Author Archives: gymnosperm

CERES and MODTRAN II

Posted on March 13, 2018 by gymnosperm

The earth does not burn at 5778 K like the sun, and therefore produces no shortwave radiation of its own. The earth radiates at about 288 K, a temperature that produces longwave radiation. When molecules absorb radiation according to their … Continue reading →

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CERES and MODTRAN

Posted on March 8, 2018 by gymnosperm

You don’t radiatively warm the third rock from the sun without reducing long wave radiation from the top of the atmosphere to space. Period. [Unless shortwave absorption increases] For far too long, we have ignored CERES data here at the … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate | 3 Comments

Differential Motions of the Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras: The 120mya Inflection and Finale

Posted on March 3, 2018 by gymnosperm

A square kilometer of extruded ocean floor exerts force in all directions. The “squareness” is partly our own construct for convenience of measurement, but also justified by lateral offsets where the linear ruptures we call ridges accommodate the curvature of … Continue reading →

Posted in Continental Wander Path, Paleogeography, Plate Tectonics | Leave a comment

Differential Motions of the Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras V: The 80mya Inflection

Posted on February 10, 2018 by gymnosperm

In the last post on constraints we decided that the east Pacific and Juan de Fuca ridges were useless in constraining the motions of the Americas. We decided that the Atlantic, Greenland, and Lomonosov ridges were acceptable explanations for the … Continue reading →

Posted in Continental Wander Path, Paleogeography, Plate Tectonics | 1 Comment

Differential Motions of the Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras IV: Constraints

Posted on February 3, 2018 by gymnosperm

We know the position and velocity of stable points on our six cratons. A reasonable question to ask is, “Can we account for this motion?” Above is a map of the ocean floor created in the last 10 million years. … Continue reading →

Posted in Geology, Paleogeography | 2 Comments

Differential Motion of the Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras III: North America and Eurasia

Posted on January 27, 2018 by gymnosperm

In the first post in this series we set the goal of using motion vectors of the continents to analyze the forces exerted on them, and described the motions of Africa and South America. In the second post we described … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate | 3 Comments

Differential Motions of Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras II: Antarctica and Australia

Posted on January 26, 2018 by gymnosperm

In the first post of this series we explored the rationale for extending precise analysis of continental motion only 250 million years. The ultimate goal of this exercise is to develop rigorous constraints on the forces creating the different motions, … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate | 1 Comment

Differential Motions of Continents, Mesozoic and Cenozoic Eras

Posted on January 25, 2018 by gymnosperm

The total volume of ocean floor production becomes increasingly difficult to constrain as we work backwards in time. Ocean floor is increasingly lost to subduction, and efforts to replicate the missing parts become speculation. The continents, by contrast, have grown … Continue reading →

Posted in Continental Wander Path, Paleogeography | 2 Comments

The Pacific Triangle, Take III

Posted on December 28, 2017 by gymnosperm

Essentially, the Pacific Triangle IS the Pacific Plate. Unless you wish to consider it a sinkhole, a point subduction zone, all that we know as the Pacific Plate has grown out of this spot in the last 175 million years. Seafloor … Continue reading →

Posted in Continental Wander Path, Geological Evolution of the Western United States, Seafloor Isochrons | 1 Comment

The Cretaceous Superchron, Beaufort Isochrons, and the Motion of North America

Posted on December 19, 2017 by gymnosperm

In the last post we explored a very peculiar set of seafloor isochrons in the Beaufort Sea and Arctic ocean. We found that a perpendicular shift in seafloor spreading defined the Cretaceous Normal Superchron, the longest known period in earth … Continue reading →

Posted in Continental Wander Path, Cretaceous normal superchron, Geography, Magnetic Reversals, Paleogeography | Leave a comment