Cause of Global Climate Changes: Correlation of Global Temperature, Sunspots, Solar Irradiance, Cosmic Rays, and Radiocarbon and Berylium Production Rates, Hacker News

Global temperature changes show excellent correlations with sunspots, total solar irradiance,¹⁴C and¹⁰Be production in the upper atmosphere, and cosmic ray incidence. Periods of global cooling coincided with these changes during the Oort, Wolf, Maunder, Dalton, 1880 – 1915, and 1945 – 1977 Solar Minimums. Increased¹⁴C and¹⁰Be production during times of increased cosmic radiation serves as a proxy for solar activity .

Increased cloudiness, produced by ionization of aerosols in the atmosphere by cosmic rays, causes increased reflection of incoming solar irradiance and results in cooling of the atmosphere. The amount of cosmic radiation is greatly affected by the sun’s magnetic field, so during times of weak solar magnetic field, more cosmic radiation reaches the Earth, creating more cloudiness and cooling the atmosphere.

This mechanism accounts for the global synchronicity of climate changes, abrupt climate reversals, and climate changes on all time scales . Thus, cloud-generating cosmic rays provide a satisfactory explanation for both long-term and short-term climate changes.