Originally Posted by: CW14The whole thing's just a natural cycle of the earth if you ask me. The average temperature goes up by one degree and it's like 'HOLY CRAP THE WORLD'S HEATING UP IT MUST BE THOSE FOSSIL FUELS'.
The temperatures have been going up, down and all over the place for the past gazillion years or so ever since man was able to measure temperature. I doubt we've had much impact on that at all...

You're right about the cyclic fluctuations, but our contribution happens to coincide with one of these natural increases. If you look >here< you'll see that the current CO2 level is nearly twice as high as it's ever been!

The scientific community is not arguing about that; its accepted fact. The debate revolves around what effect that will have, and what we can, or should, do about it. Global temperatures have been much higher in the past than they are now, but no one knows what to expect from the dramatically higher CO2 levels.