Rethinking The Ice Age ----By Lex Loeb, Originally on Yahoo contributor network

Rethinking Ice Age Geo Physics Did the Earth Really Get Colder or was the Ice Age Caused by a Major Shift in the Earth Polar Axis? Lex Loeb, Yahoo Contributor Network . During the last series of ice ages the glaciers covered much of North America and Western Europe. In other parts of the world there is no great evidence that the earth itself had cooled down. The tropics thrived with tropical rain forests and south the great continental glaciers savannah and forests thrived. Sea levels were significantly lower during the times the glaciers were largest , up to 2 miles thick, covering much of Northern North America. Sea levels, worldwide fell as much as 400-500 ft at times in that relatively recent geological history. Huge areas of what are now continental shelf lands were exposed high and dry as part of the continents. To see the areas that were exposed one can go to google maps and look at how much continental shelf land around the world can be exposed to that lower presently below sea level elevation. Areas that were dry land included a big piece of land that connected England and the rest of Europe. Florida was more than twice it's size above water, Island nations in SE Asia were more like a continent of their own. Down at lower elevations when sea level falls things can remain warm and balmy because of proximity to the water just like conditions today. Higher elevations tend to be cooler even in more southern and equatorial regions. 400 to 500 ft makes all the difference when it comes to climate. The most accepted theory at the moment for glaciation during the ice age usually has to do with Solar energy output changes. It is quite possible that that is all wrong. Theories such as the one that says Easter Island was devastated by over population might also be wrong because Easter Island might have been a very different larger land mass during the ice age and the great stone face monuments there might actually be a lot older than recognized. There is some evidence that civilization may have been more advanced during the ice age on lower elevation now under water continental shelves like those that surround India. Off the coast of California there is clear evidence of human settlements and civilization now below the present continental water line and this evidence also dates to the time of the ice age. The key to understanding what really may have caused the ice age might be in looking at how many continents were covered with ice and where they were covered. When polar ice floats on water it is moderated in temperature by the temperature of water. Water born ice more easily melts down on a seasonal basis just as it does today. When deposited on continental land mass ice is far more stable and a lot less seasonal in terms of any melt down. Long Ago I noticed that the center of what might have been the north polar ice cap might have been the Hudson Bay in Canada. It appears to be a recessed area in the content probably because of extreme ice weighing it down over millennia. That ice was always enough to lower sea levels. Sea levels were lower such that the continent mass of Antarctica grew it's continental shelf becoming more exposed as dry land which means that if the polar axis shifted putting one of the ice poles over the Hudson Bay that most of Antarctica would also remain under ice as is it today and as it happens more of it because of lower sea level just for the same reason Greenland is now "permanently" glaciated. That means that two continents were ice covered during the ice age period as well Greenland too. All of that accounts for the extremely low and stable sea levels that exposed so much of the continental shelf. There would have also been seasonal ice over the polar ocean regions and that would help to explain why Most of Northern Europe was also Glaciated and why parts of southern Africa and South America may also have been glaciated instead of seeing global cooling as the cause. Two continents verses one continent and one ocean covered with glacial polar ice makes one huge difference not just in sea level being much lower but in exposed undersea lands also glaciated that otherwise would be ocean, Moving the earth's axis also changes things on earth in a big way . At the equator the earth's circumference is greater than a similar measurement north and south connecting the poles and that is because of the centrifugal force from the earth's rotation. The process of the axis moving might have been a more violent event as the earth would have to become fatter where it was thinner and thinner where it was faster. It would all depend on whether it was by means of slow drift or whether the axis was moved by something like an asteroid strike to one side of the earth. It the ice age may have been caused by one asteroid strike and then ended by another. It is not even clear necessarily where the axis ice poles then necessarily had to be before the ice age because the ice age glaciers totally altered the earth's continental topography. It might be that the earth's axis always moves in one direction drifting or moves because the surface is moving over the magma interior? The difference between two continents and one covered with ice totally transforms the possible theory of the geological history because it then allows for woolly mammoths to be finding tall edible grass growing in places like Siberia at the same time. Siberia would also have more exposed continental shelf lands and some more ocean exposure at lower elevations as per present sea levels. The hole earth's surface is morphed in was to make it less recognizable as a result of the ice age. Evidence of the polar ice over the arctic is nil because it would have melted down as fast as the ice would have relocated to be centered over a Hudson bay northern pole . The antarctic, however could have remained frozen over though the entire ice age at the higher elevations because because it was still in the proximity of the new Indian ocean pole opposite the Hudson Bay North Pole. It all starts to make sense and then explains why Northern Europe would be glaciated much the reason Greenland is today at the lower latitude . There is no reason to believe it necessary for global cooling because of atmospheric change and or due to solar energy output changes. Certainly we do know that solar energy output changes as per the little ice age experienced by Europe in the middle ages or because of other variables. Flora and fauna in sub tropical and tropical and even northern forest species are known to have survived the ice age. Trees species in northern forests predate the ice age but they could not have survived under the ice cover of the glaciers which means those forests were located further south and maybe sometimes further north in some areas, So when we see the nearly complete range of latitudinal species collections surviving the ice age from start to finish in both flora and fauna it does not suggest any major cooling effect was part of the equation but rather a polar axis shift. The mystery then is what happens when the equator moves and the circumference of the earth grows at that point while the north south loop gets squished because of centrifugal force. That actually means that we can check the theory by looking at volcanic and seismic data history where apparent. A fast polar axis change might mean a lot more volcanism and seismic activity verses a slow drift of the polar axis? It might be that we can areas that would have been subducted into the the earth from higher elevations? There is some evidence that there is a statistical probability of more seismic and volcanic activity at certain latitudes. The great melt down of the North American Glaciers with all of it's catastrophic geological implications may have been due to slow polar axis drift or because of a much more abrupt move? It could be that there is a polar axis shift that moves approximately north to south because of magma Coriolis force eddies north and south of the poles that takes the polar axis drift a set number of years to go full circle around the earth. Maybe some day in the distant future India and or Austria would be the ice covered north or south poles as a result resulting in either one or two or no continents being under polar ice. Since most of the surface of the earth is ocean covered if we had a situation where both poles sat over water and were moderated by water temperature we would have much higher sea levels up to 500 over present levels. That explains a lot without having to cool or warm the earth as a hole with a different set of cause and effect variables than making the assumption that the atmosphere or solar energy out put can be the only causes for sea level change and variations in polar glaciation. The interesting thing is how stable the north American ice age glaciers were and that also leads to reason to speculate that the north pole was indeed directly over the Hudson Bay and not anywhere near it's present location. The way to double check the theory is correct is going to be in looking at the centrifugal force fattening of the globe due to centrifugal force. It might leave evidence behind in the geology that would support the polar axis thesis. The ability of norther conifer forests and hard wood forests to survive the ice age when their habitat was all gone because of the ice age helps support the thesis too because a lot of the mountainous areas where they could have survived would have been ice covered . That leaves lower southern continental shelf areas with ocean an d atmospheric temperatures not much different today and it also leaves areas further north or south than they had been to keep the forests in the climate range they need for survival. We knows these forests existed before the ice age because of fossil evidence show the same species. .