Perhaps 30 percent of all the sunlight reaching Earth from the Sun is reflected back into space by clouds, snow, land and water surfaces. Air masses are affected by the spinning of the Earth on its axis as it orbits the Sun. The spinning of Earth causes air masses to rotate. This phenomenon can be seen in weather satellite photographs. When the rotation becomes a tight, rapidly spinning whorl the air mass is called a cyclone.
Cyclones are our biggest storms.
The climate of Earth has been in a constant state of change ever since the planet was first formed and it is still changing. The change happens relatively slowly and we have only recently developed the tools and the knowledge necessary to discover the patterns of change over past eras and to record the gradual changes that are happening during our own lifetimes. Detailed, accurate records of the weather have only been kept for the past few decades. But, there are lots of places to look for clues - rock formations, ocean sediment cores, pollen in amber, or tree rings. When 17th century Dutch artists painted their now famous winter landscapes they were illustrating the fact that there were many extremely cold winters in the 17th-century.