[euromodder]

Originally Posted by dcb

just looking at trends, it looks like temperature is rising to me:
average global temperature - Wolfram|Alpha

Is there a question that the temperature is rising? Or is the question one of why? or??

No, it's just a question of what period to look at.
Check out the Bob Carter video.

If you pick your period, you can claim whatever you wish for : cooling, warming, stability .

That ridiculously short-term dataplot seems to indicate a rise.
Make the time frame longer, and you'll see a slow decline in temperature along with similar previous periods of temporary warming.
Make it even longer, and you'll see it's been a lot warmer, and that things are cooling down quite a bit (unlike this discussion ).
Expand to 500.000 years to see previous cycles of long cold periods and short-lived warm periods, and you'll see the only realistic way to expect temperature to go is not up, but down ....