When sunspots were first observed almost five hundred years ago, they pointed to a hole in a theory–an article of faith for some: that the sun was a perfect orb that should be free of blemishes.
Now sunspots are pointing to a hole in another theory–also an article of faith for some: global warming.
As you’ve no doubt heard, the globe has been warming in recent times. The question is: What’s causing it? The most common explanation is that it’s the release of “greenhouse gasses” into the earth’s atmosphere by fluorocarbons, fossil fuels, etc.
However, as it turns out, sunspots have also been increasing in recent years. Further: An examination of Greenland ice cores shows that the rise and fall of sunspots correlates with the rise and fall of global temperature. In other words, as the sunspots go up or down, so does the global temperature on earth.
Scientists don’t (yet) understand the mechanism by which this happens, but it apparently does. This adds credence to critics of the “global warming”/”greenhouse gasses” hypothesis, who have argued that the recent rise in global temperatures may be completely unrelated to the discharge of certain gasses by technology (in other words, that the “global warming” advocates are committing the post hoc, ergo propter hoc fallacy).
This is not a certainty. According to the BBC report on the finding, global warming has been increasing even after the rise in sunspots leveled off a few decades ago, but on the other hand that could be because the rise in temperature builds up if the sunspots continue at their current level (the same way putting a lightbulb next to an object takes a while to increase the object’s surface temperature, even though the lighbulb emits a constant level of heat–at least until a certain level of surface temperature is reached).
Time and research will tell if this is the case.
The key thing is: Some of the global warming phenomenon seems to be due to something other than the release of greenhouse gasses. The question now is: How much?
Interesting story Jimmy. A few years ago when I was still in school my Astrophysics prof mentioned that new research was suggesting that sunspots could be having a significant effect on global warming. Apparently the Sun does go through cycles of increasing and decreasing energy output. He said that more research still needed to be done on the subject and that no conclusions have been reached yet at the time. It may be that greenhouse gases are responsible for most of the warming but it could also be that they have a negligible effect compared to the Sun’s influence.
I have also read that the Earth’s average temperature was about 2-4 ℃ higher about a thousand years ago and that humanity flourished during that time.
From what I’ve heard if the earth does warm up over the next century it will warm up unevenly. That is, tropical regions will only see about a 1℃ increase in average temperature while the far north (and south) will see a rise of about 5℃. Frankly, that won’t affect life too much near the equator but it will open up vast stretches of northern permafrost land and make them habitable. A warmer planet might be able to sustain far more people than a cold planet.
That’s not to say there might be bad effects of global warming too, like perhaps floods in low-lying regions, changing precipitation patterns turning some areas to desert.
I just don’t appreciate how the Environmentalists have framed the debate in such a way that if you question their obvious hyperbole or “common wisdom” it’s automatically assumed that you don’t care about the environment and that you hate poor people and that you work for the big oil companies and want to destroy the world to line your pockets with cash. That’s just ridiculous. The environmentalists have good intentions, they see the destruction of the environment as a threat to civilization…I just don’t see the level of destruction they scream about and how that is a greater threat to civilization than things like radical Islam, the West’s growing secularism and socialism, our falling birth rates, the destruction of the family, abortion, and the birth control pill.
I’m all for doing things to conserve the environment, but not when it’s based on junk science and not when it could harm our economy to such an extent that it prevents us from tackling the bigger problems.
The author Michael Chrighton (spelling?) wrote an excellent speech/essay about the silliness of the mass hysteria about global warming. I’m sure if anyone is interested in reading it they could just google his name along with “global warming”.