Since there is also Global Warming on Mars, is the SUN causing Global Warming on Earth?

That doesn't mean it isn't happening, or that man isn't contributing to the problem. According to The United States Geological Survey man produces at least 10x (actually it is much more) greenhouse gasses every year than all the currently active volcanoes combined.

"Global warming is real"

-George W. Bush-

People when even GWB says global warming is real maybe you should pay attention.

This is a popular myth that is doing the rounds and is losely based on NASA reports but has been grossly distorted and exaggerated by some global warming skeptics. It would be a good idea to read the original NASA reports so you can put things into context. In short - there is evidence to suggest that the south polar ice cap is melting, there is also evidence to suggest the north polar ice cap is expanding. Therefore whatever warming is happening on Mars is only affecting parts of it. The probable reason for any warming on Mars are the global duststorms that sweep across the planet for days on end, such an event on earth (were it possible) would also lead to significant changes in our climate. Further, Mars is very, very different to our own planet thus making any comparisons very unreliable. It has no breathable atmosphere, is not largely vegetated, isn't predominantly water, experiences extreme temperature changes, is so cold that the ice caps aren't frozen water but frozen gas (carbon dioxide) and it's not inhabited by humans. It would be a very conveneint solution to say that the Sun is to blame for warming on Mars and on Earth, if that were the case then the other planets and moons in our solar system would also be warming - they're not. There's 172 of them all told and on 165 of them no warming has been observed. We have extremely accurate instruments for measuring changes in the output from the sun and we know that the difrerence between the highest and lowest outputs (insolation maxima and insolation minima) is very small - enough to cause global warming or cooling over thousands and millions of years but nowhere near enough to bring about the changes we've witnessed in the last few decades. The actual difference between maximum and minimum output is a variation of a little less than one thousandth (a variation of 1.3 Watts per square metre per year against a mean of 1366 W/m2/yr). Again, please refer to the original NASA reports, the skeptics are trying to fool you by concealing facts and distorting others.

Excellent information there... well researched. I see you're still facing some people who are so invested in it being man made that they dispute your sources or they attack the facts.

Let's look at that, shall we?

JamusTrip... the 'math' behind man's effect is anything BUT solid... unless you're willing to accept that a maximum of 2% of the CO2 in the atmosphere, which is a generous estimate of what man contributes, is causing the temperature to rise.

outcrop... it's funny you spout the same tired argument about the Martian atmosphere being thin. This is totally irrelevant when you consider that, in the absence of increased solar output, the surface temperatures wouldn't be rising. In fact, it lends a STRONGER argument to the notion that it's primarily solar activity, since that thinner atmosphere retains less heat so if it's rising, there must be exponentially higher levels of solar radiation reaching the surface of Mars. As for Venus, we have a harder time really gauging temperature changes there due to the volatile conditions on Venus. Temperature readings on Venus, and Mercury for that matter, are really estimates. On Mars, we have equipment capable of taking measurements.

Jerbson... same thing applies, except that you're incredibly incorrect to say that we should ignore other planets because they're not Earth. Did Al Gore put you up to that? The only reason not to use the other bodies in our solar system in the equation is to keep the man-made global warming farce alive.

subwlimn... I'd love to see where you got that data relating to volcanoes, since a single eruption spews far more CO2 into the atmosphere than you're painting. Man produces less than 2% of the CO2 in the atmosphere. Do you have statistics for Volcanic emissions?

Gengi... lol... are you a scientist? What are your credentials? Before you start saying he's 'far from a scientist' (and I'm SURE his Doctorate is in Phys Ed and all the scientists who concur with his assessment are idiots...) are you more qualified to make a statement?

Dana~ Nice compilation of Data but terrible job of dropping the ball on the conclusion. Your bottom line is not supported by your evidence. In fact, all your evidence does is dispute the solar primary theory... while relying on the really weak excuse for a theory of man's less-than-2% contribution to the CO2 levels to account for 90% of the warming??? Sorry.

Personally, I've been researching this rather extensively and am developing a theory for why some of the data collected doesn't seem to fit into any of the current explanations. I think we might be seeing the results of a combination of forces, some of which we've not seen as mankind hasn't been around long enough. As it is, at perihelion, the effects of the sun's increased output are most noticeable. When coupled with the possiblity of another condition here on Earth that is known to have some very chaotic effects... the results could be impossible to predict.

Periodically, the Earth's magnetic field reverses. Man has never been around to measure the effects of such a reversal or even to know what signs would be evident to forecast the event. Beyond some computer models, we have precious little information about this phenomenon except that it happens and that simulations indicate that there are some thermal implications during the reversal process pertaining to geothermal output.

Translation in layman's terms?

It very well may be a complex natural phenomenon we're experiencing for the first time and not a man-made event at all.

I know it's scarier to think it's not man-made... because then we have no control over it... but we have to go with the facts and not the hype.

Neither. It's not a coincidence, and we know that the Sun is not causing the warming on these other planets.

Trevor (a climate scientist) explains very thoroughly in his answer to this question:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=AihTM...

Of course, the answer to your question is within your articles. Here is a quote from the Pluto article:

"Jay Pasachoff, an astronomy professor at Williams College, said that Pluto's global warming was "likely not connected with that of the Earth. The major way they could be connected is if the warming was caused by a large increase in sunlight. But the solar constant--the amount of sunlight received each second--is carefully monitored by spacecraft, and we know the sun's output is much too steady to be changing the temperature of Pluto."

Mars is warming due to dust storms darkening its surface:

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/04/07...

More importantly, more bodies (planets+moons) in our solar system are cooling than are warming. Most show no appreciable temperature change. If global warming were due to the Sun, then virtually every body in our solar system should be warming.

We don't need to look at other planets though - we can look direcly at solar output. Every solar factor which effects the Earth's climate has been in the direction of cooling over the past 25 years. Article here:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/6290228.stm

Or the scientific paper here:

http://www.pubs.royalsoc.ac.uk/media/proceedings_a...

Bottom line is that the Sun is responsible for no more than 10% of the current global warming. Humans are responsible for 80-90%.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Climate_Change_...

Well, Um, Jack, honey....where do you think the "warm" in global warming comes from if it doesn't come from the sun?

Okay - enough teasing - let me answer your question seriously, please.

You know how a car gets hotter than the air around it when it sits in the sun? That is "auto warming," I suppose. It's caused by the sun's rays going through the glass and being converted to infrared (heat.) The visible light goes through the glass in, but less of the invisible infrared bounces back out, so the car's interior becomes noticeably warmer than the surrounding air.

The furor over global warming is analogous. Carbon Dioxide, or CO2, is a "green house gas," that acts like a car's window to allow visible light in but trap infrared. There are other green house gasses, like methane, but CO2 is one we can trace to human activities.

Yes, solar activity causes variation in the amount of light reaching the earth. Yes climate cycles exist naturally. The question is not whether or not green house gasses exist, or whether the cycles exist. The concern is more legitimately are we artificially causing what may be a really bad case of "hot car" on a global scale in addition to those natural phenomena? The problem is the lag time between the behavior and the effects of that behavior. As long as there is a lag, people go on without adjusting the behavior. Some fear that by the time the effects are so overwhelmingly evident that we muster the political will to act, we may have tipped a balance that we can not practically or without disastrous consequences reverse.

so i'm guessing ur try to say sense global warming happened on these other planets that doesn't have human life then its the sun that causes global warming and not humans,which is for the most part true.i think the sun is causing warming on these other planets but doesn't their atmosphere and natural components have something to do with it also.mecury is the closet planet to the sun, venus is the second closet but venus is hotter due to its atmosphere.there are more components to global warming then just the sun

yes the sun has in the pass caused global warming.the earth went into cycles of warming and cooling but this was before human influece,before the instrual revoultion.

That period of time was a solar maximum. You would expect warming throughout the solar system in that period.

http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/SunspotCycle.sht...

What's scary is when we hit solar minimums and STILL have the warmest years on record here on earth. This is evidence of an unnatural, anthropogenic warming.

What happens when we hit solar max again in 2011? It could be globally catastrophic.

no the sun has cycles, but these cycles are very slow whats happening on earth is very fast.

the carbon dioxide concentration have gone up by 33% since the industrial revolution. so do you think that it has nothing to do with the climate.

the most accurate climate models take into account carbon dioxide concentrations, so this coralation is just chance.

look at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change web page, they have looked at hundreds of studys and found with a >90% confadance level that carbon dioxide from fuels had led to a increase in global temperatures.

Moody Red

Roy Spencer the head of nasa it far from a scientist, he dosent believe in global warming and he also believes in Intelligent design, i think that could be more then a coinsedence.

So shouldn't it be called Solar system warming? The sun is what gives us heat, it is only reasonable to hypothesize that the shifting of heat would be cause by flare ups and sun spots. Big Al is not buying that explanation though, if he did he would have to give up the lime light.

That's a fact, Jack! (I always wanted to say that)

According to NASA's top climatologist Dr. Roy W. Spencer, there is no such thing as man made global warming.He is backed up by many major scientists around the world who say global warming is a swindle, and politically motivated.

Among those who concur are:

Tim Ball, Prof. University of Winnepeg

Prof. Shiaviv, Israel

Prof. Clark, Ontario

Prof. Reiter, Paris

Dr. Lindzen, M.I.T.