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There are a lot of mysterious things about Earth’s icy continent, Antarctica. Like, why aren’t there any polar bears? In this episode of Misconceptions, host Justin Dodd takes a look at a few more misconceptions about Antarctica, from its alleged populations of bears to its current ownership. Grab your coats, subscribe to Mental Floss on YouTube for new videos every week, and let’s dive in. Don't miss a video! Subscribe NOW: https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss?sub_confirmation=1 About Mental Floss: Mental Floss is where curious people come for trivia-tastic information. Mental Floss produces lists of fun facts, debunks common misconceptions, and tells untold stories from history, science, culture and more. Website: http://www.mentalfloss.com Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/mental_floss Facebook: https://facebook.com/mentalflossmagazine Discord: https://discord.io/mentalfloss Copyright Notice: This video and YouTube channel contain dialog, music, and images that are property of Mental Floss. You are authorized to share the video link and channel, and embed this video in your website or others as long as a link back to this YouTube Channel is provided. 2025 Mental Floss Misconceptions About Antarctica | Mental Floss https://www.youtube.com/@MentalFloss
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Back in the 4th century BCE, Aristotle suggested that Earth had to be balanced. The landmass in
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the northern hemisphere from the Arctic to the tropics must be counterweighted by a similar
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landmass as yet undiscovered in the southern hemisphere. Mapmakers in the following centuries
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drew this hypothetical land extending from the South Pole all the way to the equator
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The concept stuck around for more than a millennia. It wasn't until the 18th century
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as explorers started really looking for it in earnest that people realized there was no such
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supercontinent. And not until the 19th century was Antarctica's existence confirmed. Hi, I'm
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Justin Dodd, and today we're going to take a look at a few more misconceptions about Antarctica
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from its alleged populations of bears to its current ownership. Let's get started
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Polar bears live in Antarctica. This is an easy one. Wild polar bears live only in the northern
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hemisphere. In fact, the species has never gotten anywhere near Antarctica. Polar bears broke off
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from brown bears a long time ago, anywhere from 350,000 to 5 million years ago, and began to adapt
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to colder habitats. They developed translucent fur to camouflage themselves against ice
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and probably helped keep them warm, though the exact mechanism is still up in the air
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and adapted to a heavily marine mammal-based diet, eventually turning into polar bears
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Since their emergence, polar bears have continued to occupy their niche in the northernmost latitudes, while brown bears remain the dominant species in temperate regions
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to the south. You might be thinking, okay, but could polar bears live in Antarctica? According
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According to Polar Bear International, the animals might be able to survive for a while
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but moving them there would create enormous problems. For example, the bears could introduce
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diseases to Antarctica's wildlife or vice versa, and the continent's penguins would
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be no match for the big predators It possible that the bears would face the same diminishing sea ice as they have in the Arctic which impedes their ability to hunt seals And it would probably be illegal under U and international laws Because Antarctica has no polar bears
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penguins lost the ability to fly. Most birds escape from predators by flying away. So it would
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seem to make sense that because there are no big land-based predators in Antarctica
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America, penguins didn't need to fly to avoid becoming dinner and eventually lost that
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ability altogether. That may not be the case, though. A 2013 study showed that penguins' physical modifications for swimming underwater are
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the main factors in their inability to fly. Penguins are superbly adapted for life in one of Earth's least habitable places
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They evolve strong pectoral muscles and stiff, flipper-like wings that allow them to zip
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through the sea. anatomical features help them to chase after sea animals and evade predators like leopard seals
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and orcas. Their heavier bones are less buoyant than those of other seabirds and allow them to
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dive to the seabed for shellfish. Penguins also have thick layers of blubber that protect them
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from freezing temperatures on land and in the ocean, but make them too heavy for liftoff
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Strangely enough, penguins' lack of flight wasn't prompted by a lack of predators
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but by adaptations to make the penguins themselves better predators. It snows a lot. Antarctica is covered in ice and snow, but you may be surprised to learn
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it's classified as a polar desert. It's actually the driest continent on Earth
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Overall, Antarctica gets about 150 millimeters of liquid precipitation in the forms of rain
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snow, and ice crystals per year. The coasts are warmer and wetter with over 200 millimeters of
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precipitation a year compared to the elevated plateau in the center of the continent
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which annually can receive less than 50 millimeters or two inches. That's about the same as Death
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Valley in California and the driest parts of the Australian outback but it less than the four inches that fall in the Arabian desert So how is Antarctica so icy The snow that does fall rarely melts completely Over millennia snow on the ground compacts under
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the weight of newer snow. The pressure squeezes out air trapped in the snow layers, transforming
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them into super dense blue-toned ice. About 98% of Antarctica is blanketed by a colossal sheet
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of this ice. But because so little snow falls and global temperatures are warming
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the Antarctic ice sheet's mass is decreasing. According to NASA, Antarctica lost about 150
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billion metric tons of ice each year over the past two decades
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Various Countries Own Antarctica The short explanation? No countries actually own Antarctica. The longer explanation is
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going to get a lot more complicated. Let's go back to the first discoveries of the continent
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Some scholars suggest that Maori oral histories describe Polynesian sailors encountering a
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foggy, misty, and dark place not seen by the sun, interpreted as Antarctica, several centuries before
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European explorers even got close. However, a number of Maori and other historians dispute
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the theory that Polynesian voyagers reached the icy realm. Of the European navigators
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Captain James Cook in HMS Resolution was the first to cross the Antarctic Circle in 1773
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but pack ice prevented him from sighting the continent. Nearly 50 years later, explorers
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started to poke around the area, and there are a few candidates for the first to see Antarctica
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around 1820. The first people to set foot on Antarctica as early as 1821 were probably American
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seal hunters. Those visitors laid the foundation for the heroic age of Antarctic exploration
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a period beginning with a Belgian expedition in 1898, followed by visitors from Great Britain
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France, Germany, Japan, Sweden, Norway, and Australia through the early 1920s. Each of
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these nations managed to chart more of the coast, map the interior, and conduct scientific
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experiments while staying mostly alive and well Some also stuck a flag into the ice and claimed the land for their country By the 1950s seven nations held territorial claims over the parts of Antarctica it had explored
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These countries were Argentina, Australia, Chile, France, New Zealand, Norway, and the UK
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Another five countries, including the US and the Soviet Union, had explored the continent but made no claim to any territory
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Some of these claimed lands overlapped, and as you might expect, things got heated when one overstepped the boundaries of another
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Then, from 1957 to 1958, all 12 of these countries participated in a global scientific initiative called the International Geophysical Year
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As part of the proceedings, they agreed to refrain from interfering in each other's scientific activities in Antarctica so research could continue without any political interruptions
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It worked out so well that negotiations to make the agreement official took place in 1959 in Washington, D.C
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The Twelve Nations put their agreements into writing in the Antarctic Treaty
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which declared that current and future scientific research should be conducted in peace
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The treaty prohibited all military activities, including nuclear detonations and nuclear waste
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disposal on the continent, and stated that no country can make a claim of territorial sovereignty
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while the treaty is in force. But it also didn't negate the claims made prior to the treaty
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The claims are still technically in existence, but cannot be enforced. and most countries, including the U.S., don't even officially recognize them. To date, 58 countries
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have signed onto the Antarctic Treaty, one of the most successful and productive international
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agreements ever made. A few additional treaties have been enacted to protect Antarctica's
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environment and wildlife, and several nations operate scientific research bases there. But none
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owns the land underneath them. That's it for this episode of Misconceptions. Make sure to subscribe
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to Mental Floss to catch all new episodes of this show, including an upcoming episode
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about the Arctic, which there's another misconception for you that I may or may not
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have understood. Antarctica in the Arctic, definitely different things. Thanks for watching, and I'll see you next time
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