Posted on 01/11/2011 7:05:08 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Geoscientists in Scotland say they have evidence to disprove the controversial "Snowball Earth" theory - the idea that the planet was completely encased in ice just over 600 million years ago.
We are claiming that in reality there was not a totally frozen snowball Earth and that even during the coldest conditions large regions remained ice-free -- Dr Dan CondonThe team, from the University of St Andrews, has published its findings in the scientific journal Geology, after studying rocks in the west of Scotland, Ireland, Namibia and California. Drs Dan Condon, Tony Prave and Doug Benn say they have found evidence of sedimentary material, which could only have been derived from floating ice on open oceanic waters... The controversial theory that for millions of years the Earth was entirely smothered in ice, up to one kilometre thick, has been kicked around for more than 50 years. It rests on the apparently anomalous evidence of past glaciation in places that should have been much too hot - very near the equator. Even during the most severe ice age, many scientists thought that the ice only reached as far down as Northern Europe and the middle of the USA.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.bbc.co.uk ...
>>I dont know who you are but I like ya.<<
God, that is what I said to my now ex-wife on the night we got married!
GMTA!
:)
Charles Hapgood - "Path of the Pole"
HOLY CRAP!
Great find!!!
And I like the direction we have taken this thread... :)
Oh man, I just finished listening to that bit.
Cos’ was one funny fella (RIGHT!) — that material has legs. Real humor doesn’t need to be blue nor currently topical to be truly funny.
Thanks — I am wiping the tears out of my : “Junior Barnness — YOU GUNKY!”
Indeed, Great Minds Think Alike.
I love Cos, that man is a genius.
Sorry to sidetrack this thread you guys, but I get my autistic compulsive obsessive thang on sometimes.
RIIIIIGHT!!!
It’s my understanding that ‘Snowball Earth’ didn’t mean that the Earth was a ball of ice, but that areas that didn’t normally freeze would have done so. That doesn’t necessarily mean the entire earth, and that includes the oceans, would have been frozen, as well.
Given the fact that the continents are always on the move, how do those guys know where anything was back then, with regard to sediments/rocks?
LOL
Here’s a couple of my favorite Cosby routines:
Bill Cosby - 200 MPH full (Shelby Cobra)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4Fpqi698Do
Bill Cosby - Noah
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0KHt8xrQkk
Noah, how long can you tread water?
Interesting side note. That Shelby that Cos talks about in “200MPH” ended up killing the guy who bought it, he thought he was smarter than a dual supercharged 427 and crashed the s**t out of it at 100+ mph.
427 SC Cobra, the one of two made that still exists sold a year or two ago for $5.5M, I have a poster of it on the wall behind me as I type this drivel.
Carroll Shelby, chicken farmer from McKinney TX. He won’t be with us forever.
Oh, I screwed up, it was one of the two “Super Snake” Cobras that killed that guy. Dual turbocharged, not supercharged.
But I was right about the auction price of the remaining example. $5.5M baby.
Just daaaayummm. That’s a tad more than I’ve got in pocket change. LOL
For my first brand new car, I had to settle for a ‘67 candy apple red Mustang. But it did catch the girls’ eyes around the ol’ college campus, heheh.
And it was fun to drive. Unfortunately, it wasn’t fast enough to keep one of them gals from catchin’ me, LOL.
27F in Houston.
My Jeeps windows have a thin glacier on them too.
Related?
The CHICKEN HEART!!!
I’m smearing my jello even as we speak!.
How many SUVs and dirty coal power plants was required to melt that ice sheet, I wonder.
I meant underground lakes and evidence of former tropical or semi-tropical temperatures.
I wasn't implying any plate tectonics were involved. The plates don't float around nilly-willy on the crust like the scientists had imagined. The MOVEMENT (such as the easily identifiable matchup of the coastlines between the American Continent and the African continent) is caused by 'growth' of the planet, much as marking two spots on a balloon, then inflating it to maximum size. The spots move away from each other, but they are really not 'moving' at all.
(I am sure you know all this, but I am stating it so others understand where I am coming from)
What I was originally referring to was a change in the oscillation of the planet's rotation, which led to the current POLAR regions being at or near the 'equator' while the areas like Canada were actually the 'polar area'.
Ah, I see what you mean, things like the temperate climate that prevailed near the Haughton astrobleme.
“Snowball Earth” means that literally virtually all the water is frozen (IOW, there could be some volcanic activity melting some small pocket deep under the glaciers). There’s also a “Slushball Earth” version.
It’s a little thing I like to call “making it up out of the whole cloth”. ;’)
Two points on the Earth could very easily be moving apart without the theory having any validity.
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