North Pole Archives - DOES GOD EXIST? TODAY

March 11, 2021March 10, 2021

Texas Cold Snap Highlights Earth’s Design

Everyone has seen changes in climate patterns worldwide, and in the United States, a Texas cold snap highlights Earth’s design. We need to better understand the global weather systems related to how our planet gets, retains, and releases heat.

Recently an ice-breaker research ship was supposed to get as close as it could to the North Pole. Surprisingly, it was able to get all the way to the pole; something never deemed possible. In February of 2021, Texas experienced a very unusual cold snap. While the media was paying attention to the electric grid’s disruption and water availability problems, the impact on animals was largely overlooked.

In Texas, cold temperatures killed massive numbers of insects and the animals that depend upon them for food. Bats fell from the sky because they had no insects to eat and had no place to go to escape the cold. Milkweed was killed, cutting off the primary food supply for monarch butterflies. Sea turtles could not adjust to the low temperatures, and volunteers took 10,600 turtles to the South Padre Island Convention Center. There they warmed the turtles and eventually returned them to the Gulf of Mexico.

All of those events remind us of the delicate interdependence of life on this planet. We tend to minimize disasters of this magnitude, but we will be reminded later this year. When grocery prices spike because of the lack of Texas-grown fruits and vegetables, we will realize that the Texas cold snap highlights Earth’s design. It should make us aware of how connected we are to other life forms on the planet.

Taking care of Earth’s climate and resources means not allowing human waste of all kinds to upset nature’s balance. We must learn to appreciate God’s design for life everywhere we look. Indeed we can know there is a God “through the things He has made” (Romans 1:19-20).

Data from Associated Press 2/16/21.

January 26, 2021January 21, 2021

North Pole Ice Melting

Scientists have recently conducted a fascinating study of the North Pole region. The Arctic is warming three times faster than the rest of the planet. With North Pole ice melting, the question is, “What effect will this warming have on Earth’s climate?”

To investigate that question, The Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) involved 600 scientists and experts from around the world. They equipped the icebreaker RV Polarstern with a large number of scientific tools and accommodations. The plan was to freeze the ship into an ice floe and let it drift for a year to study the North Pole’s climate as never before.

The scientists did much of the work on the ice floe itself, even setting up camp there. Sometimes they fell through but were saved by their protective flotation clothing. They gathered large amounts of data, which will take years to analyze thoroughly. It will give a wealth of scientific information about the changes that are taking place on our planet.

The team started the project in October of 2019, but by July 30, the floe had broken up, and the Polarstern was in open water. They decided to head directly to the North Pole. On August 19, still in open water, the ship arrived at the pole and found very little ice.

Summer of 2020 ranks as the hottest ever recorded in the Northern Hemisphere. It may seem that the North Pole ice melting is too far away to cause concern for us, but changes of this magnitude at the pole will bring changes in weather all over the globe.

Reference: Discover magazine, January/February, 2021.

February 3, 2019January 30, 2019

Ice Algae – Designed Polar Grass

Have you ever wondered how animals that live near Earth’s North and South Poles survive? What do they eat, and how can any kind of food chain exist? The answer to this is ice algae.

Unlike most plants, algae do not have flowers, roots, stems, leaves, or vascular tissue. However, ice algae, like most plants, provide the starting point for a food chain. In this case, it is a food chain in very cold places. Tiny krill, penguins, seals, polar bears, and blue whales all depend on ice algae to survive. In 2016 Dr. Thomas Brown of the Scottish Association for Marine Science studied polar bears and found that 86% of the polar bears’ nutrition came from a food chain that originated with ice algae.

Ice algae have chlorophyll so they can use whatever light is available for photosynthesis. There are a variety of types of algae that live in different conditions. Some live on the surface of the ocean, some on the floor of the ocean, and some in or on the ice itself. Ice algae produce fatty acids which supply nutritional value for animals that live in what would otherwise be a nutritional void. Because there is ice algae, animal life is abundant under, in, and around the ice at both poles.

God has provided interesting food chains all over the planet. As we study global warming and its effect on life in places like the polar seas, we see more of His handiwork and learn why we need to take care of it. The admonition of Genesis 2:15 to “take care of the garden to dress it and keep it” applies as much to us today as it did to Adam and Eve.
–John N. Clayton © 2019

Data from National Wildlife, February/March 2019, pages 14-16.