Environment, Action and the Old Days

[Janne]

If the polar bear population

So how did people manage in the past?

Knowing where polar bears range, avoiding birthing areas. A polar bear mama needs a lot of calories for her survival and to feed the cub.

In the days of paddling, many Greenlanders disappeared during the hunts ( of seals, whale and bears). No doubt some of these were due to polar bears.

The Swedish explorer / adventurer Andrée left evidence ( mainly photographic) of the perils of staying in polar bear country for extended time. His team was well armed so could shoot them, ( which they did) when the bears were stalking their camp.
Unfortunately they ate the meat uncooked or badly cooked once th3ir supplies were gone.
This eventually killed all in the group.
Trikinosis ( infection by the Trikine parasite)

I wonder, is there any evidence of a Polar bear population during the last Ice Age?
Plenty of Mammut, horse, lion, but bear?

 

[demographic]

Crikey, some of you lot need to understand that knee jerking is another term for Goose Stepping.

 

[Tengu]

Mph. Theres something really funny about Polar bears. (Girt nasty things IMHO, sorry Tony...)

It used to be thought they evolved from Grizzlys in the last ice age.

The reason for that being they need an environment with lots of sea ice and seals.

And an interglacial would be relativley ice free. (Though I suspect there is little understanding of such climatic periods in the high latitudes...can anyone put me right on this?)

But genetic studies tell us when they broke away from the grizzlies, it was several Ice ages back.

So they can survive warm periods.

 

[Janne]

The oldest one found is a frozen one, in Svalbard. Estimated to be 120 000 years old.

That is before the latest ice age.

 

[GuestD]

On the topic of global warming; in order for there to be a rise in world sea levels of 1 mm, which unless you have some very sophisticated equipment is almost impossible to detect, how much polar ice cap would have to melt to make this difference ?

 

[Broch]

On the topic of global warming; in order for there to be a rise in world sea levels of 1 mm, which unless you have some very sophisticated equipment is almost impossible to detect, how much polar ice cap would have to melt to make this difference ?

It's not quite as simple as this, but the earth's oceans are about 361.9 x 10^9 m^2 (361.9 million km squared).

The volume of 1mm therefore would be 361.9 million metres cubed (361.9 x 10^6 m^3).

Ice is less dense than water (about 917kg/m^3 with no air bubbles) so a higher volume of ice would need to melt to do that.

 

[GuestD]

It's not quite as simple as this, but the earth's oceans are about 361.9 x 10^9 m^2 (361.9 million km squared).

The volume of 1mm therefore would be 361.9 million metres cubed (361.9 x 10^6 m^3).

Ice is less dense than water so a higher volume of ice would need to melt to do that.

I'll fact check that.

I saw a post recently where someone had posted two pictures entering Sydney harbour around 100 years apart showing similar sea levels. Their whole global warming denial was based on this, because they "read it on the internet"

 

[Broch]

To put it in context, that's about a column of ice 1km tall and about 600m square at the base.

 

[C_Claycomb]

On the topic of global warming; in order for there to be a rise in world sea levels of 1 mm, which unless you have some very sophisticated equipment is almost impossible to detect, how much polar ice cap would have to melt to make this difference ?

Interesting question. A bit of Google found this, which seems to be one of the better explanations.

http://www.antarcticglaciers.org/gl...ating-glacier-contribution-to-sea-level-rise/

Others
https://d32ogoqmya1dw8.cloudfront.n...activities/solution_slr_calculation_chang.pdf

 

[Broch]

Interesting question. A bit of Google found this, which seems to be one of the better explanations.

http://www.antarcticglaciers.org/gl...ating-glacier-contribution-to-sea-level-rise/

Others
https://d32ogoqmya1dw8.cloudfront.n...activities/solution_slr_calculation_chang.pdf

Yep, comes to near enough the same figure (they make it a total of 1.27mm) but to be honest there's so much variation in measurement (this is like fractal maths) that any of the figures could be way off. The volume of ice on the earth is a figure that varies dramatically but one estimate is that it's about 1.7% of the earths water.

Anyway, I suspect we are tending towards a new thread here again

 

[GuestD]

A bit of Google found this, which seems to be one of the better explanations.

Thanks. This would indicate that quite a lot happens at the ice caps without much apparent visual impact elsewhere. Taking the rise in sea level to 1" ( 25.4mm) again very difficult to measure visually the effect at the poles will be greatly increased.

 

[Tengu]

Yes, as I thought.

And didnt they find a polar bear bone in London once?

Which during the Ice Age, was a long way from the sea.

 

[C_Claycomb]

Regarding sea level rises. It occurred to me that the sea might not rise uniformly...seems this will be the case, so going and looking at our northern hemisphere coast line might not be as accurate a predictor as simple logic would suggest.

https://www.earthobservatory.sg/faq-on-earth-sciences/why-will-sea-level-rise-not-be-same-everywhere

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/scie...ill-spike-sea-levels-at-the-equator-24739579/

https://www.climatecentral.org/news/ice-melt-means-uneven-sea-level-rise-around-the-world-15640

 

[GuestD]

Regarding sea level rises. It occurred to me that the sea might not rise uniformly...seems this will be the case, so going and looking at our northern hemisphere coast line might not be as accurate predictor as simple logic would dictate.

https://www.earthobservatory.sg/faq-on-earth-sciences/why-will-sea-level-rise-not-be-same-everywhere

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/scie...ill-spike-sea-levels-at-the-equator-24739579/

https://www.climatecentral.org/news/ice-melt-means-uneven-sea-level-rise-around-the-world-15640

Yes. This is the conclusion I came to after studying various papers on the subject. Being suspicious, I also check the affiliates of the authors, just in case their findings could be deemed to be more motivated by politics as opposed to bare unbiased fact. I does happen, unfortunately.

 

[petrochemicals]

Extinction Rebellion? Averybody, including them, you and me, use electricity. So we all contribute to the use of that gas.

What do you think they can do? Disrupt people’s life and demand that somebody fixes the problem?

Too many people on the planet, we need to get the message through. For starters we could bring in a battle royale death match for anyone under 21, in the interests of saving the planet.

 

[Janne]

I recall a joke from the time when jokes were fun.
The best population control are two bricks.
I like cars. I think you have seen the instruction movie Deathrace 2000?




Yes, overpopulation is the absolutely most important single factor in most of the problems we have today and will have in the future.

Rising sea levels? No problem, they have been rising for 15 000 years.
It was a bad move to buy real estate on Beringia or Doggerland.

 

[GuestD]

Too many people on the planet, we need to get the message through. For starters we could bring in a battle royale death match for anyone under 21, in the interests of saving the planet.

How about changing that to anyone who reads the Daily Fail or the Daily Excess. After all, we do want a better world.

 

[C_Claycomb]

...

Rising sea levels? No problem, they have been rising for 15 000 years.
It was a bad move to buy real estate on Beringia or Doggerland.

Yeah,
Everyone is dying, so it is no problem to the person who contracts cancer thanks to a relative's second hand smoking. They should have chosen their relatives more carefully.

I could try to make another analogy, but if you are able to cheerful misunderstand the volumes of science published, and not understand how a rapid accelerating change differs from a slower stead change...nothing I say will make a difference.

 

[C_Claycomb]

Too many people on the planet, we need to get the message through. For starters we could bring in a battle royale death match for anyone under 21, in the interests of saving the planet.

Watch out...the under 21s are as likely to want to bring in a version of Carrousel per Logan's Run...maybe for people over 50. Think of all the benefits, far less stress on the NHS, all that housing that is held by older people opening up. More job opportunities for the young to move up.

 

[bobnewboy]

Watch out...the under 21s are as likely to want to bring in a version of Carrousel per Logan's Run...maybe for people over 50. Think of all the benefits, far less stress on the NHS, all that housing that is held by older people opening up. More job opportunities for the young to move up.

Nah. They’ll all be too busy bemoaning the fact that they can only have *one* ski holiday per year, and how much their advocado toast has increased in price since the ‘green initiative’........