Abstract
The authors identify and describe the following global forces of nature driving the Earth’s climate: (1) solar radiation as a dominant external energy supplier to the Earth, (2) outgassing as a major supplier of gases to the World Ocean and the atmosphere, and, possibly, (3) microbial activities generating and consuming atmospheric gases at the interface of lithosphere and atmosphere. The writers provide quantitative estimates of the scope and extent of their corresponding effects on the Earth’s climate. Quantitative comparison of the scope and extent of the forces of nature and anthropogenic influences on the Earth’s climate is especially important at the time of broad-scale public debates on current global warming. The writers show that the human-induced climatic changes are negligible.
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Acknowledgements
The authors express their sincere gratitude to Professor Oleg Sorokhtin of Moscow University for granting permission to use some of the materials in his unpublished manuscripts. The support of this research provided by Dr. Jemmy Yu is also greatly appreciated.
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Khilyuk, L.F., Chilingar, G.V. On global forces of nature driving the Earth’s climate. Are humans involved?. Environ Geol 50, 899–910 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-006-0261-x
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00254-006-0261-x