Interesting weather fact.

Wm. Elliot wrote:
A simple question: what caused previous ice ages and subsequent warming before man arrived?

...how do you know that "ice ages" actually existed? How did you know that "warming periods" (interglacials) actually occurred?

If you believe that glacial and interglacial (warming) periods happened (I assume you do, since you bring it up), then, via inference, we are currently in an interglacial period currently because we are not frozen solid, last I checked.

"We" know that glacial and interglacial warming periods had existed because paleoclimate scientists use using all the scientific proxies which established that glacial and interglacial periods actually happened; the same chemical, geological, paleontological, atmospheric GHG analysis, ice coring and ocean bed sediment coring we use to establish that we are indeed in a period of planetary-scale warming, as measured by satellite sensing, and interpolation of hundreds of thousands of "point" temperature sampling.

One of the strongest "proxy" data a scientist involved in planetary climate monitoring can use to track what is called 'the greenhouse effect" (feedback loop that generates atmospheric heating at the human x,y,z scale (humans live somewhere on planet surface at x,y, at altitudes of some z) is: the atmospheric GHG concentrations (ie. methane, CO2, etc, etc, etc). Scientists currently have VERY accurate measurements of CO2 (a very strong GHG, but not the strongest) going back just about 650,000 years. And currently, since about 1950, the planet's atmospheric CO2 levels had reached the same level shown in data that describes the atmos. CO2 levels around 340,000 years ago. So, atmospheric CO2 --one of the top drivers of planetary warming (the greenhouse effect), has been fluctuating between ~300ppm and ~178ppm for the past 650,000 years.....now here is the scary thing: since 1950, the CO2 natural balance has been rocketing up, WAY past where the planet had ever seen it recorded reliably (650,000 years). The earth has actually been "warming at an accelerating rate for the past 1300 years. Earth has a natural CO2 budget: and it "sinks" it pretty well, thank you very much...HOWEVER, the human generation of CO2 (as an apropos example) actually exceeds the planet's natural ability to "sink" the un-natural "overage". What "we" don't currently know is: at what point will the earth's natural GHG (say, CO2) sink mechanisms fail (or, in technical terms: saturate, or fail altogether)?? And, even worse, at what point will much more destructive GHGs (like methane) be released into the atmosphere (via permafrost thawing: occurring at an alarming rate now!), and massive insect attacks on global forests to release enormous new quantities of CO2 (one example of many: the entire Southwest evergreen forests are being attacked by insects in a massive way, from climate change, causing the die-off of every evergreen tree there-on, in the relatively near future), and from massive global deforestation and forest fires (underway since at least the 1970s/1980s)....not to mention the out of control fossil-fuel burning (coal especially) ?

It is relatively easy (and fairly painless) to implement non fossil-fuel transportation (especially automobiles) globally, as is happening now. We just need to bring down those "extra" human-injected gigatons of CO2 that can't be naturally sequestered by the planet. Why play with the planet's ability to bring down all that "extra" global GHGs naturally? Who knows what the consequences would be; so why not be reasonable, and practice the precautionary principal? The alternative could be the near extinction of man and many species, or even worse.

Mixed into the "controversy" is the input from scientists who have obviously failed to adequately explain this 'situation", and the huge non scientific "foundations" funding of the Climate Change Counter-Movement (CCCM): 91 organizations that are funded by 140 different foundations that oppose climate change to the tune of $900 million per year (among the 140 foundations are big oil). (Site: Drexel University paper, Brulle et al).

Anyhow, this is some "fuel for thought" (pardon the pun!) :B

Silver-