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 adjust
ɥƃnouǝʇuɐɔı
 
Registered: 12/16/04
Posts: 8,582
Loc: Canada, LOL
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 What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated...
#8969938 - 09/22/08 08:19 PM (2 months, 11 days ago) |
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...thereby connecting the Pacific and Atlantic oceans? Do you think this would warm up our climate significantly?
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 DieCommie
Ally
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 7,652
Loc: The Union
Last seen: 1 hour, 4 minutes
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 Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: adjust]
#8970149 - 09/22/08 09:08 PM (2 months, 11 days ago) |
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Hmmm, interesting. I know one of the oceans is at a higher elevation than the other... which one is higher? Also, what kind of currents go on down there? Does the north atlantic conveyor stretch all the way down there?
As you can see I have no answers, only questions. With knowledge of which ocean is higher, and what kind of conveyors are going on down there I bet I could make a guess.
Madtown would probably have some good ideas.
edit - also, once the man-made locks there degrade and fail, would this necessarily happen? Maybe sediment would build up and the canal would seal itself.
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Behold yon miserable creature. That Point is a Being like ourselves, but confined to the non-dimensional Gulf. He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he a thought of Plurality; for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing. Yet mark his perfect self-contentment, and hence learn his lesson, that to be self-contented is to be vile and ignorant, and that to aspire is better than to be blindly and impotently happy.
Edited by DieCommie (09/22/08 09:10 PM)
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Idiot
Freak Out!
Registered: 11/27/05
Posts: 2,184
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: adjust]
#8970975 - 09/23/08 12:15 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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Are you seriously thinking of destroying the planet?
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zouden
Neuroscientist
Registered: 11/12/07
Posts: 3,341
Loc: Australia
Last seen: 4 hours, 39 minutes
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: DieCommie]
#8971316 - 09/23/08 02:08 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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>Maybe sediment would build up and the canal would seal itself.
The enormous tides washing back and forth would destroy the canal pretty quickly I reckon
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Wave upon wave of demented avengers
Marched cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream
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adjust
ɥƃnouǝʇuɐɔı
Registered: 12/16/04
Posts: 8,582
Loc: Canada, LOL
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: zouden]
#8971328 - 09/23/08 02:13 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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Or would they make it deeper?
I read that one of the causes of the current ice age is the connection of north and south america, that the separation of pacific and atlantic oceans changed the ocean currants and cooled the earth somehow. I'm not sure if this is true or even provable though.
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ToiletDuk
BORG9 Crew
Registered: 05/16/03
Posts: 38,501
Loc: EarthFarm 1
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: Idiot]
#8971709 - 09/23/08 06:10 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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Quote:
Idiot said:
Are you seriously thinking of destroying the planet?
Naw, Adjust just wants to kill billions and wipe out all life on earth. 
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zouden
Neuroscientist
Registered: 11/12/07
Posts: 3,341
Loc: Australia
Last seen: 4 hours, 39 minutes
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: DieCommie]
#8971750 - 09/23/08 06:43 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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>I know one of the oceans is at a higher elevation than the other... which one is higher?
According to wikipedia, the Pacific side is 20cm higher because it's less dense (saltier). But opening all the locks wouldn't do anything except drain the artificial lakes - the Pacific and Atlantic would never be joined. So much for that idea.
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Wave upon wave of demented avengers
Marched cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream
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Hematite
Newbee
Registered: 05/04/07
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Loc: Wisconsin
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Re: What do you think would happen if a large chunk of Panama was excavated... [Re: zouden]
#8972492 - 09/23/08 11:12 AM (2 months, 10 days ago) |
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A wide gap between North and South America would help warm equatorial ocean currents to stay near the equator, rather than being deflected north or south. This would reduce transport of heat to the poles, making the equator warmer and the higher latitudes colder. Tropical storms would become more common and more powerful in the Atlantic as sea surface temperatures rose and the temperature gradient increased. The sharper temperature contrast between the poles and the equator also would strengthen the jet stream over North America and probably push it south. Climate would become colder and drier north of the jet stream, and warmer and wetter south of it. The effect would be less marked in south America because the south pole is completely surrounded by ocean and circumpolar currents (the 'roaring 40's') that trap cold air in Antarctica.
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