Earth's poles long overdue for reversal

Cosmos Magazine ^ | 5/5/08 | Claire Thomas

[sinanju]

I thought the biggest dread was that an unstable geomagnetic field in the process of switching would temporarily lay us bare to the cosmic rays.

[Army Air Corps]

Great, I guess Algore will hustle people for money to stop polar change...

[Chickensoup]

this would lead to the end of the world as we know it??

[Chickensoup]

this would lead to the end of the world as we know it??

[caseinpoint]

Absolutely. The toilet bowl water would swirl the wrong way and really mess us up.

[mikrofon]

Time to swing counter-clockwise, I guess...

[Mr_Moonlight]

"The reversal process is very unpredictable," said Biggin. "We could be heading into a reversal in the next few centuries, or we might be waiting another million years".

Gotta love the exactitude of these studies ... "it could happen tomorrow or perhaps a zillion years from now, or maybe sometime in the middle, actually it may never happen at all" .... Now then, where is my research grant check ?

[skimbell]

Maybe this is the undefined "change" that Obama keeps promising.

[basil]

Well, this really pins it down, doesn't it?

OMG! We're all gonna dieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

[pennboricua]

global warming is making this much worse.

[ovrtaxt]

That sucks, now I’ll have to turn all my maps upside down, I can’t call myself a southerner anymore, and my toilet will flush all funny.

[doc1019]

And the west coast is overdue for the “big one”. If, perhaps, maybe … love science! Mayhap tomorrow the sun will not rise.

[Sherman Logan]

Human beings have survived reversals in the past, however, added Gubbins, "so we are likely to come through the next one unscathed."

The geological record suggests that the last reversal was around 800,000 years ago.

The most commonly accepted theory is that modern humans emerged about 200,000 years ago.

I don't see how these three statements can be reconciled.

[RockinRight]

WE’RE GONNA DIE!

[Wally_Kalbacken]

major changes may not even happen in our lifetimes

Hmmm, add this an to the increasingly lengthy list of stuff I will not get around to caring about in my lifetime (b. 1957).

[Las Vegas Ron]

Somebody's got to say it: Bush's fault

[Grizzled Bear]

It’s not in my job description dude!

[equaviator]

Everything is up-side down and backwards anyway so, WTF?

Right?

[C210N]

Everybody, quick! Take off your carbon shoes, and put on Iron shoes.... we must switch from palpitating on carbon footprints to Iron footprints.