Earth's magnetic field getting closer to flipping?

[JackD]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal None of us will live long enough to see it...even if it starts today. It takes 1000+ years for a polar shift to complete.....according to this and other articles I've seen. Assuming this is true, it's not something we need to worry about. I won't lose any sleep over it.

 

[Burt Gummer]

It has happened many times before.

That is why you have Mammoths frozen in the act of grazing at the North Pole and giant shark fossils dug up in Montana.

It will of course happen again when a large enough gravitation body passed through our solar system to trigger it.

Personally I believe this place is ready to be treated like an Etch a Sketch anyway.

 

[packman]

It has happened many times before.

That is why you have Mammoths frozen in the act of grazing at the North Pole and giant shark fossils dug up in Montana.

It will of course happen again when a large enough gravitation body passed through our solar system to trigger it.

Personally I believe this place is ready to be treated like an Etch a Sketch anyway.

Does this mean the toilet will swirl the other direction when it flips?

 

[Burt Gummer]

yes

 

[PaulZ]

Yes, and the reason they call it weather is that it's weather, 'whether' we like it or not!
There was an interesting article that I read years back that studies have show that most mammals become sterile in a reversed pole environment.

I would like to see those studies

 

[salmonriverjohn]

Excerpt from Encyclopedia Britannica,
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/175962/Earth/54200/The-geomagnetic-field-and-magnetosphere

"An important characteristic of Earth's magnetic field is polarity reversal. In this process the direction of the dipole component reverses—i.e., the north magnetic pole becomes the south magnetic pole and vice versa. From studying the direction of magnetization of many rocks, geologists know that such reversals occur, without a discernible pattern, at intervals that range from tens of thousands of years to millions of years, though they are still uncertain about the mechanisms responsible. It is likely that during the changeover, which is believed to take a few thousand years, a nondipolar field remains, at a small fraction of the strength of the normal field. In the temporary absence of the dipole component, the solar wind would approach much closer to Earth, allowing particles that are normally deflected by the field or are trapped in its outer portions to reach the surface. The increase in particle radiation could lead to increased rates of genetic damage and thus of mutations or sterility in plants and animals, leading to the disappearance of some species. Scientists have looked for evidence of such changes in the fossil record at times of past field reversals, but the results have been inconclusive."

 

[3MTA3]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geomagnetic_reversal None of us will live long enough to see it...even if it starts today. It takes 1000+ years for a polar shift to complete.....according to this and other articles I've seen. Assuming this is true, it's not something we need to worry about. I won't lose any sleep over it.

You mean I'm stuck with all those defective upside down compasses I bought????

 

[JackD]

Perhaps the only thing more fluid than climate change is scientific theory.

 

[Burt Gummer]

Our vanity and self-importance as a species is entertaining.

An expanding Universe with hundreds of billion of Galaxies all with hundreds of billions of solar systems.
Millions of Earth-like planets out there and we believe our backward, ignorant, brainwashed species is important somehow.

When it is our time to expire, whether it is slow or abrupt, no one will miss us. We simply are not that important.

 

[JackD]

....... no one will miss us. We simply are not that important.

I'm a little more optimistic than this. I'd like to believe we are here to fulfill a purpose and in the end that task will have been completed.

 

[PaulZ]

So; over the space of a thousand years we could get increased particle radiation which may cause increased rates of mutation or sterilization. That is an evolutionary spurt not necessarily a catastrophe .
The Sun will burn out in a billion years but there's not much point in "prepping" for that either!

 

[Hook686]

If everybody ran to one side of the earth, would the speed the flip up, or slow it down ?

 

[EZLivin]

If everybody ran to one side of the earth, would the speed the flip up, or slow it down ?

We would want to be really really careful though because if it started tipping in a crazy way it might get knocked off orbit and hit the moon. Tipping a planet is a serious issue and something not to be messed around with.

 

[Ligito]

Yes, and the reason they call it weather is that it's weather, 'whether' we like it or not!
There was an interesting article that I read years back that studies have show that most mammals become sterile in a reversed pole environment.

I'm already sterile.

 

[Ligito]

And, the sky is falling, too?

 

[Mark W.]

Millions of Earth-like planets out there and we believe our backward, ignorant, brainwashed species is important somehow.

Well Burt it is to some of us!

 

[Ligito]

There are many star systems but there is only 1 Solar system.
Our sun is named Sol, hence the name Solar system.

 

[packman]

Our vanity and self-importance as a species is entertaining.

An expanding Universe with hundreds of billion of Galaxies all with hundreds of billions of solar systems.
Millions of Earth-like planets out there and we believe our backward, ignorant, brainwashed species is important somehow.

When it is our time to expire, whether it is slow or abrupt, no one will miss us. We simply are not that important.

Yoda the wise one, truth speak do you

 

[mjbskwim]

Our vanity and self-importance as a species is entertaining.

An expanding Universe with hundreds of billion of Galaxies all with hundreds of billions of solar systems.
Millions of Earth-like planets out there and we believe our backward, ignorant, brainwashed species is important somehow.

When it is our time to expire, whether it is slow or abrupt, no one will miss us. We simply are not that important.

Hahaha
I tell people this and they say "what about your grandson?"
Well,unfortunately he'll burn like the rest of us.
If it happens it happens,no one will know the difference.
And not another planet will shed tears

 

[whiskeybill]

Be careful here folks, the Progressives will come up with some sort of magnetic field tax, or a magnetic credit exchange... Or something.

Or worse yet, ban magnets!