Earth Magnetic Reversal Speed

Some self-proclaimed experts have written books and magazine articles, and have been on radio talk shows, alarming science-illiterates about cataclysmic events in the very near future as earth's magnetic field snaps to the opposite polarity. There is evidence that earth's magnetic field may have started to reverse, but no scientific basis to declare with reasonable certainty that it has. Furthermore, there is little or no historical evidence or theoretical basis to think reversals occur almost instantly as these self-proclaimed experts would have us believe. Past reversals have occurred very quickly on a 150 million year geological time-scale, but not on the time-scale of human life. Accurate computer modeling of the process is not possible with the capabilities of existing computers, but crude modeling suggests that reversals may take 6000 or so years. ©2005 Tigertek, Inc. All rights reserved.

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