Comment by OscarCunningham
7 years ago
Oh, I didn't spot that they had already considered that path.
However I don't accept their defence.
1) Depending on environmental conditions, my path can cross the Lisan Peninsula. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lisan_Peninsula (EDIT: In fact there's enough clearance to just go completely south of the Dead Sea)
2) Their path crosses the Volga River, which is much larger in total surface area than the Dead Sea. And at the point at which they cross it, the Volga is just as wide as the Dead Sea.
But rivers don't fit in the conventional definition of "major body of water" even if their surface area is large.
It's odd to say you "don't accept their defense" when you're really just operating from a different set of assumptions in the first place.
>rivers don't fit in the conventional definition of "major body of water"
I suppose that's true. But it raises the question of what a river is. Lots of things that people would describe as lakes in fact have water flowing into them, through them, and out of them. So it's hard to distinguish them from a broad river.
Anyway, the distinction is moot since you can in fact squeeze just south of the Dead Sea and avoid hitting it at all.
Without looking up a formal definition, how I believe the common person would differentiate between a river and lake are the following:
Rivers tend to have high flow to volume ratios, faster moving flows at depth, are usually more shallow, and are defined more like a squashed tube in natural states.
Lakes tend to be deeper, more stable (slower flow, if discernible at all), and are generally placid. Lakes /usually/ have a large dimension in at least two surface directions while rivers usually have that in only one.
Exceptions to the above occur with canals/channels* (though that's an ocean thing) which might be closer to the fuzzy boundary.
River deltas also occur in high sediment deposit areas, such as the ends of rivers where they transition in to lakes / oceans; the extreme end of a river delta being bogs and other swamp like areas with shallow slow moving water. (I argue that such areas are neither river nor lake, but a third category.)
> It's odd to say you "don't accept their defense" when you're really just operating from a different set of assumptions in the first place.
Why is that odd? Their set of assumptions is exactly what he is criticizing.
I think of criticizing the defense as criticizing the argument or reasoning offered.
Put another way, if the problem is with the assumptions, the criticism goes far deeper than just that defense.