RECENTLY I was listening to the radio early in the morning at the sort of hours kept only by vampires, crazed journalists and the occasional rock star, and I heard an interesting report.
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It said the amount of ice in Antarctica had expanded to a new record amount.
Hmm, interesting.
I thought that was interesting and I waited to hear more, even listening to the radio for several hours, but not another report or mention.
So only the incredibly sleep-deprived were going to hear about that.
But with so much talk about climate change, I wondered why this record breaking event generated only a few seconds of airtime, and at a time when only I and three goldfish were listening.
Had the Antarctic ice shrunk to a record level, it would have been major news, and understandably so, because if all the ice in Antarctica melts we will all be under something like 20 metres of water.
But if ice sheets melting is major news, and it certainly has been each time the arctic ice reduces in size, why is the ice growth in Antarctica seemingly dismissed as being trivial?
I had to find out for myself and after a little digging found out the level of sea ice in Antarctica has been expanding by about 1 per cent each year, and while the size fluctuates with the seasons, last year Antarctica reached a record size on 20.14 million square kilometres.
That is close to three times the size of Australia, which measures a touch under 7.7 million square kilometres.
I must admit I am a bit of a geek, so I find the whole ice expansion in Antarctica to be fascinating, given the regular and repeated warning about the polar caps melting due to global warming, which will supposedly be the death of us all and the world we know.
However even more interesting were the attempts by global warming advocates to explain the phenomenon, fumbling over things including suggestions of freshwater not mixing with salt and freezing more easily.
You see, the observations of an expanding Antarctic ice area are at odds with all the climate change predictions, and I’m not sure if it is scientists or comedians who are scrambling to find explanations.
I almost feel of my chair laughing when one claimed it was all due to geography and geometry”, saying “With no northern barrier around the whole perimeter of the ice, the ice can easily expand if conditions are favourable,” with no attempt to explain why the conditions are “favourable” in a climate that is supposed to be getting warmer.
Another claimed there was a layer of fresh water sitting on the top of the sea in the Antarctic region that was not mixing with the salty water below, and was freezing more easily. Talk about rolling of the floor laughing at that one.
The other jokes, or explanations, include attributing the ice growth to a low-pressure system supposedly influenced by a hole in the ozone layer, which have been whipping icy cold winds around and freezing water.
Or there is the one about the bishop the actress, and snow falling on thin ice and pushing it below the water surface, cooling the water and freezing it more to make thick ice.
Now, I think that one is really skating on thin ice.
I don’t know about any of that, but what I do know is the whole climate change debate reminds me of a few flies trying to explain a yard full of cattle dung.
The earth is, according to scientists, around 4.5 billion years old, and we have readings and measurements relating to at best the past couple of hundred years.
Yet despite their lack of understanding of the earth’s natural processes scientists still want to make definitive statements.