What makes an island an island?
Why is Australia considered a continent but Greenland isn't?
Is it by size or just arbitrary?
who cares
>>7752033
Tectonic plates.
Why do you not even give a fuck? You should be banned for not trying.
>>7752033
I thought Australia was part of Oceania along with like 14 other countries. I know nothing about geography though, so 99% sure I'm wrong.
>>7752042
That's stupid
What makes a planet a planet?
Why is Mercury considered a planet but Pluto isn't?
Is it by size or just arbitrary?
>>7752129
Orbiting a star, being big enough for gravity to crush it into a sphere but not big enough to undergo fusion, and "clearing the orbit" (I.e. not being in a belt of other similarly sized objects, actually dominating the space around its orbit..)
Mercury is the only Mercury-sized object near Mercury's orbit, but Pluto is just one of zillIons of other Pluto-sized iceballs out in the Kuiper belt.
>>7752136
To put it another way, Ceres would be a planet if there wasn't an asteroid belt around it. Since there is, it's just a big asteroid.
>>7752136
>a sphere
>"clearing the orbit"
So, arbitrary.
>>7752139
Jupiter has tons of asteroids on its orbit, does that mean it's not a planet?
>>7752148
Are any of those asteroids even close in mass to Jupiter?
>>7752033
There's some things we'll just never know.
Like, why is the sky blue? Why is water wet? Why did Judas grab the Romans while Jesus slept?
Those things will always remain a mystery...
![tide-goes-in-tide-goes-out-you-still-cant-explain-that[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/pGRLHuT.jpg "tide-goes-in-tide-goes-out-you-still-cant-explain-that[1].jpg")
>>7752183
>>7752033
Australia is a country consisting out of the Australian mainland, Tasmania and some other little islands. The continent it is part of is generally called Oceania, but sometimes people call Australia a continent because it's all completely fucking arbitrary.
>>7752183
Jesus wanted Judas to do what he did otherwise he couldn't perform the sacrifice to save mankind.
Judas was literally the most loyal apostle.
>>7752033
Greenland is like southern India, too small for a continent.
>>7752148
>Jupiter has tons of asteroids on its orbit, does that mean it's not a planet?
Those asteroids' orbits are controlled by Jupiter. That counts as clearing the orbit, just like having moons.
https://pam.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continent
We know of only one planet with land and oceans for which we've defined "continent". So it's really just a convention for Earth.
If pressed to make a definition supported by outright criteria, I'd define a continent as "large expanses of land formed by accretion by tectonic action". Generally islands aren't formed that way, nor are they that large.
>geology
>science
By definition, anything larger than Greenland is a continent
>>7752033
Fucking Mercator fucking shit up again, Greenland isn't even big.
>>7752033
>Why is Australia considered a continent but Greenland isn't?
Mercator projection is why you think Greenland should be a continent.
>>7752042
> Arabia
> India
> Europe and Asia are considered separate continents
![mercator[1].png](https://i.imgur.com/iHiyIOc.png "mercator[1].png")
>>7753230
>>7753256
Yup.
>>7752033
are you fucking kidding me?
pick up a globe, kid, they should have them in your primary school.
