Global Warming/ Ice Age?

Question

Everyone is talking about global warming and I myself haven't really looked into this so forgive me If I'm missing some rudementary point. Ok,so I know Ice Ages are cyclicle and there is a stage of general warming between Ice ages. So could global warming just be part of a natural cycle between ages of glaciation?

Answer 1

Yes and no. The amount of CO2 in the air has been measured from ice cores going back hundreds of thousands of years, and it does show regular ups and downs. The last few thousand years are an up cycle. But the last 100 years are way way above any of the cycles. And we know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, which means it traps the sun's heat very effectively. So the assumption is that the Earth will warm up soon. Glaciers seem to be melting faster now, and the assumption is that the trapped heat is all going to melt that ice instead of raising the air temperature, because the air hasn't actually gotten all that warm yet.

Answer 2

In response to Bob's completely idiotic and ridiculous response. Bob, I don't know where you get your information, but you need to check your facts. You are probably either a big-business Republican, or you work for one of those oil companies that are destroying the Earth.

1. You claim that water is the only element known to man to expand when it freezes. While this may be true, what does this have to do with global warming??
2. Your example of how ocean levels would actually fall if all of the icebergs melted is completely ridiculous. Here's how it really works: There are two types of ice on our planet: sea ice and land ice. The sea ice, such as the Arctic ice cap, would not cause any rise in ocean levels because they are floating in the ocean. To understand this, imagine an ice cube in a glass of water. When it melts, it doesn't change the level of the water does it? However land ice, such as Antarctica and Greenland, does impact sea levels because the melting ice turns into water that runs into the oceans. If all of the land ice in the world melted, it would cause sea levels to rise at least 50 feet.
3. As for your example on greenhouse gases, it is also FALSE. First of all, the idea that more CO2 will "fertilize" the world's crops was generated by the American coal industry, so that should give you an idea as to the validity of this claim. A recent study by botanists Elizabeth Ainsworth and Stephen Long have analyzed the idea. Many of our most important crops would have a very small benefit from the abundance of CO2. For example, rice would only show an increase in yield of about 6 percent, and wheat 8 percent. In addition, in the futre crops will be stressed by higher temperature, more ozone at ground level, and changes in soil moisture, all of which decrease yields. Therefore, instead of an increase in yield, a CO2-rich world promises to be one in which crop production is lower than today.

Bob, you are a moron, and you need to stop trying to spread misinformation. Get your head out of the sand and start seeing the truth about global warming, and what we can do to stop it.

Now to answer the original asker's question: No, global warming is not just part of a natural cycle. Yes, there is a natural cycle that has been occuring for millions of years, but the current levels of CO2 are far higher than any other levels we have seen in the past. The current temperature is also among the hottest it has ever been here on Earth, and as CO2 continues to rise, the temperature will only get higher. I hope this helps, and make sure you do everything you can to help stop global warming before it destroys our civilization.

Answer 3

Here is something to think about don't believe me check this stuff out...

1.Water(H2O) is the only element known to man to expand when it freezes every other element contracts when it freezes so that is the first fact. For example fill a milk jugg with water, now stick it in the freezer... come back later and it will have exploded from preassure of freezing water.

2.Icebergs are massive chunks of ice, only a few percent of the ice is above water, which means the rest of the ice is underwater.

3.The ice underwater because water expands when it freezes is displacing the liquid water. So when that iceberg melts all the ice under the water will contract and fill a smaller space, so the level of the water will be less now because the ice which was displacing the liquid water is unfrozen and now occupies a less amount of space.

4.Scientific models show that if all the ice on this planet melted we would see a 3" DROP in ocean levels NOT a rise but a DROP.

Now isn't that interesting.

Now for the greenhouse gasses.

1.Plants LOVE a carbon dioxide rich air supply.

2.The more carbon dioxide their is the faster they grow.

3.Plants use photosynthesis to get their food so they can grow.

4.When the plants sense a higher level of carbon dioxide they will make up for it by sucking up more and more and one of the products of photosynthesis is OXYGEN!!

5.So no matter how much CARBON DIOXIDE there is the plants will COMPENSATE and suck up more and grow faster and bigger. and the bigger the plant is the more OXYGEN it produces through photosynthesis