Slashdot Mirror
Birth of a New African Ocean
Khemisty writes "Formation of an ocean is a rare event, one no scientist has ever witnessed. Yet this geophysical nativity is unfolding today in one of the hottest and most inhospitable corners of the globe. Africa is splitting apart at the seams. From the southern tip of the Red Sea southward through Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Mozambique, the continent is coming unstitched along a zone called the East African Rift." This stretching of the earth's crust has been going on for 20 million years, and within another 10 million the Red Sea will have broken through to create a new sea.
Mention of this split WILL show up in someone's eco-speech.
Not sure why people warning of global warming are such a popular target for snide comments, even if they do occasionally exaggerate or misunderstand the science involved. After all, the global warming is a reality and to quote a statement endorsed by "all of the national academies of science of the major industrialized countries" it is "is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic (man-made) greenhouse gas concentrations" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming). This is controversial in the same sense that the theory of evolution is, in that people are free to disagree even with established scientific facts when it is in their interest to do so. In both cases the interest is part religious and part financial.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
Isn't it strange that some christians pick to believe the "no sex before marriage" thing instead of the "don't eat shellfish" part, though? I guess they must really like prawns.