The Earth is able to control its temperature even in dramatic situations

A study by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has pointed out that the Earth has a “stabilizing feedback” mechanism that keeps global temperatures within a stable, habitable range, even in the face of dramatic changes. Scientists believe that “silicate weathering,” a geological process that eventually pulls carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and traps it in rocks, plays an important role in regulating the Earth’s carbon cycle.

Such a mechanism would be able to provide a geologically constant force to keep carbon dioxide and global temperatures in check. However, until now there has never been any direct evidence to corroborate the existence of such feedback.

Therefore, the MIT team applied a mathematical model to paleoclimate data of global mean temperatures over the past 66 million years to find any characteristic patterns of stabilization phenomena. Scientists have found that indeed there appears to be a consistent pattern in which the Earth’s temperature swings are smoothed out over time. The duration of the flakes is similar to the time it takes for silicate erosion to act.

That Research is the first to use real data to confirm the existence of a stabilizing feedback, the mechanism of which is probably silicate erosion. This stabilizing feedback would explain how Earth has remained habitable through dramatic weather events in the geological past.

According to MIT graduate student Constantin Arnscheidt, this finding is very interesting because “we know that today’s global warming will eventually be reversed through this stabilizing feedback,” however, he warns that this process “will take hundreds of thousands of years to happen, so it may not be fast enough to solve our current problems.”

Temperature history wasn’t the only data used in the study

In addition to global temperature fluctuations through geological history, the researchers also worked with a number of records of the chemical composition of fossils and ancient sea shells, as well as preserved Antarctic ice cores. According to the hypotheses formulated for the research, if there were no stabilizing feedbacks, global temperature fluctuations would increase over time. However, this was not the case, as stabilization reigned before very extreme fluctuations.

Over longer timescales, the data revealed no stabilizing feedbacks. Thus there appears to be no recurring retreat of global temperatures on timescales longer than a million years. So the question remains: what kept global temperatures in check during that period? While some scientists point to the case, others argue that there must be a stabilizing feedback. Arnscheidt believes the answer probably lies somewhere between these two extremes. It may be a fluke, but some mechanism probably worked to keep the Earth habitable.

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Source: Olhar Digital