APOD: Earth's Recent Climate Spiral (2022 Aug 22)

[mountainjim62]

"Compared to the past 250 million years, the Earth is currently enduring a relative cold spell, possibly about four degrees Celsius below average."

Am I a crank too?



"It costs the wrong people money."

Actually it costs EVERYBODY money. That doesn't mean it's not worth the money, but we should be honest about it.

[Chris Peterson]

"Compared to the past 250 million years, the Earth is currently enduring a relative cold spell, possibly about four degrees Celsius below average."

Am I a crank too?

I don't know. Are you?

We are currently in an ice age, and have been for about 2.5 million years. That ice age has been marked by repeated glacial and interglacial periods. We're in one of the latter now, so our temperature is above the million year average. And below the 50 million year average. But the absolute temperature isn't really what matters. The problem is caused by the rapidity of the current warming, which is on the order of a century, compared to several thousand years or more for warming (or cooling) in natural cycles. And that's too fast for most of nature to adapt, which is why we are experiencing a mass extinction as well as huge stresses on human society.