There really is a lot of trash floating in the sea. When it hits shore, we should pick it up. (Attention, Summer Interns!) But what if it is a vast "continent" (as most of us now have heard) in the middle of the ocean, coagulated in a "gyre," a kind of circling current? (I suspect the word "gyre" is inspired by Lewis Carroll's nonsense poem, "'Twas Brilling" in Alice in Wonderland. "Gyre and gimble" is what the "slithey toves" did.)
Well, there is one particularly trashy area stuck in an oceanic gyre, but it's not quite the nightmare you've heard about. Discovery Sr. Fellow Jay Richards investigated for an article at The Enterprise Blog (hosted by American Enterprise Institute). The area where trash is more than usually common is only about one percent the size of Texas. (What is that, the size of Delaware?)
If a skeptical view of a trash "continent" is warranted, as Jay says, I tend to be skeptical as well that cleaning it up would take many times more energy than the plastic float represents. You wouldn't have to clean it all up to make a litter difference.
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