79 comments

  • HocusLocus 7 hours ago ago

    "Fisher Hallur Antoniussen took a photo of it to show crewmates, but it quickly took off after being posted on social media."

    I don't blame it, I would have done the same.

  • tickerticker 21 hours ago ago

    The exposed portion of the berg is roughly spherical. The submerged portion must be enormous and approximately symmetrical to hold that sphere in such an upright position.

    • Frummy 20 hours ago ago

      So the tip of the iceberg is just the tip of the iceberg

      • lucyjojo 17 hours ago ago

        Indeed, that tautology is a true statement.

    • Retric 18 hours ago ago

      With just one photo we can’t really say if the exposed portion is roughly spherical. However, the guy taking the photo who presumably got a better look seems to think it was “diamond shape.”

      • 15 hours ago ago
        [deleted]
  • tantalor a day ago ago

    Check around it for Super Samples!

    • jvanderbot 17 hours ago ago

      I wish I didn't think this immediately as well.

      • creaturemachine 16 hours ago ago

        Wait until the Democracy Officer hears of this lack of faith!

  • bee_rider a day ago ago

    Do black Labrador icebergs also have webbed feet, to swim better?

    • bregma a day ago ago

      No, but golden Labrador icebergs are the friendliest of all the icebergs and can make a great addition to any family.

      • burnt-resistor 15 hours ago ago

        The vet bills and cleaning up after them is really ridiculous.

  • scoot 21 hours ago ago

    Is this just of passing interest, or something that "ists" (scientists, geologists, climatologists etc.) would gain potentially valuable data by taking samples from it?

    • 14 hours ago ago
      [deleted]
  • morkalork a day ago ago

    Will the icebergs broken off get older and older?

    • cess11 21 hours ago ago

      As long as we keep pushing CO2 into the atmosphere and don't run out of ice, yeah, most likely.

  • IncreasePosts 20 hours ago ago

    Wouldn't this melt "quickly" due to solar radiation based on how dark it is? That is to say, I wouldn't it most likely be closer to 100 years old than 100,000 years old?

    • burnt-resistor 15 hours ago ago

      That's for new soot depositing on ordinary, existing glaciers with previously high albedo. That causes a spiraling feedback effect of more forest fires and accelerating glacier melt,

      It's probable that these dark glaciers are mostly sludge with only a bit of ice. We won't know until some field researchers go out there and gather data and samples.

    • malfist 20 hours ago ago

      I'm sure you know more about iceburg ages than the professor of oceanography that dated it.

      • dotancohen 19 hours ago ago

        To be fair, the guy who just dated it likey knows the least about it. It's the guy who broke up with it that knows the most.

      • IncreasePosts 15 hours ago ago

        I was literally asking about the range that the oceanographer provided. I didn't assert anything

    • marcusverus 2 hours ago ago

      This post--which actually engages with the content of the article--is being downvoted, while "Do black Labrador icebergs also have webbed feet, to swim better?" is being upvoted.

      Where do we run once the redditification of HN is complete?

  • dylan604 a day ago ago

    After reading, I'm less interested in a black iceberg as much as now wondering what a fish harvester is as it's not a term I've seen before. Have we changed the term to reflect the vast quantities of fish that fisherman is inadequate?

    • throwup238 20 hours ago ago

      It’s a local quirk of the Canadian fish industry more than anything. DFO uses the phrase in their fishery notices: https://www.nfl.dfo-mpo.gc.ca/en/node/2377

      The history page of the local union, they use the phrase “fish harvesters” rather interchangeably with “fishermen”: https://ffaw.ca/about-us/history/

    • serial_dev 21 hours ago ago

      It could be to make fishermen gender neutral, but I think it is to hide the fact that you are essentially killing the fish by the thousands, letting them suffocate. Fish harvesting sounds innocent and PG 13.

    • ahazred8ta a day ago ago

      There's a union or collective bargaining guild that has trademarked the term Professional Fish Harvester in Canada. #PFHCB

    • tanseydavid a day ago ago

      I am guessing that it is a translation artifact.

      • maxerickson 21 hours ago ago

        Seems to be in use in primarily English contexts.

        https://www.alaskasafetyalliance.org/explore-careers/maritim...

      • creaturemachine a day ago ago

        Newfoundland is predominantly English-speaking, so it's unlikely this reporter used anything else when preparing this story.

        • soperj 21 hours ago ago

          >Newfoundland is predominantly English-speaking

          That's quite generous of you to say.

          • margalabargala 20 hours ago ago

            For anyone wondering, over 98% of Newfoundland's population speaks only English.

            https://www.heritage.nf.ca/articles/society/language.php

            • dylan604 18 hours ago ago

              Yeah, Newfies speak English just like Scottish speak English. Those words might be English, but it's the phrasing that makes no sense.

              • Eavolution 9 hours ago ago

                Can confirm, I've only ever heard a chain of the word "woof" from a newfie.

              • mc3301 18 hours ago ago

                What're you at 'der b'y?

              • grovesNL 18 hours ago ago

                Yes b'y, Newfoundland English is best kind sure.

              • fooster 18 hours ago ago

                Newfoundlanders you mean.

                • brailsafe 18 hours ago ago

                  Fairly sure Newfie is broadly used as a colloquial term of endearment in the rest of Canada, by Newfoundlanders and non-Newfoundlanders. There's just too many syllables

                  • creaturemachine 17 hours ago ago

                    How about Newfoundland-and-Labradorean? It's funny that the only ones insulted by Newfie are the non-newfies.

                    • fooster 17 hours ago ago

                      I am a Newfoundlander and I don’t appreciate that term.

                  • fooster 17 hours ago ago

                    It is not. It is insulting and derogatory. Don’t use it thanks.

                    • brailsafe 7 hours ago ago

                      While that's not how it's ever been used in my life, I can accept that it's perfectly valid for you and presumably many others to feel differently.

                      Having grown up with so much predominantly east coast originating comedy, and around so many Newfoundland diaspora, I guess it never occurred to me that there was any real negative connotation whatsoever, beyond poking a bit of fun at some of the presumably antiquated cultural stereotypical differences via self-deprecating jokes that most people from smaller places have their own versions of and don't take too seriously.

            • tejtm 16 hours ago ago

              Curious that.

              The English did force the French population out of there and down the Mississippi to become Cajuns.

              And the children of the native Abenaki population were sent to English Schools.

                 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_of_the_Acadians
              
              
                 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canadian_Indian_residential_school_system
              • soperj 2 hours ago ago

                Acadians were in Nova Scotia. There were already a bunch of French in New Orleans/Louisiana. Hence "Louis"iana, new "Orleans", "De-troit" etc. It was all new France.

                And the residential schools happened well after the formation of Canada, and a lot of happened at the behest of the Catholic Church (ie: French Canadians). see Vital Grandin.

              • margalabargala 14 hours ago ago

                Well sure. Lots of shitty things were done that caused the current state of affairs to come into being.

                I was just describing the present day, not defending whatbwas done to create it.

    • HPsquared 19 hours ago ago

      It makes sense in the context of fish farming. Not sure if that's what this is, though. Harvesting doesn't sound appropriate for catching wild fish.

    • kkylin 21 hours ago ago

      Might one say fish harvesters capture "exponentially more fish"? (Sorry, couldn't resist...)

    • dan-robertson a day ago ago

      I think it might be a gender-neutral version of fisherman. Not something like a factory ship.

      • a day ago ago
        [deleted]
      • xeromal a day ago ago

        It's a horrible alternative lol

        • blipvert 20 hours ago ago

          Wait until you have to deal with the horror of gender specific icebergs!

          “It's not only that he is all black. He is almost ... in a diamond shape”

    • IncreasePosts 21 hours ago ago

      Fisherman: catches fish

      Fish harvester: might catch fish, but might also be the one that cleans/processes them and isn't actually involved in pulling the fish out of the water

    • NooneAtAll3 a day ago ago

      ohhh, I thought it was the boat

  • uzbit 19 hours ago ago

    [dead]

  • catlover76 a day ago ago

    [dead]

  • codeddesign 21 hours ago ago

    [flagged]

  • BurningFrog 20 hours ago ago

    [flagged]

    • 14 hours ago ago
      [deleted]
  • m3kw9 a day ago ago

    When are these going on sale in drinks?

  • tromp a day ago ago

    > He guesses the ice in the berg is at least 1,000 years old, but could also be exponentially more ancient — even formed as many as 100,000 years ago.

    That's not exponentially more (which would be a preposterous 2^1000 or 10^1000 years old). It's just 100 times more. Should I stop being annoyed at how media use the word and just accept their alternative meaning of "a lot" ?

    • Scarblac a day ago ago

      It's two numbers. It's a constant increase, you can fit a line between them, but also a degree 10 polynomial or an exponential curve.

      Yes, it just means "a lot".

      • burnt-resistor 15 hours ago ago

        High variance/confidence interval. Probably needs some C14 / O18 dating to narrow it down by field researchers gathering samples rather than us speculating from afar.

      • escapecharacter 21 hours ago ago

        I agree, you can also say exponential if there's 4 or more numbers.

    • jhrmnn a day ago ago

      This is how language develops, I’m afraid. But imagine that the age is 10^k where k is something like “age class”. Then indeed the age grows exponentially :)

      • serial_dev 21 hours ago ago

        It still doesn’t grow exponentially, it is just orders of magnitude older.

        Possibly, because if I read between the lines, their answer is “huh I dunno”.

        • parineum 21 hours ago ago

          Orders of magnitude is an exponential measure.

          1*10^n

          • serial_dev 9 hours ago ago

            Yes, but where is the growth? They just said that the age of iceberg is 1000 years or maybe older 100.000.

            There is no exponential growth there, just someone not having any clue about the iceberg wanting to sound knowledgeable about the subject.

          • WithinReason 10 hours ago ago

            so then every change can be called exponential

            • 5 hours ago ago
              [deleted]
            • serial_dev 9 hours ago ago

              > This chair is 4 years old. Or, maybe 5 years old.

              Yeah, exponential growth!!!

    • SAI_Peregrinus a day ago ago

      1.0116^10000 ≈ 100000

      Journalists tend to just think of it as "a lot more", but since they didn't specify the base of the exponential we can at least find a way to make the article technically correct. There are fun classes that admit incomparable values, such as the Surreal games. If they'd said "the game {1 | -1} is exponentially more than { | }" then it'd be impossible to find a base to make the statement true. There's lots of fun to be had with this sort of math, as you know.

    • mekoka a day ago ago

      If we want to express ourselves using exponents, consider that 1000 years (1×10^3) and 9000 years (9×10^3) would be of the same "degree" of ancestry, while 100,000 years (1×10^5) would be of completely different (exponential) significance.

    • Frummy 21 hours ago ago

      1000^(5/3)=100 000

    • ghssds a day ago ago

      1.01158^1000 ~= 100000

      Exponentially more!

    • readthenotes1 a day ago ago

      10^2 in exponential form...

      At least he didn't say logarithmically more

    • 867-5309 20 hours ago ago

      1000^1⅔=100000

    • fuzztester 21 hours ago ago

      it's not only the media.

      it's just a figure of speech, (used like some people (ab)use "literally"), which I am sure you know, considering your profile, or even otherwise.

      other people than the media use it too:

      e.g. this Rob Pike post about Go (the programming language, not the game you like):

      Less is exponentially more

      https://commandcenter.blogspot.com/2012/06/less-is-exponenti...

    • pestatije a day ago ago

      any exponential can reasonably be approximated to a linear in the right range

    • Drunkfoowl a day ago ago

      [dead]