To all the people who say global warming is a "natural cycle"?

Question

What's the cause of this cycle? Natural cycles don't just "happen", they have to have a cause.
And before you answer, keep in mind that the sun is NOT the cause. Much to the chagrin of many "sceptics", the sun is monitored very closely and is not the cause of the current climate shift. The sun may contribute to the warming, but it is not the cause. See chart linked below for the modeled trend and the variations in the major forcings that contributed to 20th century climate.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Climate_Change_Attribution.png

Foamy the Horny Squirrel: Realclimate has two excellent articles on what the conclusions about solar forcing are, as well as exactly how they were arrived at:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/08/did-the-sun-hit-record-highs-over-the-last-few-decades/

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/07/the-lure-of-solar-forcing/

I used the graph from Wiki simply to illustrate my point.

Lauren: This most certainly is a question. Since I've seen so many poeple here claiming that global warming is a natural cycle, and has nothing to do with humans, I figured they must have cause for this natural cycle. I mean, why would they go around claiming that it's a naturla cycle if they don't even know what the cycle is?

Slider728: Yes, I'm well aware that climate change has happened in the past. I never claimed that climate change couldn't be caused by natural forcing, I'm just curious as to what natural forcing they think is causing THIS climate change.

jim m: You say that "most of climate is caused by things that are ongoing inside the Earth and are not known to science at this time." If they're unknown to science at this time, what makes you think they "cause most of the climate"? I mean, if they're "unknown" they're...well...unknown.
And why do we care what "causes most of the climate"? I don't care about what causes the climate, I care about what causes the climate to change.

Albatros: Ah, so you did. I don't find it horribly surprising that you didn't get a good answer. Doesn't look like I'm having much better luck.

Albert Einstein: I'm not asking if it's proved whether or not it's a cycle (because you're right, it's not). I'm just asking what people think the cause of this cycle is.

Albatros: Ah, so you did. I don't find it horribly surprising that you didn't get a good answer. Doesn't look like I'm having much better luck.

Albert Einstein: I'm not asking if it's proved whether or not it's a cycle (because you're right, it's not proved). I'm just asking what people think the cause of this cycle is.

Noone N: The wiki graph I gave was just to illustrate my point. Read the links I provided to the realclimate articles if you want "real data".
And like I've already said, I'm well aware that the climate has changed in the past. I just want to know what all these people who claim it's a natural cycle think causes the natural cycle. In other words, there is a well developed, internally consistent theory that predicts the effects we are observing, so where is the sceptic model, or theory whereby CO2 does not affect the temperature and where is the evidence of some other natural forcing?

AZ Imagined:Your argument about global warming starting 200 years ago is not particularly valid. You can pick practically any point in the past you want that was colder than today, draw a line from then to now and say "look! X years of global warming!"
Just take a look at this graph, and I think it's pretty apparent when the current trend of warming began:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:1000_Year_Temperature_Comparison.png
You then mention the temperature drop during the 40's-70's. You see, no one is claiming that CO2 is the only factor affecting the atmosphere. It's an extremely complex system subject to many forcings. During the 40's and 50's, CO2 was temporarily over overwhelmed by an increase in human particulates and aerosol pollution. Pollution regulations and improved technology saw a decrease in this different kind of emissions and as the air cleared, the CO2 signal again emerged and took over.
Models of human caused global warming most certainly do explain the cooling. Th

Answer 1

Well, the current cycle of global warming began when the Little Ice Age ended (mid 1800s). That right there is one of the bigger selling points on the currect trend being part of a natural cycle.

Uh, you do know about the Little Ice Age, right? Medieval Warming Period? Yes? Good. Then you are somewhat educated on past natural climate shifts...neither of which we have indentified a specific cause for how they began or how they ended. (If you don't know about these relatively recent climate shifts, then you are not qualified to have any opinion about global warming today.)

Between 1850 and 1940, the planet warmed about one degree Celsius. Then from 1940 to 1970, we cooled off (one would expect continued warming during this time if it were caused by humans). Remember the reports of the coming ice age in the 1970s? Too young for that? Since the 1970s we have gone back into a warming trend.

Models of human-caused global warming cannot explain the global temperature drop from 1940 to 1970? Can you?

Now think about it those facts for a while and perhaps start thinking about the subject independant from those at either end of the global warming debate. The truth is likely to be somewhere in the middle. There are many forces at work here...the sun, ocean currents, orbital dynamics, and us humans too.

Answer 2

I'm not sure where the wiki data you cite comes from, but it doesn't look like any data I have seen from legitimate scientific sources such as NOAA, NASA, or even IPCC. You might want to go to some of these web sites and get some real data.

One thing you will find is that there are documented natural cycles of temperature and CO2 dating back for over 400,000 years, and these past cycles are very similar to the current cycle that we are in. Based on this, we can probably expect average global temperatures to increase by another 3.0 deg C.

Now as to what causes these cycles, that is still open for discusion. Clearly previous periods of massive increases in CO2 levels and the subsequent extensive global warmings were not caused by humans burning fossil fuels, so there was some other effect in play. There are a number of theories, but I haven't seen a really good one yet.

Of course the current levels of CO2 are much higher than anything seen in the past, but the rate of global warming is does not appear to be any greater than before. And as I mentioned above, the temperatures we are seeing today are still well below historical (and natural) maximums.

Answer 3

GLOBAL WARMING...Has EVERYTHING to do with Humans. We are the cause. It is caused by too many carbon emissions in the earth's atmosphere. And where does carbon come from?? Cars, fires, manufacturing plants, etc, etc. All HUMAN causes. The sun plays a TINY role in it. Because of all the crap us HUMANS are putting in the atmosphere, we are trapping to many of the sun's rays so the earth is heating up. If this WERE a natural process it would have taken YEARS UPON YEARS for us to feel the impact so suddenly. This change is climate year after year is changing at a rapid pace. At a NOTICEABLE rate. My god. It is January, and today was the first time my area has had any amount of snow, that has lasted more than a day. ( I live in Canada.) The only way to fix the problem is to cut down on our carbon emissions. People really need to research this more...then they will understand. Face it....at this rate, Mankind will be the end of the human race.

Answer 4

Tough question. No one has yet to prove that global warming happens in a cycle simply because we do not have sufficient data. Yet historically, we have observed the possible effects of global warmings in many instances eg massive rises in tides, shifting in the seasonal cycles. I once saw a documentary which shows a completely submerged city several hundred feet under the sea off the coast of Japan, pointing to the fact that the current sea level has rised a few hundred feet over historic times. Yet there are signs of of marine life on top of what are now mountains. Fossils and sea shells were discovered in some mountains in Taiwan, which point to the fact that the current sea level could have be much lower than pre-historic times. What does all these mean? It means that the rise of fall of the sea level, which many attribute to global warming can be a natural occurence (whether or not it's a cycle cannot be proven because no one keep records since pre-historic times), unlike many environmentalists who claimed that it is the work of industrial pollution alone. The charts in your wikipedia link show the fluctations in temp over the past one hundred years due to various reasons. We need to collect the data for, say,another 500 years to see if there is indeed a "cycle". Meanwhile, keep discussing......

Answer 5

Why don't you look at temperature cycles for more than 100 years.

Here is a graph of global temperature deviations over the last 500 thousand years:

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/f8/Ice_Age_Temperature.png

Global Climate Changes are natural. I do not think humans are helping the matter any, but they are not the only cause of it.

You can not refute the fact it has happened in the past. You can not refute the fact that global warming has occured in the past before humans had any affect on the issue.

This is not an excuse for inaction now. I do not doubt that humans are accelerating global climate changes. I guess we have to kill off 3/4 of the world's population before we will believe it.

Answer 6

While it is undoubtedly true that there are natural cycles and variations in global climate, those who insist that current warming is purely natural -- or even mostly natural -- have two challenges.

First, they need to identify the mechanism behind this alleged natural cycle. Absent a forcing of some sort, there will be no change in global energy balance. The balance is changing, so natural or otherwise, we need to find this mysterious cause.

Second, they need to come up with an explanation for why a 35% increase in the second most important greenhouse gas does not affect the global temperature. Theory predicts temperature will rise given an enhanced greenhouse effect, so how or why is it not happening?

Answer 7

Yes it is natural. Technically, everything in nature is natural. But the earth goes through cycles every so often. A kind of clensing. Like a High Colonic. and we are the turds.

The sun has little to do with Global warming. It is ozone that builds up in the atmosphere that keeps the rays from escaping, causing a greenhouse effect. It has happened at least 3 times before. The climate becomes very erratic, the poles melt, then the warming leads to an Ice age. Like a clensing.

Answer 8

What we are experiencing is a pause in an uptrend. From right here, we can't verify the place temperature will bypass. The cycle? Sunspots. Temperatures do not track precisely with sunspots, yet because of the fact the 11 year cycles get closer mutually and larger numbers of spots, temperatures tend to get warmer. because of the fact the cycles unfold (or end) temperatures tend to get chillier. you may attempt to describe this away, yet this correlation works better than something all of us be attentive to. we don't ought to faux to be attentive to the way it works, it purely does. If it stops working, i will luckily admit that i exchange into incorrect.

Answer 9

The sun is monitored very closely??????? With what exactly, temps based on someone out there holding a turkey thermometer to get temps of the sun. Your first mistake was using wikipedia as a source, make sure you do that when you get to college. That should work out really well for you. Your second strike is going with a graph that shows actually no data from 1900-1960, more than likely because those "wonderful" monitoring tools that you so mentioned didn't exist yet. So going off of forty years and calling that a cycle is completely absurd. Strike three....Yer out of here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Answer 10

Most of climate is caused by things that are ongoing inside the Earth and are not known to science at this time. Modern science relys on models and the Earth is not a model. There is nothing in modern models of climate change that includes any of the processes that are ongoing inside the Earth such as volcanos, sea vents, geysers, hot springs and other geothermal factors that have a very important effect on the climate and weather.