Posted on 10/30/2003 5:04:39 PM PST by Dales
LIVERMORE, Calif. -- A trio of scientists including a researcher from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has found that humans may owe the relatively mild climate in which their ancestors evolved to tiny marine organisms with shells and skeletons made out of calcium carbonate.
In a paper titled "Carbonate Deposition, Climate Stability and Neoproterozoic Ice Ages" in the Oct. 31 edition of Science, UC Riverside researchers Andy Ridgwell and Martin Kennedy along with LLNL climate scientist Ken Caldeira, discovered that the increased stability in modern climate may be due in part to the evolution of marine plankton living in the open ocean with shells and skeletal material made out of calcium carbonate. They conclude that these marine organisms helped prevent the ice ages of the past few hundred thousand years from turning into a severe global deep freeze.
"The most recent ice ages were mild enough to allow and possibly even promote the evolution of modern humans," Caldeira said. "Without these tiny marine organisms, the ice sheets may have grown to cover the earth, like in the snowball glaciations of the ancient past, and our ancestors might not have survived."
The researchers used a computer model describing the ocean, atmosphere and land surface to look at how atmospheric carbon dioxide would change as a result of glacier growth. They found that, in the distant past, as glaciers started to grow, the oceans would suck the greenhouse gas -- carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere -- making the Earth colder, promoting an even deeper ice age. When marine plankton with carbonate shells and skeletons are added to the model, ocean chemistry is buffered and glacial growth does not cause the ocean to absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
But in Precambrian times (which lasted up until 544 million years ago), marine organisms in the open ocean did not produce carbonate skeletons -- and ancient rocks from the end of the Precambrian geological age indicate that huge glaciers deposited layers of crushed rock debris thousands of meters thick near the equator. If the land was frozen near the equator, then most of the surface of the planet was likely covered in ice, making Earth look like a giant snowball, the researchers said.
Around 200 million years ago, calcium carbonate organisms became critical to helping prevent the earth from freezing over. When the organisms die, their carbonate shells and skeletons settle to the ocean floor, where some dissolve and some are buried in sediments. These deposits help regulate the chemistry of the ocean and the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. However, in a related study published in Nature on Sept. 25, 2003, Caldeira and LLNL physicist Michael Wickett found that unrestrained release of fossil-fuel carbon dioxide to the atmosphere could threaten extinction for these climate-stabilizing marine organisms.
There is much spin in the above which needs to be rectified. You told longshadow 'bad boy' for inciting a flamewar and you threatened me for asking you to stop it. I don't call that fair treatement. In a site (and a thread!) which is trying to stop abusive behavior for you to tell me that I should allow abuse to 'roll off my back' and attacking me for not doing so shows extreme bias and extreme unfairness in someone that claims to be an impartial observer.
In addition, your bias towards evolution itself is shown in your very words on this post:
I think that the points you raise about the (for lack of a better word) snobbery amongst certain scientific circles against certain aspects of the conservative movement have merit. I am sure that there is some reticence from some of your scientific peers that they say is for that reason.
I also think that the religious people have a point, that some use science as just another tool to try to drive religion from the public realm.
You add to the above with the following later on:
If your goal is to try to run the scientific conservatives out of Free Republic, you may as well hit 'log off' right now and go somewhere else and bitch about how things are here. Save us a step or two. And if your goal is to try to run off those who look at life more through faith, the same applies.
Now on the above you are clearly saying that evolution is science and those opposed to evolution are against science. I call that bias. Further:
Moreover, I think that the discussions between different mindsets within conservatism are important to be had, on this topic and other topics.
to say as you do above that atheists, evolutionists, materialists which are allied with the NEA, the liberals, the Communists and were allied with the Nazis in destroying Christianity and civilized society are conservatives shows extreme bias on your part since that is one of the important points being made against evolution by the opponents of it.
As to solving the problem on these threads:
So the options are, do away with these discussions, or fix the problem.
The solution was given to you by Half Full in post# 376:
It is easy....the initiator of insults on any particular thread gets banned for two weeks, then a month, and third offense permanent. Would clear up personal attacks in record time.
Which is what I was trying to have you do when it became obvious that a flame war was being initiated and called you in to fix it. Instead of punishing the initiator you threatened me (and continue to do so). So yes, you are biased, and that Vade and Patrick were able to 'predict' your unfair threats against me before you made them shows that you are not only biased but of the same mindset with one side.
So therefore, your post only adds to the evidence of your bias and your mishandling of these threads. As I said before and you continue to give evidence supporting my position - you are part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Neither do I, but a similar attitude is expressed towards Creationists. Try Intelligent Design, whoops, it is Creationism in other clothes. Creationist, oh, you participated in the persecution of Galileo. Creationist, you are a flat earther. Creationist, you believe pi is 3. Creationist, .....
I am a Creationist. I believe God created the heaven and the Earth as stated here.
Gen 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
That makes me an embarassment to Conservatism?
That the Earth is ~6000 years old for one. That evolution did not occur for another.
"Ad Hominem"
Nonsense, I simply stated the truth. You posed the question as a deliberate attempt to drag me into a futile Q/A session so you could make your claims. Claims that you have no intention of abandoning when they are shown to be illogical and defy reality. I've been there before and others confronted the nonsence to no avail.
God created the universe, man and gave us a Free will. I've exercised the gifts of observation, reason and Free will and have come to the conclusion that the Universe and Earth are billions of years old and man evolved from simpler forms. If you want to "debate" the validity of what is known scientifically, please do it with someone more tolerant of illogic and story telling.
Thanks.
See, this is just one tiny example of the kind of thing we go over and over with you. You are saying something false about evolution. You have it wrong at a very fundamental level.
Evolution says that different species arise from common ancestry via variation and natural selection. The variation is the only random part. Natural selection--the word "selection" should give you a clue--is non-random. Evolution, the joint operation of variation and natural selection--is non-random. Over time, it produces a convergence upon adaptation to current conditions.
Humans love a good story, or a bad one....
Blow in some humans ears, and they will follow you anywhere..
Please point to where I have ever said that the earth is only 6000 yeats old.
As long as there is a liberal media who hates everything Christian, then Republicans will be branded as "naro-minded, etc.
That Christians are bringing down the republican party is a myth. Our fight is against liberals and liars of the left.
I do too.
Really? Jesus, who brought forgiveness to us all, is intolerant? Perhaps, it is only you that is intolerant, no?
You've been around long enough to know that there are Christians on both sides of this debate, so are the other Christians simply deluded? Or is it that you are blessed to see the absolute truth every time?
Or perhaps, you would care to rephrase your argument?
I don't think so, but I think it's an oversimplification, as well.
If you've read what I've been posting, I think there are ways to respectfully accommodate differing points of view without pandering. Several of the posters on these threads are interested in reaching some kind of middle ground, without compromising what any of us believes is true, and we've been talking about it, but it's frustrating, because the threads keep getting pulled, because some people don't play well with others.
Believe me, I can get very chagrined by hostile, intolerance evolutionists, and sometimes take exception to what has been said, but keeping intellectuals (I think we all, including you and me, qualify for that term, more or less) in line is worse than herding cats, and it's not my job, anyway.
Are you presuming to judge who is a Christian and who is not?
Evolution perverts everything!
Why is that? If existence is eternal as Christ taught, why is the concept of infinite progress so difficult to accept?
Why is it not possible to have evolution as part of intelligent design? (Random selection is just an ignorant assumption based upon incomplete information.)
No, you couldn't. Not remotely. I know plenty of scientists who are Christians. My boss is one. Pardon my frankness, but those scientist Christians view creationism with contempt and ridicule.
I am outspoken in my conservative views, even in a field that, admittedly, is rife with liberals, and even in a university that, notoriously, is among the most radically leftist in the world. Regularly in the course of political discussions with other scientists, the issue of creationism (unfairly) gets thrown in my face. It's the low SAT score on the transcript of conservatism. The best answer I can give is something like, "well, not all conservatives are creationists..."
Actually, what I say is, "very, very few conservatives are actually creationists," but I know from places like FR that there are many more of them than I am willing to admit to my colleagues.
Then how do posts 311 and 343 on this thread further that middle ground?
You know that's not true! How many time do you have to be told that *most* US biologists are both Christian and evolutionist?! (and I suppose most Indian biologists are both Hindu and evo, and most Paki ones are Muslim and evo, etc. Get it?)
And even if your slander were true, it has no impact on the theory. It lives or dies on the evidence, and it's flourishing today as never before.
Science is about cause and effect, about predictable and repeatable occurrences.
Found that Cambrian bryozoan yet?
or the Cambrian rabbit?
or the pseudogene... (you know it by heart now)...
or the fossil intermediate between a bird and a mammal?
Why aren't these predictable and repeated?
It is used by the atheists in this country, that is why they join hands with evolutionists in the school battles
As you know, most evos are Christians of one sort or another.
As to evolution being scientifically true, the use of insults and character assassination by evolutionists
But calling people militant anti-christian atheists, communists, nazis, nea partisans, frauds, charlatans, liars, underminers of the morals of the country (that's what they got Socrates on), etc. isn't "insults and character assassination"?
Among the people who are more likely to believe that God or some intelligent design did play a role in the creation of life and the universe are four-fifths or more of born-again Protestants (86%), Republicans (81%), and those with household incomes of $25,000-$34,999 (79%). Also sharing this belief are an average 75% of 30-49 year-olds, residents of small cities and rural areas. More women (74%, including 62% who strongly disagree) than men (63%) agree with the majority.
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