When I was younger, using plastic water bottles was basically unheard of. There were water fountains all over the place… Now when I go to the park, the fountains are often non-working. Is there a stigma against water fountains? New York City water, in particular, starts out super-clean in the Catskills, and sure there is some possible…[Read more]

Like many of the comments, I also hadn’t given much thought to microplastics or the idea that doing laundry would be an issue… I would be interested to see the detrimental effects better documented though–like if you keep fish in an a tank full of microplastics, what happens compared to normal?

Are you sure that “Single-use plastics are definitely more cost-effective when compared to any other materials that can be used”?  Are you considering the long term costs on ecosystems, environment, and the effects these could have on people?

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Yes, eventually Los Angeles will be off the west coast of Canada…

Yes, the India-Asia collision will eventually stop. (Today we live in New York at the site of an old collision much like that one). And the placement of the continents keeps shifting, so yes, over time the arrangement will be quite different…

The water is usually around a couple weight percent. It’s not a lot, but it makes a big difference!

The continents form by many different processes, so they are more diverse. Usually at least though there is the old granites and gneisses and other “hard” rock. Then often one or more layers of sediment on top. The continents are many times older than the sea floor, so they have a more complicated history and structure.

Pangea is just the most recent one, so we have most information about it.

Subduction tends to happen when the sea floor is old and dense. The Atlantic sea floor isn’t super old… but also it is difficult to get subduction started. You have to overcome some resistance to get the process going. It’s a big question in geology, how that can happen.

Yes, the other Hawai islands do not have active volcanoes. The eruptions just stop happening… and there is actually a new island forming by volcanic eruption off the coast of the big island!

To become “inactive” it just means the eruptions stop. So erosion and weathering take over. The rocks cool down (become more dense), so there is some…[Read more]

It’s possible for the different boundaries to be subducted under a continent (like in this case, under North America. But things get warmer in the mantle, so the processes are different, so even if there is still motion apart or together it doesn’t make new sea floor, or volcanoes, etc.

yes.

Please also see Amanda’s earlier post (she found the names and a link to more information about the earlier supercontinent.

Yes there is a “supercontinent cycle”. So they have formed, and then break apart again eventually. As I understand, it has to do with all the heat that builds up under the supercontinent and causes rifting.

20 meters/year??! whoa. Some things that would happen would be that the sea level would rise tremendously because the ocean crust would be warmer and less dense everywhere. So the continents would be flooded. Also, as you said, there would be a lot more volcanic gasses… my guess, probably still possible for a human to survive, but it would a…[Read more]

At any trench, it will be one plate going under the other… even if it’s at a triple junction.

The EQ happen cluster along plate boundaries. The depth and intensity aren’t really related.

It may be kind of like a boiling pot of soup. Sometimes the froth on top is all pushed over to one side (a lot of upwelling in one area)… but in the case of the Earth the froth is an insulator, so it can get hot under the supercontinent area, and this can eventually cause the supercontinent to break up again and spread out.

Is this is a comment or question? Try to either pose a question, or click “reply” if you are commenting on a topic that someone else posted. Thanks.