Geophysical global cooling

Before the concept of plate tectonics, global cooling was a geophysical theory by James Dwight Dana, also referred to as the contracting earth theory. It suggested that the Earth had been in a molten state, and features such as mountains formed as it cooled and shrank.^[1] As the interior of the Earth cooled and shrank, the rigid crust would have to shrink and crumple. The crumpling could produce features such as mountain ranges.