December 8th: Ice
Another persistent theme of the festive season is one of
snow and other cold-weather phenomenon (if you’re in the Northern hemisphere,
that is; conditions are different in the southern hemisphere
given the seasonal variations, but I’m not sure to what extent westernised
cultural norms overrule logic in this instance)
Every recognisable festive image or icon, be it a space-time
defying over-generous bearded fat
man, and indoor
fir tree, a sleepy
picturesque village or anything in a liquid-filled globe that you shake,
has to be covered in or at least be in close proximity to some snow. And what
is snow? It’s just ice with a lack of discipline.
People can be a bit hypocritical about ice and snow at
Christmas, though. They celebrate its image, even going so far as to get imitations
of it to decorate with, and they’ll espouse on the joys and merits of children playing in it.
But when ice and snow actually does show up, it gets nothing but complaints.
This is like name dropping a successful friend or family member to impress
other people and get things your own way, but if said person then shows up and
asks if they can say with you for a few days, all you do is whinge about the
inconvenience, like how you have to pay more for the heating bill and they use
up all your salt.
We all like to have a moan about the snow and ice if and
when we are confronted with it, that’s almost part of the tradition (of a UK
Christmas at least). But so is gift
giving and generosity, we’re told. And yes, ice is annoying; it bursts the
pipes, clogs up the traffic, occasionally causes us to fall over and break
something, and forces us to wear thick clothes which are impractical and
annoying for tasks requiring fine motor control. However, this list of gripes
does seem somewhat petty when you consider what ice provides in return; namely,
the existence of life on Earth.
Granted, there are probably some sulphur breathing
worms on undersea volcanic vents which would dispute this fact, if they
were capable of complex cognitive processes and cross-species interaction,
which is doubtful. But even they might be indebted to the icy goodness. Life as
we know it on Earth wouldn’t be possible without ice doing what it does, and I’m
not just referring to the Frozen
Planet life, as cool as it may be (pardon the pun).
As you may probably know, ice doesn’t behave like most other
solid substances. For one thing, it’s less dense than the liquid form of the
substance, water. Ice floats, which is nice. This means it forms a sort of protective, insulating
layer on bodies of water in very cold conditions, allowing liquid water to
persist beneath, rather than ice sinking and eventually causing the whole mass
of water to freeze solid.
As you probably know, liquid water is integral for life to
exist, providing an essential medium for pretty much all biological processes
to occur in, being known as a universal
solvent.
Unlike all the other chalcogens, H2O is
a liquid at room temperature. Oxygen, being a bit of a greedy molecule, tends
to hog all the electrons in this molecular state, giving it a net negative
charge, leaving the poor hydrogen atoms (or ‘protons’ if you prefer) all
exposed and naked in their positivity. This means water molecules are ‘polar’,
negative on one end, positive on the other, like a magnet, sort of (actually, how do
they work?). Essentially this means water molecules are drawn to each other
under typical environmental conditions, rendering it a liquid.
But when it’s cold enough, the hydrogen bonds that are so
rapidly formed and broken in liquid water become more ‘fixed’, as there’s less
energy to break them, feeble as they are. But hydrogen bonds are actually
longer than the polar bonds in liquid water, meaning the molecules are
further apart, meaning it’s less dense than the liquid.
It’s like getting a box of Lego for Christmas. When it’s
in a box, it’s closely packed but all ‘loose’, you can shake it about. When it’s
assembled into something, it’s a lot more rigid but also takes up a lot more
space. And it’s essentially stable, but takes a certain amount of energy before
it reverts to its ‘fluid’ state. With ice, it’s a significant introduction of
heat energy, with Lego it’s more of a misplaced foot and a lot of swearing.
Either way, the result is the same; rigid but fragile bonds are broken.
It’s a lot more complicated of course, but essentially it
goes like this: Ice floats à
Life exists.
Also, its inclusion makes everything look ‘Christmassy’, and
enhances the quality of various beverages, alcoholic or otherwise. It’s up to
you which is more important, but surely that’s enough to overlook a few burst
pipes or traffic jams during the festive season?
Twitter: @garwboy
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