Life waxes and wanes with bobbing of the Solar System

[Brian]

Life waxes and wanes with bobbing of the Solar System (http://www.thetechlounge.com/news/9634/+Life+waxes+and+wanes+with+bobbing+of+the+Solar+Sy stem/)

"The solar system's up-and-down motion across our galaxy's disc periodically exposes it to higher doses of dangerous cosmic rays, new calculations suggest. The effect could explain a mysterious dip in the Earth's biodiversity every 62 million years.

The solar system moves through the Milky Way rather like a child on a merry-go-round. It completes a circuit of the galaxy once every 100 million years or so but as it goes it bobs up and down through the dense galactic disc.

Previous research had suggested this motion might affect Earth's climate as the solar system passes through the giant hydrogen clouds concentrated in the galaxy's spiral arms. Some researchers have said these clouds could be dense enough to sprinkle the Earth's atmosphere with dust, blocking out sunlight and cooling the planet."

Read full story here (http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn8923--life-waxes-and-wanes-with-bobbing-of-the-solar-system.html)

[Burrell]

Add the sunspot cycles of 11 years and something around 40 years and then volcano cycles of 10s of thousands of years for major events which cause solar changes.

Then the Milankovitch cycles of 10s of thousands of years in 3 basic variations in Earth's orbit with respect to the Sun and you have variable Solar energy input to the Earth's atmosphere and surface which become very complex, yet seem to have some long term verifiable cycles, like the 110,000 CO2 cycle verified from the Antarctic Vostok ice core samples.
<http://www.aos.wisc.edu/~aos100-2/clim/>

Finally the Milky Way-Solar System interaction adds another variable.

But it is all human's fault that climate changes occur, according to some people of late. I don't buy it.

It is far more complex than most average commentators make it out to be.

[Frosty]

i've heard of this but its kinda of cool to think about