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Ed Meyer's avatar

What a strange article in Vox. I read about 2/3 of it before I gave up.

I laughed out loud when I read their statement that "Nearly 40 percent of the country's seaside soil already has salt in it...". Actually, 100% of soil everywhere has salt in it. I understand you can't grow anything without it. (salt, not soil).

And, yes. Land that is routinely flooded by the sea will probably tend to contain higher concentrations of salt.

The oddest part to me, is their "Electrical conductivity value" chart with the four parts of the world dotted with red. Unless I missed it, this chart is neither explained or even mentioned anywhere else in the article. I made an assumption about what they are trying to say, but it would have been nicer if they had explained it themselves. But, then again, I guess leaving me free to make assumptions is the point.

I did notice, however, that while the focus of the article is on the "supercharged" and "unprecedented" salinization of the soil due to seawater intrusion, on the chart showing Australia, they placed some of their red spots smack in the middle of some of the driest land on the planet and which also happens to be many hundreds of miles from the nearest coastline.

I guess not only do they not listen to themselves, they can't read a map either.

I remember back in the early/mid 1960's my mother's constant guilting me into eating green beans "because there are starving children in Bangladesh". Once, I offered to help her box them up and take them to the post office. I didn't make that mistake a second time!

Flippin’ Jersey's avatar

Shockingly, Hawaiians, living on an island in the middle of the largest body of salt water on the Earth, somehow procreated. It’s a scientific mystery! Perhaps native Hawaiians were just made of sterner stuff…or learned not to drink salt water, either one.

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