Little Ice Age Misconceptions

People have all kinds of weird and wacky ideas about climate change. One that you hear from time to time is that we are coming out of a Little Ice Age. A recent post by Dana Nuccitelli on Skeptical Science thoroughly debunks the Little Ice Age theory.

As the to-the-point intro of the piece states:

The argument that we’re simply “coming out of the Little Ice Age (LIA)” makes one of two assumptions:

  1. The planet oscillates around some natural equilibrium temperature such that after it cools, it must warm to return to this temperature, and vice-versa.
  2. Whatever caused the LIA cooling has reversed phase and is now causing global warming.

The first assumption demonstrates a lack of understanding regarding what causes planetary temperature changes.  The second does not hold up under scrutiny of the empirical data.

Read more on why we are not just coming out of a Little Ice Age on Skeptical Science.

This post is a quickie, a way for us to share more news with you by linking to good stories on other sites.

Photo Credit: Stuck in Customs via flickr under a CC license

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