Merging this post and the "top" post and we can come to a few interesting ideas and exercise our minds.

The history of the Earth is almost completely unknown. We have an off-kilter axis and a slight planetary wobble. We have yet another magnetic pole. If Earth were a top, we might see that it was losing its equilibrium and starting on its decline.

It does not take an extraordinary stretch of the imagination to assume that our seasons, which we take for granted as 'normal' are really a sign of a planet in decline. Life on our world now oscillates and compensates for the extremes of weather, both hot and cold and the living things which have not compensated have died off.

It is also easy to hypothesize that whatever catastrophic event initially imbalanced the Earth, upsetting its balance and axis, set in motion a chain of events that are impossible to halt with our current scientific understanding. The wobble on a top shows it is imbalanced and is losing energy to its environment via friction. Our Earth is, quite possibly, losing energy to the solar magnetic field - causing a slowing of the rotation, harsher seasonal changes, etcetera.

Imagine the Earth before - no seasons - and a balanced climate evenly dispersed over the surface. Living things get used to balmy temperatures over the majority of the planet's surface and extreme cold only exists at the poles. Suddenly the catastrophe occurs, perhaps an impact or a near miss with a large object, and the axis is shifted.

The first seasons begin. Plant life must adapt. All living things must adapt. Storms, for the first time develop as hot and cold systems meet. Creatures which have never known frost die off en masse. Millions of plant species and living organisms perish due to the tilt and the havoc it plays with the weather.

From this moment on, the Earth's planetary evolution has been forever altered and shortened. Weather extremes will continue to increase as the imbalanced Earth slows down. Hotter summers, colder winters and due to this, fiercer storms and oscillating ice ages and hot periods.

Ironically, the very conditions which may have made it possible for man to become dominant on this world may be the conditions which, sooner than anyone ever imagined, evict him from it. And make no doubt about it - humanity will be evicted from Earth, and it will leave or it will perish in the throes of a dying world.

As the world slows, temperature disparities will increase. Hots will get hotter and colds will get colder. 170 degree summers and -100 degree winters could be just a few thousand years away along with storms, hurricanes and extremes of such intensity that most living things will perish or be confined to ever smaller portions of the planet which are relatively balanced.

Food for thought, and a necessary understanding of the Earth's climate mechanism you are very unlikely to hear from most climatologists.