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Melting ice sheets could spur oceans' rise
Reuters ^ | 03.23.06 | Deborah Zabarenko

Posted on 03/24/2006 8:24:22 AM PST by Dr. Marten

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To: DustyMoment

LOL!

Not only are liberals depressed and depressing people to be around for any length of time, they now project their paranoid reasons to be depressed hundred(s) of years into the future.


41 posted on 03/24/2006 9:37:57 AM PST by BlessedByLiberty (Respectfully submitted,)
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To: DustyMoment

Heh. Which country would you rather belong to?


42 posted on 03/24/2006 9:43:05 AM PST by Dr. Marten ((http://thehorsesmouth.blog-city.com))
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To: antaresequity
When I take ice cubes and and put them in a glass and fill it up with water...when the ice melts the water level drops.

If you piled the ice up well above the rim of the glass, high enough that the ice was not floating but resting on the bottom of the glass, then water would overflow the glass when the ice melted. This is analogous to the situation in Antarctica.

The vast majority of the ice caps ice is below sealevel...not above it. Just as in ice bergs.

Unlike icebergs, this ice is resting on the sea floor, because of the weight of the ice that is above sea level. This fact automatically shows that when it melts the sea level will rise.

43 posted on 03/24/2006 9:45:21 AM PST by wideminded
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To: Jemian
Ice also has more volume than liquid water, so wouldn't the oceans really decrease if the ice melts?

No. First of all, a lot of the ice in question (and I do mean "in question") resides on land (e.g., Antarctica & Greenland). Second, the stuff that is in the ocean is floating, not fully submerged. It displaces its weight in volume. That means that, when it melts, it would fill in the same space in the ocean as the volume of submerged ice, so there is no appreciable change in sea level when ice in the ocean melts.

Science has really debased itself, publishing tripe like this.

44 posted on 03/24/2006 9:50:19 AM PST by Nevermore
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To: RexBeach; Dr. Marten

I didn't see any reference to the Falklands. The Maldives are a string of islands off the coast of India; I guess its a nice vacation spot, but most of the country is only a few inches above sea level.


45 posted on 03/24/2006 9:59:00 AM PST by marron
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To: Dr. Marten

Ok, this is pretty radical. Suppose, just for a moment, that the earth is a living organism instead of just a dead ball of dirt traveling through space and time?

And, suppose that, if the earth is a living organism, it goes through periodic changes that affect its atmosphere?

So, if the earth is a living organism and we have proof that it has been through some of the changes previously - even BEFORE climatological records were kept or man walked the earth, is it possible that these changes are repeating and that man has nothing to do with them?

I warned you it was radical!! It's much easier to pretend that the sky is falling (or the sea level is rising) than to actually apply any thought to this issue and take a chance on hurting some brain cells!!


46 posted on 03/24/2006 10:03:08 AM PST by DustyMoment (FloriDUH - proud inventors of pregnant/hanging chads and judicide!!)
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To: marron

You know what, you're right. The Argies call the Falklands Las Malvinas. Oops. Thanks for the "heads up!"

-Rex


47 posted on 03/24/2006 10:03:09 AM PST by RexBeach ("There is no substitute for victory." -Douglas MacArthur)
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To: Dr. Marten
Melting ice sheets could spur oceans' rise

Seems to me this has happened many times! Some when mankind was wandering the seas, remember the ancient Turkish charts which depict Antartica's UNDERLYING LAND MASS (rather than its current configuration covered in ice)?

48 posted on 03/24/2006 10:04:58 AM PST by ExSES (the "bottom-line")
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To: Dr. Marten
It is a cyclical event which mankind contributes to, but not the cause of.

Mankind's activities are likely the primary cause of the 20th century warming trend that has accelerated since the mid-1980s. There are currently no applicable time-scale climate cycles that would contribute to the current short-term trend.

49 posted on 03/24/2006 10:19:05 AM PST by cogitator
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To: Bommer
There 196 billion metric tons of CO2 thrown up into the atmostphere yearly. Oceans evaporating contribute to 80 BMT. Volcanic activity (not just sudden eruptions) and decaying plant life, another 80BMT and humans 6 billion BMT.

These numbers are for CO2 sources. What about the natural sinks for CO2?

50 posted on 03/24/2006 10:22:14 AM PST by cogitator
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To: doc30
I haven't seen any sea level rise, yet. The road behind the building is only a few inches above sea level.

Current sea level rise is only a few mm per year, mainly due to thermal expansion, and perhaps partly mitigated by increased snowfall on the central part of the ice caps and freshwater storage in reservoirs.

51 posted on 03/24/2006 10:23:31 AM PST by cogitator
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To: cogitator
What about the natural sinks for CO2?

I don't know. Tell me?

52 posted on 03/24/2006 10:42:09 AM PST by Bommer
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To: Dr. Marten
SO THEN.. a building BOOM is in the future as coastal citys are moved to higher ground?..
Groooovey.. Should be good for many economies..
53 posted on 03/24/2006 10:44:37 AM PST by hosepipe (CAUTION: This propaganda is laced with hyperbole..)
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To: rock_lobsta

54 posted on 03/24/2006 11:23:24 AM PST by Chinito (6990th Security Group, RC-135/Combat Apple, SEA Class of '68)
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To: Bommer
Your post listed the major sources of CO2 to the atmosphere, both natural and anthropogenic (human). It didn't list the natural sinks, i.e., the processes which remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Chief among these is the process of photosynthesis. Second is the absorption of CO2 by the oceans. A couple of diagrams explain this better than my words:

If you add up the sources to the atmosphere and the sinks from the atmosphere in the bottom diagram, there is a net addition of +3 to +5 to the atmosphere. Feel free to do the math for the top diagram.

That's why, even though the natural sinks and sources (to be picky, we are really talking about fluxes of C02 into and out of the atmosphere) are much larger than the human component, it is the human component that is responsible for the increase in atmospheric CO2 since the mid-1800s. This conclusion is supportable by measurements of the changes of the stable carbon isotope ratios in the atmosphere and by the dilution of carbon-14 in the atmosphere.

By the way, there is straight factors-of-10 conversion between petagrams of carbon and metric tons of carbon, but I don't know what it is off the top of my head.

55 posted on 03/24/2006 11:47:16 AM PST by cogitator
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To: Bommer

By the way, volcanoes are not a significant source of CO2 to the atmosphere. The link I post most frequently about that indicates that fossil fuel C02 emissions are about 150 times greater than CO2 from volcanoes.


56 posted on 03/24/2006 11:49:28 AM PST by cogitator
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To: Rodm
Maybe the ocean level won't rise at all, maybe arrid parts of the earth will absorb the water. Who knows maybe the sahara desert will become a jungle!

Actually what will happen is Teddy Kennedy and his ilk will compsensate for all the continental ice melting by stocking up their wet bars with more ice for the increased drinking they will do while worrying everyone on the coasts will drown.

Problem solved.

57 posted on 03/24/2006 11:55:21 AM PST by Auntie Dem (Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Terrorist lovers gotta go!)
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To: wideminded
If you piled the ice up well above the rim of the glass, high enough that the ice was not floating but resting on the bottom of the glass, then water would overflow the glass when the ice melted. This is analogous to the situation in Antarctica.

WRONGO!

I've tried this experiment your way--the ice ALWAYS floats, and when it is all melted the water level is still BELOW the rim of the glass.

The icebergs in the ocean are not resting on the sea bottom--they are floating.

The issue of continental ice is another matter, which WILL raise sea level--if nothing else compensates for it.

58 posted on 03/24/2006 12:01:57 PM PST by Auntie Dem (Hey! Hey! Ho! Ho! Terrorist lovers gotta go!)
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To: Auntie Dem; antaresequity
I've tried this experiment your way--the ice ALWAYS floats, and when it is all melted the water level is still BELOW the rim of the glass.

You didn't do the experiment my way since you didn't put enough ice in to make it rest on the bottom. Are you telling me that a 1-foot tall ice cube could be floated by one inch of water?

You have to put enough ice in so that the weight of the ice will be supported by the bottom of the glass even after you fill it with water (as antaresequity specified). There will then be a bunch of ice above the surface of the water. You may need a wider glass or a big chunk of ice to do this.

Here's the logic behind this:

1. If the ice is resting on the bottom, that means that the total weight of the ice is greater than the weight of the water it displaces.
2. The water displaced has the same volume as the amount of ice below the water line.
3. Therefore, if the ice melts, the volume of the water from the melted ice will take up more space than the ice which was below the water line.
4. Therefore the water level will rise.

The icebergs in the ocean are not resting on the sea bottom--they are floating.

We're not talkng about icebergs. We're talking about the ice in Antartica. Apparently a great deal of the ice sheets surrounding Antartica are so heavy that they rest on the sea floor.

59 posted on 03/24/2006 2:31:16 PM PST by wideminded
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To: wideminded
Ummm...can you explain how it is submarines can navigate to the north pole under the ice pack if the ice as you say is supported by the bottom of the sea?

The North Pole is about 450 miles (725 km) north of Greenland in the middle of the Arctic Ocean - the sea there has a depth of 13,410 feet (4087 meters).

60 posted on 03/24/2006 2:41:12 PM PST by antaresequity (PUSH 1 FOR ENGLISH - PUSH 2 TO BE DEPORTED)
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