The Climatic Environment

Abstract

The patterns of life are influenced by many processes operating at different spatial and temporal scales. The last two chapters focused on continental drift and glaciation. Continental drift is recognized as a geologic process that occurs on a global scale over the course of millions of years. Glaciation is a meteorological phenomenon that also has global geological impact, but operates in cycles of tens and hundreds of thousands of years. This chapter will focus on general meteorological phenomena of the Earth: weather and climate. Weather is the current condition of the atmosphere. Weather has diurnal and annual cycles and has an immediate impact on the Earth’s organisms. Climate is the long-term average of weather. Current practice in the United States describes climatic norms by using a 30-year mean which is updated each decade.