Republican congressman explains sea-level rise: it's rocks falling into the sea

[crocoduck_hunter]

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/polit...L&ocid=U007DHP

A member of Congress has suggested that the White Cliffs of Dover tumbling into the English Channel was causing rising sea levels.

Related: Everglades under threat as Florida's mangroves face death by rising sea level

Republican Mo Brooks of Alabama pushed back at the notion that rising sea levels were the result of global warming in a hearing of the House Science, Space and Technology on Wednesday.

Instead, Brooks pointed to silt deposition as well as erosion as a cause of rising sea levels. Questioning scientist Phil Duffy of the Woods Hole Research Center, Brooks postulated that silt and mud washed by rivers into the ocean caused water levels to rise as it settled on the sea floor. “Now you have got less space in those oceans because the bottom is moving up,” he said.

And many people in his district are nodding their heads in agreement right now.

[GenYus234]

Some may be nodding in agreement but plenty others are slowly banging their head on their desks in frustration.

[WildaBeast]

Doesn't much of the stuff that erodes into the sea later get deposited on the shore elsewhere anyway? Isn't that how beaches form?

[crocoduck_hunter]

In part, yes.

[thorny locust]

Let's see. Rocks from cliffs can fall into the sea, but ice from glaciers can't.

I'm having a certain degree of trouble wrapping my head around that "logic".

[GenYus234]

Rocks sink to the bottom so the level goes up. Ice floats on the surface, so the level stays the same.

[thorny locust]

Ah. Ice in an above-freezing ocean doesn't melt. Gotcha.

[RichardM]

As one who went to grade school and high school in Alabama, there is a strong reason I now reside in a university town in New Mexico. And it is still bad enough that many of the faculty here still think the Republican tenets are good.

[crocoduck_hunter]

That's at a public university?

[Richard W]

Originally Posted by GenYus234

Rocks sink to the bottom so the level goes up. Ice floats on the surface, so the level stays the same.

It depends whether the ice was already floating or not...if it falls off a glacier (over land) into the sea then the level goes up whether it melts or not, because of the displacement caused by the volume of ice. If it was already floating then the level doesn't go up whether it melts or not... (disregarding expansion and factors like the ground rising once it's not under pressure from the ice).

I know you probably already know that and are making a joke, but it does seem to cause confusion and your sarcasm was subtle enough that people might take it at face value!

[RichardM]

Originally Posted by crocoduck_hunter

That's at a public university?

Yes. One of the business faculty even served in the Turnip administration.

[ChasFink]

If he's right about rocks, mud, and silt causing the rise, then we don't have a global warming crisis, we have an erosion crisis. Why isn't anyone doing something about this?

[crocoduck_hunter]

Because that makes it totally natural and therefore not something we have to concern ourselves with or do anything in response to.

You know, like how we treat earthquakes.

[Brad from Georgia]

Every time a fish pees....

[ganzfeld]

Also, the Ice Ages were caused by too many people leaving refrigerators open.

[kitap]

Originally Posted by ganzfeld

Also, the Ice Ages were caused by too many people leaving refrigerators open.

Don't be silly. The Earth is unchangeable. There was no Ice Age.