Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Melting Polar Ice Caps to Raise the Level of Seas and Flood the Continents
May 15, 1932, Sunday
WE still speak of "the Ice Age" as if it belonged to the remote geological past. Geologists have reached the conclusion that there were several ice ages. What is more, the last Ice Age, known as the Quaternary, is only about half over, despite our blistering Summers.
New Evidence Supports Geology's View That the Arctic Is Growing Warmer
January 28, 1934, Sunday
TWO pieces of evidence were recently presented to substantiate the views held by most geologists that some day there will be no frozen North and that vessels will sail in Arctic seas now imperilled by ice floes. One piece of evidence comes from Greenland, the other from Alaska.
About -- Polar Ice; How fast does it melt? An expedition seeks the answer.
October 24, 1954, Sunday
ONE of the objectives in the forthcoming American expedition to Antarctica is to check on the status of the stupendous ice fields and glaciers of that little-known continent. The particular point of inquiry concerns whether the ice is melting at such a rate as to imperil low-lying coastal areas through raising the level of the sea in the near future.
For the past few hundred thousand years the climate of the earth has oscillated enough to produce a succession of frigid ice ages and warm interglacial periods. It has generally been assumed that these climate changes were gradual, but new theories that they occur with devastating suddenness are now being tested.
Meteorologists disagree about the cause and extent of the cooling trend, as well as over its specific impact on local weather conditions. But they are almost unanimous in the view that the trend will reduce agricultural productivity for the rest of the century. If the climatic change is as profound as some of the pessimists fear, the resulting famines could be catastrophic. “A major climatic change would force economic and social adjustments on a worldwide scale,” warns a recent report by the National Academy of Sciences, “because the global patterns of food production and population that have evolved are implicitly dependent on the climate of the present century.”
Puzzling Arctic Haze Is Identified As a Byproduct of Air Pollution
January 11, 1979, Thursday
A puzzling haze over the Arctic ice packs has been identified as a byproduct of air pollution, a finding that may support predictions of a disastrous melting of the earth's ice caps.
This makes me curious to know if Chicken Little had anything to do with the Little Climatic Maximum (a fact, not a wild rant).
During that period of time, temperatures around the world were significantly higher than previously. The LCM facilitated the Vikings' colonization of Greenland (which was likely a much more accurate designation for the island at the time). When the LCM ended midway through the 15th century, world temperatures dropped--and that's why the Viking colony in Greenland was abandoned after five centuries.
It happened; it really did. These things run in cycles, whether anyone wants to believe it or not. And if we're heading into another cycle of climate change, then all the YouTube videos on Earth aren't going to make any difference.