Read & Seed 4: Third Quarter of Silent Snow

For this quarter of the book I read chapters 8-11, going from pages 127-190.

Main Topics

These chapters covered a lot of interesting topics. Such as the changing climate and contributors of the Arctic Islands and the sudden evolution of the islands. These chapters also went into detail the effects of these contaminants on the people living there. One chapter focused entirely on the effects on sex hormones and immune systems, but there was one topic that interested me more than any other. 

There was extensive research done on the Faroe Islands, in northern Denmark on the effects on babies by mercury from their mothers eating whale blubber while pregnant. The experiment covered hundreds of babies and consisted of each child coming into the lab once a year and have extensive tests performed on him/her, each year until they are well through adolesence. It went through the process for one 7 year old boy. Each year the testing goes for 8 hours straight. They put these children through eveyr test under the sun; physical tests, brain tests, cognitive tests, intelligence tests, memory tests, everything you can think of. I just remember thinking it seemed crazy to put these children through this once a year, even since the scientists claimed that the effects they were looking for minor compared to the effects of alcohol and tobacco on a fetus. They also said they would not be able to make any conclusions from one child, so they had to test hundreds.

Implications

There are a lot of topics in this book that our society should be mindful of.  Such as the iron testing I talked about earlier. Those results would be important to people all over the globe. Their are other high mercury contaminated areas, such as Lake Michigan and the other Great Lakes. It is also important to be aware of the minor global warming signs that are occuring in the Arctic. These can act as warning signs for the rest of the world.