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Scientists Shocked as Arctic Polar Route Revealed
Paladin144 writes "A route unencumbered by perennial sea ice leading directly to the North Pole has been revealed by recent satellite pictures. European scientists indicated their shock as they noted a ship could sail from Europe's northern-most outpost directly to the pole, something that hasn't been possible during most of recorded human history. The rapid thawing of the perennial sea ice has political implications as the U.S., Canada, Russia and the EU jockey for control of the newly opened passages."
Is it just me or is the world cracking up?
What was the joke?
European scientists indicated their shock as they noted a ship could sail from Europe's northern-most outpost directly to the pole, something that hasn't been possible during most of recorded human history.
Now look, I've seen quite a few movies where they go straight to the pole. No dialogue, nothing. Seriously.
Push Button, Receive Bacon
Did they find any evidence of ManPolarBearPig?
There won't be as many icebergs for ships to run into.
http://michaelsmith.id.au
Am I part of the core demographic for Swedish Fish?
teach polar bears how to operate arctic toll booths
But it could have some chilling consequences.
I would think this will open up lots of new trade opportunities between Russia and North America. I don't know what that could mean, but it is certainly interesting. What kind of manufacturing prowess does Russia have that has been heretofore underutilized because they could not as efficiently get goods to North American ports? Or is this all a bunch of hooey?
(I thought of this because I remember reading this article about Pat Broe, which may or may not have been slashdotted, but it is about an investor in the Canadian port of Churchill, Manitoba, which could well profit from an opened northern passage.)
By the way, I live in Manhattan, and I think it's about time to move...to some city somewhere that's 20 or 30 miles inland.
gameDB
"something that hasn't been possible during most of recorded human history."
1. So it happened earlier in recorded human history?
2. There was technology throughout most of human history that recorded Arctic ice cover?
3. Until aircraft, nuclear submarines, nuclear icebreakers, and satellites were invented, nobody was able to say with certainty whether the Northwest Passage existed or not, which was previously the domain of people like Henry Hudson. Indeed, until the technology existed, nobody could really map the icepack with any decent accuracy.
Sweeping statements like the above are simply stupid, as there is no evidence either way. They do make for good inflammatory copy, though.
Oh yeah, in geological terms, human history is less than the blink of an eye. With fossils unearthed recently showing _tropical_ weather in Northern Canada, I think it's safe to say that the Arctic ice cap is a temporary feature.
--
BMO
Now Shut up about it not being our fault or it being some peiodical sun-peak-activity-stuff, and quit stalling ... We need a fundamental change in how humanity does things. It also doesn't hurt our economics, that's bullcr*p from the current batch of men in (economic+political) power.
Yes, I'm left. You have a problem with that?
I did a Google search for other articles on this topic, and nobody has the actual satellite images, just a bunch of lame pictures of *small* icebergs from 2003? I can just see all the Al Gore propaganda jokes tomorrow...
But seriously if you're going to write an article at least post the images. Even Discovery Channel didn't have a good image and they are usually all about the pictures!
And in other news, Santa's workshop is nowhere to be found.
I followed the link to TFA, and was expecting to see the very satalite images which have shocked the scientists... but no. WTF?
If the scientists want us to believe that the polar ice caps are melting, then we (the public) are going to want to see pictures.
Sorry, without pictures, I don't believe it. Anyway, I've got to go now, because I've got to pick up my kids from school in my SUV.
return 0; }
I wonder how long it'll be before capitalistic-minded individuals realise the substantial implications of this; they can make money selling boat cruises to the North Pole!
An ice breaker fount its way to the North Pole in 2000. There was no ice on the spot at that time. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/888235.stm
Is that this will probably further endanger native wildlife such as polar bears which have been drowning due to lack of ice.
OK, so who volunteers to break the news to Buddy the elf that he won't be able to walk back home?
(I like to whisper too.)
Global Warming could cause Europe to freeze over.
Say goodbye to warm Riviera Summers.
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
European scientists indicated their shock as they noted a ship could sail from Europe's northern-most outpost directly to the pole, something that hasn't been possible during most of recorded human history.
While it's definitely news, I don't know why these scientists are so shocked. We've known about global warming for a long time now. Isn't this an expected development?
The idea of circumnavigating the north pole for sport is an interesting one. Of course, if we include submarine travel, it's been done for military purposes for quite some time.
When the Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich (owner of the British soccer champions Chelsea, among a lot of other things) started his Chukotka project, on the inlet to Bering's Strait, there was some speculation on whether he knew someting that others didn't. :-)
u tions_government/chukotka_3904.jsp
Maybe he did? Check out Chukotka on a map and see for yourselves
http://www.opendemocracy.net/globalization-instit
What the hell do they want to control?
It's not like they are going to start a war for control of seaways to the north pole.
In fact, what do they even want with that place, and why can't they just get along like good girls and SHARE the seaways.
Move sig!
Shhhh.... don't tell the big polluters about this. Soon enough we're going to be hearing about the benefits of global warming and how it is creating more jobs and empowering the consumer, or something else equally as true.
>U.S., Canada, Russia and the EU jockey for control of the newly opened passages.
I was going to say something about the US just declaring it was a terrorist passage and sending in the troops to take control of it but then I decided that any sentance with 'jockey' and 'newly opened passages' just sounded rude/funny enough without comment (except this one).
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
when Google Earth is going to be updated so we can see it for ourselves?
Too small to mention, heh? I'll let you know we've never lost a single war against Russia nor the U.S... and we seriously intend to keep the record perfect!
"" How about taking the safety labels off everything, and let the stupidity-problem solve itself? """
And that is pretty much what's happening here, except that between the skeptic nutters in the US, the petrochemical-funded astroturf pseudo-science that the Royal Society publicly protested about yesterday. By the time the evidence is clear that not only are massive changes occurring, but that these changes are going to kill tens or hundreds of millions of people, it will be too late.
Hence, We're all doomed. I rest my case.
Everything I needed to know about life, I learnt from Blake's Seven
Something seems a bit off in the article's wording. I'm not sure why, but it sounds a bit weird. Is anyone else getting this impression? (I'm being serious.)
The following from the article sounds a bit weird to me. Wouldn't it make no difference if light were reflected back from the ocean's surface as the same net energy from sunlight is still going to be trapped within our sphere? (A mirror from outerspace would be a different situation altogether.) Ice, being white, reflects the Sun's rays. Less ice therefore means the sea warms, which in turn accelerates the shrinkage.
they're the English football (not soccer) champions.</pedant>
Ok now, let's see those friggin capitalists who have been in denial about global warming make a U-turn and start recognising it as a wonderfull thing they can turn into profit.
Fry planet, fry!
The rapid thawing of the perennial sea ice has political implications as the U.S., Canada, Russia and the EU jockey for control of the newly opened passages."
Yup, no chance of any kind of international solidarity, or public domain status... if money can be made claims will be staked.
The North Atlantic Ocean can be a dangerous place, as anyone who can recall the fate of the Titanic will know, and the North Atlantic is thousands of miles from the pole. Just because the sea ice has broken up to the point that there are open stretches of water to the pole, does not mean that those waters are in any way navigable by your typical container or cargo vessels as icebergs and submerged ice litter the area. Perhaps in a few more decades the ice will have retreated enough to permit safe passage, but if anyone thinks Richard Branson could just whistle his yatch up the open waters to the pole needs a reality check.
There's no point shocking the scientists over it. A few politicians (not to mention a lot of regular folk) could use a bit of zapping to get their attention..
-- All your bass are below two Hz
You failed geography, right? Most of California and New York are above sea level, way above the 10 to 15 feet the sea level is expected to rise over the next century. Now Virginia Beach, Virginia, home of Pat Robertson, GONE. And not a moment too soon.
It has been predicted that half of the Netherlands (my homeland) will dissapear gradually during the next 100 years, unless we build better and higher dams all around the sea. Offcourse, parts of the NL are already under sea-level ("polders") but not nearly half of it.
Luckily, I live in the area which will be unaffected, so all I have to do to get rich is buy massive amounts of land here. Still, the implications would be enormous.
The more I think of it, the more I believe we should act, and act quick. But I'm not certain as to act upon WHAT exactly.
Free beer is never free as in speech. Free speech is always free as in beer.
Or...
Disagree with either statement or stance and you'll immediately be branded a "nutter". Or a "fool", a "shill", or some other emotive and manipulative slur.
at least one of the farging photos - albeit a bit touched up - here it isA MSR_2006_H.jpg
http://esamultimedia.esa.int/images/envisat/ASAR-
The non-red area near the pole (indicated by the black circle in the middle of the photo) is the concern, since it represents pack ice (and water) rather than solid ice
Close, with the vast distances to be covered and the high volume of freight, rail would be about the only choice. Even that would have difficulties some seasons and may not be practical year round. Though in the summer solar electric stations along the line could probably provide the power. Rails are more efficient than highways and able to route higher volumes of freight. They're also presumably easier for customs to monitor.
That said, passenger transport is an easy addon once the freight line is there. Personal vehicles can be stowed in car carriers. Passengers can then spend time in their cabins or the restaurant, pub, etc. Roll your car, loaded with gear, on in Portland or Vancouver and off in Anchorage, Anadyr, Magadan, Jakutsk, Wuhan or Seoul.
A highway would be a waste of resources at this point both to build, maintain and use. Just Portland to Anchorage is about 1500 miles, or about 25hrs of driving at an average speed of 60mph -- and that looks to be only about the halfway point.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
I was gonna say somebody might want to send ice breakers up there and try to keep it open, but apparently this has all been considered at length and billions of dollars put into it and it aint happening. That rings quite true to me and it even gives me pause to further reflect on the real basis of our current period of globalization.
I use this phrase "current period of globalization" to make the disctinction between events in the last seventy years or so and the globalization that occured in earlier centuries that is referred to as mercantilism. Proponents of our current globalization like to emphasize the distinction between that earlier period by saying that our modern globalization is the enemy of tariffs and doesn't see global trade as a zero-sum game: the implication being that everybody can win in this new game. While I enthusiastically support the idea of everybody being a winner, I think this story about the rusting Soviet ice breaker does reveal some of the frayed edges in this rhetoric of globalization.
If the globalization game was really so simple and straightforward then you'd think that any geographic advantage such as Russia's proximity to North America and the presence of an open sea route across the north pole would have led directly to huge trade growth between the two regions. And yet, the advantages of globalizations have fallen primarily on Asian nations which are about as geographically distant from North America as is possible to be on the globe. The recent rise of China muddles the picture a bit, but when you consider China's ethnic diaspora in the countries of the north and south Asian Pacific Rim that were in large part former military allies of the United States things seem a bit clearer.
But this does all get off the point. After all, there is the Bering Strait. If geographical proximity was so important then why isn't the Bering Strait used. That would seem to benefit Russia, China and Japan after all. So perhaps it's all just plain old practical considerations.
Hmm, went and looked at Wikipedia to see what it said about the Bering Strait. I guess a tunnel under the strait seems line an interesting way to go but the main problems are environmental and cultural. The area is basically in a pristine state and there's a lot of resistance to development.
So who knows. Perhaps this open ice passage is all pretty irrelevant.
In fact, the story behind lutefisk is less impressive.
Most likely, there was a fire. And then lye was created by combination of ashes+water, and the lye damaged the fish. But throwing away the fish was not an option, so the hungry folks did their best with what they had - and hey presto! Lutefisk was born..
But yeah, only crazy people eat lutefisk. And crazy people are not to be messed with!
And while we're at nasty Norwegian food, check this out! Yep - baked sheep's head.
Stop the brainwash
But look at all the defense possibilities. With a huge wall between you and the seas, it would be hard to launch an invation by sea
The parent is informational.
I do not believe in karma. "Funny"=-6. Do good and forbid evil. Yours, Oft-Offtopic Flamebaiting Troll.
Just the opportunity for some of us less social Slashdotters to pick up new friends!
(Not recommended for those of us who used to cry when the snowman melted...)
So a huge fuck-off crack appears in the pole and the first response is not hey! how do we fix it, no, it's hey I want dibbs on trade routes.
This! This! is why I want to vote communist!
In the not too distant future, next Sunday A.D.
Am I the only one to find it highly ironic that the spokesperson from the ESA's Oceans/Ice Unit is called "Mark Drinkwater"?
Ice Unit? Drink water?
Bwaha!
Well, the northernmost part of the bit that included N America is a lot higher than the tropics. Bummer for you that
a) That includes Greenland
b) That includes Alaska
Where's canada? A wee bit further south.
Depending on how you think the continent panned out (some of that is under water now: the continental shelf) you can make it to be tropical or sub-tropical (Sub tropical rainforest ring a bell?)
And how do you know that's how the landmasses fell out? Was there a human there?!!?! Your skepticism seems to be very selective...
You don't need to invade, all you'd need is one dam-busting bomb.
It doesn't matter which ape activates the Monolith
Sometimes I wonder if Richard Branson needs a reality check!
I'm just jealous - I wish I had half his balls! :-O
Yes, it's a classic fallacy: "I don't understand it/can't do it, so then it's false/impossible." It's not quite a knee-jerk reaction, but I'm not certain which bodypart he jerked to come up with that conclusion.
The view was horrible and the smell was even worse; Julie severely regretted becoming a proctologist.
Gavin Menzies' book "1421" makes a good argument that the Chinese treasure fleets did manage to sail along the north coast of Greenland, and explore Siberia, which argues that there were several major routes that could be navigated by the large junks of the day. The evidence that they actually sailed to the North pole is pretty thin - but then again it is hard to see what evidence they could have bought back that would convince anyone. And most of the other stuff they surveyed and plotted has turned out to be supported by other evidence, so why not?
Anyhow, while we are knocking holes in the article, polar bears are quite happy to swim 50 miles or more out to sea. That little crack won't worry them. We need to be worried about global warming, but the issue isn't helped by hype like that.
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM7ZF8LURE_index_1.html
Is jockeying for control of the north pole ocean really the dominant concern here? I find this news pretty disturbing. Personally, I think there should be an international law that no ships may use the north pole ocean for shipping until all current world leaders are hung from lamp posts like Mussolini.
Imagine if you weren't allowed to use roads because a bus company complained about your driving 3 times. --skunkpussy
I just want my children to be able to enjoy the North Pole as much as Shakleton enjoyed the South Pole.
No not Holland.. Just had my Stag do in Amsterdam! - was hoping to visit it every year on a Stag Do reunion... never been to a better place for a blokes weekend... although some of the males in my wife's family would appear to have only enjoyed the ladies in Windows.. which you can get in Manchester if you know where to look.. the whole Amsterdam experiance was wasted on them - they spent the whole weekend getting blowjobs of women dressed as School girls! (a little wierd for my liking) where as my friends and I enjoyed more of the greenery.
Obviously I can't speak for Mr. Branson, but I suspect his yacht probably could reach the Pole quite safely using its navigation aids.
In other news, steam tractors cannot keep up with the traffic on modern roads.
Pining for the fjords
Bah. Just because you're too sissy to eat lutefisk doesn't mean that those of us who do eat it are crazy. In fact, in northern Norway, we eat most things that move. Or has moved... Or could move... OK then, we eat most things. On a related note, here's a tip if you're ever visiting Norway: Never wear fur in northern Norway.
The view was horrible and the smell was even worse; Julie severely regretted becoming a proctologist.
The people on this forum worry me. Reality check.
There's a time to joke and be happy little Cluster Bs and there's a time to do something and maybe not break up constructive conversation because it is challenging your simplicity or might concern something bigger than you.
I never understood this conjecture. I mean, using this logic shouldn't the Netherlands pretty much never have existed?
Computers allow humans to make mistakes at the fastest speeds known, with the possible exception of tequila and handguns
So who thinks the next world war will be fought over who gets to take control of the newly opened polar route? Prime land rich with resources previously inaccessible? Hmmmm....
They said we were daft, trying to build a country in a swamp
what about global dimming ( wiki dimming)?? theres more than one side to this story
No, really, most of us are really going to die.
And how many here are going to understand what they're seeing?
That's ok, I prefer my earth straight up.
Cake or Death? Cake Please!
Everyone knows the world didn't exist before "recorded human history". The world is melting, the world is melting!! It MUST be true! The devil in the White House is to blame! Iran and Venezuala must save the world from the fiery devil melting the world!
They can travel under it. That would have helped the Titanic quite a bit. The U.S. Navy regularly traverses the Arctic in submarines as part of program to improve operational readyness in the Arctic. It's one thing for a nuclear submarine to travel UNDER the ice using sonar and internal navigation (ice does not permit access to GPS telemetry), but quite another for a cargo or container ship to traverse the Arctic. If you think that commercial shipping is just going to skip along the high seas of the pole through ice, storms and fog you're being incredibly naive.
Your argument that the British Navy kept the Soviet Union supplied in World War II is somewhat misleading in that the convoys were not traveling through pack ice to the North Pole. Quite a difference navigationally.
It seems to me like across rest of the world there is a pretty solid consensus amongst people and scientists alike that global warming is real, and that humans are responsible for it. In the US however, opinion seems to be divided, and it seems to be divided roughly along party lines. Does it not occur to you critics of the theory that people are responsible for global warming that perhaps, just perhaps you are buying into bullshit propaganda and pseudo-science?
A lot of the 'science' that questions our role in global warming is in fact funded, directly or indirectly, by big industries like the oil industry. Doesn't that make you a little suspicious? The global scientific community has no reason to lie about this. There is not some massive conspiracy amongst climatologists to increase their prestige and funding. Occam's razor people.
Critics try to use scientific principles to discredit climate research that links mankind to climate change. What the hell? These are SCIENTISTS that are doing this research, they are PEER REVIEWED papers they are putting out. Don't you think that they have already been subject to the most rigorous scientific scrutiny?
Or perhaps Santa Claus has a base of operations in every country, including one in Spencer County, Indiana, USA, close to the Holiday World theme park. The H0H 0H0 code indicates that Santa's Canadian operations are out of Montreal.
Well shoot y'all. I live in West "By God" Virginia and I'm looking for some nice beach front property. This Global Warmin' you varmits speak of taint nothin'.
"When I first heard Daydream Nation it quite frankly scared the living shit out of me." -- Matthew Stearns
You are talking about a country where a significant part of the population, including some high-ranked politicians question evolution and believe in stuff like Armageddon. The president ends each and every speech, including those about global warming with something like "God bless you and/or America". Even if some of these people think that global warming could indeed be caused or sped up by humans, they probably welcome it is something in their Gods plan to final make Armageddon happen. If the people of the US continue to vote for representatives like this, global warming is actually pretty far down on the list of things to be truely afraid of.
Why are you so stupid, stupid.
I just can't get worked up about global warming. As far as I'm concerned, if it happens, it happens, and people will just have to deal with the consequences or die.
.1% don't care because it will never affect them.
Folks, until the rich people's homes are underwater, nothing is going to happen. In fact, even then they will likely just take their insurance check and build wherever the new beachfront is.
99.9% of the world's population has ZERO control over this. The other
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
After all, a 767 to shelp two geeks around (oh, and the hookers to fill their California Kings) certainly won't affect this.
Not that Paul Allen is any better.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
Rentals of "Ice Station Zebra" have plummeted.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
Also, who said anything about travelling through pack ice? We were talking about passages with a varying incidence of bergs. That reflects the Arctic convoys in winter. There is a huge amount of operational knowledge about the higher reaches of the north atlantic, and I think you underestimate this.
BTW I believe the Royal Navy also frequently travels under the Arctic to keep in practice, but of course they do it without needing to use long pseudo-Latin words.
I can assure you that travelling under the Arctic was not an option for the Titanic; most of its problems arose from precisely the fact that it was indeed under the water at the end of its voyage. And an icebreaker does not have ice above it, so it can use GPS and radio. What is your point here?
Pining for the fjords
Yes, you are right.
Andy Rabagliati
For centuries your European explorers searched in vain for a Northwest Passage to China. They eventually had to give up and admit failure.
But now, thanks to good old Yankee know-how, we have created one for you. Long-dreamed of commercial trade oppertunties have been opened to you! No, no, there's no reason to thank us. Really. It was our pleasure.
If there's anything else you need that can be accomplished via massive greed, sloth, and lack of self-awareness, don't hesitate to ask us.
In millions of years when the waters cover our precious land, we will be forced to evolve back into the oceans from which all life started. We will not be on top of the food chain anymore. There will be swift cunning predators that arise from the depths to pick us off with simplicity. They will laugh in our face as we try to out smart them with our low mental capacity. All the Homo sapiens will become extinct excluding the ones that branch off and evolved to best suit the enviroment. We will become shawdows in sea as we watch octopus-like creatures evolve to become smarter than we could ever imagine.
Don't you idiots ever get informed by watching Fox News? Global warming is a myth, and all credible science has disproven it.
Have you ever wondered How to Take Over
Sailing to the north pole is only of interest to a few scientists.
More importantly, have the fabled North-East or North-West passages opened up as viable trade routes?
need a free COBOL editor for Windows?
Who are you?
What do you want?
Scientists have been warning that the Arctic has been heading for trouble for some time, but it wasn't until *now* that politicians world-wide have given a flying fuck about it, because someone said they can make MONEY off of it.
Fuck humanity. We deserve the shit that's coming our way.
Has the fact that as the icecover over land dissapears there will be less weight and cause the landmass to rise?
Then we will send in halliburton or ch2mhill to take care of things.
Home of a lot of computer science types. Who think they know all aspects of math, physics, and technology. But don't. So they joke. Wait until the next linux or PHP story. Then you'll get some content in the replies.
Well, other consequences of the rise in global temperature include a likely southward redirection or diminishment of the gulf stream. This means, as the world warms up, Europe, especially northern Europe, will get much colder. So I'm not sure I'd invest in real estate in NL for the long term.
...keep fingers over eyes and in ears and keep saying
La la la - I can't hear you...
This is a, "been there, done that, got the T-shirt", for captain Nemo.
Today the tropics are located at 23 degrees north and south of the equator. Does anyone really know where they were relative to the equator further back in time? I don't have a link, but there is some evidence that the Earth's tilt has changed over time and the current axis of rotation may not have always been so.
science is a religion
If you'd like to use some of the data these articles discuss, the EdGCM project has wrapped a NASA global climate model (GCM) in a GUI (OS X and Win). You can add CO2 or turn the sun down by a few percent all with a checkbox and a slider. Supercomputers and advanced FORTRAN programmers are no longer necessary to run your own GCM.
Disclaimer: I'm the project developer.
Space and Computers.
"the U.S., Canada, Russia and the EU jockey for control of the newly opened passages"
Now it should be obvious to everyone why global politicians are so "blind" to global warming. Where all the political and business interest opposition to the science comes from, and how huge it really is.
The Old World (led by the "EU") colonized the New World as just a part of their quest for a "Northwest Passage" between their European and Asian coasts. Half a millennium of genocide, rape, pillage and pollution have followed, making those in the business more rich, powerful and evil than imagined before. Now they're finally getting such a direct route, between even more valuable ports. No opposition from any academics, grassroots political organizations, and documentary movies is going to get in the way of that engine that's moved the world for all of modern history.
--
make install -not war
I like how sceintiest have redifined "recorded history" to mean in the last 200 years. Who knew that all those ancient Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, and Chinese never recorded any of their history! Neither did mideaval Norseman, and Europeans apparantly! Wow history class should be MUCH shorter now. No need to learn about the Norse colonization of Greenland and Iceland when the climate was warmer than today. It wasn't recorded! Pay no attention to those Norse Epics; They dont really exist
Stag - bachelor :)
Stag do - bachelor party
Bloke - man, guy
"they spent the whole weekend getting blowjobs [..] my friends and I enjoyed more of the greenery" - "I am stupid and/or gay"
The problem of keeping sea level where it is at - Solved!
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
You insensitive clod!
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
It's also worth noting that we've already got a longer route that this ecological disaster improves.
--
make install -not war
Big changes always happen after a big storm. The FEMA and insurance groups study the wreckage and come up with new recommendations, which the various governments (fed, state, local) may enact through building codes. The FEMA keeps case studies, for other people to copy and learn. Hurricane-prone states have programs specifically to address construction in the hurricane zones.
Living in a "Windstorm II" area, our bigggest concern is wind-blown debris smashing a window, which lets the wind blow inside, which can then rip the roof off from the inside. That's why hurricane shutters are a big deal. (We're still saving up to buy nice shutters for our house.) Our stick-built house, with brick "veneer", is built to withstand winds gusting to 110 MPH. Note that the above Louisiana success story added $12K to the cost of the house, and would probably violate most planned-subdivision regulations.
That said, a friend from Puerto Rico was shocked when she first moved up here. She nearly put her hammer through the wall trying to hang a picture. "What! The walls aren't made of cement blocks?!"
....Now offering tours to the North Pole. Direct sea voyage available. Book your tickets before winter comes, or wait 10 years when it won't matter what season it is.
In other news "Global Warming increases tourism. Governments now support global warming emissions, Oil companies and Motor Companies rejoice."
br. In future news "The polar ice cap is no longer polar, nor ice. Come enjoy the nice hot spa's at the tropical North Pole...because any place on Earth is a desert wasteland."
I mod down so you can mod up. Your welcome.
Well, to be honest, I think that it is in Minnesota (where I live), Canada, and Russia's best interest for the world to warm up. And maybe someday people will embrace a human-controlled climate, instead of running for the hills. Since we're controlling the climate unintentionally anyways, why not control it intentionally, for much less cost than Kyoto? I mean, reducing energy consumption is important, and we should do that as well, but everyone knows that at best Kyoto can only slow down global warming, right? So why not do something active?
http://www.llnl.gov/global-warm/
PS. I love the old Soviet determination of triumph over nature, even though it destroyed their country and their environment. Nuclear weapons as practical engineering tools, that's what I'm talking about! (Bad idea on our planet, though.)
PPS. Seriously, though. Even a super-Kyoto-type-thing will only slow global warming. It will NOT stop it, and it can not reverse it. Only geoengineering can do that. It's something people should at least consider.
http://www.llnl.gov/global-warm/
It started as a natural phenomeneon. The dunes along the coast created a natural defence against the sea for the land behind it. As the sea could no longer flood the planes behind it, it dried up and became land, which attracted the first inhabitants more than 2000 years ago. I believe Bangladesh is in a similar situation.
A few big lakes remained and in some regions flooding occured regularly. Only later the dykes were built to protect against extreme conditions. The emptying of the lakes to claim the land (so-called polders) came only in the 16th century or so (I might be a century off). Technical progress created the system we have today, but the basic situtation remains - a natural situation to have land below the sea level.
That's a real phenomenon. Of course, it's a long-term one. The North American continent is still in the return swing of it's sea-saw motion, with the part of the continent above the 49th parallel (Canada) rising while the southern half sinks. The northern half was pressed down by the ice during the last ice age, and is still rising from when it all melted away 10,000 years ago.
But that won't affect the ice sheet in question in this article, since this ice sheet is floating on top of the Arctic Ocean and rests on no land at all.
"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
"Mister President, perhaps you should transmit a planetary distress signal ... while we still have time."
-- Sarek: "STIV:TVH", Stardate 8390
-kgj
That's my opinion, but feel free to look into it on your own. The wikipedia article is a good place to start. It sounds like the parent post is somehow trying to tie this fringe theory into global warming. Energy turning into enough matter to alter the gravitational field of the earth?!? WTF!?! This is grade A wingnut territory, IMHO. But feel free to look into it and judge for yourself. I first approached it with an open mind, but the extreme looniness of the theory soon made itself clear. This is only one step removed from the Time-Cube on the crackpot scale.
The sheer arrogance of calling the theories which have produced all the wonders and luxuries of our modern world "worthless" astounds me.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Who the hell predicted NL would 'gradually' disappear?
I'm pretty sure you guys will violently disappear as each dike floods. 'Oh, look, the sea level went up half an inch, it went over the dike when the tide came in, 1/10th the country is now underwater.'
After that, sure, maybe the rest of it will be slow.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
For centuries people sought the Northwest Passage alternative to the stormy Tierra Del Fuego or narrow Panama Canal. Amundson (first guy to south pole) lead the first successful sea passage exactly a hundred years ago. Now people are routinely doing this in the summer. Pretty soon it might be safe enough for summer commercial ships.
Exactly my point.
Free beer is never free as in speech. Free speech is always free as in beer.
"It seems to me like across rest of the world there is a pretty solid consensus amongst people and scientists alike that global warming is real, and that humans are responsible for it. In the US however, opinion seems to be divided, and it seems to be divided roughly along party lines."
Most of the world's nations that contribute to climatology are well to the left of the US, and they and our slightly less conservative party (Democrats) are in agreement about global warming. Reality has a well-known liberal bias, so there you go. It's pretty simple, really.
That won't easily happen.
As the water rises, the dikes inland holding back the rivers are the first to have a problem. Maybe some will break, but it will never be able to cause 1/10th of the entire country to flood in one day.
It is even more likely that the gradual disappearance will be human-controlled: almost every single bit of shore (be it inland or sea) is watched continuesly here. When something becomes awkward, the government can decide to evacuate the region and return it to the water in a period of time. Indeed this has happened already at some inland strips near rivers.
Besides that, polders are unpoldered, ditches are broadened or reused, rivers are broadened, lakes are created etc. If that continues at the same pace as the rising of the sea, the Netherlands will gradually become a smaller country.
Free beer is never free as in speech. Free speech is always free as in beer.
Its about damn time Euope stopped stealing all of our warm tropical water.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
Why not, in USA we did, but we call it New Orleans! And we are spending untold millions to restore the area after the hurricane one year ago.
Go figure.
From my contact in the year 2030, here's the latest Google map from that year.d _map_01.jpg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Piri_reis_worl
Especially after the first two countries sank into the swamp...
But the third one - *that* one stayed up. Until now...
The problem is that this is a global issue, which leads to several political difficulties. The countries favour mitigation do so because they feel that mitigation is cheaper than adaptation, and vice versa for the other side. Even if adaptation is as cheap as certain people predict, it is going to fall in a way that is disproportionate from the causes of the problem. Why should rural unindustrialised states pay for the consequences of a few who benefited from polluting?
And what if adaptation was more expensive than predicted? Will the polluters be punished for scuppering the opportunity to save civilisation as we know it? Whatever the intention, the appearance would be of mass genocide - richer states making the waters rise (both metaphorically and literally) and using their gained riches to move to higher ground whilst poorer ones drown. If people are truly serious that adaptation should be favoured instead of mitigation, they should put their money where their mouthes are, and give some sort of committment to dealing with their own mess.
"Now? In our moment of triumph? I think you overestimate their chances."
Good one!
-kgj
-kgj
"Recorded human history" goes back at least 5,000 years. I doubt we've had the ability to do satellite imagery and spot this briefly here, quickly gone path to the pole more than a few decades. Sigh, this demonstrates yet again that you don't have to be as stupid as Barbara Streisland to be Environmentally Correct. The remark above is really, really dumb--roughly the equivalent of a flat earth, fall off the edge geography. Any scientist who made it ought to be tossed out on his rump.
And this bit as silliness is much like that, published a few years ago in the NY Times, expressing alarm that the North Pole was briefly bare of ice, something we were told hadn't existed for many millions of years. (At any given time, some 10% of the Arctic Ocean is free of ice, sometimes it's at the Pole.) Precisely how we could know something that could only be revealed by the satellite photography of recent years proved to be beyond the limited collective intelligence of the NY Times. And in the end, the paper looked rather stupid, when it turned out that the "scientist" who fed the information to them knew nothing about that Arctic ice.
I wish I had the link, but there was an interesting environmentalist document that leaked out not long ago. Essentially, it said that our arguments are weak in this area, so there was a need to resort to hysterical, alarmist claims. This is on a par with that.
You see this in the fact that every indication of climate change is turned into a disaster, when common sense would say that quite a few changes will be beneficial. The warming from 1000-1300 AD that gave Greenland its now-odd name was quite beneficial for Europe. Climate changes, that's why it's a climate and not a fixity. Humanity needs to ignore these ignorant, alarmist twits and adjust to what's likely to be mostly a benefit--warmer winters, longer growing seasons, less use of fossil fuels for heating, perhaps even a summer trading route for ships through the Arctic, etc.
I might add that we shouldn't forget two additional factors. First, there's a significant slice of the scientific community that seems unable to stick to its work and goes off, half-cocked in some direction that feeds their individual egos and inflated sense of importance. "Here I am, saving the world..." That sort of thing. Malthusianism, Eugenics, the Population Bomb, Global Cooling and the New Ice Age (a 1970s hysteria that didn't quite take off) and now Global Warming. It feeds their egos and the scientific community has yet to learn how to discipline them.
Finally, remember this is a European story and Europeans tend to be a bit less stable than people in the U.S. As Tom Wolfe famously observed, "Fascism is always descending on the U.S., but settling on Europe." Nutty ideas don't seem to find as much traction here as they do in Europe. Europeans, particularly the educated ones, seems to feel a need for some sort of elaborate system to explain the world, rather than take our more adaptable, common-sense approach. That's, of course, a general pattern. There are Americans who do think, for reasons that defy explanation, that Germany, France, and even Russia (when it was the USSR) provide models that we ought to emulate. Yeah, like we need sky-high taxes, stiffling bureaucracies, chronic double-digit unemployment, and birthrates so low that by 2100, there'll hardly be any French, Germans or Russians left.
--Mike Perry, Seattle
Well it's easy enough to figure out how to stop this. The problem is *obviously* all of this so-called 'global warming' melting all of the ice. I'm suprised no one's implemented the solution already. Hundreds of thousands of air conditioners, all pointed at the poles and cranked to max. Problem solved.
Don't you love tolerate us anymore?
Best Slashdot Co
"Don't forget that this tiny amount will be joined by water running off of Greenland, Antartica and other polar landmasses with ice on them, 100% of which will raise the water level."
You hint but don't make explicit the fact that ice is sitting on top of a landmass instead of just sitting in the ocean.
Perhaps if you're a creationist, you might believe that, but in comparison to the age of the arctic ice, most informed sane people would find that 'humankind' has been a little more than temporary.
Our lineage is at least 3.3 million years old http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/ 2006/920/1, older --- in my uninformed opinion --- than most of the arctic sea ice http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_age.
I can understand the utility of the rhetoric, but we've survived ice ages, droughts, famines, plagues and wars and I think that a little more water (lets say a few dozen feet) and heat (lets say 5-10 degrees) over the next few thousand years isn't going to do us in, as much as you'd like to believe it.
By the way, I'm a scientist, and I'm not that shocked.
I usually skip Global Warming stories on Slashdot, because ensuing discussion is almost always the same. Al Gore says. Junkscience.com says. The evidence is unavoidable. No it's not. Yes it is. It's a trend. It's a glitch. It's CO2. It's sunspots. Greedy corporations! Tree-hugging hippies!
But this time I tuned in, because I thought something big like this would give us some new insights. But no, just jokes and discussion of the feasilibity of trade routes. The big missing ingredient is our friendly GW skeptics. They're just totally absent from this discussion! Come on people, are you going to let a little objective, unambiguous evidence scare you away?
First of all, a (sea-) dike is not a dam, and you can't just "bust a dike". Sea-dikes are more like hills than like walls. The riverdikes are smaller, but even if you do manage to breach one, you will flood only a small piece of land. The land is protected by a network of dikes instead of just one big one.
Actually, controlled flooding of the land is part of Holland's defense against land invasions. Not that it worked all that great the last two times...
1. Scientific American is a popular science magazine. It isn't peer reviewed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_American
2. This isn't 'critical of global warming', only of calculations of its costs. No mention of 'alternative hypotheses' in the abstract at least.
3. The title of this is "Solar cycle length hypothesis appears to support the ipcc on global warming". The IPCC's position of global warming is that it exists, and it's probably human caused. So the article has analysed the alternative hypothesis of solar variations and has decided *against* it, in favour of the mainstream CO2 view.
4. In the abstract, we have the statement "This comparison shows without requiring any recourse to modeling that since roughly 1970 the solar influence on climate (through the channels considered here) cannot have been dominant." It's an unequivocal statement against solar theories in favour of mainstream CO2.
All of the peer reviewed links given acknowledge the existence of human caused GW. The only anti-GW view is from a non-peer reviewed source. The assertion of GP is still without any backing.
"You have to remember-- we went from THE WORLD IS GOING TO FREEZE! to THE WORLD IS GOING TO WARM AND FLOOD! in the space of about 10 years."
Why not apply my test above to this as well? Find me a peer reviewed source suggesting that the world is going to freeze, optionally with an environmental wacko slant to it.
"Just goes to show you that Google is not a crutch for normal brain function. ;-)"
Well I Googled for slashdot and the damn thing laughed at me.
Actualy, nearly 50% of the Netherlands is under sea level or slightly above it. That amount is not going to change all that much the next century, but because the geographic plate on which Holland is built is slowly tipping over (about 40 centimeters every century), the shoreline which is protecting the lower lands behind them is sinking into the sea.
So for Holland, stopping global warming (if that's what causing the raising sea levels) won't be enough. Eventually, Holland will disappear under the sea.
Luckily, even with the rising sea levels (also approximately 40 centimeters a century) that won't be anytime soon, because the Netherlands has plenty of skill and money to fight the sea for a long time to come.
The ice melts and Canada gets the north-west trade route it has always dreamed of. It also gets to export huge numbers of beavers to protect other nations from the melt-water. Go Canada!
They killed Santa!
You bastards!
barack to the future?
Muskeg is why they don't build much in northern Canada and Siberia. Whereever there's Muskeg (pretty much anywhere you'd want to put a train track) you have to dig down 30 meters of sloshy mud and fill the hole with gravel. If you don't dig to the bedrock, your train engine may just sink entirely into the peat.
I suppose they could build on concrete pilings like the elevated LRT systems in cities, but then the load would be limited.
So if all floating sea ice melted sea level would increase just 4 cm. In contrast, if the glaciers in Greenland melted (which you would think would have to happen if all floating sea ice melted), sea level would increase by an estimated 6.5 meters. Losing the Antarctic ice masses (which again would have to happen for all floating sea ice to melt) would increase sea levels by nearly 75 meters. The 4 cm contribution you point out is completely negligible except from an academic standpoint.
Where's that +10 insightfully funny button when you need it?
This! This! is why I want to vote communist!
Communism as its been practiced (outside religious enclaves) is similar to monopolistic corporatism... where the State is the only corporation, holds all the monopolies, and all the citizens are the employees. Gives new meaning to the idea of being "terminated," huh?
But if you want to vote communist, move to the US; our communist party hasn't been noticably inconvenienced by the fall of the Soviet Union, and they often manage to field local-level candidates in some of the more liberal-leaning areas of the country.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Scientists see a disaster of unimaginable proportions (unless you can imagine 100,000 Katarinas) and politicians see an opportunity for personal gain. The Thais it right.
>many scientists were warning that the north pole could disappear completely
As long as we can keep the other latitudes.
maybe they will fall into the hollow earth like so many believe.
No no! The third one burned down, fell over, then sank in to the swamp. It was the fourth one that stayed up! And that's what you're gonna get, lad: the strongest post in Slashdot!
~~ Behold the flying cow with a rail gun! ~~
The more you eat, methane you'll poot,
The more you poot, the larger the route.
With global warming always in doubt.
Just because you can mod me down, doesn't mean you're right. Shoes for industry!
A. Gulf Stream OFF image of US vegetation (Ice Age conditions)
or
B. Gulf Stream ON image of US vegetation (present day conditions)
Scroogle
This is good news for the Global Warming rabble rousers. With much fewer and less powerful tropical storms/hurricanes this year, the Bush hating Global Warming disciples can't use Katrina-like storms as a tactic to instill fear in people - I think we're on storm letter "H" this year (alphabetically), a month later than Katrina of last year. At least with this photographic "proof" of the polar ice melting, they've found a new messiah.
After all, Bush I implememented a federal death penalty just like Stalin, and Bush II has apparently replaced free elections with something remarkably similar to Communist elections (in function if not in technique).
> You failed geography, right? Most of California and New York are above sea level, way above the 10 to 15 feet the sea level is expected to rise over the next century.
;)
While it's true that most of the land in Calfornia and New York State is above sea level, don't forget that much of the *population* is concentrated at or very close to the coastline. New York City, in particular, would be FUCKED by a rise in sea level, and other cities like San Francisco would also be in trouble (remember, the sea has tides). Even if most of California and New York remain above water, it would still be a tragic loss -- otherwise one could argue that the devastation of New Orleans was only a "minor" loss compared to the relative safety of Louisiana.
> Now Virginia Beach, Virginia, home of Pat Robertson, GONE. And not a moment too soon.
If I was still a church-goin' Christian, I'd say, "Amen to that, brother."
"All hands, BRACE FOR IMPACT!"
We just have no control over it.
>its the bored middle classes that are too lazy to do anything but consume.
The middle classes have very little choice over their environmental impact. I'd wager the biggest single contributor to environmental problems that the middle classes provide is from driving their cars to and from work.
There is very little choice in that action.
Before you start about how people should all live next door to their place of work, you need to understand that most people can't do this, and the rest choose not to. People will get jobs in the best places they can, and they will buy houses in the places that provide the best opportunities for their children. Quite often, these two places are not in the same place.
Steve
A work that expires before its copyright never enters the public domain and thus enjoys eternal copyright protection.
> something that hasn't been possible during most of recorded human history.
Looks like we dodged another murderous ice age. Whew!
Oh, wait, that's not the politically correct answer, is it?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
You were joking, but in his 1977 (!) book Heat Arthur Herzog proposed cooling off the earth by using giant lasers to beam excess heat into space. Yeesh.
I figure by 2030 or so my 6-digit UID will be something to brag about.
I was watching this ETV thing about the Badlands that was saying that they were formed by a torrental flow that happened over a (relatively)short period of time. Their guess was that an ice dam melted and allowed a pent up ocean of water to suddenly equalise back all over the rest of the ocean. So what are the chances of a glacier melting and a couple of feet of sea from the top of the globe flushing Canada again? They seemed awfully convinced about the possibility, but I guess maybe sea level is sea level everywhere? I'd look it up, but I don't live anywhere near the beach or canada. Isn't there some kind of bulge at the equator form all the spinning, is that still there? I'm just not convinced that a flat pan of water and a few ice cubes & density measurements necessarily represents all of the variables of a big gravity making ball of spinning earth...
Canada hasn't lost a war to the US yet either, thankfully!
In fact, in the war of 1812, not only did we win, but we torched the White house and several other US buildings including the department of treasury.
Go Canada!!
According to this article:
"The Arctic is undergoing nothing less than a great rush for virgin territory and natural resources worth hundreds of billions of dollars..."
"...In 2001, Russia made the first move, staking out virtually half of the Arctic Ocean, including the North Pole. Moscow sought to bolster its claim by sending a research ship north to gather geographical data. On Aug. 29, it reached the pole without the help of an icebreaker - the first surface ship ever to do so."
Finally, someone is thinking about the children.
Fata viam invenient.
"Did they find any evidence of ManPolarBearPig?"
What would Steve Ballmer be doing there?
I knew there would be someway to reply with a M$ related troll in this topic if read down far enough. I see someone already managed to get a Al Gore related comment in, lets see that leaves Bush, at least one Clinton, Linux, Beowulf, Nazi's, p0rn, and oh yea "In Soviet Russia....". Oh well I'm not to the bottom yet.
Wabi-Sabi
Matthew
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bush_Compound
http://www.inforain.org/Northslope/anwr_3.htm
let me get this straight: we're on a burning, sinking ship and the big boy countries are jockying over who gets to control the hallways?
nice.
We truly have amused ourselves to death.
F = the "global warming" stuff.
./ has marked this +4 Informative. *sigh*
U = this was probably an open passage; Vikings may have crossed it.
D = all that is really happening is we are finally
and
That's exactly what this is, the leganary Northwest Passage finally possible to normal traffic. This is HUGE. It would reduce the travel route for goods from China/Asia by over half! and bypass many hostile weather/political areas. It litterally would dump directly into the northern EU countries... some of the most stable in the world and very close to current manufactureing centers in Russia and Germany, UK, and France. In a hugely political move, this could cut the US off from the rest of the world. No more Panama, Goods between China and the EU could move freely with no intruption.
No, Bush's policies are closer to fascist-style state corporatism than the soviet flavor of communist-style state corporatism. The main difference is that fascist ideology glorifies industry rather than the workers themselves. Depressingly similar, in many ways.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
It seems to me that the "whole Amsterdam experience" would involve doing both, no?
Momentarily, the need for the construction of new light will no longer exist.