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[Phys-L] Re: Fwd: NASA Satellites Measure And Monitor Sea Level



At 06:00 AM 7/8/2005, Aaron Titus wrote:
I'm forwarded a news article from JPL regarding the measurement of
sea level. I have two questions:

(1) How is sea level defined? For instance, this may come as a shock
to you, I don't know, but sea level on the Atlantic side of the
Panama Canal is at a different elevation than sea level on the
Pacific side.

(2) It seems that the article quotes one source as saying that half
of the measured rise in sea level is due to thermal expansion of the
oceans. Another source says that over half of the rise in sea level
is due to melting glaciers. Is this a contradiction or am I missing
something?

Aaron


What a wonderful opportunity for list subscribers to taste the
pleasure of dialog style learning - if they will resist the opportunity
to consult the many web sources of opinion.
Let me set the ball in motion.

1)
If I were seeing a world of new creation, I might consider several
ways of defining a 'sea level'.
The mark which is half way between the long term average of high tide
positions and the long term average position of low tides.
OR
The long term average of the position which evenly divides the
area of sea levels above this mark with time and the area of sea levels
below this mark with time.

I would soon understand that sea dynamics promotes different sea levels
of even connected bodies of water, however defined for both bodies,
I expect.

2)
If I were faced with a water cylinder of constant diameter,
I might want to draw conclusions linking the water height and its temperature.
Perhaps I would start with an equation of the form
h(t) = h(277) + (t - 277)/273 *h
for a height at water temp (K) given a height at temp 277K

Then I would start considering the inflexion in density for water around 4degC
and improve the estimator.....



Brian Whatcott Altus OK Eureka!
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