The famous lines by Song dynasty poet Xin Qiji—"I sought her a thousand times in the crowd, then suddenly turning back, there she was in the dim light"—are well known to everyone. The renowned Qing dynasty scholar Wang Guowei once cited this as the "third realm of scholarship." Whenever I think of this third realm, I cannot help pondering what kind of knowledge structure a geoscientist should possess, and how many "degrees" of seeking are needed to reach the realm of "suddenly turning back, there she was in the dim light."

Since the 1970s, geological science has been advancing in an all-directional and accelerated manner. "All-directional" refers to the vigorous rise of new and interdisciplinary fields such as geophysics, geochemistry, and geological mathematics, as well as the opening of multiple domains and pathways—into the sky, the sea, and the earth. "Accelerated" is manifested in the shortening of scientific theory cycles and the rising rate of knowledge obsolescence.

Taking structural geology alone, the application of the finite element method and computer simulation of the mechanical processes of fold and fault formation and of crustal movement has become one of the main pathways toward quantification in structural geology. In the identification and staging of paleotectonic features,paleotectonic stress fieldinversion, and the discrimination of metallogenic structures, the application of fuzzy mathematics has shown new vitality. When discussing tectonics and metamorphism, tectonics and magmatism, and tectonics and mineralization, one inevitably touches upon the relationships between the tectonic stress field and the rheological field, the heat flow (temperature) field,geochemical fieldand others. More intriguingly, with the in-depth study of deep structures and global tectonics and the advancement of the entire earth sciences and astronomy, we must ultimately seek thekinematic equationsthat describe crustal movement, as well as the dynamic equations that describe endogenic and exogenic geological processes, so as to fundamentally grasp the inherent laws of crustal development, evolution, and movement.

Clearly, in today's era of leapfrog development in geological science, to become a promising geological talent one must lay a deeper theoretical foundation and open up broader learning space.

For well-known reasons, contemporary young geoscientists generally share certain weaknesses: relatively poor knowledge of literature, history, and philosophy; relatively low research and creative ability; weak imaginative thinking and comprehensive application ability; and relatively poor oral, written, and graphical expression skills. This gives rise to a series of problems in study and work. A considerable number of middle-aged geoscientists, due to untimely knowledge updating, suffer from serious "overload operation." This phenomenon of unreasonable and imperfect knowledge structure must command our sufficient attention.

So what kind of knowledge structure should geological talent possess? We might first look at the experiences of the older generation of geologists. Alfred Wegener, founder of the continental drift theory, transformed from an astronomer and meteorologist into a geologist, and the breadth of his knowledge is admired by the world. The reason Li Siguang could make contributions different from ordinary geoscientists is precisely that he possessed a foundation in mathematics and mechanics that ordinary geoscientists lacked. Professor Wang Hongzhen, currently president of Wuhan College of Geology and known as "half a Redologist," is recognized in geological circles as a "prodigy." It is evident that the better the foundation and the broader the knowledge, the wider one's horizons, the broader one's contact with the unknown world, and the higher the probability of success.

In summary, can the knowledge structure of geological talent be conceived as a model as shown in the figure below: