habsgeographicalmar12

Geography? The key skill of Solicitors, Barristersand Judges is not to know what the lawsare, and these are easily retrievable by anybodywho wants to look them up; no, the skilllies in interpreting the law and applying themto circumstance. There may not be a definitelaw for a particular situation. Sporting refereesface this all the time; they make a decisionbased on relevant laws and regulations but italways comes down to circumstance and situation.AS Level Geographers will be familiar withthe name Sue Earle; she was legally forced topay for the destruction of her own home andlivelihood having been forced to selling herhouse for £1 to the government and has beendenied compensation.The coastal stretch between FlamboroughHead and Spurn Point along the Yorkshirecoastline (see diagram above) experiences higherosion due to a number of factors. Mappletonerected groynes which successfully built up aprotective beach. This however, due to north tosouth longshore drift, dramatically altered thesediment supply to Great Cowden causing tenfold increased erosion rates from three to thirtyfeet per year. Sue’s farm became dangerouslyclose to the cliff rapidly and because of this shehad to sell the cows occupying the rapidly disappearingfields. Eventually her farm housewas compulsorily purchased and she wasforced to pay demolition costs. The legal battleis ongoing, with judges having to make decisionsbased on current relevant laws, but obviouslythere are no specific laws directly relatedto the case which is why it is so hotly debatedas to what, if any, compensation Sue Earleshould receive.Many Habs boys go on to study Economics atuniversity. Geography provides an importantunderpinning here too. At a lower level,knowledge of HDI and comparing gross domesticproduct (GDP) with other variables on ascatter graph is the main theme, but the studyof human activity, such as tourism and the economiccosts and benefits to each country, canbe fascinating. Key microeconomic principlesare also studied in depth at iGCSE level. Variousmodels of production are looked at whenstudying inputs, processes and outputs in a varietyof businesses as well as location analysis;businesses locate themselves to maximise economicopportunity and minimise costs. For examplealmost all large industrial sites are locatedon a river or coast for transportation of highvolume goods; coal power stations are a goodexample of this.More obviously, there are also many caseswhere physical Geography is at the heart ofScience. Chemistry forms the basis of mosttypes of weathering, most notably carbonation.The process is essentially brought about wherethere is water (rain), carbon dioxide (naturallyin the air) and calcium carbonate (commonlylimestone or chalk). There are two main chemicalreactions in the process: CO 2 + H 2 O →H 2 CO 3 and H 2 CO 3 + CaCO 3 → Ca(HCO 3 ) 2 . Inthe first instance, rain combines with the carbondioxide in the air to form carbonic acid.When this acid falls as rain it reacts with thecalcium carbonate in limestone or chalk to formcalcium bicarbonate, which dissolves and iswashed away in the rain water. The process ismost prevalent in glacial periods because colderwater holds more dissolved carbon dioxidegas so the process is much more efficient. Thisis a textbook example of where Geography extractsthe cores of subjects (a chemical reactionin this case), but without including excesswaffle; to this day there has never once beenanybody interested in chromatography.The final subject which Geography lies at theheart of is Physics. Again, a popular subject.Global warming has meant that the study ofthe climate has in recent times taken up an increasingpart in Geography syllabuses acrossthe board from primary school to degree leveland in society in general. To understand theclimate one must come to terms with some underlyinglaws of physics. Notably the fact that23