What if ice didn't float?

Answer 1

Rum & coke wouldn't look the same.

Answer 2

One fact is true of almost every molecule ever made: As it gets colder, it contracts. And when it freezes from its liquid form, its greater density allows it to sink to the bottom of that liquid.

Water is an exception. As it cools below 39°F, something extraordinary happens: it expands rapidly. It expands even more as it finally freezes at 32°F. Because it is now less dense it is now less dense -not more dense- than the water around it, ice rises to the surface. Every cube of frozen water since the beginning of time has floated atop that refreshing drink.

When ponds and lakes freeze, the ice forms a protective layer that shelters the liquid water below. Protected from further cold and wind, that water is able to maintain a steady 39°F temperature, so further freezing is slowed down. The life-forms in the water are allowed to survive for another season.

What if ice didn't float? As the temperatures of earth's early ponds dropped below freezing, the top layer of ice would have sunk, allowing the next layer to freeze quickly and also sink. As the pond gradually froze solid, life would have had a hard time making it past the first winter.

If ice didn't 'float, George Wald said, there no longer would be any ponds at all (or lakes or any other bodies of water): as a frozen pond warmed up after that first winter, a thin layer of liquid water would have floated atop the ice. The top of this layer would then have vaporized (somewhat like dry ice) into the atmosphere and space, while the lower layer would have frozen and sunk thus, as the pond thawed, it eventually would have all vaporized and never been a pond again.

Answer 3

If ice didn't float then it would sink. If it didn't melt then all the oceans would freeze from the bottom up. Even Happy Feet would have never been around.

Answer 4

Life as we know it would not exist. The unique structure of water accounts for ice being lighter then liquid water. If that were to change then all of the other properties of water would also chance. Since life on earth is mostly water, it and us would not be here. This is one of those cases where a subtle change can have huge consequences. Every thing is connected, you can not change one thing without effecting many, many others.

Answer 5

Not an answer PER-SE but FYI, water [H2O]is the Only substance on this Earth that simultaneously exists in all three physical states ( Gas-Liquid-Solid) throughout the planet!

Answer 6

Then the sea level would be higher than it is now. And New York and all other coastal areas would be screwed. So please don't use your magic powers, O mighty not troll, to make ice denser than it's unforzen counterpart!

Answer 7

Can't until you prove that water SHRINKS when it freezes, like most other liquids do, and their ice DOES sink. The frozen form of fluids generally does sink in the same liquid.

Answer 8

At least we wouldn't have that particular problem with the titanic. We would have a million other problems with it, but not that particular one.

Answer 9

Penguins would bee in deep doggie doo !

Answer 10

lakes would freeze from the bottom up -- killing all life in them when it got cold. Sad.