The nature of the climate system is reviewed. We then review the history of scientific approaches to major problems in climate, noting that the centrality of the contribution of carbon dioxide is relatively recent, and probably inappropriate to much of the Earth’s climate history. The weakness of characterizing the overall climate behavior using only one physical process, globally averaged radiative forcing, is illustrated by considering the role of an equally well-known process, meridional heat transport by hydrodynamic processes which, by changing the equator-to-pole temperature difference, also impact global mean temperature.

中文翻译：

---

基于单一过程对气候行为的过于简化的描述可能会导致错误的结论

审查了气候系统的性质。然后，我们回顾了解决气候主要问题的科学方法的历史，并指出二氧化碳贡献的中心作用是相对较新的，并且可能不适合地球的许多气候历史。通过考虑一个同样著名的过程的作用，即通过流体动力学过程的子午热传递，该过程通过改变赤道至极点的温度来说明仅使用一个物理过程（全球平均辐射强迫）来表征总体气候行为的缺点。差异，也会影响全球平均温度。