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#21066 04/29/07 09:51 AM
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About 55 million years ago Greenland's eruption and the beginning of the formation of the Atlantic Ocean caused climate warming:

http://www.livescience.com/forcesofnature/070426_petm_volcano.html

The article compares atmospheric change at the time to what is happening today.

"During the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), massive amounts of greenhouse gases were injected into the oceans and atmosphere, causing global sea surface temperatures to rise by up to 10 degrees Fahrenheit.

"The event changed global rainfall patterns, broiled and acidified the oceans, and killed up to 50 percent of the world’s deep-sea organisms. The warm climate also opened up new migration routes for horses and other mammals into North America and might have even fueled early primate evolution."

Primates had already evolved but the event presumably separated Old World from New World monkeys.

Last edited by terrytnewzealand; 04/29/07 09:54 AM.
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Our species might achieve in 100 years what took 100,000 years to happen naturally. And if the PETM is any indication, Duncan said, it will also take our planet about that long to recover.

This guy "Duncan" should join our discussion group. Have a look at the follow-up article, "Timeline- The Frightening Future of Earth". We are indeed living in a Fool's Paradise.

This week an American entrepreneur approached me to show him around some seamounts around here. He's been developing Oyster Farms for cultured pearls. Apparently the Oysters in beds in Japan and NW Australia are showing stress that is pollution related. They've developed beds in the Cooks, the Marquesas and the Tuamotus. The oysters here have black or yellow lips, very highly prized. So I took him out at first light yesterday. I just put in a new Lowrance and didn't know how to use it. He showed me how to get it working, and we came across a trio of Humpback Whales, the first ones of the year, coming up from the Antarctic. He asked me to throttle down and come up closer to them. About 100 yards away he said, "Watch this". He changed the setting on the Fish Finder and, at a certain Ping Speed, the whales took off straight away from us like they'd been shot.

Oh yes, we truly ARE the Masters of the Earth.

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Cool link Terry, thanks. I'm gonna look into that PETM thing.

One comment on the article was a little over the top.
'The PETM is “one of the few examples in the natural record where we get changes in chemistry and temperature that are approaching what we’re seeing today,” Duncan said.'

Really? Approaching from what direction? re:

"... causing global sea surface temperatures to rise by up to 10 degrees Fahrenheit.
The event changed global rainfall patterns, broiled and acidified the oceans, and killed up to 50 percent of the world’s deep-sea organisms."

Guess I'm just being picky; I think I get the point.

As an aside:
It wasn't until the end of the Eocene (~35Mya) that climate began approaching what we consider moderate.

Wolfman, protect those seamounts! With 5 billion people living by the coastlines, seamounts will be the only place left to grow food.

~~samwik


Pyrolysis creates reduced carbon! ...Time for the next step in our evolutionary symbiosis with fire.
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Good article. thanks.


When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."
--S. Lewis
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What especially interested me about the article is that volcanism is usually said to lower global temperature. I guess it depends on the ratio of gas to particles in the eruption.

Samwik wrote:

"It wasn't until the end of the Eocene (~35Mya) that climate began approaching what we consider moderate."

Up till recently, perhaps still, the cause of this change was said to be the opening of the gap between Oz and Antarctica. This allowed the circum-polar current to develop isolating Antarctica from warmer currents.

Regarding sea mounts. I'm treasurer of the local branch Royal Forest and Bird Protection society. It's is big on saving them. Seems we have a lot within our 200 mile limit.

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Wolfman- maybe you could take that Ping Thing and point it at the whales when the Japanese Researchers are harpooning them for science!! It would be good to see them get away.

Interesting infomation on the oysters--Similarly here where anecdotal evidence locally shows marlin being caught in the Bight between Victoria and Tasmania. We do not see these particular tropical type fish here. The water is apparently a lot warmer than usual.

It'll be the cane toad invading next!

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Terry! You say, "I'm treasurer of the local branch Royal Forest and Bird Protection society."

I even have a few issues of "Forest and Bird" around the house here. It's a beautiful publication!

Ellis, good idea. Maybe someone should tell Greenpeace.

Thanks,
~Samwik



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"What especially interested me about the article is that volcanism is usually said to lower global temperature. I guess it depends on the ratio of gas to particles in the eruption." -Terry

Yep, and underwater volcanism releases much less particulates (usually).

~SA


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BOT, after 3 posts.

I found this out there on the PETM (LPTM, IETM).

"Sediments recovered above and below the P/E boundary allow the study of the biotic evolution associated with the P/E boundary . Planktonic foraminiferal “excursion fauna” were found to have been present in the equatorial Pacific in the Paleocene prior to the P/E event but only became abundant elsewhere during the global warming associated with the P/E boundary, while nannofossil extinctions previously associated with the event actually occurred above it.
Thoracosphaera cysts, representing a disaster flora found at the K/T boundary, were found in the Leg 199 P/E boundary intervals."

I think the last sentence is revealing. There are species out there, ready to take advantage of whatever happens.

~~SA


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Samwik wrote:

"There are species out there, ready to take advantage of whatever happens."

I suspect the punctuated equilibrium demonstrated in the fossil record is at least partly a product of this phenomenon. By the way did someone send you the F&B mags?

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I saw some dramatic pictures of differing rock layers reflecting the PETM events on the web.

re: Forest & Bird; our university library subscribes and gives away unused duplicates about once every year or so. Slightly oversized (like legal sized) and nice glossy photos (if I'm recalling correctly). Does that sound right? It's been 10 years.... Neat stuff to look at with the kids at bedtime (and helped with a couple of their school projects too). wink

~~SA


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Very much nice glossy photos. A friend says it's too depresssing. All the articles are about creatures on the edge of extinction but I disagrre.

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Originally Posted By: terrytnewzealand
About 55 million years ago Greenland's eruption and the beginning of the formation of the Atlantic Ocean caused climate warming:.......................
"The event changed global rainfall patterns, broiled and acidified the oceans, and killed up to 50 percent of the world’s deep-sea organisms. The warm climate also opened up new migration routes for horses and other mammals into North America and might have even fueled early primate evolution."

Primates had already evolved but the event presumably separated Old World from New World monkeys.


Migration routes for horses? Horses never developed in the Americas.
Nor have their pre-historic skeletal remains ever been found.
Bison yes, not horses.
All horses in the Americas first originated when Ferdinand Pissaro brought them over by boat, to conquer the Incas
Neither the Incas, nor the N American Indians, had ever developed the wheel. So horses able to carry "the Gods" and supplies were held in awe by both nations, and frequently stolen for breeding.



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"You will never find a real Human being - Even in a mirror." ....Mike Kremer.


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Wow, that PETM event is fascinating. Thanks again.

http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2002AM/finalprogram/session_2785.htm

The origin of __PRIMATES__ is linked to this!

"Body size dwarfing in Wa-0 mammals cannot be explained as a response to temperature alone, and elevated atmospheric CO2 probably played an important role. Body size is influenced by food quality. Experiments with plants grown in CO2-enriched atmospheres (double present levels) yield enhanced photosynthesis, with more carbon and less nitrogen in plant tissues. The extra carbon enhances production of secondary compounds, inhibiting digestibility. CO2 enrichment reduces rubisco enzyme in foliage, decreasing leaf protein and lowering nutritional value for herbivores, which causes the herbivores to grow more slowly. Slower growth, coupled with any of the usual seasonal temperature, rainfall, or day-length effects controlling reproductive cycles, would lead to reproduction at smaller body size. Such an explanation involves temporary and reversible environmental selection leading to a transient evolutionary dwarfing response.
Faunal changes lagged onset of the CIE by some 13 and 22 k.y., consistent with the idea of a stepped response to climate change. In Wyoming, endemic Meniscotherium appeared in the first step of response some 13 k.y. after initiation of the CIE.
Cosmopolitan Artiodactyla, Perissodactyla, and __PRIMATES__ appeared in the second step, some 9 k.y. later, at about the time they appeared on all three northern continents.
Climate change can have profound and lasting effects on mammalian faunas."
Profound, eh?

~samwik


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Mike, probably the glaciations wiped out the ancestors of modern horses. I read recently that also happened to the earthworms and honeybees in North America. Colonists introduced our familiar earthworms and honeybees. I was stunned.
~Sam


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"Scientists have revealed that Yellowstone Park has been on a regular eruption cycle of 600,000 years. The last eruption was 640,000 years ago…so the next is overdue. The next eruption could be 2,500 times the size of the 1980 Mount St. Helens eruption. Volcanologists have been tracking the movement of magma under the park and have calculated that in parts of Yellowstone the ground has risen over seventy centimeters this century." I am new to this forum so if you folks have already discussed "super volcanoes" then my apologies...

http://www.solcomhouse.com/yellowstone.htm


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Mitth,
The topic of supervolcanoes has been brought up in the past. If you want to change the topic, please bring up a new thread. Or find the old one and renew it.

Amaranth,

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Samwik. That link provides enough reading for a year!

Mike asked:

"Migration routes for horses?"

From the information I have collected over the years: three-toed horses (genus Hipparion) left North america via the Bring bridge 5-7 million years ago. The first Equus (one-toed horse) left later, 2-3 million years ago. True horses didn't come out, so to speak, until about 1 million years ago. As to the extinction of horses in North America, we've been down that road before. I haven't changed my mind.

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Terry, sounds as if you have a theory about NA horses. Can you point me at a good thread to see "down that road?"

Thanks

~Samwik

p.s. Yes! I copied it and will be back many times, I'm sure. There are probably similar (for other years) links around. smile
~S

Last edited by samwik; 05/03/07 08:43 AM.

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Ok Sam I'll look for horses but in the meantime I found this account of the pattern of tempersture fluctuations over the last 200,000 years. It agrees with what I understood to be the pattern so it must be correct!

http://www.esd.ornl.gov/projects/qen/nerc130k.html

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