les plus caractéristiques. Dawson a déguisé ces divergences dans des éditions ultérieures à 1855 de son livre Acadian Geology en remaniant une vaste part du stratotype mesuré et en abandonnant nombre de ses propres observations. Même si plus de 200 études subséquentes de Joggins se sont appuyées sur les stratotypes mesurés, la présente étude représente le premier examen détaillé des stratotypes et elle révèle des divergences auparavant inconnues entre deux des premières études géologiques les plus importantes réalisées en Nouvelle-Écosse. [Traduit par la rédaction]
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.001 | 0.003 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.008 | 0.005 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".