Alfred Lothar Wegener (1 November 1880 – 13 November 1930) was a German scientist and meteorologist. He is most notable for his theory of continental drift, which he proposed in December 1912. This was the idea that the continents were slowly drifting around the Earth. He also had ideas about why the continents drift, which other scientists thought were impossible. His hypothesis was not accepted until the 1950s. Then several discoveries gave evidence of continental drift, and of the actual causes.