Where does sea or ocean water get the salt from?

Answer 1

From minerals exposed in the sea bed and from minerals washed out of land masses by rivers and streams.

Answer 2

There are all kinds of salt deposits all over the world, some of which are exposed to sea water (which would make the sea saltier).

Of course the sea water evaporates and falls down on land in places that DON'T have salt, giving us fresh water lakes, rivers, etc.

When water evaporates (it leaves the salt behind), and then falls down on the cold earth and freezes, not returning to the ocean, the oceans get saltier.

Similarly as the planet heats up, all those ice flows melt and the water gets gets less salty.

Most blood systems have approximately the same salinity as the ocean: Scientists believe that this is because the chemical reactions required for life developed in the sea and even as critters abandon their former home, they still need to have those reactions within.

Answer 3

Naturalplastics was doing so well till he started explaining his answer. Most salts in the ocean do come from basalt, although it is a mere coincidence that basalt has salt in its name. Upwelling basalt comes in contact with ocean water and ions are transferred from the basalt to sea water. These systems become black smokers and white smokers.

To clear up other mistakes he made, basalt is not a mineral, is a rock containing minerals. The minerals in basalt are calcium rich plagioclase feldspar, olivine, pyroxene, and accessory minerals such as magnetite. Double chain silicate minerals are amphiboles, which can be found in some basalts but are not a normal constituent. Basalt usually does not contain minerals with volitiles such as hydroxides and it is not due to "stripping off" that basalt adds to the salts in the oceans.

Answer 4

a very common mineral on the ocean floor is basalt. The SALT in basalt isn't to fool you.

A very generalized chemical equasion for the minerals in basalt is
0-2 calcium or sodium
5 iron or magnesium
8 silicon or aluminum
22 oxygens
2 hydroxides, chlorides, fluorides

The mineral forms a double chain silicate (http://www.visionlearning.com/library/modules/mid140/Image/VLObject-3541-051230031227.jpg) where the silicon/aluminum and iron/magnesium bond with the iron to form the triangles in the diagram. This leaves the sodium/calcium (alkali earths) and the chloride/fluoride/hydroxide (halides) which are larger ions that reside in the 'holes' in the structure, which are the easiest to 'strip off' when they are eroded. When they're stripped off, they increase the saltyness in the ocean water, and they accumulate over time.

Answer 5

from the earth?????? =)

Answer 6

GOD.