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a creator of the tectonics of blocks, which is today applied
a lot in geology. He proved that the positions of the continents
were totally different in the geological past, meaning that
they had definitely been moving. Much later, modern geophysical
measurements, including the application of satellites and
radio-signals, confirmed his theories. Milutin Milankovic
is truly a scientific genius, finally acknowledged as such
by the world on December the 10th, 1976 when the "Nature"
magazine printed the final results of the 5-year project,
whose basic goal was to validate Milankovic's work and to
answer the question whether his evaluations were correct or
not. After it had been confirmed that the variation of the
Earth's orbit was, in fact, the pacemaker of the ice ages,
all doubts were dispersed, and our genius became a member
of the world's scientific elite. |
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Milankovic became the subject of intense interest of numerous scientific
teams, since his work spanned the problems of several fields of
knowledge. The symposium "Milankovic and the climate"
was organised in Palisad, USA in 1982, and over 90 most eminent
scientists all over the world took part. They all came to the symposium
because of the interest they showed in the work of our genius, but
also because they wanted to further develop and research the Sun
- Earth interaction and all its consequences. There is obviously
more to this field of science than meets the eye, since NATO was
very interested in the symposium and since it was, in fact, one
of its sponsors. In the year 1988 a scientific meeting was held
in Perudia, Italy, by the name of "Cyclo-stratigraphy".
A new research method was promoted there, based on Milankovic's
sunlight cycles, and on detecting colder and hotter cycles of our
planet through the study of rhythmic changes of the layers of rock.
Regrettably, nowadays there is more interest in Milankovic's work
abroad than in his own country. So far no project has been financed
in Milankovic's homeland which would have as its subject his cycles
of sunlight, although the results of such a project would have had
a multidisciplinary significance. The question why Milankovic is
so "uninteresting" to his fellow-countrymen, apart from
a few enthusiastic individuals, remains so far unanswered. Milankovic
is this nation's asset and should finally be acknowledged as such.
The European Society of Geophysics has been giving the annual "Milutin
Milankovic" medal since 1993, while no such medal has even
been considered in our country. That's why the question "Whose
is Milankovic, anyway?" seems appropriate. Milankovic died
on 12th of December, 1958. His legacy includes a number of textbooks.
His textbooks on Cosmic mechanics, which he taught at the Belgrade
University from 1909 till he retired in 1955, have been used a lot
since. He was a famous rhetorician and stylist, which is why his
works, such as "The history of astronomy", "Through
the realm of science", "Technical science in ancient times",
or "Technical science and science in general through centuries",
are probably the most beautiful works of popular science written
in Serbian, while he is best known by his novel "Through the
Universe and through the centuries". Nowadays everybody considers
him the greatest of travellers through space and time. His memoirs
"Memories, events and revelations" tell us exactly what
Milankovic was like as a man and as a scientist. Nowadays, all you
need to do is search for the site named "MILANKOVITCH"
at the Internet and the browser will provide you with numerous facts
about our great scientist whose achievements match those of Tesla,
Pupin, Cvijic, Mika Alas, Pancic, or other scientists world-wide.
At the same time, another thing can be noted: no other scientist
is so popular with readers as Milankovic, and he is often quoted
by others. That's why it is appropriate to say that what Milankovic
planted at the end of the second millennium will give fruit in the
third.
Source: www.astronomija.co.yu
Author: Vlado Milicevic, Ph.D, geoins@EUnet.yu
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