This research paper compares geology across Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America. It argues that the continents differ because their crustal foundations, plate-boundary settings, supercontinent histories, climates, erosion systems, sedimentary basins, and human uses differ. The study begins with deep time, plate tectonics, rock records, and surface processes, then treats each continent explicitly through crustal architecture, mountain belts, rifts, basins, landforms, hazards, resources, and open questions. Comparative chapters connect cratons, orogens, rifts, sedimentary basins, glaciation, volcanism, groundwater, mineral systems, and geological risk across the world. The paper is designed as a long-form overview rather than a substitute for detailed regional mapping. Its purpose is to show how a world geology argument can move from planetary theory to continental evidence without reducing a continent to one famous mountain range or one mineral deposit. Appendices provide comparative case studies, geological intervals, research prompts for each continent, a glossary, and a source portfolio.
Benjamin Williams (Tue,) studied this question.