Can someone please explain global warming?

Question

I know the earth is getting hotter, but I hear that this will cause another ice age. That does not make sense.

Answer 1

Actually the temperature of the earth has increased less than 7/10 of 1 degree (C) from 1880 to 2005. That is an increase of about 1 degree (F) in 125 years. You may choose to believe that is global warming or you may not. Here is a link taking you to a NASA chart showing that temperature chart. http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2005/2005cal_fig1.gif There are numerous charts all over the internet showing the same. Some say that 1 degree is enough to impact the global climate, others say it's not. Most proponents of global warming think the earth's temerature has risen much higher than that and don't even know that it has only risen by 1 degree. But the charts do not lie as do the proponents on both sides of this issue.

Back in the '70s all the hype was about global COOLING and another ice age was coming. I remember that they blamed pollution for that too. They said that all the pollution was darkening the skies and not as much sun was coming through so the earth was cooling off. It took several years but they discovered that they were mistaken. So when someone says, "the sky is falling" don't believe everything you hear on either side of the issue. There are Spin Doctors galore out there.

Most of the time people will form an opinion and not really be informed about the subject with which they become so opinionated about. So it's best that you not form your opinions from other's opinions, (as in this forum) but on the facts presented.

Learn more about the '70s global cooling here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling
I hope that helps...

Answer 2

Global warming is just that: the earths climate heating up. Despite the assertations of well paid scientists and politicians who depend on grant money from environmentalist, anti-business, anti-industrial groups for food, there is NO evidence tyeing human production of greenhouse gasses to the increase in temperature. All the previous warming and cooling cycles (including the Little Ice Age in the middle ages and the period during which grapes were being grown in Canada and north England, and Greenland was Green, not white) took place without our help. Every volcano eruption accounts for somewhere between 5-10 years of human industrial activity. These gasses are not used by plants as they are created, the way slower released human made CO2 is. Methane is also a more powerfull greenhouse gas, so killing all the cows, moose, gazelles, wildebeasts, and elephants should help, although strangely enough, no ones suggested that yet. The most powerfull and common greenhouse gas is water vapor. Lets not forget that untill the '70's, these same groups and scientists were wetting their pants because evil human activities were causing global cooling

Answer 3

Global warming refers to the earth's mean temperature increasing.

It is a whipping post for democrats who have no other means of getting elected into office and environmentalists who are running out of ways to get our attention.

You will hear most frequently that our cars and factories are emitting CO2 into the atmosphere, creating an inordinate amount of greenhouse gasses that the earth cannot cope with. Greenhouse gasses create an environment in the lower atmosphere where the sun's heat is trapped within the biosphere and warm's the earth.

What democrats, liberals and environmentalists won't tell you, possibly don't know, is that there are at least 6 naturally occuring sources of greenhouse gasses that all exceed that of man-made origin. The ones I remember are the rain cycle, the exchange of gasses between plants and mammals, volcanos and livestock flatulation.

Global warming cannot cause an ice age. It's seems counterintuitive to you because it's wrong. The warming trend is now being observed, in part, by melting glaciers, not by their growth.

Answer 4

There isn't a real answer about global warming because the whole thing is a sensationalized theory at this point. The earth has been hotter many times in history, chances are this is just part of the natural cycle.

Oh, regarding "An inconvenient truth" check the facts before swallowing the movie's premise whole. There is an awful lot of junk science presented as fact in that movie. Don't believe everything they tell you.

Answer 5

Global warming is the observed increase in the average temperature of the Earth's atmosphere and oceans in recent decades and its projected continuation into the future.

The increased amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) are the primary causes of the human-induced component of warming. They are released by the burning of fossil fuels, land clearing and agriculture, etc.

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Answer 6

It will effectively mess up the way the world works in terms of hot currents. This will in turn cause an ice age.

Answer 7

Please watch the documentary by Al Gore called "An Inconvienent Truth" it goes into Global Warming at length.

Answer 8

highly recommend you watch "An Inconvenient Truth", the Al Gore movie - very informative and contemporary.

Watch it and some of your questions will be answered.........