Scientists say human greenhouse gas emissions have canceled the next ice age

[IDemo]

At a time of intense planetary warming, it’s odd to even contemplate a counterfactual world in which we might instead be in or heading into a glacial period, sometimes more popularly called an “ice age.”

But new research published Wednesday in the influential journal Nature suggests that we may have had a close scrape with such a period earlier in the current geological epoch known as the Holocene — and that pre-industrial human modifications of the climate through agriculture, fires and deforestation might have just barely staved it off.

“Humanity narrowly escaped a glacial inception in the middle of the Holocene, which was almost suppressing the formation of civilization,” says Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, one of the paper’s three authors and founding director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (tjhe other authors are also affiliated with the institute).

Moreover, the study says, massive human greenhouse gas emissions since that time have likely “postponed” what might otherwise be another ice age “by at least 100,000 years.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/01/13/scientists-say-humans-have-basically-canceled-the-next-ice-age/

[hedda_foil]

1. I have a feeling this is going to explode in the researchers faces.

[GliderGuider]

2. Can you explain why? nt

[hedda_foil]

3. No. That's why it's just a feeling.

[bloom]

4. This is not really a new idea.

From looking at various data - it has been suggested for quite a while that an ice age would have been on the horizon - if greenhouse gases and global warming had not happened.

So one way to look at it would be - well that's good we're not having an ice age - as that would bring it's own set of problems. If humanity was really smart we would try to maintain greenhouse gases at the optimum level - but we aren't really that smart. At least not yet.

[hedda_foil]

5. If that's the case, and I doubt if there were enough humans on the planet to change climate then..

The Holocene began with rapid deglaciation and the retreat of the Neolithic ice sheets about 12,000 years ago. The number of people moving up and out of the ice age temperate zones was rather small, though they multiplied over the years This theory postulates another ice age around 6,000 years ago, which would make the Holocene just a minor interruption in a very long ice age. It also postulates that humans were sufficient in number by 6,000 years ago to affect the onrushing return of the ice sheets to pre-thaw levels. There simply weren't enough people on earth at that time to have affected the climate with the limited technology of the time.

This paper appears to be saying that we should all thank our lucky stars for human-caused global warming because it's saving us from another ice age.

I find it suspicious and would like to know who funded the research and how long it's been since the lead author started up his grandly named "institute."
But that's just me.