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Global Warming? Pffft! Try sunspots!
There are people that have looked at the sun long enough to realize two things:
1. There are dark spots that traverse the surface
2. There is a pattern to how many spots there are during a given period
Sunspots are not just interesting science experiments and footnotes to the anatomy of our star, but they could actually have a direct impact on the Earth's climate. According to some scientists, we are long overdo for a storm of sunspots. Usually these things happen in cycles and as it happens the sun has been far too quiet for the comfort of many. So much, in fact, that a hundred scientists all got together and had a conference about it.
The concern is that there is a theory that sunspots affect our climate. It is known, for example, that during a period of 50 years when there were no sunspots the Earth fell into a bit of an Ice Age (right around 1650 CE). This was not only a problem for most of the civilized world leading to famine and enormous population loss, but it also left the modern world wondering of something as seemingly insignificant as cool spots on the Sun was necessary to our worldly well-being.
Lately, we have been charged with the task of taking care of our waste to prevent Global Warming. Could it be we are actually heading for an Ice Age? The world has seen abrupt Ice Ages before. 12,000 years ago an Ice Age came without warning and left just as quickly (only after sticking around for a thousand years).
Is this one more thing to worry about? This and asteroids plummeting into New York City?
Surely there are other things to worry about, but perhaps the philosophical question brought up is this: the systems making life exist on this planet can be so easily altered by so many things it is good practice to remember how fragile things really are. Being good stewards to this world is not just a hobby, it is a responsibility.
We may not be able to control sunspots, but we can control our waste. And one strike against us is better than two.
This work by
Mark Havenner is licensed under a
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.
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