Sunspot Minimum or "Is the sun going to sleep?"

[Mr. Pockets]

Originally Posted by JesseK

If you combine some NASA photos with findings (such as evidence that ice used to be at the top of a 1000-ft plateau in Madagascar) that support the 'Snowball Earth' theory, it seems logical that climate change is happening and that it can have huge ramifications. Yet I fear the uneducated masses will use a colder year that results from a docile sunspot maximum season as evidence that climate change is a myth.

Originally Posted by EricH

It may be (who knows) that the sunspots, huge volcanic eruptions, etc. that produce extra-cold winters and summers are acting as counters to global warming, giving the earth a chance to recover.

I know this might be a tad off topic, but as some comments have been made in reference to global warming I have a quick question: why are people so convinced that human activity is dominant cause of global warming. I'm not saying it isn't (I'm hardly anything remotely resembling an expert on the area), but warming and cooling far beyond what we are experiencing has happened in the past (way before humans industrialized). Take the end of the ice age, when the glaciers covering a massive portion of the northern hemisphere receded. There were no people spreading greenhouse gases at that point, so it's not as if natural warming has never occurred. I don't doubt that human activity plays a role in global warming (or cooling), but I think people might be a little quick to exaggerate it.
Just my $0.02