Posted on 07/19/2006 11:13:06 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks
long, dark winters when the sun shines for as little as five hours a day.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
If this line is any indication I would not trust anything in this article. I was stationed for a year at Keflavik Iceland which is South of Greenland and during late December and early January there was no sun shine, only a short period of twilight at mid day. I don't think there is anything like five hours of sunlight in Greenland on the shortest days. I doubt that we have as much as nine hours in South Carolina during the shortest days.
"Sounds like the temperature it is trying to get back to when the Vikings were there in 900 to 1200 plus or minus"
I misinterpreted that, and first thought, "My gosh those Vikings really were tough -- I couldn't have taken it that cold!"
It would if all the ice was submerged, but part of the ice cube floats above the surface. The only part of the ice that is displacing water is the part that is submerged, and the amount of water that is displaced has a mass equal to the total amount of the ice.
The boat/bowling ball example is trickier, but I'm thinking the water level goes down once you sink the ball. Here's why: before you drop the ball, the boat will displace a volume of water that has a mass equal to boat+you+ball. The ball is much denser than water, so it's weight displaces a volume of water greater than the volume of the ball. However, once you sink the ball, it sits on the bottom and only displaces a volume equal to the size of the ball, which is less than the volume displaced when the ball was adding itself to you+boat, so the pool level drops a bit...
I wouldn't list that the Vikings "thrived". They only had two major settlements, consisting of 1,000 and 4,000 people. That's a tiny village.
They didn't grow much grain or vegetables, either. Early on, they quickly reverted to growing dairy products, because the cold and sea spray didn't allow for good gardening. Most Vikings grew hay to feed to the goats and sheep through the winter, and ate the dairy products they produced. Any animals whom they couldn't feed over the winter, they killed and ate.
That was the good times. When the weather turned "cold" (chuckle chuckle), they ate more seals as their farms failed. Then, they either died or moved away.
What most people hear about the Viking colonization of Greenland is dramatized accounts of what happened, used to lure tourists. What I wrote is established archeology.
Sorry, but I was a history major who studied the Norse a lot. Figured I'd spend a lot of time on this thread when I saw it. :-)
When you hear "The Immigrant Song" being played in Greenland.
We are your overlords.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.