The ancients thought the Sun was a big lump of coal

The ancients thought the Sun was a big lump of coal. If that was the case , it would have burnt up in 5000 years. We now know that the dynamics of the sun's generation of the heat and light is much more complicated.
Did you know it takes thousands of years for the heat to come up from the center to go out from the Sun where we see it 9.5 minutes later on earth?

Now here is some of the latest.

Twisted Solution to Sun's Mystery Heat
By Jeanna Bryner“Theorists suggested that twisted, tangled magnetic fields might exist,” said study presenter Leon Golub, senior astrophysicist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. “With the XRT, we can see them clearly for the first time.”
Staff Writer
posted: 21 March 2007
01:16 pm ET
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/070321_solarb_update.html

Sea floor records ancient Earth discovered

The crustal plates of our earth's continents lie on top of more molten layer. During the 1900's , there was evidence that the plates of the continents moved apart after being all together in one big plate called Pangea. The upwelling from volcanic action, pushed the continents apart where we have the present day configuration. A theory by the geologist Wegner theorized that happened over the many millions of years but many , even many scientisits, were skeptical. But as more evidence piled up , it became accepted.
I was so interested about the evidence that I did a study in my undergraduate years. It was entitled "The palentological (and biological ) evidence of Continental Drift."
Now here is some currents new evidence.

Sea floor records ancient Earth
A sliver of four billion year old seafloor shows the earliest known evidence of plate tectonics on Earth.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6479289.stm

Whale fossil is found in vineyard
A five million-year-old whale skeleton is uncovered beneath one of Tuscany's most famed vineyards.
The biggest whale fossil ever discovered in Italy has been found in one of the country's finest vineyards. The skeleton appears to be complete and, for the last month, palaeontologists from the University of Florence have been carefully digging around the terraces to extract it in one piece.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6482859.stm