[vi3t_dragon31]

what would happen to the world if all the polar ice cap melted???
when do u think it will melt?

[StalingradK]

I think... There will be more water

[The Silver Thong]

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I think... There will be more water

that was funny

[seeking]

i want you all to do this expirement



take a glass

put 3 ice cubes in the glass

fill the glass up to the very top with water, i mean very top, were you can see the water hovering over the top


let glass sit in sun



come back


tell me what happened


that is your answer

[Raptor]

^You seem to forget that Antarctica lies on SOLID GROUND, which means when the ice cap melts it will cause the ocean to rise. The Arctic however floats, and when it melts the ocean will not rise.

[Frosty]

Quote

i want you all to do this expirement
take a glass

put 3 ice cubes in the glass

fill the glass up to the very top with water, i mean very top, were you can see the water hovering over the top
let glass sit in sun
come back
tell me what happened
that is your answer

Water will spill out of my cup, so what is the big deal?

[seeking]

the ice on antartica laying on solid ground changes nothing

and no, the water wont spill out over your cup, the water level will decline


if the polar ice caps were to melt, the sea level would decline as well

[Welsh Shaun]

Sorry for being thick? well I'm not really, its just that i was taught that two thirds of the ice lies beneath the water and obviously one third is seen above. Is this not true? and if it is would'nt the water level rise enough to cover land beneath sea level?

I bow to your knowledge a genuine question to enlighten me.

[gandalf2013]

.

This post has been edited by gandalf2013: 02 December 2005 - 07:29 AM

[Radioactive Man]

Isn't ice denser than water?

[StalingradK]

Yes... that's why it hurts to be hit with a huge icicle and not a cup of water...

[Guardsman Bass]

For an example of what the world would like if all the polar ice melted, take a look at the Early Cretaceous Period (about 105 million years ago). There was no polar ice, along with a significant amount of greenhouse heating resulting in greater water vapor evaporation, with a resultant sea level 650 feet higher than it is today.

The results? Oceans covered about 80 percent of the Earth's surface (as compared to 71 percent today), much of the low-lying areas were submerged to make very shallow, warm seas, covered in islands where hills used to be, and a great passage of water covered the interior of the North American continent in a warm, shallow sea. The climate was certainly a lot better, with the average world-wide temperature around 25 degrees Celsius - the average temperature of the Amazon rain forest today.

This post has been edited by Guardsman Bass: 05 November 2005 - 04:10 AM

[Beggars]

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Isn't ice denser than water?

Quote

Yes... that's why it hurts to be hit with a huge icicle and not a cup of water...

it depends if your hit with the cup

[seeking]

welsh: you are correct that most of the ice is underwater but that still doesnt change the fact that when that ice melts, the sea level will drop, just like when you have the ice cube in the cup, most of the ice is under the water, but when it melts the level of water in the cup decreases


gandolf2013 - your are incorrect, when the water on antartica melts most of the water will be absorbed into the land mass, some will evaporate and spread out over the oceans and other land bodies, and some will fall into the ocean, the water falling into the ocean will indeed make the sealevel rise however, if antartica is at that stage the polar ice caps will have allready long been melted away, lowering the sealevel enough to were the excess antartic water would not make any devestating effects

[Guardsman Bass]

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Isn't ice denser than water?

No. Water is extremely rare in that it is one of the few materials in which the solid state is actually less dense than the liquid state, which is why ice cubes dropped into a glass of water float, and lakes freeze from the top down rather than the bottom up.