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Earth Space Science

Canada Comet Lengthened the Ice Age 66

Posted by samzenpus from the just-when-it-was-getting-warmer dept.
Iddo Genuth writes "Recent geological evidence gathered in Ohio and Indiana has been verified by a University of Cincinnati assistant professor as support of a comet theory, claiming a comet explosion over earth was the cause of drastic changes to life on our planet. This evidence strengthens initial data collected over a year ago. The explosion, which occurred over what is now Canada, caused the extinction of animals and cultures and lengthened the Ice Age nearly 13,000 years ago that should have been coming to an end."
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Canada Comet Lengthened the Ice Age More

Canada Comet Lengthened the Ice Age

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  • new tag needed (Score:5, Funny)

    by spir0 ( 319821 ) on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @08:35PM (#24411285) Homepage Journal

    blamecanada

  • Blame Canada! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    They're not even a real country anyway.

  • Blame the Canadians, of course! (Score:5, Funny)

    by failedlogic ( 627314 ) on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @08:38PM (#24411303)

    Not surprising. Americans are always blaming us for everything. Now they're blaming us for a poor environmental record, preventing the advancement of man, being a magnet for comets - a problem the Americans know our government won't fix so they'll have to do something.

    This story will surely convince the last bunch of skeptical Americans that we live in Igloos. My Core2Duo is overclocked to 10 GHz with "air" cooling. I have heat pipes on the CPU which are used to warming up my living space. Even though it might be a heat wave where you are, I know that shorts were not invented by a Canadian.

    Great country, eh? We're great story-tellers too!

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by tgd ( 2822 )

      Don't forget: we blame you for not getting your dollar to fall in value along with ours.

      Now lap dances in Montreal are expensive.

    • Re: (Score:1, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      the mass extinction of many species caused by that massive comet impact allowed the rise of human life in the first place, we were the quickest to adapt to other climates by wearing the skins of other animals. something that we probably turned to even in africa, if the ice age was long enough and cold enough.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        So we can blame canadians for the lack of nudity in the world?
        Wait, this is slashdot. Home of the Roll packs...
        I for one welcome our Fur bearing Canuck overlords!

      • Re:Blame the Canadians, of course! (Score:4, Informative)

        by WgT2 ( 591074 ) on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @10:09PM (#24411885) Journal
        "the" ice age?

        • bungled phrase, and the fix (Score:1, Informative)

          by Anonymous Coward

          No; read the whole clause:

          [something] lengthened the Ice Age nearly 13,000 years ago that should have been coming to an end.

          The phrase "the ice age" is qualified; it's only talking about the ice age that [did something or other], which it specifies in the final clause. The misplaced adjective phrase does break standard English syntax (which is often order-sensitive), but not enough to change its meaning to a description of "the one and only" ice age. Of course, capitalizing "Ice Age" as if it were a proper noun does imply that the author was thinking this, even if he didn't manage to screw up the sente

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by WgT2 ( 591074 )
            The 'the' comment was both for the previous post AND for the title of the article, which, on Slashdot, are so often misleading about the actual nature of the story.

            I do appreciate the grammatical break down - one just does not see such thoroughness on a regular basis.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by HTH NE1 ( 675604 )

          No, *the* Ice Age.

          Expect more sequels.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by SEWilco ( 27983 )
      And you can't have your diamonds back either. You didn't pick up your litter, so we had to do it.

    • Even though it might be a heat wave where you are, I know that shorts were not invented by a Canadian.

      Not invented by us... but certainly still utilized by us. I live in a small town Saskatchewan. A good portion of the population still wears shorts in the winter.

      I wear nothing more than undergarments, blue jeans, a t-shirt and a 'bunnyhug' (sask. term -- 'hoodie' everywhere else) during the winter... which can be as low as -40C [gov.sk.ca].

      Last winter I dug my '91 Chrysler Daytona out of the snow (literally up to ove

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by TheLink ( 130905 )
        "Last winter I dug my '91 Chrysler Daytona out of the snow (literally up to over a meter high) a few times "

        You left out "in a blizzard and you liked it" :).

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by Brynath ( 522699 )
        Bahh, You Canucks can't take all the credit for that very warm winter Getup.

        Us Alaskans have been wearing that for just as long as you all.

        But then again most of the US doesn't believe we are part of the US, so uhhh can we stay with you?

      • kudos on not translating your measurements and readings from metric.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jonfr ( 888673 ) *

      America has super volcano, we can blame them for the near extincion of the human race next time around.

      (I don't live in Canada, but U.S should take some blame anyway)

    • Actually that documentary Michael Moore did where he went to Canada asking about gun laws, and found that people didn't lock their doors and he tested this by randomly walking into peoples houses unannounced. They did walk up and question him, but the response from them was more curiosity than anything. In America that would get you shot.

      I was really impressed with the overall attitude Canadians had, and it really changed my view of them. The only thing wrong with Canadians is there aren't enough in Americ

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by Nos. ( 179609 )
        I would not call that typical in Canadian cities today. Maybe in small towns you may find it occasionally. Moore (like lots of film makers) picks abnormal situations and plays them as normal to make a point.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by mi ( 197448 )

        went to Canada asking about gun laws, and found that people didn't lock their doors

        A lot of Americans do not either.

        In America that would get you shot.

        Not if there is a filming crew outside — makes it fairly obvious, you aren't a criminal sneaking in.

        Unless, of course, someone recognizes Michael Moore — then all bets are off.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Synonymous Bosch ( 957964 )

      It's convenient enough for Canadians to tell how they saved Americas Bacon during the war for Independence, but the second you blame them for Americas rise to world domination, they get all defensive...

  • Playing the odds (Score:4, Insightful)

    by symbolset ( 646467 ) on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @08:39PM (#24411309) Journal

    Finally one of these articles that mentions both panspermia and periodicity of extinction events in TFA.

    Before the bookmakers get started let's get this out there: although the odds of an extinction level event occurring today or tomorrow or this year is exceedingly remote astronomers agree that in the fullness of time it's not just likely, it's certain.

  • Canada? Comet? Ice Age?
  • ... cynical politicians all over the U.S., secretly planning to bring a comet to Earth to quickly solve our global warming crisis. Hey, it'd be easier than lessening our dependence on foreign oil, right?

  • Interesting ad placement (Score:4, Insightful)

    by damn_registrars ( 1103043 ) <damn.registrars@gmail.com> on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @10:12PM (#24411913) Homepage Journal
    Is anyone else getting a banner ad on the side that is advertising the "Scientology Video Channel"? Rather amusing pairing, I suppose. Real science sharing my browser with a religion based on the writings of a third-rate science fiction author.

  • Why does the word redundant keep bouncing around in my head.

  • Conversely, it may have delayed global warming.

  • Look guys, we're sorry and all, but really, this was important to us. I mean, the beer was starting to get a little warm, and we still had a few thousand games of hockey to play. This ice age extension was really just the thing we needed.

  • By lengthening the Ice Age we messed up the cycle and today we are entering in a warming period, if this comet hadn't hit us we would be running into another cooling trend around now and CO2 would be the bees knees and we could drive our SUVs and people would be a lot damn happier.

    I blame Canada too.

  • perhaps the people that think human byproducts have the biggest impact on the climate will wake up after more reports like this. That Earth isn't a closed system, that there are huge fucking things flying around this tiny blue marble that effect our climate much more than humans making some unpleasant gases.

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Ambitwistor ( 1041236 )

      perhaps the people that think human byproducts have the biggest impact on the climate will wake up after more reports like this. That Earth isn't a closed system, that there are huge fucking things flying around this tiny blue marble that effect our climate much more than humans making some unpleasant gases.

      You are very confused.

      The existence of large extra-terrestrial influences on climate doesn't somehow negate the possibility of large human influences on climate.

      Yes, if a giant comet or asteroid hit the planet tomorrow, that would seriously screw up the climate, moreso than human actions. That doesn't mean that humans aren't currently having a big impact on changes in climate, or that people who are concerned about this need to "wake up" from anything.

    • Sorry. It was the burritos.

  • References: couldn't find the latest study, here [nature.com] and here [allendale-expedition.net] for earlier comet-impact groundwork.

    Note that the latest research being reported here is just new evidence for a comet, not new evidence specifically for a comet-climate link.

    I know everyone likes a "big outer-space thing smashing the Earth" story, but there are certainly other theories of what caused the Younger Dryas [wikipedia.org] cooling; the prevailing theory is a shutdown of the thermohaline circulation due to fresh water from Lake Aggasiz as the Laurentide

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