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Building on the pioneering work of the 18th-century Scottish geologist James Hutton, Charles Lyell developed the theory of uniformitarianism. This theory says that the natural processes that change the Earth in the present have operated in the past at the same gradual rate. Lyell supported his theory with geological observations that he made in the course of extensive travels in Europe and North America.

Charles Lyell is also considered one of the founders of stratigraphy - the study of the layers of the Earth's surface. He developed a method for classifying strata, or layers, by studying ancient marine beds in Western Europe. Lyell observed that the marine beds closest to the surface, therefore the most recent, contained many species of shell-bearing molluscs that still live in today's seas. On the other hand, deeper, older strata contained fewer and fewer fossils of living species. Lyell divided the rocks of this period into three epochs, based on decreasing percentages of modern species. The names he proposed-Eocene, Miocene, and Pliocene-are still used today.

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