TIL of the continent "Zealandia", a large, mostly submerged continent in the Pacific Ocean which New Zealand is a part of.
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Zealandia - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zealandia?wprov=sfla1
Here's me hoping the next cataclysm drains the oceans by a few hundred feet so we can establish New Old Zealand 🇳🇿
That's in Frisia/whatever fake country controls it for now
If submerged land can be called continents, where's the line between what is and isn't a continent?
That Civilization 6 uses geological continents when the 'continent' key word is used where every other game in the series uses geographical continents for that key word still bugs me.
I think the reason Zealandia is called a "submerged continent" is because it is made of continental crust rather than oceanic crust.
But IMO the best geologic definition of continents is by tectonic plates, which mostly matches up with the cultural definitions of the continents.
For the major continents, we have these plates:
- North American
- South American
- Eurasian
- African
- Australian
- Antarctic
There are several smaller plates too, like the Caribbean, Indian, and Arabian plates. IMO, we should consider these independent continents.
There is also a dedicated Pacific plate. The ring of fire is the border of this plate.
New Zealand / Zealandia is on the ring of fire. Half on the Australian plate, half on the Pacific plate. You can actually see the border of the two plates when you look at the topographical map of Zealandia.
Oceanic crust is heavier, denser, and composed of different rocks than continental crust.
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The OP states it was part of Gondwana, maybe that's what makes it different.
If you click through to the microcontinent link that seems to support the idea of microcontinents being pieces broken off a bigger one. But with everything coming from Gondwana then that means all the existing ones are fragments, and the only reason other fragments aren't considered continents is size (e.g. Madigascar).
Zealandia seems to be the Pluto of continents. Too small to be a continent but much larger than the largest microcontinent.
Nope, they're all around you and me and everyone else. They just evolved into things that (usually) have wings. In terms of phylogeny, they're dinosaurs.
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Well, maybe in theory. NZ has many unique birds not found anywhere else, but they are generally threatened or endangered. If you want to see them in the wild, generally you have to go to a very specific location.
If I look outside, almost certainly all I'll see are European dinosaurs.
So maybe I should correct my statement to say they almost all died out.
That's a debate that transcends culture. Some cultures say there are seven, some say six, and yet others say five.
Seven is wrong no matter your definition of continent, unless you count New Zealand or "because racism."
Depending on your definition there are between four and nine continents, but the definition that includes Europe to make a total of seven necessitates India being its own continent without racism being the primary reason why Europe is a continent and India is not.
(Also if it transcended culture it wouldn't depend on culture for the answer)
(Also some people do say there are seven, because India is a continent with a land barrier and a tectonic plate and Europe is not)
And that's valid, if your definition is just continuous land masses. However, some definitions incorporate ideas of notable narrowings such as the African and Central American connections and continental plates, or even projected drift.
For example, some day the Americas and Africa/Eurasia will separate from continental drift. Some even argue the Americas already are separated thanks to the Panana Canal, humans just hurried the process along.
I originally saw the unriffed version and I still really like it. It sucks that Universal executives made them chop down the movie to shorter than the length of a TV episode (along with all the other stupid changes they forced). It makes it look like a much worse movie than it actually is. Not that it is a bad movie for MST3K, just that it was made unnecessarily much worse than it actually was, which was about what you could expect for "good" 1950s sci-fi.
Mannnnnn, I wanna live on a billion year old, largely submerged continent. Shit looks dope af. And they seemed to kind win at Pandemic. Great share, thanks!
Just give it a few years. The continent you are currently on will be largely submerged soon enough.
Lol 5,000 meter mountains submerged? The ocean is rising a few meters. Its bad for islands and costal cities.
There's no risk of whole continents getting submerged
80% of the US population is in the East. The high plateus of the US and the rockies are extremely sparsely populated
Oceania tends to refer to the region, including both Australia, New Zealand, Melanesia, Micronesia, and the many small island nations.
Sometimes, we are "collectivly" treated as a continent, despite being almost all island nations with no land boarders.
All this time we've been keeping our true power hidden.
Also, if you mention Zealandia in New Zealand, people will look at you blankly and say "The bird sanctuary?"
Just wait until you hear about how they discovered Doggerland once had people on it!
(That said, Doggerland wasn't a continent.)
During the early Holocene, the exposed land area of Doggerland stretched across the region between what is now the east coast of Great Britain, the Netherlands, the western coast of Germany and the Danish peninsula of Jutland.
So, it was a bit bigger.
Btw, UK and europe were all connected, until the big glacial seas from thawing ice broke loose.
My favourite map without NZ, was a map that included the southern island but not the northern island. So the country was unrecognisable.
