Sarah Goodell
Mr. Ippolito
Core Bio: Current Event #3
13 February, 2017
Chang, Kenneth. "Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields."New York
Times 14 Feb. 2017: n. pag. Print.
A recent article by Kenneth Chang from the New York Times, titled “Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields,” describes how jars from the ancient civilization of Judah dating between the eighth and second centuries can give clues into how the Earth’s magnetic field has fluctuated in the past and what that can tell us about our future on Earth. As the author writes, “Volcanic rocks record the strength and direction of the magnetic field as they cool and harden.” Because scientists are unable to date volcanic rocks precisely, these ancient jars are used to record “Earth’s magnetic field when they are fired in kilns and then cooled.” At the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, California, scientists took small chips from the ancient jars, then heated and cooled them “in a magnetic field to deduce the strength of the field when the jars were first made.” In the oldest jars, from the late-eighth century, scientists discovered that the magnetic field at that time was very strong, confirming prior theories. However, that spike of field strength has dissipated and declined by a third in under 30 years.
This article allows insight into how scientists are investigating Earth’s magnetic field in depth and how it is still impossible for us to fully understand that field. Although we are gaining more information and performing new experiments everyday, we have not been able to fully explain our shifting magnetic field because we lack sufficient historical evidence to prove our theories. These new findings will promote new experiments that can explore the decline in the magnetism of our field. Although scientists have discovered a spike in Earth’s magnetism, “Geophysicists...are [still] unable to explain how such a large spike, even one limited to that region [Judah], could have occurred and disappeared so quickly.” These experiments and findings also question our understanding of the Earth’s interior. As Dr. Livermore, a professor at the University of Leeds in England, said, ‘“It’s simply very difficult to explain...On the flip side, if the spikes really do exist, then they have major implications for how we understand the Earth’s interior.’” Dr. Livermore has also tried to perform experiments replicating the Earth’s interior, focusing on conditions where the core would create such a significant spike as the one that occurred on Earth, however, the majority of these experiments have failed.
The author of this article, Kenneth Chang, has displayed both his strengths and weaknesses in writing this article. Chang did a great job using credible sources that were quoted directly from the most essential experiments regarding this topic. This includes professor Dr. Philip Livermore and archaeologist Dr. Erez Ben-Yosef. Although this is a difficult topic to discuss and write about, Chang described the magnetic field, its process, and how these jars have influenced our previous theories very well. However, Chang was not able to provide sufficient information about where these scientists will go from here. He could have addressed the fact that other artwork or ancient household items can provide similar information from other time periods. Also, Chang could have included a description of the magnetic field to help create a better understanding for his readers. By doing so, Chang would have allowed for a better set-up for the rest of his article. This background foundation would have made it easier for his readers to fully understand Earth’s magnetism. Overall, Chang did a great job writing this article, proving this topic to be very informative and leaving me with many questions about our future regarding the changes in Earth’s magnetic field. 
Catherine Faville
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
Core H Biology
My classmate Sarah Goodell did a review on the article “Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields,” from the new york times. I liked how Sarah described in detail the reasoning as to how scientist can figure out the change in the Earth's magnetic field, she describes the process on how the use these jars to reveal the lines that indicate the strength and direction of the magnetic field. She also was able to pull together numerous quotes from scientist backing up her analisis, making the reading more interesting and easy to read.
However it would have been nice if she pulled together some outside perspectives on this matter, maybe to get an opposing view to make a better case on how these jars may be able to determine the future of the Earth's magnetic field. Also to add a little more knowledge on why exactly scientist are still perplexed on the field itself, as to why we don't know a lot about it, even with new information on it.
Something that surprised me was that I was unaware that volcanic rocks were able to show scientist the direction and strength of the magnetic field from previous years, I found it interesting because as we were in Earth science beforehand we did not learn too much on the magnetic field, so it was nice to add on to old information.
Marina Alfano
ReplyDeleteMr.Ippolito
2/16/17
Current Event #3
Chang, Kenneth. "Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields."New York
Times 14 Feb. 2017: n. pag. Print.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/14/science/magnetic-field-earth-jars.html
This week, my classmate Sarah Goodell wrote a review on an article from the New York Times about how jars from the ancient civilization of Judah can give us clues into how Earth's magnetic field has changed over time and what might happen in the future. One thing I think was really well thought out was when she put quotes from the article so that the reader could easily understand what the author tried to say instead of her trying to paraphrase it and confusing the reader. I also like that sarah included how this connects to all scientists studying the magnetic field and that we still can’t fully understand it so that she is telling the reader that this is one of the things we need to discover more about. Lastly, I enjoyed that she explained what scientists previously thought about the magnetic field and what they thought after the jars were discovered and tested on.
Although her review was well written, she had a few flaws that I think she could have fixed to make the reader more knowledgeable. First, when she says that this finding will give us insight into the earth's interior yet she never explains what it might reveal about the interior. Also she says, that these findings will promote new experiments but she doesn’t elaborate on what new experiments it will promote. I think it would have been nice to know what new experiments will be done after discovering these jars.
This article review was very interesting to me because I remember in earth science learning about the magnetic field and it seemed interesting to me. I didn’t know much about it and I was interested in learning more. I thought it was interesting that if the spikes do exist then they have major implications on how we perceive the Earth's interior which I had previously thought was already studied and that scientists had come to conclusions about Earth's core. I will definitely read into more experiments done on these jars and keep myself up to date with these new findings because personally I find them very interesting.
Andrew Howson
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
Core Biology Honors
2/16/17
Chang, Kenneth. "Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields."New York
Times 14 Feb. 2017: n. pag. Print.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/14/science/magnetic-field-earth-jars.html
Sarah Goodell reviewed the article “Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields” by Kenneth Chang. She explained in-depth details that I found very interesting and implemented quotes very well. I found her criticism to be very well done.
There were, however, a couple of minor flaws with her review, the first of which being that she did not explain the implications of the fluctuations in earth’s magnetic field. The second flaw was that she did not explain the way in which the jars were able to record the evidence of magnetic fluctuations.
This article was very interesting, as I did not know that it was possible to learn about the earth’s magnetic fields from ceramic materials.
My fellow classmate Sarah Goodell wrote an extremely insightful and great review on, “Ancient Jars Hold the Clue to Earth’s Fluctuating magnetic fields.” This is an article from the New York Times about how jars from the ancient civilization of Judah can give us clues into how Earth's magnetic field has changed over time and what might happen in the future based on the historic events. One thing I think was really well thought out was when she put quotes from the article so that the reader could easily understand what the author tried to say instead of her trying to paraphrase it. The use of these quotes helped me in that I didn’t have to go back to the article and scour the article for the parts that she was referring too. I also like Sarah includes how the topic of the ancient jugs connects to all scientists studying the magnetic field and that we still can’t fully understand it. This tell us the readers about what scientists still need to figure out. Lastly, I enjoyed that she explained what scientists previously thought about the magnetic field and what they thought after the jars were discovered and tested on. The explanation of their findings helped me understand the results more clearly. Another thing that I found as a great addition to a great review was the explanation of the effect of the experiment and how it affects all subsequent experiments on the topic. Furthermore, she did an excellent job with her review.
ReplyDeleteWhile Sarah’s review was very good, there were a couple things that needed to be said. For one, the article talked about the how exactly the jugs determined the information about the poles and how it could be imprecise. It is important to note that the information could be imprecise because it could alter data. Also there was a professor that did a lot of work on explaining the importance of the future based off the data that they received. His contribution to the piece was important and should have been mentioned.
One thing that I absolutely found amazing from this article was basically the article in its entirety. It actually boggles my mind that after many many years of research even with the help of modern technology we have found these ancient jugs that predicted the pole reversals and recorded them. If the civilization that created these jugs were so advanced then it makes you wonder what else they have that could benefit us.
Chang, Kenneth. "Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields."New York
Times 14 Feb. 2017: n. pag. Print.
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/14/science/magnetic-field-earth-jars.html
Catie Burnell
ReplyDeleteMr. Ippolito
Core Biology Honors
March 23, 2017
Chang, Kenneth. "Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields." The New York Times. The New York Times, 14 Feb. 2017. Web. 20 Mar. 2017. .
My classmate Sarah Goodell wrote a great review on the article “Ancient Jars Hold Clues About Earth’s Fluctuating Magnetic Fields” by the New York Times’ Kenneth Chang. The article, written in February of this year, details how jar handles that had recently been excavated from the ancient city of Judah gave scientists insight into how the Earth’s magnetic field rose and fell during the Iron Age. Sarah did an excellent job of incorporating quotes in her review, which proved the claims made in her review and made her claims more credible. I also enjoyed how Sarah discussed the author’s strengths and weaknesses in writing this article, showing she carefully read and analyzed the article. Additionally, Sarah did a great job explaining the relevance of the article to modern science, particularly considering that not much is known about the field of magnetism.
However, although Sarah overall had an exemplar piece of work, there are still some things she could improve upon. For example, I think it would have been great if Sarah had included some more background into what the Earth’s magnetic field is and why it is important as it is not fully explained in the article or her review. Similarly, I think it would have been beneficial for Sarah to include some quotes or information from other sources that would support her claims and the claims made by Chang in his article. Overall, though, Sarah wrote a very comprehensive review.
This article stood out to me because I normally do not consider archaeology and Earth science to go hand-in-hand, as was shown in Chang’s writing. I found it fascinating that an item as simple as a jar can give scientists information about subjects as complex as the Earth’s magnetic field.