For the past 100 years, scientists have been warning people about climate change. The general opinion swung about three times, from cooling to warming to cooling to warming again. The fact is that the Earth's climate is constantly changing. There are cooling periods and warming periods. However, studies have shown that short-term temperature changes cannot be used as an indicator for future predictions. The fact that the Earth has experienced warming over the past century does not prove that the industrialization of humanity is the cause. If we want to even attempt to predict how the climate will change in the future, we need to look back over a longer time interval. Recent global warming is not the result of human activity, but of natural causes. 97 percent of the carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere comes from nature, not humans. Volcanoes, swamps, rice fields, leaf litter and even insects and bacteria produce carbon dioxide as well as methane. According to the journal Science (November 5, 1982), termites alone emit ten times more carbon dioxide than all the factories and automobiles in the world. Natural wetlands emit more greenhouse gases than all human activities combined. (If greenhouse warming is such a problem, why are we trying to save all the wetlands?) Earth's climate has followed a pretty clear pattern over the past 700,000 years. Throughout this period there have been a series of glacial cycles each lasting around 100,000 years. The cycle begins with 90,000 years of cooling, called the ice age, followed by 10,000 to 12,000 years of interglacial warming. The average temperature of the last ice age we had reached about 9 to 12.6 degrees Fahrenheit colder than it is today at its lowest p...... middle of paper.. ....sion=1.0>.Bob Carter. “Global warming is the result of natural forces.” Current controversies: global warming. Ed. Debra A. Miller. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2008. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale of wind. Anne Arundel Community College. April 19, 2010. Dennis T. Avery. “Global warming is caused by a climate cycle and not by greenhouse gases.” The cause: greenhouse gases. Ed. Ronnie D. Lankford. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2009. Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale of wind. Anne Arundel Community College. April 19. 2010 .