| You're a little confused here. "Ice Age" is when there's ice on the planet .. the planet is in an ice age and has been for a long long time - a bit longer than humans have existed in modern form. The Quaternary glaciation, also known as the Pleistocene glaciation, is an alternating series of glacial and interglacial periods during the Quaternary period that began 2.58 Ma (million years ago) and is ongoing.
~ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaternary_glaciationIn terms of the glacial cycle the planet was due to begin cooling and enter a period of greater glaciaton than currently existed in, say, the 1880's. "Was due" but didn't happen is key, and the reason for that is the increase in insulation like a few extra blankets thrown on the bed by human activity - the clearly recorded and well sourced increase in CO2 levels that much has been written about. If you're looking for detail and definitions then I'd suggest looking through the IPCC report(s) or start with something foundational such as Syukuro Manabe's 1967 classic Thermal Equilibrium of the Atmosphere with a Given Distribution of Relative Humidity https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/24/3/1520-04... |
an ice age consists of alternating paired epochs 'glacial - interglacial'
an ice age is when things are bad cold sea level drops and icing occurs
interglacial is the opposite bright warm sea level is high
within these epochs periods of cooling and warming are also distinguished but on a smaller scale
the end of the last glacial epoch began about 20.000 years ago
we are now living in an interglacial epoch that began 11.700 years ago
and one example of a slight cooling in our generally warm times was the Little Ice Age which lasted from the fourteenth to the middle of the nineteenth century
after that global warming began intensified by anthropogenic impact
p.s.
point: saying that 'global warming' is caused by human activity is like saying 'coffee with milk' is just 'milk'