Against the Grain

Which is more important, the Sun or mankind's activities?

The Sun Also Sets:

"R. Timothy Patterson, professor of geology and director of the Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Center of Canada's Carleton University, says that 'CO2 variations show little correlation with our planet's climate on long, medium and even short time scales.'

Rather, he says, 'I and the first-class scientists I work with are consistently finding excellent correlations between the regular fluctuations of the sun and earthly climate. This is not surprising. The sun and the stars are the ultimate source of energy on this planet.'

Patterson, sharing Tapping's concern, says: 'Solar scientists predict that, by 2020, the sun will be starting into its weakest Schwabe cycle of the past two centuries, likely leading to unusually cool conditions on Earth.'

'Solar activity has overpowered any effect that CO2 has had before, and it most likely will again,' Patterson says. 'If we were to have even a medium-sized solar minimum, we could be looking at a lot more bad effects than 'global warming' would have had.'"