The fact that this is apparently consensus and not a crackpot theory is the most amazing thing about it. The little kid in me is kind of wishing I had gone into geology...
Where would like half the earth's population move to, if things happened quick enough for you to experience the results of a new ice age? Like Half or Eurasia and North America would be covered in ice...
You are aware that "The Day After Tomorrow" was a fictional movie, right? It's a dramatisation set in the real world. Fantasy Mexico can do all manner of things.
I'm going off topic here, but I just want you to know that this is the first time in months, maybe years, I've read the word "literally" used both correctly and not pedantically* and I'm all shaken up by it.
*) (well aware that this comments fails my own criterium)
You may enjoy knowing that the singular of criteria is criterion (Greek, not Latin). A criterium is a bike race, from the same root: a κριτήριον is a decision, with the same nuance of meaning as English judg(e)ment.
Aren't the other seven continents the dominant land-mass on a separately defined tectonic plate? According to the article there's no agreed upon definition.
In general, it's pretty easy to reclassify almost anything if you're willing to promote a new definition.
No, not if you're counting Europe as a continent (which you are because you count seven). Europe's east boundary is political/cultural.
It's rather silly how this is SO ingrained that even an article about the definition of continents includes Europe without comment. Even the map it cites draws Europe in a unique way, as a distinct labeled area but also as a part of Eurasia. Zealandia makes infinitely more sense as a continent than Europe.
Also, I just found out that some textbooks in Europe teach that North and South America are the same continent. The irony.
which is kind of how we say it. Kiwis are "optimized" speakers, we don't like words that make our mouth do too much work, so we optimize by smoothing out big changes. In this case it's common to hear the 'd' almost completely gone. Nu Zeelun :)
It kind of looks, from that map, that is could also be classified or considered a part of the Australian continent, given the "continent" mostly falls within the Australian plate.
The edges of Australia and Zealandia continental crust approach to within 25 km across the Cato Trough (Fig. 2). The Cato Trough is 3600 m deep and floored by oceanic crust (Gaina et al., 1998; Exon et al., 2006). The Australian and Zealandian COBs [continent-ocean boundaries] here coincide with, and have been created by, the Cato Fracture Zone along which there has been ~150 km of dextral strike slip movement, linking Paleogene spreading centers in the Tasman and Coral seas (Fig. 2; Gaina et al., 1998). This spatial and tectonic separation, along with intervening oceanic crust, means that the Zealandia continental crust is physically separate from that of Australia. If the Cato Trough did not exist, then the content of this paper would be describing the scientific advance that the Australian continent was 4.9 Mkm2 larger than previously thought.
I wonder whether geologically they are separate or was that trough created after the plate formed --that is is it a contiguous mass with an eroded trough or were these separate masses mashed together via tectonics?
See their Figure 5 [1] where they hypothesize how Zealandia was formed from the breakup of Gondwana, before which it did in fact lie adjacent to what later became a separate 'Australia' continent. Some of the definitions are complicated by the fact that continents join and break up, and their continuity across multiple continental cycles is not a given -- but that of cratons is, which are sort of an inner core of really old rocks that managed to survive all sorts of tectonic abuse. Zealandia has yet to be shown to contain a craton, presence of which would probably result in its undisputed acceptance as a continent. All of today's "classical" continents are amalgamations of contiguous continental crust around one or more neighboring cratons. See the 'Geology' section for discussion.
India is a former continent underlain by its own craton and its own tectonic plate that has collided with the much larger Eurasian plate in the epic Himalayan orogeny [1]. Eurasia is a multi-plate continent that forms a continuous expanse of continental crust that has geologically interacted with parts of itself for millions of years.
On the other hand, Zealandia is a continent which broke away from Gondwana (much like India did) and has since stood independently apart, not accreting to any other continent.
Geologists trying to gain relevance by toying with definitions. Not unlike, and even less significant than, the astronomical reclassification of Pluto as a dwarf-planet. Sign of the times I suppose.
Poor Zealandia is always under-appreciated.
http://worldmapswithout.nz/