Quote:
Originally Posted by roflwaffle
Um, welcome to 2005? The increase in solar irradiance has been about a fifteenth of the total increase in radiative forcing. About 14 parts emissions due to human activities and about 1 part the sun.
So if we're interested in the behavior of the climate, we shouldn't study the climate? Heck, if we all stuck thermometers up our butts, maybe we could use that temperature info to study cosmology. 
*throws grenade*
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Did you notice how I said "Cosmic" not "Solar"?
There are 1,000 kinds of radiation happening at the same time, and everyone seems to focus on the one closest to us.. nevermind the huge black hole that noone fully understands at the center of the galaxy, nor the 15 other ones approaching it at speeds that we can't begin to fathom. Nevermind the fact that Earth's orbit is not a perfect ellipse, and changes with cosmic distortion, so that over the course of a few thousand years, the Earth's orbit around the sun may have changed to put it a few thousand miles closer to the Sun than it was previously.
I'm not suggesting that Global blahblahblah doesn't exist, nor am I dismissing it (fully). I just wish that people who discount one input or another would actually consider them all before opening their gloat holes.
On a micro scale, it's very easy to say that the difference that has been caused by humans is the sole reason for the global temperature to change, but when ALL the inputs are considered, you may be surprised by what comes to light. The existence of inputs beyond our control is a certainty, I can assure you that. To what extent those inputs are effecting our potential eventual demise, I do not know.
Regarding whether or not we should use temperatures outside the realm of air temps and sea surface temps, there is a compelling point for it - namely, that Earthen temperature can't change in minutes. If you're looking for basic temperature information, it's perfectly fine to look at the temperature elements directly around you. If you're looking for trending, either increasing or decreasing, you'll want to look at something that doesn't change on a daily and biannual basis, and doesn't have real-time input from solar radiation or changes in air-temp.