Earth System Science (ESS)
Climate Feedbacks
Climate Archives
Geological Time Scales
Climate and Human History
100

This is the study of Earth's land, oceans, and atmosphere as a single system.

What is Earth System Science (ESS)?

100

Reactions that push climate change in the same direction as the original forcing.

What are positive feedbacks?

100

The natural repository of clues about past climate conditions is called this.

What is the archives of nature?

100

This term describes the new geological era heavily influenced by human actions.

What is the Anthropocene?

100

The study of climate using information from nature and society is known as this.

What is climate history?

200

ESS views the Earth as this, composed of interacting subsystems.

What is a single system?

200

Melting polar ice, which further warms the climate, is an example of this type of feedback.

What is a positive feedback?

200

Human-produced records of past climate conditions are found in these archives.

What are the archives of society?

200

The Anthropocene is proposed to have begun around this year.

What is 1950?

200

This field scrutinizes claims about climate's impact on human society.

What is the history of climate and society (HCS)?

300

These are the four subsystems in ESS.

What are the geosphere, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and biosphere?

300

Feedbacks that counteract the original forcing and moderate climate change.

What are negative feedbacks?

300

Can reveal atmospheric conditions from as far back as hundreds of thousands of years through this technique.

What is ice core sampling?

300

The current geological epoch we live in, according to the formal geological time scale.

What is the Holocene?

300

The term for the idea that climate determines the course of human history.

What is climate determinism?

400

The geosphere consists of all the land, earth, and rock, and is sometimes called this.

What is the lithosphere?

400

Cloud cover that cools the Earth by blocking sunlight is an example of this feedback.

What is a negative feedback?

400

This type of record provides precise and accurate information about climate trends.

What are instrumental records?

400

The Anthropocene emphasizes the role of these in the current climate change.

What are human actions?

400

This historian pioneered the field of climate history by using sources from society.

Who is Christian Pfister?

500

External forces that alter the climate and cause reactions are known as these.

What are forcings?

500

These feedbacks can push climate change to a tipping point.

What are positive feedbacks?

500

Analyzing tree rings to study past climates is known as this.

What is dendrochronology?

500

The concept of the Anthropocene suggests climate change today is comparable to these.

What are past geological epochs?

500

Combining climate history and human history helps us better understand this.

What is our changing climate?