>Maybe so. But then, the system can withstand a lot of disturbance - the albedo of the planet can vary (just the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krakatoa#Effects show enough) etc. It doesn't mean the humans on the planet would fare easily. Just in the last four years I've seen floods in central Europe (2004 or 2006?); a hurricane season with borrowing from Greek alphabet (2005), once-in-500-years floods in Iowa (ongoing now), and several other things which may have been written off as "once in nnn years those have to happen". Can anyone explain, then, why do we have at least one of those almost every year now?

Uh, better information access?