Warning: Hard science ahead.

Now, I'm not an environmental change nay-sayer. The Earth has been getting warmer, and much of this warming coincides with industrial development and CO2 levels. However, I believe that humans are not the sole cause of environmental change, merely a part of a greater environmental shift.

I'd like to point to Neutrinos. Neutrinos are near-massless particles that travel at close to the speed of light and interact so little with ordinary matter that a cubic light year of lead would only stop 50% of them. Neutrinos, in the context I'm speaking of, are created mostly through nuclear processes such as radioactive decay and nuclear fusion. If you'll recall, Sol, our sun, creates energy through nuclear fusion of Hydrogen to Helium, and then to Lithium, Beryllium, and Boron.

Now, according to scientists, the sun's fusion processes should put out about 7 SNU (Solar Neutrino Units, about 10^-36 neutrino capture events per atom per second), plus or minus 1.2 SNU. However, all scientists have ever been able to find is about 2-3 SNU. BUT, Technetium levels in deep Molybdenum mines reveal (through mathematical probability stuff that is way over my head) that during the Earth's interglacial periods between Ice Ages, and before the start of Ice Age events, the Earth was exposed to about 7.5 SNU, within expected limits. During the Ice Ages, though, the levels dropped to 2-4 SNU.

What gives? The neutrino level is too low, similar to that of an Ice Age. Fewer neutrinos means that the sun isn't fusing as much; according to the scientists, the neutrinos created by fusion into Boron are missing, though those created by the lower-energy Beryllium reaction are still present.

It's a cycle. The sun gets overheated and expands. This expansion creates less pressure in the sun's core, so the higher energy fusion reactions cease and the amount of energy released drops. Less energy, the sun cools down and shrinks a bit. This puts more pressure on the core, restarting the fusion process, which causes the sun to heat up again, and so on and so forth.

It is quite possible that CO2 is saving us from another Ice Age - we're overdue for one anyway. I will say that we're putting out a bit more than we should be; hell, we're putting out a lot more. But there's more to climate than just CO2 and greenhouse effect. Keep that in mind.

http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/astro-ph/p.../9604009v1.pdf
Biographical Encyclopedia of Scientists - Google Book Search
Neutrino - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Solar neutrino unit - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

__________________
An' it harm none, do as ye' will.


Never argue with an idiot. He'll just drag you down to his level of intelligence and beat you with experience.

I can't believe that I missed this thread before. Let the fun begin.

1) There are 3 types of neutrinos (electrons neutrinos, muons and tau neutrinos, which have such a short life that they go bye bye very quickly) the only kind that we see from the sun is the electron neutrinos (which I'll cakk EN).

2) The idea that the sun was going through "neutrino phases" was proposed in 1967, long before we knew anything about them.

3) We can't detirmine what the Earth was exposed to at one time by ENs as in order to do so, we would have to find a location that was exposed at one time and then was hidden away, as so it couldn't be interfered with again. Such a place doesn't exsist on Earth as ENs pass through every cubic centimeter every second replaceing their foot steps.

__________________
Set your destination with your heart, get there with your mind.

"The wisest men follow their own direction." - Euripides