Originally Posted by
Helen49
The use of fossil fuels on today's grand scale, to power our industry, domestic appliances motor vehicles, even aircraft is a relatively new phenomena. [Considering the age of the earth]. So what caused the previous dramatic changes in world temperature which affected sea levels, drowned forests,changed the shape of continents etc??
Man's ability to beat the elements......whether it's rain, snow, gales, floods or whatever has always proved difficult or impossible. So whilst I can accept that 'man' has aggravated the climate change issues, I find it difficult to accept that man has either caused the climate change or is capable of preventing it???
Discuss!!
Always thought about this myself. Who can explain the massive and relatively rapid retreat of the ice sheets over the northern hemisphere 15,000 years ago? And the subsequent advance again 10,000 years ago and finally, their retreat back to the polar regions - certainly not human influence.
I'm convinced volcanic activity has a huge impact on the climate; major eruption (Mount St Helen's, for example) colder winters. The smallest particles of dust get into the stratosphere and are able to travel vast distances, often worldwide. These tiny particles are so light that they can stay in the stratosphere for months, blocking sunlight and causing cooling over large areas of the Earth.
There’s been a theory that even our own planet’s orbit has more impact on the Earth’s temperature than we are aware. I’ve read theories from scientists that we do not necessarily rotate around the sun in a perfect circle. Sometimes there is a slight wobble and sometimes the route is slightly more elliptical. It only takes a minuscule adjustment to these degrees and we see longer hotter summers or colder winters, depending on the hemisphere.