ATale of 2 frogs, on global warming.
A Tale of Two Frogs
By Kelpie Wilson
t r u t h o u t | Environmental Editor
Friday 08 December 2006
I learned something fascinating this week. I am in San Francisco, staying with friends, and my host Dave Parks is a physicist as well as an accomplished naturalist.
The last time I saw him, Dave told me that under an ultraviolet light, scorpions will glow with a green fluorescence. To prove it, he brought a portable black light and we went into my yard that night and started lifting rotten logs and shining the light under them. Sure enough, we soon saw a bright green scorpion, looking like a creepy rubber glow-in-the-dark toy. Dave couldn't tell me why scorpions do that, but he could prove that they do.
This week, Dave told me that frogs in Alaska will freeze solid in the winter. Not surprising in itself, but I was amazed to learn that in the spring when they thaw out, they don't melt into a putrefying mess of flesh, but start hopping around as if they'd never spent the winter as a frog-flavored popsicle.
That made me think of a better-known but less fortunate property of frogs, their propensity to cook to death when placed in a pan of cold water that is slowly heated to boiling. Because the heating is slow, they never react by jumping out of the pan. Their world goes from cozy, to hot tub on-high, to full rolling boil before they can do anything about it. This frog story has also became the standard explanation for why humans are not reacting with appropriate speed to climate change - the heating is coming on too slowly to raise the alarm and make us do something.
But depending on what part of the planet you occupy, the gradual heating scenario may no longer hold true. The Arctic, a place that few people inhabit or visit, is heating much faster than the rest of the planet, and devastating changes are already underway. Europe is another region that is feeling the heat more than most. Europe seems to be skipping winter this year as flowers bloom on Alpine ski slopes and bears find their dens too warm and soggy to hibernate in. That is one reason why Britain and other EU countries display a growing sense of urgency as they lead global efforts to reduce carbon emissions.
Dave had one more interesting piece of information for me.
For rest go to
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_120806J.shtml
By Kelpie Wilson
t r u t h o u t | Environmental Editor
Friday 08 December 2006
I learned something fascinating this week. I am in San Francisco, staying with friends, and my host Dave Parks is a physicist as well as an accomplished naturalist.
The last time I saw him, Dave told me that under an ultraviolet light, scorpions will glow with a green fluorescence. To prove it, he brought a portable black light and we went into my yard that night and started lifting rotten logs and shining the light under them. Sure enough, we soon saw a bright green scorpion, looking like a creepy rubber glow-in-the-dark toy. Dave couldn't tell me why scorpions do that, but he could prove that they do.
This week, Dave told me that frogs in Alaska will freeze solid in the winter. Not surprising in itself, but I was amazed to learn that in the spring when they thaw out, they don't melt into a putrefying mess of flesh, but start hopping around as if they'd never spent the winter as a frog-flavored popsicle.
That made me think of a better-known but less fortunate property of frogs, their propensity to cook to death when placed in a pan of cold water that is slowly heated to boiling. Because the heating is slow, they never react by jumping out of the pan. Their world goes from cozy, to hot tub on-high, to full rolling boil before they can do anything about it. This frog story has also became the standard explanation for why humans are not reacting with appropriate speed to climate change - the heating is coming on too slowly to raise the alarm and make us do something.
But depending on what part of the planet you occupy, the gradual heating scenario may no longer hold true. The Arctic, a place that few people inhabit or visit, is heating much faster than the rest of the planet, and devastating changes are already underway. Europe is another region that is feeling the heat more than most. Europe seems to be skipping winter this year as flowers bloom on Alpine ski slopes and bears find their dens too warm and soggy to hibernate in. That is one reason why Britain and other EU countries display a growing sense of urgency as they lead global efforts to reduce carbon emissions.
Dave had one more interesting piece of information for me.
For rest go to
http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_120806J.shtml
posted by Paschal Baute at 12:23 PM
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