Structure of the Earth discontinuity (a second order discontinuity). The uppermost mantle together with the crust constitutes the lithosphere. The crust-mantle boundary occurs as two physically different events. First, there is a discontinuity in the seismic velocity, which is most commonly known as the Mohorovičić discontinuity or Moho. The cause of the Moho is thought to be a change in rock composition from rocks containing plagioclase feldspar (above) to rocks that contain no feldspars (below). Second, in oceanic crust, there is a chemical discontinuity between ultramafic cumulates and tectonized harzburgites, which has been observed from deep parts of the oceanic crust that have been
Age of the Earth the Earth itself. In 1892, Thomson had been made Lord Kelvin in appreciation of his many scientific accomplishments. Kelvin calculated the age of the Earth by using thermal gradients, and he arrived at an estimate of about 100 million years. He did not realize that the Earth mantle was convecting, and this invalidated his estimate. In 1895, John Perry produced an age-of-Earth estimate of 2 to 3 billion years using a model of a convective mantle and thin crust. Kelvin stuck by his estimate of 100 million years, and later reduced it to about 20 million years. The discovery of