災變論

thumb|The discoveries of different layers of fossils, such as those containing Palaeotherium and [[Anoplotherium (pictured), by Georges Cuvier led him to believe that series of catastrophic events wiped out worlds before the modern one.]] In geology, catastrophism is the theory that the Earth has largely been shaped by sudden, short-lived, violent events, possibly worldwide in scope. This contrasts with uniformitarianism (sometimes called gradualism), according to which slow incremental changes, such as erosion, brought about all the Earth's geological features. The proponents of uniformitari