Posted on 02/17/2017 6:13:02 AM PST by bgill
Zealandia a new continent submerged in the southwest Pacific is a step closer to being recognised, the authors of a new scientific paper claim.
A paper published in GSA Today, the journal of the Geological Society of America, contends that the vast, continuous expanse of continental crust, which centres on New Zealand, is distinct enough to constitute a separate continent.
Despite the obvious question of how something so large could be previously undiscovered, the papers authors argue that even the large and the obvious in natural science can be overlooked.
Zealandia covers nearly 5m square km (1.9m sq miles), of which 94% is under water, and encompasses not only New Zealand but also New Caledonia, Norfolk Island, the Lord Howe Island group and Elizabeth and Middleton reefs.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
A zillion year ago globull warming should be blamed.
Except for New Zealand, it's pretty much under water.
Sounds like an excellent place to send the lefty dems.
From the sound of this article, and many others, they’re buying-up all the bunkers they can find.
Take it up with now non-planet Pluto.
So Pluto isn’t a planet because it’s too small, but New Zealand is a continent. SMH.
Recognize it as a distinct “continental craton” if you will, but calling it a continent makes mincemeat of what “continent” means. Why Zealandia, and not Madagascar?
The sheep now have gills.
Proof of global warming, nearly an entire neo-continent submerged by rising sea levels.
Trump’s fault.
Greenland - (840,004 sq. miles) (2,175,600 sq. km)
New Guinea - (303,381 sq. miles) (785,753 sq. km)
Borneo - (288,869 sq. miles) (748,168 sq. km)
Madagascar - (226,917 sq. miles) (587,713 sq. km)
Baffin - (194,574 sq. miles) (503,944 sq. km)
Sumatra - (171,069 sq. miles) (443,066 sq. km)
Greenland - part of North America.
New Guinea - part of Australia
Borneo - part of Australia
Madagascar - part of Africa
Baffin - part of North America
Sumatra - part of Australia
New Zealand - doesn't exist
The Pluto thing really bugs me. The only reason they came up with the new definition of a planet is because they had insisted for so many decades there was no 10th planet... and then they found the 10th planet (Eris). So before they made their announcement, they invented an arbitrary definition of “planet,” demoted Pluto, and then avoided the embarrassment of “there’s your tenth planet, right there, suckas.”
A planet should be any body large enough to be rounded by hydrostatic equilibrium that revolves independently around the sun. Making the definition subjective on what else is in the neighborhood and NOT interacting with it is just plain stupid. “Clears its own orbit?” How often are we going to face “We thought it was an extrasolar planet, but it turns out, we found another object in its neighborhood, so never mind?”
Also rubs me the wrong way: calling any orbiting rock a “moon.” Call them “natural sattelites,” if you want, but there’s nothing apparently in common between The Moon and a big snowball orbiting Jupiter. At some point, we’re going to see Jupiter clearly enough that we’ll need some distinction between “moon” and “larger chunk of ice in a ring.”
No kidding: one so-called “moon” of Saturn is buried in the D ring and is only 150 meters.
Proposed new definitions:
“Moon” means a body that orbits around another planet and is large enough to that the effects of its own gravity are strong enough to morph solid rock into a rounded shape.
“Natural satellite” means any other natural object in orbit around a planet.
That means Earth has one moon; Jupiter has four; Saturn has five; Uranus as four; Neptune has one; and Pluto has one.
*That’s a very fancy word, necessary for a very precise definition, but it’s not so hard of a concept:
I referenced Madagascar because whereas Greenland, New Guinea and Borneo are connected to North America, Australia and Asia by submerged continental shelves (like Great Britain is to Europe), Madagascar is on a separate hunk of granite altogether from Africa... although in double-checking myself, I was surprised that there is indeed an “ocean” between much of Greenland and Baffin Island, North America, and the continental connections between them (on either side of this “ocean”) are much smaller than that between Alaska and Siberia.
Thanks for that. Very interesting.
Stupid article and premise. Looking at that map, it’s obviously a part of the Australian continent.
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