Final answer:
Rocks change over a vast geologic time scale, with the Earth's history spanning approximately 4.5 billion years as confirmed by radioactive dating methods and the geologic time scale. The transformation of rocks and Earth's features results from slow, continuous processes and not sudden catastrophic ones.
Step-by-step explanation:
The Earth is dynamic, so the rocks change over a vast geologic time scale. The process of rock formation, deformation, and alteration can span millions to billions of years. The geologic record demonstrates that the Earth is approximately 4.5 billion years old, a fact substantiated by radioactive dating methods, including uranium-238 dating. Geologists use the geologic time scale to describe the sequences and durations of events that have shaped our planet. This time scale clarifies the chronology of geologic events and the evolution of life, highlighting that the Earth's features were not formed by sudden catastrophic events but rather through slow and continuous processes observable even today.
Geologic structures, such as the folded rock layers seen in Australia's Kalbarri National Park, showcase the Earth's history. They are relatively static on short time scales but have transformed significantly over Earth's long history, indicating a high degree of plasticity and motion within the planet's crust over eons. The oldest known rock minerals on Earth are crystals from Australia dating back at least 4.404 billion years, suggesting the Earth is at least this old but not older than the 4.57 billion years estimated for the solar system.