How does one explain away millions of years of extreme temperature change on our planet?

Question

I just would like to know how people can blindly follow this new Al Gore religion and yet won't anser this question.

Answer 1

They lie. Thats how they explain.

Answer 2

Well aside from asteroid strikes, sea level fluctuations, volcanic activity, and ice ages, I guess we don't have ANY explanations that fit into YOUR criteria. All those ice cores taken in the polar regions that positively show the evidence MUST be figments of Al Gore's imagination.

I guess my point is that the only Blind followers I have come into contact with are religious ones. Not a single scientific finding qualifies. Could it be you are just sadly misinformed or under informed?

Answer 3

lol...i think all those people are crazy and need to read a little geo. in the 60's people though we were going into another ice age because the temp droped before that they sayed we are going into global warming because the temp went up....it's just a cycle the world goes in....and CO2 has nun do to with it in fact co2 turns into limestone(which is the host mineral for caves) and every time we breath we make co2...The population has gotten much better the last 200 years , and people live longer so that can be where the CO2 increases.....i know i did'nt answer your question but this are facts all those people need to know before they say people are making the temp rise

Global Scientist have very good points but not much back up

Answer 4

Ice Ages. Sooner (I mean Sooner) or later another ones going to happen if it doesn't Earth=Dry Heap of Soil. If the ice caps melt they have to freeze. Just like gravity ice age has to happen its an endless cycle of freezing and melting.

Answer 5

One who is scientifically minded explains it on an event by event basis and through processes that work on a geological time scale.  It's actually very much easier to carefully explain millions of years of slow climate change punctuated by dramatic events than it is to explain how, how in the last 200 years  atmospheric CO2 levels have risen to percentages not seen for 200 million years, and claim that humans and the burning of fossil fuels have nothing to do with this.  CO2 is a greenhouse gas, fact.  200 million years ago the earth was much warmer, fact.  The industrial revolution began roughly 200 years ago, fact.  Since the beginning of the industrial revolution industry has been emitting CO2 at a rate much higher than the earth is able to naturally sequester it, fact.  There is a documented rise in global temperature over the last 200 years, fact.  There really is no other logical explanation for this (the solar cycle is only 11 years).

Answer 6

It's called the sun... and they can't as they are too wrapped up in trying to make excuses for everything that happens. Then trying to force everyone to bend to their will to fix the lies.

Personaly I let go and just enjoy the ride!

Answer 7

Mass extinctions occur simultaneously with the extreme temperature changes.  Just because they do happen doesn't mean we can survive the next one, especially if its severe.

Answer 8

I'll bet that its the same fools who slam GWB, its all his fault.

Answer 9

The majority of climate scientists believe that global warming is caused by humans. I am not a scientist. I don't understand the science. But, climate scientists, who have dedicated their life to studying climate and only climate, believe that global warming is real. I have a pretty good feeling that, being climate scientists and all, they know all about millions of years of temperature change. It's their job. However, they have decided that this warming is not normal. Personally, I don't care what Al Gore has to say. And I sure as **** don't care what you have to say. I do care about what climate scientists have to say.

Answer 10

we are not talking about millions of years now

we are talking about changes with in a few decades

Answer 11

No one is trying to explain away previous temperature changes. Just trying to get it through your obviously thick skull that change doesn't happen the same way every time.

http://dels.nas.edu/dels/rpt_briefs/clim...

I don't "blindly" follow anyone. And your, along with the denial club's, fixation with Al Gore it quite telling. You attack the messenger, because you can't attack the message. You're just like the other deniers on here. You pose a question, but offer no details or rebuttals to the mainstream science. All you want is to hear from like minded people for support of your uninformed opinion. Meanwhile, the other 85% of society is moving on without you. I see your need to belong, but you really need to open your eyes and re-evaluate.

Answer 12

Yes, how can one ignore that nearly all of those past changes were associated with elevated levels of greenhouse gasses?  Those past warmings are evidence that our current emissions are contributing to the magnitude and pace of warming observed today.

Unfortunately past warmings did not happen this fast, so we're taking the planet into entirely new territory:

New Research Confirms Antarctic Thaw Fears - Spiegel Online

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk...

"...the Pine Island Glacier has shrunk by an average of 3.8 centimeters annually over the past 4,700 years. But the Smith and Pope glaciers have only lost 2.3 centimeters of their thickness annually during the past 14,500 years. Satellite measurements taken between 1992 and 1996, though, show a loss of 1.6 meters in thickness per year on the Pine Island Glacier -- a figure that represents 42 times the average melt of the past 4,700 years."

Even the minimal warming case studied will lead to a large number of species extinctions (also very clear as a result of past climate changes):

http://www.killerinourmidst.com/methane%...

A careful examination of a large number of species in numerous parts of the planet projects that a stunning portion of them will be "committed to extinction" in just 50 years, with only modest global warming (Thomas, 2004). "Committed to extinction" means that, in the language of poet Pedro Pietri (1968?), "their names [are] listed in the telephone directory of destruction," that is, the book of death. It does not mean that 50 years from now all these "committed" species will be gone, but rather that they will no longer have a habitat in which they can survive. The demise of the last members of such species may hang on for some decades, but their ultimate doom is assured.

The findings are the result of a comprehensive examination of more than a thousand terrestrial species -- plants, insects, mammals, birds, frogs and reptiles -- in regions representing about 20% of the Earth's surface. The regions studied are located in all continents except Asia, and represent a wide variety of environments: boreal (northern), temperate, and tropical forests, tundra, grasslands, savannah, deserts. The amount of warming that was projected in the study was shockingly small. Three projections were used: 0.8 to 1.7 °C (1.4 to 3.0°F) in the minimal warming case, 1.8 to 2.0°C (3.2 to 3.6°F) with mid-range climate change, over 2.0°C (3.6°F) at maximum (Thomas, 2004; Pounds and Puschendorf, 2004).

But with only this rather minimal amount of warming, and even with an assumed ability to disperse to more favorable environments, 11, 19, and 33 percent of total species (in minimal, mid-range, and maximal cases, respectively) will disappear. Mortality among those species with little or no ability to disperse will be considerably higher (34, 45, and 58 % in the respective no dispersal cases). Moreover, the "minimal" case (0.8 to 1.7 °C/1.4 to 3.0°F) represents the minimum expected warming by 2050: as the study's authors point out, this means that this level of extinction is inevitable (Thomas, 2004). In 50 years, more than 10% of terrestrial species -- at minimum -- will be on a one-way path to extinction; in 100 years, almost all those species will be gone.

"Contrary to previous projections," the authors note, "[climate warming] (which they attribute to human activity) is likely to be the greatest threat in many if not most regions." The study did not examine the "historically unprecedented" carbon dioxide levels with which organisms will have to contend, or interactions between climate change and other ecological threats, which the authors indicate are likely to be even more severe than climate change in isolation (Thomas, 2004). The message of this study is simple: climate change kills -- and kills extraordinary numbers of living things -- even when it is minor.

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We do know the actual outcome of climate change, since it has happened before:

Permian–Triassic extinction event

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Permian-Tri...

It was the Earth's most severe extinction event, with up to 96 percent of all marine species and 70 percent of terrestrial vertebrate species becoming extinct. Because approximately 25 percent of species survived the event, the recovery of life on earth took significantly longer than after other extinction events. This event has been described as the "mother of all mass extinctions".

Climate Model Links Warmer Temperatures to Permian Extinction

http://www.physorg.com/news6003.html

Can you explain that evidence away?

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Even the relatively stable period of the last 10,000 years has caused mankind some serious problems:

Medieval Warm Period: a Time of Productivity and Prosperity?

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

So wouldn't the greater changes and challenges that we appear to be setting in motion be a rational cause for concern?  How can you completely ignore the lessons of the past?

Answer 13

It's been discussed since the mid-1800's, so I always wonder how you people can get it Al Gore being the originator out of that.  I guess it's a good thing though, because its pretty much the high point im your reasoning.