SWhat changed
McKenzie and Parker modeled rigid plates as rotations on a sphere and tested a common North Pacific rotation pole against published shallow-earthquake slip directions.
Scientific scope
McKenzie and Parker modeled rigid plates as rotations on a sphere and tested a common North Pacific rotation pole against published shallow-earthquake slip directions. Approximately rigid aseismic plates on a sphere; relative motion is an instantaneous Euler rotation. Transform slip gives direction, not rate; additional spreading-rate evidence is needed. Local planar velocity circuits apply rigorously only at infinitesimal junctions; global circuits use angular velocities, not summed finite rotations. North Pacific pole is constrained by San Andreas and Kodiak directions; about 80 published shallow-earthquake solutions were tested. Published data are not newly replayed; fit uncertainties and local exceptions remain. Mercator preserves local angles, not velocities near poles. Model is explicitly instantaneous phenomenology, excludes intermediate/deep-focus earthquakes and leaves driving mechanism and plate evolution unresolved. The target covers pages 1276-1280. The original header dates the paper December 30, 1967; some catalogue metadata instead displays December 1. The assessed contribution is limited to this tectonics paper. The regional field-data analysis has not been independently reproduced here.
Evidence
Source-linked, scoped account of the original work. The published scope states the scientific assumptions and remaining verification limits. WRS has not independently certified the full proof, experimental result or system benchmark.
Contributors
- D. P. McKenzie · SCIENCE: Original source-listed scientific author of this scoped work; byline does not determine effort fractions.
- R. L. Parker · SCIENCE: Original source-listed scientific author of this scoped work; byline does not determine effort fractions.
- D. P. Mc Kenzie and R. L. Parker, The North Pacific: an Example of Tectonics on a Sphere, original Nature scan, Alberta copy
- Publisher Crossref deposit for Mc Kenzie/Parker 1967 spherical tectonics
Provisional WRS assessment, edition 2026-10-16.1. Independent expert calibration is pending. This grade does not certify correctness or assign ownership.
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