When polar ice caps grow (during ice ages, for example), lighter forms of oxygen from water vapor and seawater accumulate in the frozen ice caps, leaving greater concentrations of one heavy form of oxygen behind in the sea, where it is absorbed by marine organisms. ████ ███ ██ ███ ███ ████ ███████ ███ ██████████████ ██ ████ █████ ██████ ██ ████████ █████████ ██████ ███ ███████████ ███████ ██████████████ ██ ████ █████ ██████ ██ ███ █████████ █████████ ███ █████ ██████ ██████ ████ █████████ ███ ██████ ██████
When polar ice gaps grow, greater concentrations of a heavy oxygen form are left in the ocean, which gets absorbed by marine life. When polar ice caps shrink, lower concentrations of this heavy oxygen are left in the ocean. So, we can predict whether ice caps were growing or shrinking by examining the concentrations of heavy oxygen in sea life during a time period. During one 30,000 year period, concentrations of heavy oxygen increased during the first 20,000 years, then decreased in the remaining 10,000 years.
Polar ice caps were growing during the first 20,000 years of that period, then shrinking during the last 10,000 years.
The information given most strongly ████████ █████ ███ ██ ███ █████████ ██████████ █████ ███ ██████ █████████ ██████
Average global temperatures ██████ █████ █████ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ██████ █████████████ ███████ ███████ ██████ ████████████ ██████ █████ ██████
Polar ice caps ██ ███ █████████ ██ ███ ██████ ████ ██████ ████ ████ ████ ██ ███ ███ ██ ███ ███████
The beginning of ███ ██████ █████████ ████ ███ █████ ██ ██ ███ ███ ████ ██████ █████████████ ██████ ██████
The polar ice ████ ████ ███ █████ ██████ █████ █████ ███ ██████ ██████ ████ █████ ██ ███████
An ice age ███ ███████ ██ ██ ███ ██████ ███ █████ ██████ █████ ██ ███ ███████