Reply #10: It is a valid comparison since both types of catastrophe fuck up planetary energy balance.

[joshcryer]

As yet there have been well over 2000 nuclear weapons tests since we invented the bomb. Nuclear winter, unlike global warming, is theorized, and some people believe we'd get at most a "nuclear autumn." Assuming another 20 years of no CO2 abatement (which is the likely outcome) nuclear winter would merely serve to balance out the warming that we have caused.

I'd be more concerned about the billions dying from radiation poisoning and direct effects from nuclear war than a "nuclear winter."