Spyke
lemmy.world

I just realized there is an entire continent where there are no trees, and thus no sticks.

And it isnt a small continent either. it is larger than all of Europe and also larger than Australia. We arent talking about an island or archipelago or even some random landlocked desert. It is a continent.

the fact that there are no sticks that naturally occur there at all... it confuses and concerns me.

This is deeply unsettling to me.

84
esareply
discuss.tchncs.de

Coastal Norway is also pretty warm in this sense, but there aren't any trees far north. I suspect there's more than just warmth they want

4
Podunkreply
lemmy.world

So i did a little research. The sad/fun part about my realization is... if you go back far enough in time, before the ice and nothingness, archeologists have pointed out that Antarctica was once a massive forest continent.

Millions of years ago, it had trees, and thus, sticks for days and days.

Once again we are living in the wrong time. Too late to explore all continents having sticks. But also too early to live where all continents have sticks. In the grand scheme of things, we exist in the uneven ground.

It's a sad equilibrium to be sure.

24

There's also stuff we're pretty sure first evolved there. Because it used to connect south America to Australia

2
Affidavitreply
lemm.ee

also larger than Australia

Not all that well-known, but Australia claims about 42% of Antarctica as part of it's territory.

12

Maybe but usually when people talk about Australia in this context they mean the continent, not the country.

1

It makes sense why there are no sticks. But I agree, the thought of a lack of sticks seems to be unsettling, not a lack of trees or bushes.

Are we that naturally attracted to sticks because of primate evolution? I wonder if the earliest human ancestors developed this awareness of sticks as it is a primitive tool used to survive.

5
lemmy.ca

This is likely an extremely powerful weapon that can only be used once before it breaks so save it for the last boss.

78
ouRKaoSreply
lemmy.today

Fuck, I beat the last boss and I forgot this was in my inventory...

31
Hawkreply
lemmy.dbzer0.com

I'd say an icicle defines as a stick. A stick does not need to be wooden (like a stick of dynamite).

7

the “stick of dynamite” argument really gums up the works here. i reckon it’s under the larger stick-umbrella, but still doesn’t meet the criteria of JUST “a stick”. think like, a capital-S-stick in the same way christians refer to capital-G-god.

an icicle is the “other minor deity” of sticks.

2

Can you poke things with it? Can you swish it around and pretend it's a sword? Does it bring joy to your heart? Then it's a stick.

21
feddit.uk

Nope. Ignore the pandering milquetoasts.

A stick is a stick. This is not one. Do we have no standards?

19
rbn
sopuli.xyz

Is there no flotsam from elsewhere washed ashore in Antartica?

But independent of that, I think that's an awesome ice stick!

18

I just learned that flotsam (and jetsam and lagan) are specific terms with specific meanings.

IDK if sticks that fall out of trees really belong to any, I think maybe that would just be floating debris.

Something man made has to be either flotsam (from a sunken wreck) or jetsam (intentionally discarded) but a stick that fell from a tree is neither of those.

2
superkretreply
feddit.org

You can't bring anything that could carry non-native lifeforms on it, to preserve Antarctica's unique Flora and Fauna from invasive species.

37
Arghblargreply
lemmy.ca

What, not even our nice Norwegian shape-shifting assimilating microbesdogs?

EDIT: I am sad lemmy doesn't appear to support strikethrough.

14

Doesn't work for me? Vivaldi (Chrome-based browser, desktop) using old.lemmy.ca

Oh... ha, I browse using the 'mlmym.org' theme. Using www.lemmy.ca I see it works. Must be a bug in the theme. I'll see who I can report to, for a fix. Thanks.

5
Anticorpreply
lemmy.world

Wouldn't anything that didn't evolve to deal with Antarctica's brutal climate just immediately die?

3
Danquebecreply
sh.itjust.works

With the number of species that live on a stick, you could get unlucky and transport one which would randomly happen to have traits good for thriving in Antartica.

1
lemmy.world

I agree, but don’t humans carry the even more microbial live than sticks? And what about birds and seals? I am guessing there is quite a lot of exchange of microbes between Antarctica and the other continents.

2

Yea, you're right, and I don't have any counter point. I don't know what the experts think about this.

1

Bread sticks
Stick of butter
Stick of dynamite
Carrot sticks
Stick shift

I feel like there's enough precedent to allow the Ice stick, given the circumstances

10

Disagree. In each of the cases you've cited the term "stick" describes the form of the subject, and no better term exists.

If small shafts of carrot were commonly called carroticles, then you couldn't call one a carrot stick.

Clearly the object pictured in this post is an icicle. It is not an ice stick.

4

"...there are no sticks here. Nothing grows..." so far...

[...] we demonstrate a clear but nonlinear trend towards a greater area of vegetation cover across the [Antarctic Peninsula] in recent decades [...] Crucially, the rate of change in vegetation cover has increased considerably in recent years

[...]

Regardless of the complexities discussed in the preceding, the overall statistically significant trajectory of APwide greening from 1986 to 2021 [...] provides strong evidence of rapid and ongoing response of AP vegetation to climate change, and presents a compelling case for future widespread changes in the AP’s terrestrial ecosystems.

8

This is why there are 12 types of Christianity. No it's not a stick and I will crusade against anybody who claims it is.

8

.... I'm just going to be technical and point out that it's currently summer in Antarctica .....

7

...that's not a poke!

Seriously - this doesn't count as a stick - this is a close approximation of a stick in that it has many similar properties but it is far from it. Watch how in a few hours it dissolves on the ground (or inside?).

However it does beautifully capture the novelty-based appreciation of sticks. There's something to this, for sure...

0

You bet you're cold white pasty ass it counts. Now go spear a narwhal or do something cool with it!

6

You can melt and solidify metal but that is considered a rod, not a stick

You can melt and solidify water

That is a rod of ice

6
gnureply
lemmy.zip

I would assume biosecurity concerns

6
midwest.social

That doesn't make sense, if that were the case it wouldn't be relevant anymore as humans simply walking on the continent would introduce incredible amounts of bacterias and viruses.

Even with the sterile processing of Moon and Mars rovers have observed this. It's impossible to prevent, only reduce.

2
gnureply
lemmy.zip

It’s impossible to prevent, only reduce.

And that's what such efforts aim to do. You can't prevent everything but you can definitely cut down on what is potentially being introduced. This is particularly true when a place is as geographically isolated as Antarctica. For a relevant example I know that if you were to bring a raw stick into Australia it'd be confiscated (or required to be pest treated at your cost) due to biosecurity concerns, and we get literally millions of people visiting per year so that's a significantly harder containment job than Antarctica would present. Even within Australia there are biosecurity controls disallowing movement of stuff like fruit and grape vines between some of our states/regions.

I would be surprised if biosecurity controls for our parts of Antarctica were not even stricter, given that it is a largely untouched landscape and reducing impact on it is considered worthwhile to do these days (not so much in the early days of the Antarctic program, but we try to do better now).

2

Huh, I'm interested in looking into this. I'm just curious on the fact that a stick is "wood", which I imagine parts of the structures are also constructed out of wood. There must be some hella crazy multiple-inspections through a construction process especially if it's fabricated overseas. There's going to be wood and contaminates all through the insulation layers but if it's that strict then there has to be procedures in place.

2

Actually hearing that a country would go to that length makes a lot of this more understandable.

I mean, shit, the Asian Carp in America has destroyed so much natural habitat as a fish, and microbials can cause huge amounts of damage if they are invasive and much more difficult to figure out their source, and harder to stop once it spreads.

2