Posted on 02/14/2011 1:30:02 PM PST by kronos77
I like that closing sentence -- "future decision-making could be made based on scientific data and not on political expediency". I wouldn't count on it, but that would be great.Caves reveal clues to UK weatherAt Pooles Cavern in Derbyshire, it was discovered that the stalagmites grow faster in the winter months when it rains more. Alan Walker, who guides visitors through the caves, says the changes in rainfall are recorded in the stalactites and stalagmites like the growth rings in trees. Stalagmites from a number of caves have now been analysed by Dr Andy Baker at Newcastle University. After splitting and polishing the rock, he can measure its growth precisely and has built up a precipitation history going back thousands of years. His study suggests this autumn's rainfall is not at all unusual when looked at over such a timescale but is well within historic variations. He believes politicians find it expedient to blame a man-made change in our weather rather than addressing the complex scientific picture.
by Tom Heap
Stalagmites reveal past climateThe researchers examined four stalagmites from Crevice Cave, the longest cave known in Missouri, located about 75 miles south of St. Louis. The stalagmites appeared to have been broken by natural forces such as floods or earthquakes and were found about 80 feet below the ground surface, says Dorale. The team determined when the stalagmite layers were deposited, then deduced paleotemperatures and the general types of vegetation growing in the vicinity during that era by examining the carbon and oxygen isotopes within the calcium carbonate. The profile showed that the area had been covered by forest 75,000 years ago, but by 71,000 years ago, it was savannah and by 59,000 years ago, had become a prairie. Between 55,000 and 25,000 years ago, the forest had returned and persisted. Dorale explains that the pattern is consistent with climatological records from the ocean.
by Kristina Bartlett and Devra Wexler
Glad I could help. Wait, what? ;’)
Halton Arp noticed that the most red-shifted objects are obviously connected to other structures which are not as red-shifted, and since red-shift is usually believed to indicate velocity and relative distance...
They aren't and I can't. But that wasn't my point. My point was that it has taken millions of years to form the features in caves. Unlike the surface of the Earth, they are undisturbed by human and natural forces. They may not give an 'exact' count, but we do know it took many millions of years to form some of them.
So they can give us a 'minimum' time that Earth has to have been a planet.
No it isn't.
They announced finding it in ‘88. Then they went quiet about it until now. Interesting that they recently reported that we might be seeing two suns in the sky when a nova explodes... Don’t be alarmed. It’s a regular kinda thing!
Astromony has a global warming feel to it these days.
When in the world did the Zodiac change? Not that it bothers me any, but it sure would be nice not to be a Pisces anymore. Pisces seemed to have the worst horoscope, at least when I was a kid...
It all depends whose doing the, "Astronomy" IMO...
It all depends whose doing the, “Astronomy” IMO...
Proof by multiple assertion?
If you don't know the deposition rate, you don't know the age, even by factors of 10 or 100 or 1000.
Sequoyah Caverns, south of Chattanooga at Valley Head, Alabama, has fast-growing formations. Director of the caverns, Clark Byers, cemented a clear plastic panel in front of some stalactites in April, 1977, to prevent tourists from breaking them off. In less than 10 years the stalactites grew about 25 centimetres (10 inches or one inch per year).In October 1953, National Geographic published a photo of a bat that had fallen on a stalagmite in the famous Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico, and had been cemented on to it. The stalagmite had grown so fast it was able to preserve the bat before the creature had time to decompose
At Australia’s Jenolan Caves in New South Wales, a lemonade bottle was placed below a continually active stalactite in the ‘Temple of Baal’ in 1954. In the following 33 years a coating of calcite about three millimetres thick has formed on the bottle.
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