> To be clear, so far some of the oldest ice found is over 6 million years old...
And they're working on finding even older!
"Given the spectacularly old ice we have discovered at Allan Hills, we also have designed a comprehensive longer-term new study of this region to try to extend the records even further in time, which we hope to conduct between 2026 and 2031"
So this means these areas were once not ice covered? Does this mean the area is returning to what it was a thousand years ago? And, back then, this was the normal or is ice covering the normal?
> And, back then, this was the normal or is ice covering the normal?
"Normal" is probably not a very useful framing. We're currently in an interglacial period in an ice age. So, on one scale we'd expect ice there, on one scale we'd not. On another scale we're just waiting for the sun to swallow the Earth and burn it all away. What's "normal" out of that?
If you happen to be asking if the current human-caused warming is an issue, yes it is. The Earth doesn't care, and "normal" doesn't care. We do though, we're fucking up our environment pretty good and it's causing misery and death.
6000 years ago was about the time of the last interglacial period so likely it was ice free at that time.
As was stated "normal" is not really a useful framing. It has at various times been both "normal" for the glaciers to extend much further south, and it has also been "normal" for the earth to have no glaciers at all. When thinking about climate change the issue is not that the climate IS changing, but rather how quickly. There is no evidence that global climate has ever changed as quickly as it is today, with the fastest rates we have evidence for being on the order of 1 degree every thousand years, as compared to the current rate of about 1 degree per 50 years.
What's most impressive to me is how razor sharp the slate arrowhead they show in the top photo is. I've seen photos of many stone age arrowheads but they are usually much more dull and blunted.
That's because they weren't exposed to the weather as much. Essentially these were 'shrinkwrapped' in nature's own version of Cosmoline. No bacteria, no free oxygen. Once did this with a rose to see how long it would last and it basically was perfect until we moved house. Many years and not even the slightest change, it didn't even lose color.
I'm slightly surprised they're just holding these artefacts with bare hands. I thought that was generally a no-no for dealing with objects untouched for thousands of years
Conservationists and archivists (sometimes) use gloves on cleaned samples, but not archaeologists. An archaeologist wearing gloves is almost certainly just cold.
There's no real reason to immediately protect the find from light handling when it's discovered. It's a dirty object that's still coated in whatever was floating around the environment for those thousands of years. The rock will be fine and probably handled multiple times before it gets back to an archive.
I think the only times I've worn gloves in the field were for a very rusty metal dagger and some especially sensitive human remains.
> no real reason [...] still coated in whatever was floating around the environment
I wonder, might one instead make an argument that it's not currently economic-technologically feasible to avoid artifact surface information destruction and contamination, at any stage of the dig-to-archival-conservation pipeline, nor to extract whatever information might be there, outside of very rare cases? Rather than there's no information there to lose?
Perhaps it becomes possible-and-affordable at some point, to frequently check, say, "oh neat, here are some 10 um notches on the surface, with some nice yeast, and some pollen, and oh, maybe that's a bit of calcified biofilm for nanopore DNA?"? Does automated lab tech progress, someday make "brushed, handled, dusted, washed, and shelf in the basement" start sounding like 19thC "we accessed the site using dynamite"?
Yes: most mainland Norway ice was gone during the holocene climatic optimum (9–6 thousand years ago), and glaciers recovered since then (until approx the 20th century, when deglaciation started accelerating again).
The climate is varying in long cycles, and the deglaciation 20 thousand years ago (last glacial maximum) was driven by a spike in summer temperatures, and this peak has already long passed. Ice ages and interglacial periods have a certain momentum to them, so it takes more than just that to go back to full ice age..
Sure, our actions and inaction regarding climate change threaten the very future of humanity, but on the bright side we're going to learn so much about human history in the process!
Nah. For centuries up to the 1850s, climate was looking pretty dicy. The little ice age, had it gone on, might have represented a return a big ice age.
The heroic efforts of early industrialists adding carbon to the atmosphere avoided this calamity and set us up with a level of comfy and productive climate unknown in the quaternary.
I wonder if there were any climate change alarmists around 20,000 years ago; telling everyone that the planet was doomed if those mile-deep glaciers covering New York ever melted?
To be clear, so far some of the oldest ice found is over 6 million years old...
https://news.oregonstate.edu/news/six-million-year-old-ice-d...
> To be clear, so far some of the oldest ice found is over 6 million years old...
And they're working on finding even older!
"Given the spectacularly old ice we have discovered at Allan Hills, we also have designed a comprehensive longer-term new study of this region to try to extend the records even further in time, which we hope to conduct between 2026 and 2031"
Just saw a presentation at the OSU PRAx Center last night bringing science and arts together (https://prax.oregonstate.edu/poetry-polar-science).
One of the presentations was on this research, and I was somewhat amazed the new stretch goal is to find 10 million year old ice. More power to them!
So this means these areas were once not ice covered? Does this mean the area is returning to what it was a thousand years ago? And, back then, this was the normal or is ice covering the normal?
> And, back then, this was the normal or is ice covering the normal?
"Normal" is probably not a very useful framing. We're currently in an interglacial period in an ice age. So, on one scale we'd expect ice there, on one scale we'd not. On another scale we're just waiting for the sun to swallow the Earth and burn it all away. What's "normal" out of that?
If you happen to be asking if the current human-caused warming is an issue, yes it is. The Earth doesn't care, and "normal" doesn't care. We do though, we're fucking up our environment pretty good and it's causing misery and death.
6000 years ago was about the time of the last interglacial period so likely it was ice free at that time.
As was stated "normal" is not really a useful framing. It has at various times been both "normal" for the glaciers to extend much further south, and it has also been "normal" for the earth to have no glaciers at all. When thinking about climate change the issue is not that the climate IS changing, but rather how quickly. There is no evidence that global climate has ever changed as quickly as it is today, with the fastest rates we have evidence for being on the order of 1 degree every thousand years, as compared to the current rate of about 1 degree per 50 years.
What's most impressive to me is how razor sharp the slate arrowhead they show in the top photo is. I've seen photos of many stone age arrowheads but they are usually much more dull and blunted.
That's because they weren't exposed to the weather as much. Essentially these were 'shrinkwrapped' in nature's own version of Cosmoline. No bacteria, no free oxygen. Once did this with a rose to see how long it would last and it basically was perfect until we moved house. Many years and not even the slightest change, it didn't even lose color.
That would actually be a brilliant treatment to give wedding bouquets! I’ve never heard of Cosmoline. Going to look it up. Thanks!
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my lathe also came wrapped in cosmoline and shrink-wrap
I'm slightly surprised they're just holding these artefacts with bare hands. I thought that was generally a no-no for dealing with objects untouched for thousands of years
Conservationists and archivists (sometimes) use gloves on cleaned samples, but not archaeologists. An archaeologist wearing gloves is almost certainly just cold.
There's no real reason to immediately protect the find from light handling when it's discovered. It's a dirty object that's still coated in whatever was floating around the environment for those thousands of years. The rock will be fine and probably handled multiple times before it gets back to an archive.
I think the only times I've worn gloves in the field were for a very rusty metal dagger and some especially sensitive human remains.
> no real reason [...] still coated in whatever was floating around the environment
I wonder, might one instead make an argument that it's not currently economic-technologically feasible to avoid artifact surface information destruction and contamination, at any stage of the dig-to-archival-conservation pipeline, nor to extract whatever information might be there, outside of very rare cases? Rather than there's no information there to lose?
Perhaps it becomes possible-and-affordable at some point, to frequently check, say, "oh neat, here are some 10 um notches on the surface, with some nice yeast, and some pollen, and oh, maybe that's a bit of calcified biofilm for nanopore DNA?"? Does automated lab tech progress, someday make "brushed, handled, dusted, washed, and shelf in the basement" start sounding like 19thC "we accessed the site using dynamite"?
3 replies →
Me too but presumably they’re not really that unique as there are hundreds? Or maybe the stone/hard artifacts are handled different than organic/soft.
Thats one pretty arrowhead
Does this mean that the ice wasn't there during the stone age?
Yes: most mainland Norway ice was gone during the holocene climatic optimum (9–6 thousand years ago), and glaciers recovered since then (until approx the 20th century, when deglaciation started accelerating again).
The climate is varying in long cycles, and the deglaciation 20 thousand years ago (last glacial maximum) was driven by a spike in summer temperatures, and this peak has already long passed. Ice ages and interglacial periods have a certain momentum to them, so it takes more than just that to go back to full ice age..
Yes, the early Neolithic was warmer than modern era.
wrong: IPCC AR6 puts the warmest Holocene stretch (~6.5 ka) at about 0.2-1°C above 1850-1900. 2011-2020 already beat that
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Whatever you put in the glacier the glacier gives back to you. Anything you leave there ends up at the bottom of it in the moraine.
Sure, our actions and inaction regarding climate change threaten the very future of humanity, but on the bright side we're going to learn so much about human history in the process!
Climate is out. Climate tech too.
AI is in.
With oil prices rising, climate tech is still quietly advancing.
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what if we used AI on the climate
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Imagine if we move to Mars only to find out we used to live there...
Nah. For centuries up to the 1850s, climate was looking pretty dicy. The little ice age, had it gone on, might have represented a return a big ice age.
The heroic efforts of early industrialists adding carbon to the atmosphere avoided this calamity and set us up with a level of comfy and productive climate unknown in the quaternary.
Amazing how humanity keeps lucking out like this.
I wonder if there were any climate change alarmists around 20,000 years ago; telling everyone that the planet was doomed if those mile-deep glaciers covering New York ever melted?
Including Stone Age diseases?
Yes.
Just wait for a few ancient-but-novel pathogens to start emerging too.
unlikely there are any in the ice that were not also present outside the ice
[dead]
Hyperborea
I come from a land down under
Crom!
I wonder what we will find beneath Greenland's ice?
Imagine if the water disappeared
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That last sentence is how we know you've never been there. The ratio is the same as anywhere else.
I’ve been to Norway, Sweden, Iceland, Denmark, Finland, the British Isles, all of it really.