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Orbits of Jupiter and Venus Affect Earth's Climate, Says Study (usatoday.com)

According to a new study published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, gravitational tugs from the planets Jupiter and Venus gradually affect Earth's climate and life forms. The phenomenon occurs every 405,000 years and has been going on for at least 215 million years. USA Today reports: Jupiter and Venus are such strong influences because of their size and proximity. Venus is the nearest planet to us -- at its farthest, only about 162 million miles -- and roughly similar in mass. Jupiter is much farther away, but is the Solar System's largest planet. The study says that every 405,000 years, due to wobbles in our orbit caused by the gravitational pulls of the two planets, seasonal differences here on Earth become more intense. Summers are hotter and winters colder; dry times drier, wet times wetter. At the height of the cycle, more rain falls in the tropics, allowing lakes there to fill up. This compares to the other end of the cycle, when seasonal rains in the tropics "are less and lakes have much less of a tendency to become as full," [study lead author Dennis] Kent said. The results showed that the 405,000-year cycle is the most regular astronomical pattern linked to the Earth's annual turn around the sun, he said. Right now, we are in the middle of the cycle, as the most recent peak was around 200,000 years ago.

4 of 208 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Tax system to tax gravity... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Im NOT joking the joke is on everybody buying into the carbon emmision taxes crap over the global warming scare. Our little planet is doing her puberty thing and we are along for the ride. Just wait and see where the north pole is gonna endup.

  2. Re:Well well by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    ... some people will cling to anything in order to explain away things they don't want to take responsibility for ...

    Hang on, stop right there. Here is the biggest reason I can't stand eco-nazis. I am NOT responsible. You are using the wrong words, either on purpose or through ignorance, to emotionally charge your argument.

    The responsibility lies with the past dozen or so generations that built up and caused this problem. I inherit this problem, I own this problem, I must be one of the many that suffer to fix the problem. But stop with the bullshit that we, alive now, CAUSED this and bear responsibility for it. All we get to do is choose to make it better or make it worse.

    Instead, you call people that don't like your attitude retards. You are not actually convincing anyone to agree with you this way. Do you think having a prius or other electric car helps? Wrong. Get a bicycle. Have you ever traveled by air? Not helping. Eat foods from all over the world that aren't locally in season? Your fault too. Now please shut up with the alarmist eco-nazi bullshit unless you are actually setting a good example. Oh, you use computers and the internet? Wasteful...

  3. Re: Tax system to tax gravity... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Climate skeptics more eco-friendly than global-warming alarmists: study

    "A study by Cornell and the University of Michigan researchers found that those “highly concerned” about climate change were less likely to engage in recycling and other eco-friendly behaviors than global-warming skeptics."

    LOL!

  4. Re:Flat Sun Society by religionofpeas · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Even typical short term variations of 0.1% in incident irradiance exceed all other energy sources (such as natural radioactivity in Earth's core) combined)

    Which is irrelevant. Just because there are even smaller sources of heat, doesn't make the 0.1% swings any more important.

    Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more

    Whatever this effect is, it can't be big on a global scale, because we don't see any significant 11-year period in the Earth's global temperature. And, actually, since the 1980's, the output of the Sun has been decreasing a tiny bit, while surface temperatures have gone up to create new record highs. The correlation just isn't there.