If you remember I asked: "what makes Australia a continent, Greenland an
island? What is cutoff for island size?" Well, I talked with a Geology
professor today and he said it had nothing to do with the geology of
Greenland or Australia. He wondered if it was an arbitrary designation used
in Geography, but wasn't sure. He also mentioned Asia, which is on the same
land mass as Europe used to be considered a seperate continent, but is often
called eurasia now. Also, Antartica is surrounded by water (ice) but isn't
an island.
Gregg
Ron answered:
> >Que? How long is a piece of string? For all my life, including school,
> >Australia has been called Island or Continent. I dont think there is any
> >specific limit, if bigger than Australia = continent, smaller and
> surrounded
> >by water = Island; Greenland is about 1/3 the size of Australia.
> >Australia is both smallest continent and biggest Island!
Wiliam contributed:
> AFAIK an island is called a continent whe it is so big that it does have a
> distincive land climate. This is very true with Australia.
John H added:
>> ......should be Australasia which includes New Zealand. Australia on its
own is not a continent.
Sean then wrote:
>>>From what I remember, when I was a kid Australia was an island and a
continent. Admittedly I didn't learn much about New Zealand and never
thought to ask which continent it belonged to.
>>However I've been hearing the term "Australasia" a lot more in the past
15-20 years - initially from a political perspective (i.e. in newspapers),
then in commercial businesses (e.g. international business' address
categories).
Foxy thought:
>> Australia on it's own is a continent. Australasia is generally Australia,
New Zealand PNG and some other countries. A country does not have to be in a
continent.
While Lex suggested:
>> Island: typified by insular attitude of inhabitants who exhibit a single
cohesive identifying behavior. (Examples: rednecks, hillbillies, yankees,
hareleggers, sodbusters.)
>> Continent: contains two or more such groups of inhabitants.
< This message was delivered via the Olympus Mailing List >
< For questions, mailto:owner-olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx >
< Web Page: http://Zuiko.sls.bc.ca/swright/olympuslist.html >
|