From the UK Telegraph – source link
The protective bubble around the sun that helps to shield the Earth from harmful interstellar radiation is shrinking and getting weaker, NASA scientists have warned.
By Richard Gray, Science Correspondent
Last Updated: 9:23AM BST 19 Oct 2008
New data has revealed that the heliosphere, the protective shield of energy that surrounds our solar system, has weakened by 25 per cent over the past decade and is now at it lowest level since the space race began 50 years ago.
Scientists are baffled at what could be causing the barrier to shrink in this way and are to launch mission to study the heliosphere.
The Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, will be launched from an aircraft on Sunday on a Pegasus rocket into an orbit 150,000 miles above the Earth where it will “listen” for the shock wave that forms as our solar system meets the interstellar radiation.
Dr Nathan Schwadron, co-investigator on the IBEX mission at Boston University, said: “The interstellar medium, which is part of the galaxy as a whole, is actually quite a harsh environment. There is a very high energy galactic radiation that is dangerous to living things.
“Around 90 per cent of the galactic cosmic radiation is deflected by our heliosphere, so the boundary protects us from this harsh galactic environment.”
The heliosphere is created by the solar wind, a combination of electrically charged particles and magnetic fields that emanate a more than a million miles an hour from the sun, meet the intergalactic gas that fills the gaps in space between solar systems.
At the boundary where they meet a shock wave is formed that deflects interstellar radiation around the solar system as it travels through the galaxy.
The scientists hope the IBEX mission will allow them to gain a better understanding of what happens at this boundary and help them predict what protection it will offer in the future.
Without the heliosphere the harmful intergalactic cosmic radiation would make life on Earth almost impossible by destroying DNA and making the climate uninhabitable.
Measurements made by the Ulysses deep space probe, which was launched in 1990 to orbit the sun, have shown that the pressure created inside the heliosphere by the solar wind has been decreasing.
Dr David McComas, principal investigator on the IBEX mission, said: “It is a fascinating interaction that our sun has with the galaxy surrounding us. This million mile an hour wind inflates this protective bubble that keeps us safe from intergalactic cosmic rays.
“With less pressure on the inside, the interaction at the boundaries becomes weaker and the heliosphere as a whole gets smaller.”
If the heliosphere continues to weaken, scientists fear that the amount of cosmic radiation reaching the inner parts of our solar system, including Earth, will increase.
This could result in growing levels of disruption to electrical equipment, damage satellites and potentially even harm life on Earth.
But Dr McComas added that it was still unclear exactly what would happen if the heliosphere continued to weaken or what even what the timescale for changes in the heliosphere are.
He said: “There is no imminent danger, but it is hard to know what the future holds. Certainly if the solar wind pressure was to continue to go down and the heliosphere were to almost evaporate then we would be in this sea of galactic cosmic rays. That could have some large effects.
“It is likely that there are natural variations in solar wind pressure and over time it will either stabilise or start going back up.”
(hat tip to Dvid Gladstone)
I’m glad you picked this story up that I sent you, Anthony.
REPLY: thanks for the reminder, I got it again fresh today from another source, but you were the first.
Oh my, how did man cause this one?
Interesting times . . . . .
You mean there is something that CO2 isn’t causing?
This is worrying.
Gol-dingy! There oughta be a law against the sun changing.
(Give it time. Our cream-o’-the-crop politicians will think of some law to pass in order to be seen as “doing somthing.” I suppose tinfoil hats will become mandatory and be federally regulated. Me, I’m going to beat the rush and start evolving a cosmic radiation-proof hide now. I can’t wait for Washington.)
Seriously, that’s some disconcerting news. I was unaware of the issue.
I’ve heard there has been also an increase in the intensity of sun shine. Could that be connected and is there any scientific proof and maybe graphs/data to look at?
WT
Imagine the fun if it turns out the best defense for our blue planet is higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations…
Without the heliosphere the harmful intergalactic cosmic radiation would make life on Earth almost impossible by destroying DNA and making the climate uninhabitable.
Nonsense – only man made CO2 can affect the climate. The sun has nothing to do with the radiative heat balance of the earth.
If we are, in fact, heading toward a solar minimum, wouldn’t this affect both climate on earth and the solar wind? It also seems reasonable that this is cyclical. It’s worrying because of our short view of things, but if we had data for the past 1000 years, this would be normal and predictable.
Here comes the Maunder or Dalton Minimum… 🙁
Bah! Fifty years is nothing!
Why, I remember the heliodip of 1,234,567 BC! The cosmic radiation was so bad we could only leave our caves carrying mammoth skulls over our heads…the thicker the better. Imagine commuting to work with a bone umbrella and a stone briefcase…on foot…uphill…both ways. 🙂
Seriously, this is great news. We learn a lot more about nature when things change. Good times for solar science.
Now if only our planet’s climate system weren’t so darn stable…
This is very worrying. As I read it I kept thinking about the punctuated equilibrium theory of evolution. If this is a long-term cycle, it will start to go up again before it kills everything, since life has gone on for 3+ billion years. But how long is that cycle, how low does it go, and to what extent has it effected DNA in the past?
I know I’m stretching my imagination a bit, but I can’t help but wonder.
I too think this is cyclical. Every 22 or so years the cosmic ray measures flatten at the top instead of peaking. Leif has said this flat, peak, flat, peak thing related to cosmic rays measured during minimums when they can get into the atmosphere to be measured, is related to the complete switch from positive leading, to negative leading, then back to positive leading sunspots. I may have that reversed and it should be negative leading, to positive leading, then back to negative leading sunspots but you get the point. The fact that this happens is related to the Sun’s magnetic shield strength (Leif please correct if wrong) as it builds and weakens during these 22 year cycles. It could then be that there are longer cycles that result in waxing and waning shield strength. Anyway, I think that Leif has talked about this phenomena in some of his articles and will shortly refer us to them. I hope so. By and large, this is nothing to worry about, at least in that it has probably happened before.
Okay, so it’s shrinking. Supposedly alot. So where’s the graphic so we can get an idea of the scale of the problem?
Or is the ‘bubble’ so expansive that it could shrink by, say 75% and Earth would still reside within it’s protective sphere of influence?
Anthony,
Once again you have posted on this subject so obviously have suspicions this phenomenon is now affecting and will affect climatic conditions on earth. Do you think it is inclusive of the PDO shift or a separate issue that may add to it? It would seem with the sun at such low levels, if Svensmark et al are correct with respect to GCR, the possibility of a serious drop in global temperatures may in fact be witnessed in a few short years.
As oceans have been releasing enormous amounts of heat into space, if OHC continues to wane and decline, isn’t it logical to assume surface temperatures at some point will begin to decline as well, and more rapidly apart from ENSO? It would certainly be nice if Josh Willis would make the Argo OHC data available to the public. Jason1sea level data is in limbo as well.
If oceans do not continue to accumulate heat, there is no “global” warming.
First the dot com bubble, then the housing bubble, and now the heliosphere bubble. I’m about bubbled out.
Maybe there’s a silver lining. We could sell solar offsets. Get in the game before Algore figures out what’s going on.
Or lead hats. Lead roofing. Cosmic ray shelters. Protect your DNA, move underground!
I’m sure there’s money to made in this latest sky-is-falling report somehow.
I have read that it takes Earth approx 300,000 years to complete one orbit of the galaxy. Are there any Earth events that have a 300,000 year pattern?
According to the “Cosmic Rays Seed Clouds” theory, an increase in cosmic rays should increase cloud cover and accelerate cooling. I don’t know what the status of that theory is, but it’s probably better than “Man Made CO2 Causes Catastrophic Global Warming”.
I don’t think we should use the term “bubble”. It implies a boundary, a hard border. It is more likely a statistical transition region that is defined by how many and of what energy GCRs permeate the heliosphere. I’m sure that there’s no “light switch” or “step function” point in the heliosphere.
Swampie,
Obviously it is caused by the same chlorofluorocarbons that caused the hole in the ozone.
Al Gore told me so!
He forgot to add this, which I though was compulsory for any MSM science reporter today.
“It has been claimed by some scientists that the increase in cosmic radiation hitting Earth might cold down earth’s temperature.
However the huge majority of scientists dismiss such claim and conclude that the human increase in greenhouse gases will continue to warm up the Earth’s climate to dangerous levels. This was reported by a consensus UN report from IPCC which was compiled by over 2500 scientists.”
Is it just me or are these sunspots that show cycle 24 polarity starting out nearer the equator than other ramping up cycles and would that lead one to hypothesis that the Sun really didn’t have enough magnetic energy to allow cycle 24 sunspots to pop out further towards the poles? They were there but just didn’t have enough mojo to get to the surface and now the conveyor belt is more towards the equator now. I remember many months ago when some of us were saying that the very first sunspot tiny tim was way back in 2006. Might we already be a quarter of the way to maximum?
“Without the heliosphere the harmful intergalactic cosmic radiation would make life on Earth almost impossible by destroying DNA and making the climate uninhabitable.”
We’re all gonna die!
“It is likely that there are natural variations in solar wind pressure and over time it will either stabilise or start going back up.”
Well, maybe not! 🙂
/sarc off (proper protocol)
this is my favorite web site. thanks again for another interesting article.
‘Scientists are baffled at what could be causing the barrier to shrink…’ but Carl Rove and Dick Cheney sinisterly declined comment and refused to return phone calls from the New York Times.
“There is a very high energy galactic radiation that is dangerous to living things.”
The intragalactic dark radiant energy in the Milky Way Galaxy theory, as a cause of global wackiness, er, warming, has credibility? 🙂
/sarc off
See the following web site archive for that early cycle 24 tiny tim.
http://space.newscientist.com/article/dn9778-first-sunspot-of-next-solar-cycle-glimpsed.html
There is a reference to Leif at the end as an alternative view of the strength of cycle 24 from that of Hathaway.
This is the typical [misleading] NASA announcement. They are under pressure to show that their data and findings are extraordinary and spectacular breakthroughs, and so overhype everything. Here http://www.leif.org/research/SolarWindFlowPressure.png is a graph of the solar wind flow pressure [normalized to Earth’s distance] since spacecraft measurements began. The Ulysses data refer to the two red circles. As should be obvious, the last polar passes are indeed lower than the previous passes [at solar minimum], but this is just part of the normal waxing and waning of the solar wind. There has been several times in the past where the flow pressure was the same or even lower, so no big deal, and no alarms should be sounded. It is like discovering that it is colder in winter than in summer.
Pamela Gray (19:20:48) :
Is it just me or are these sunspots that show cycle 24 polarity starting out nearer the equator than other ramping up cycles
Yes, it is just you.
Leif, when someone lobs one across the plate like that, the best response is usually to resist temptation ~ jeez (not posting in moderator role, jus little ol’ jeez)
Isn’t this just another confirmation of what we skeptics have been saying all along: the substantial majority of recent warming stems from variation in direct and indirect solar effects?
[…] Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking […]
jeez (20:15:02) :
Leif, when someone lobs one across the plate like that, the best response is usually to resist temptation ~ jeez (not posting in moderator role, jus little ol’ jeez)
Since you did not supply a timed or named reference, I don’t know what you are referring to. If it was Pamela Gray (19:20:48) : I’ll just remark that there was no temptation, I was simply telling Pamela that there is nothing unusual about the latitude of the SC24 spots.
[…] by our heliosphere, so the boundary protects us from this harsh galactic environment.” From Watts Up With That? Original source: Telegraph.co.uk _____________________________________________________ 20 […]
CERN have been sufficiently convinced that very high energy galactic origin cosmic rays are a factor in global cloud cover and therefore of possible significance to climate variability to have set up a cloud chamber experiment at the LHC.
Considering the unexpected and so far unexplained changes taking place in the heliosphere it is unfortunate that this experiment will be delayed past it’s 2010 date by the recent damage to the LHC.
Data from such an experiment would have been invaluable as a base line measurement to test the effects of changes in these incoming high energy galactic particles on global cloud cover and therefore the global climate.
I think a few years ago there were a couple of papers that looked at and tried to check on cosmic ray levels over some millions of years at the global surface using alterations caused by cosmic ray debris impacts to the crystal structure of certain elements in ancient rock formations.
If a means of checking previous cosmic ray levels could be found then you could lay bets that the planet has been here innumerable times in the past.
To frighten the horses a bit more, this sort of low solar activity plus the consequent changes to the heliosphere and the galactic cosmic ray increase and the possibility of a resultant increased global cloud cover could just happen to have been the trigger that helped, along with other orbital changes, to tip the globe over into the ice ages in earth’s past history.
As for danger to life on earth, just another throwaway line from a scientist who probably does not quite realise that this sort of off the cuff comment is likely to be taken up by some ignorant journo who has no scruples about accuracy but just wants that all important grossly overblown scoop which will frighten the hell out of the public once again and raise sales.
Could get interesting when the Doomsday warmers meet the Doomsday coldies at Armageddon!
mark wagner (20:16:15) :
Isn’t this just another confirmation of what we skeptics have been saying all along: the substantial majority of recent warming stems from variation in direct and indirect solar effects?
No, it is not.
I came over to check out the posts today, it’s pretty scary really when you realize how the sun can change so much. Life has survived for millions of years but nothing says it doesn’t have shortened life spans or high cancer rates for large portions of those time periods.
ROM (20:52:34) :
To frighten the horses a bit more, this sort of low solar activity plus the consequent changes to the heliosphere and the galactic cosmic ray increase and the possibility of a resultant increased global cloud cover could just happen to have been the trigger that helped, along with other orbital changes, to tip the globe over into the ice ages in earth’s past history.
Leif Svalgaard (20:10:04) :
This is the typical [misleading] NASA announcement. They are under pressure to show that their data and findings are extraordinary and spectacular breakthroughs, and so overhype everything. Here http://www.leif.org/research/SolarWindFlowPressure.png is a graph of the solar wind flow pressure [normalized to Earth’s distance] since spacecraft measurements began. The Ulysses data refer to the two red circles. As should be obvious, the last polar passes are indeed lower than the previous passes [at solar minimum], but this is just part of the normal waxing and waning of the solar wind. There has been several times in the past where the flow pressure was the same or even lower, so no big deal, and no alarms should be sounded. It is like discovering that it is colder in winter than in summer.
Leif, I would never be one to take offense to a simple answer, which I know, in your case, is backed by logic. So if others thought something off about your answer to me, I didn’t.
Pamela Gray (18:48:43) :
I too think this is cyclical. Every 22 or so years the cosmic ray measures flatten at the top instead of peaking. Leif has said this flat, peak, flat, peak ….
I am not sure we are in a typical cycle….this is showing signs of something bigger. The polar polarity strength is weaking….SC23 is prob still going,(way tooo long). We could see a phase catastrophe very soon.
And Neptune and Uranus are nearly lined up behind Jupiter.
Check it out for yourself, next year it will all be happening.
http://math-ed.com/Resources/GIS/Geometry_In_Space/java1/Temp/TLVisPOrbit.html
I am trying to find data of the equatorial rotation speed of the sun….there is some suggestion it slowed during the Dalton. Does anyone have a link?
‘Might we already be a quarter of the way to maximum?’
Yes, if it is a Maunder type event, the spikes of a shoulder will appear in the normal ramp up and then the curtain falls back down. But we don’t know that anymore than we know when the next named Minimum will suddenly dawn upon us.
See page 16 in LONG-TERM SOLAR CYCLE EVOLUTION: REVIEW OF RECENT
DEVELOPMENTS
I. G. USOSKIN1 and K. MURSULA2
I don’t know where you find this but nobrainer had it posted in another topic.
As for the warmies and coldies, all I want to know is which type of crops to plant to actually get something out of it other than wasted space plants.
You know, the basic stuff, food.
On a lighter note, if the cosmic rays gets deadly, we can all marvel at the sheer genius of the Pryamids, Stongehenge and start building Fred Flintstone huts.
They say the Stone Age really rocked out.
Possible source for this article:
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/23sep_solarwind.htm
Hmmmm.
Well this might be an explanation for:
1. Why the Mayan calendar ends on 2012.
2. Why at one point in history the number of humans on the planet were under 10,000.
3. I’m going to build an underground bunker so I can survive this and emerge as the last living man! I am Legend!!
Now I need to win the damn lottery to pay for it.
[…] Continued here: Comment on Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking by Richard deSousa […]
Hmmmm.
“Could get interesting when the Doomsday warmers meet the Doomsday coldies at Armageddon!”
Like that scene on South Park where everyone, but the Mormons, end up in Hell.
To paraphrase:
“So who was that was responsible for destroying the Earth?”
“It was the Mormons. The Mormons people. Ok form a line …”
What is this, science journalism day?
It seems there always has to be at least one line of hype such as this in these type of stories:
Certainly if the solar wind pressure was to continue to go down and the heliosphere were to almost evaporate then we would be in this sea of galactic cosmic rays. That could have some large effects.
I can accept variations in the solar wind, but down to virtually nothing? Come on now. That seems to take it out of the realm of science.
Robert Bateman (21:13:17)
See page 16 in LONG-TERM SOLAR CYCLE EVOLUTION: REVIEW OF RECENT
DEVELOPMENTS
I. G. USOSKIN1 and K. MURSULA2
I don’t know where you find this but nobrainer had it posted in another topic.
There you go Robert.
http://cc.oulu.fi/~usoskin/personal/SolPhys_Review_proof.pdf
OK, I’m talking through my hat here (no comments on that you…)
The fact that the probe is “listening” to some “signal” from the boundary indicates to me that a physical limit exists between the solar wind and the cosmic rays. We may not be able to see it or touch it, but a “sound” exists when the two meet.
Interesting. Leif, your illumination would help here. I’m an engineer. Worked with microwaves (which behave something like water – surprisingly) and fiber optics. Which leads me to postulate that such a boundary could exist.
Please, remember, – engineer – , words of two sylables or less please….
TNX
Mike (with a grin – never did like those erzats emoticons…)
Brett
the following sites have a description of the latest(I think) cosmic ray and cloud formation information.
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/influence-of-cosmic-rays-on-the-earth.pdf
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/sky-experiment_2.pdf
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/Cosmic_rays_and_climate.html
Leon Brozyna (21:51: “I can accept variations in the solar wind, but down to virtually nothing? Come on now. That seems to take it out of the realm of science.”
Why? That would certainly be out of the realm of science for those who e.g. say that Svensmark is a Flat Earth Society scientist. That’s almost the conclusion in the report by Laut and Damon. Laut was a person who has had order from IPCC and the document was refered by IPCC:
http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.berlingske.dk%2Farticle%2F20071215%2Fdanmark%2F712150037%2F&hl=sv&ie=UTF-8&sl=da&tl=en
There is nothing which legitimate the positive feedbacks in the AGW theory, which I think is out of the realm of good science. Complain about that makes AGW ppl say one has no idea of good science, but shall put all trust in IPCC. The feedback assumption is (or was; now it’s falsified) anyway stupid.
IPCC has been and are very much a political show.
Tom in ice free Florida (19:04:34) :
‘I have read that it takes Earth approx 300,000 years to complete one orbit of the galaxy. Are there any Earth events that have a 300,000 year patter?’
You are not far out Tom. It is actually 250 million years. You must have read your figure in The New Scientist. While I am here, perhaps the shrinking protective bubble occurs every 100,000 years, thereby allowing such an increase in cosmic rays that we rapidly enter a full ice age due to an increase in cloud cover.
Tom in ice free Florida (19:04:34) :
I have read that it takes Earth approx 300,000 years to complete one orbit of the galaxy. Are there any Earth events that have a 300,000 year pattern?
I think the current “agreed” galaxy orbit timescale is around 226 million years.
I would be looking closer….our solar system has much shorter patterns that line up with solar minima.
“Or is the ‘bubble’ so expansive that it could shrink by, say 75% and Earth would still reside within it’s protective sphere of influence?”
I don’t believe that is the correct way of thinking of it. A certain number of cosmic rays always penetrate to Earth. As the stream of particles from the Sun weakens, we see more of them penetrating to the inner solar system. It isn’t a matter of “shrinking” so much as it is a matter of “weakening” the way I understand it. And as it weakens, we get hit with more cosmic rays.
This could have happened many times in the past. It could result in more cancers or genetic mutations of various sorts. It could be an event that triggered periods of evolution of new species as some of these mutations would prove beneficial and allow that species to eat more or evade predators better. These events might have also caused mass extinctions in the past or mass extinctions along with large numbers of genetic mutations. We just don’t know and only 5000 years of recorded history just isn’t enough time to know what happens on geological time spans of millions of years.
Point taken on the normality of the solar wind variations Leif and thank you for the correction and clarification.
Apologies for the speculation on the tipping points into Ice ages,.
Looks like you didn’t have much success in hosing down a lot of other speculation either.
Dendrochronologists have been in the firing line here so a couple of questions which relates to their profession.
Are the byproducts of cosmic ray collisions within the atmosphere of sufficient quantity and of sufficient difference to be able to be readily identified in soil and / or water samples?
If they are and can be readily detected can these byproducts of the cosmic ray collisions be taken up by trees and identified and the levels of take-up be measured in individual annual tree rings or is this beyond the current technology ?
The trees would probably need to come from very high altitudes where the cosmic ray effects would be most marked.
Living in Queensland Australia, from recent observations, the spring storms are getting more intense and becoming more like they were 1982-1990. I wonder in Svensmark’s theory is being proven in this micro-environment, that is more cosmic rays are getting threough and affecting lower cloud build up such as typical cumulus nimbus.
The suns “bubble” could be reacting to a lack of stimulas, very much the way Earth’s “bubble” has been reacting to lessened solar activity. We have no idea what forces blast our solar system. What is outside the bubble is an even bigger mystery. The Voyager I and II have passed through this, lets call it a barrier for grins. http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov/ Geeze Im dating myself, I remember when they were launched:) Well given what we knew then, to what we know now, I would say that we still have a long way to go in figuring out all of the factors that influence not only our sun but our planetary system as well.
I also think I read some where that our entire galaxy has its own bubble.. that our merry go round trip around its center sometimes brings us out of the bubble…….bubble, in a bubble, in a bubble 🙂 It may have been one of those sites that predicts the end of the world at the end of the Myan callendar tho.. so I cant quote you a source. But what I do know, is that a great deal of space science involves a lot of guess work, building a theory, and then getting shot down once technology surpasses the guesswork. My personal fav black holes, which supposedly suck everything in.. so why do they have emissions.. maybe … http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/news/07-139.html
something similar could happen to us.. or not.. face it folks theres a zillion ways to end life on Earth. You will go nuts if you worry about them all:)
Either way, looks like cap and trade is coming to the USA in full force. Nancy is gonna save us all for the greater good with acceptable losses:) Isnt that comforting?
To ROM:
The CLOUD experiment at CERN is not delayed by the technical problems of the LHC, as it is not linked to LHC. It is however delayed by the financial problems related to LHC overspending (because of various technical problems).
The CLOUD experiment could be carried out at ten other places in the world. You may ask, why is there no other place picking it up? At CERN, personalities like Carlo Rubbia, the Nobel laureate, have convinced the CERN scientific council to spend the money (of order 10 – 20 Million Euro). At this level of spending, CERN is still an independent institution. The National Lab.s in Europe, Japan, and the USA are no longer that independent from political influence, even at this level of project size.
The cosmic rays which get modulated by the solar influence have relatively low energy, up to 20 Giga-electronVolt. They are predominantly influenced by the solar magnetic filed, the ‘open solar flux’, a field where Leif Svalgaard is actively working on. Collisions with solar wind protons are not important for screening the cosmic rays, in contrast to the statements in the article. The screening during active solar times is sigificant:http://ulysses.sr.unh.edu/NeutronMonitor/images/0_1950-2006.GIF
Looks like we may be in for global cooling after all–just as the juggernaut of co2-based warming theory is let into our diminishing national coffers! Thank you for this excellent site, I’m not a scientist but I appreciate proper scientific skepticism
A question often asked of AGWers is this. How much longer would global temps need to remain flat in order for the GCM results to be falsified.
So, for all those who believe that recent ‘changes’ in the behaviour of the sun will result in plunging temperatures on earth, I’ll rephrase this question
How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?
@Alfred Ledner Annonson,
About the clouds-cosmic rays theory: have there been any attempts to quantify the effect of cosmic rays on the climate, or do the three documents you link to reflect the current level of understanding on the subject?
Oh gosh! Is this another result of man-made global warming? It’s bad enough that we are mucking up Earth’s atmosphere….but now it seems we are mucking up the sun’s atmosphere too!
Maybe if we all hold our breaths long enough, we can reduce CO2 emissions!
John Finn,
You played a little rhetorical trick in your quetion there. You slipped in the phrase “short term” when mentioning climate shifts. By my own reckoning, the Sun would have to put in a series of below average, or late, sun spot cycles; or several, say 6, decades of low output to impact climate.
It’s a Sun thing.
I’m confused! This news release was issued as a “warning” by NASA scientists. What action(s) do I take? Can I or should I venture outdoors today? Will congress legislate corrective measures to protect my family? Help, I’m almost paralyzed with fear!
Oh you guys do like a good yarn. Stop all the theorising & realise that it’s the CO2 casing all these ills & woes, don’t let science get in the way of agreat money makeing deal. Liked the idea about selling solar credits, I’ll buy share in that one.
After all that the news of colling global temperatures, the news about the sun in shutdown mode, low solar magnetic field, low heliosphere, arctic ice in potential recovery, & what do WWF come out with? A report about Climate Change being even faster than was previously thought & eco disaster around the corner, The Royal Society with a report about deadly destructive ozone as a new scare story to tag on to CO2.
BTW, we in the UK have just celebrated the 50th anniversary of a wonderful long-running childrens’ programme called Blue Peter. It was wonderful watching all those fashion, science, technology, & lifestyle stories, of what & how the world would be like by the Y2K, just like ALL those other things predicted in their day, the movies, the futuristic tv shows, etc., absolutely hillarious, but none of it ever happened!
However, this news realy is serious if one is serious about real science,. as oppsoed to AGW believers being really about serious scienctists!
How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?
That right there is another argument… some of us here have experienced some pretty chilly weather conditions this past summer and due to the political nature of some of the scientists in charge of the data sets we question the accuracy of the data being presented. If the scientific consensus were not “settled” in spite loud opposition and if certain parties hadn’t been busted fixing the numbers, and if a proper discussion could be fostered between the believers and the heretics resulting in a return of scientific methods over blind belief.. perhaps we could all benefit.
Oh, I’m sorry, I overreacted. I didn’t realize the source of this story was the UK Telegraph. I feel better now – think I’ll take a walk.
Michael J. Bentley (21:59:42) :
Which leads me to postulate that such a boundary could exist.
There is, indeed, a very marked boundary, called the heliopause, marked by a ‘termination shock’. The boundary occurs where the solar wind pressure falls below [it decreases by the square of the distance] the pressure in interstellar space. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliosphere has a decent explanation.
Mike Dubrasich (19:03:44) :First the dot com bubble, then the housing bubble, and now the heliosphere bubble. I’m about bubbled out.
You forget the South Seas Outbubbling Fizzy CO2 Bubble
ROM; Dendroclimatologists not dendrochronologists have been taking stick.
Dave.
ROM (23:47:33) :
Are the byproducts of cosmic ray collisions within the atmosphere of sufficient quantity and of sufficient difference to be able to be readily identified in soil and / or water samples?
Generally yes. The isotope 10Be created by cosmic rays can be readily found in ice in Greenland and Antarctica.
If they are and can be readily detected can these byproducts of the cosmic ray collisions be taken up by trees and identified and the levels of take-up be measured in individual annual tree rings or is this beyond the current technology ?
14C can be measured in individual tree rings. But the so-called ‘Carbon cycle’ smoothes out variations of short duration, so one has to model the cycle to try to extract short-term variations, so 14C data is usually a mean over several years.
How does the earth’s magnetic field fare in all this?
Ever since I found the solar system barycentre material, I’ve been utterly convinced that here lies the real (cyclic) key to climate change. Here are the predictors whose predictions have a semblance of matching the reality.
F Rasmin and nobwainer,
Thank you for the correction, as I said I read it somewhere and just didn’t remember the number of zeros (too much time in the Sun without a hat). But the thought is the same, since we have no recorded history of what happens in this area of the galaxy, who knows what forces can act upon us. Not saying that there is, just saying who knows rather than the science is settled (A. Gore et al ad nauseum),
@Wyatt A:
I don’t think we should use the term “bubble”. It implies a boundary, a hard border. It is more likely a statistical transition region that is defined by how many and of what energy GCRs permeate the heliosphere. I’m sure that there’s no “light switch” or “step function” point in the heliosphere.”
It is described as a “shock wave” (Apparently the Sun velocity is supersonic w.r.t. the intestellar medium — e.g., faster than a density wave can propagate in that medium), so it might be a fairly abrupt transition.
Michael J. Bentley (21:59:42) :
Hey, we real engineers can handle words of three syllables. Otherwise, we’d have to call ourselves geeks.
Vincent Guerrini Jr (00:03:13) :
The expectation is for more maritime stratus and blocking sea surface warming.
Over land and at mid altitudes there are enough condensation nuclei for clouds to form.
The sun’s magnetic field is weakening.
The earth’s magnetic field is weakening.
What’s a guy with a magnetic personality supposed to do now?
The sun’s magnetic field has been weakening for the last ten years.
The earth has been cooling for the last ten years?
Connection?
It is hard to tell where they think they are going with this. Are they trying to tie the heliosphere to the sunspot cycles and gross solar activity (an almost obvious connection) or are they trying to frighten us with “the sun is getting weak, and we will all die of cosmic radiation damage”? If the former, then it certainly can’t get much worse as we are already at a minimum in solar activity and a turn-around is in the cards – eventually. If the latter, then I would REALLY like to see the data that supports continued secular reduction of the solar wind. This would seem to violate all that is currently known about the evolution of G-type stars.
“Without the heliosphere the harmful intergalactic cosmic radiation would make life on Earth almost impossible by destroying DNA and making the climate uninhabitable.”
How can we be sure that this isn’t just another “generated crisis” to scare people and keep federal funds flowing into NASA coffers? A new IBEX satellite will be launched to “gain a better understanding of what happens at this boundary and help them predict what protection it will offer in the future.”
How can scientists predict that? What if the prediction is that the shrinking bubble will keep shrining? Wouldn’t money be better spent on adaption technology?
Maybe tin hats and clothing is good advice.
Sorry, but after all the shenanigans and scare mongering of the AGW crowd, I’m more skeptical than ever.
John Finn:
“How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?”
Not being smarmy here, but given that it was 36deg during the night at my home, and it was 60deg yesterday afternoon at 2pm, and that my days are getting shorter/cooler and plants are reacting appropriately, I’m certain the sun IS, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts.
It seems as though your question contains several subjective terms, such as “current relatively high levels”, and “plunging temperatures”. Why not say what temperature pattern would convince you that the sun is not the cause of what we’re currently experiencing?
JimB
I propose a tax on all solar power systems. It is obvious that the decrease in the sun’s output is directly related to the increasing demand for solar energy. We have to stop using the energy from the sun to stop “SolarShrinking ™”
Who is Leif Svalgaard? I’m just curious. People seem to respect his opinion even if they disagree. Also, what is his stance?
Leif – If you’d like to answer, I’d appreciate it. I really just don’t know who you are and I’ve read your comments for the last few months now.
REPLY: Leif is a distinguished solar physicist – why not do your own research with Google, or visit his website leif.org – Anthony
I do not have the scientific knowledge that most people, who blog on this site have. I hate to sound political, but unfortunately many so called scientific studies seems to end up in some sort of crisis. The more sensational, the more government money thrown its way. We’re all getting numb.
One day there will be a scientific find that will merit substantial taxpayer money. Our coffers might be empty.
The discussion on this topic seems to be walking along the yellow brick road. A bit of reality here and there but mostly not, and with political undertones (love the hidden meaning behind the Wizard of Oz stories). I think the original article is media hype fueled maybe by scientists who might want to change the discussion from warming (which is kind of a dud at the moment and is not the hot topic it once was) to something else. Actually maybe even anything else. Any scientist who sticks to his/her guns through to the bloody end of either a verified or not null hypothesis has my vote. But then such theories that don’t have such verification do not get published, just like no one came to see the lightbulb filament that didn’t work. You will not ordinarily see “oops we were wrong” published studies where the bottom line is that after all that dull reading from the intro to the summary says, “move along folks, no news here”. So now we are being lead to believe that something that has happened before is suddenly called, “Now here is something worrisome that hasn’t happened in recorded history!” I prefer not to rubberneck this one. It kind of reminds me of the same folks who tried to get us to look at global warming and wring our hands and pockets of cash.
What current high levels, John Finn? As compared to the little ice age or the medieval warm period? Florida has been cooling and cold-sensitive crops have retreated further south during my lifetime. I suspect much of the vaunted warming is merely urban heat island effect and the rest can be laid at the feet of a warm PDO.
This is the same UK Telegraph that gave us the 1979 and 2007 ice pictures?
About the only thing I could glean from this is that it might be useful to replace the aparently broken down or worn out Ulysses. Most things that appear in the mass media are sensationalistic beyond repair.
A Modest Proposal
If we ARE indeed entering a protracted Solar Minimum (as appears increasing likely), I propose that it be named the Gore Minimum.
Alternately, if you are one of those folks favoring hyphenation as a matter of policy, the Gore-Hansen Minimum.
We owe it to our progeny to remind them again of the fruits of unmitigated hubris. (c.f Babble, Tower of)
HA Reynolds
Houston
PS Buy Coal.
I don’t know, I think I’m on the side of the skeptics on this, particularly after watching Frank Caliendo’s….er…Al Gore’s “Supernova” soon to be Oscar winning documentary. I don’t think the sun is going to a minimum at all – it’s taking a deep breath before it explodes – and am scrambling to find my 1.5M SPF sunblock lotion.
Do we have to have yet another crisis? What does this say about how our minds work? How far removed are we, really, from Black Age understanding of how things work, when we have something like this pop up? Frankly, I’m a little tired and cynical of the new age “priesthood” that seems to have their grip on us at the moment.
well, with TSI so low…
http://spot.colorado.edu/~koppg/TSI/TSI_TIM.jpg
and the solar flux so low…
http://solarcycle24.com/
is it really any wonder that the heliosphere is shrinking? seems pretty logical to me despite the fact that it has gone largely unreported.
MarkW, if you believe Svensmark http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/Cosmic_rays_and_climate.html and i believe his theory has some merit, then there is a very strong link between the strength of the sun’s magnetic field and earth’s temperature.
REPLY: Note from moderator…please stop mangling URLS by placing them in ( ) or putting …. ahead of them. Just simply puts as this and I won’t have to fix them:
works http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/Cosmic_rays_and_climate.html
doesn’t (http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/Cosmic_rays_and_climate.html)
doesn’t …http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/Cosmic_rays_and_climate.html
Thanks again Leif for bringing some sense into the discussion and much appreciated the link to the graph of the solar wind.
Ilya Usoskin at Oulu University maintains a graphic data base of the neutron flux (as good as any measure of how galactic rays penetrate as far as Earth’s atmosphere ) – and this shows a recent influx consequent upon the current very quiet sun, as well as other peaks for the previous cycles back to 1964. If Svensmark’s effect is significant, then the ‘lows’ in cosmic ray flux – especially at the 1990 solar maximum, will ‘pulse’ short-wave radiation into the upper 100m of the ocean – and the 1990-1991 max coincided with a major shift in ocean warming and cloud patterns – the opposite – a cold pulse is with us now. If the quiet sun continues with a low maximum as several solar specialists think likely, then the cool period could be prolonged. Ocean cycle peaks (ENSO is the only candidate now as all other cycles are entering the negative -cold phase) and volcanic activity could distort the pattern either way – and on the prediction front, the UK Hadley Centre have delayed their November publication of future climate projections – I think they may be re-assessing not just the PDO effect, but also how much longer the North Atlantic stored heat will last – sea surface temperatures are dropping out there right now after 20 years of warming.
John Finn: How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?
Since we’re asking questions, how much longer would we need to have: increasing ice in the Arctic as well as the Antarctic, cooling oceans, and global temperatures dropping before you people stop believing in the myth of manmade C02-induced climate change?
Lief,
Thanks – Wiki is not one of my favorite places to go – so much there is, um, bad information. Nice to know some of it is still good. Besides that I was raised in the “book” encyclopedia era. Colored pictures came later, I had to deal with black and white.
Ric,
But that’s only true of MIT and School of Mines grads…
Mike
John Finn (02:15) : “How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?”
I’m no climate scientist but very interested in climate science.
There is a thermal delay (even if Lockwood didn’t know this). We’ll never have abrupt shifts due to the sun only, and its activity is never corresponding to a certain temperature. That’s a naive suggestion which shows lack of understanding of the earth’s climate system (where e.g. the oceans are the most important factor for regional and short time climate changes and which is very complicated).
Still we have a sun-climate correlation since the 19th century, but PDO+AMO has an even better correlation. (Sun activity and ENSO may very well be linked, due to e.g. Robert Bakers research; it seems we have a quite direct climate control from the ocean oscillation. See “Oceanic Influences on Recent Continental Warming“, here:
http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/people/gilbert.p.compo/CompoSardeshmukh2007a.pdf )
Remember e.g. that 1998 was a solar minimum during the El Nino.
But why shall anyone deny what IPCC – this absolute definition of truth – isn’t denying? IPCC admits in AR4 that there is a correlation between solar min and max in the 11 years solar cycle, of the magnitude 0,2 degrees C. That magnitude would not be possible from changes in the strength of the radiation output of the sun alone. (Maybe IPCC explain this with positive feedbacks – which are unlikely and now disproved.)
All major encyclopedias say that solar minimums – like Sporer, Maunder, and Dalton – caused periods of cooler climate, and that the sun activity is linked to temperature. Encyclopedias are not scientific truth, but it’s interesting that those defending the absolute weak CO2 theory, which stands solely upon unlikely and now falsified positive feedbacks, always refuse to admit that the sun activity affects the climate of the earth. I don’t say it must do that, but data shows it does, and the cosmoclimatology theory is strong due to all different research. (It’s a bit like the refusal of climate change in history, or the refusal that warmer climate has been and will be good for mankind; I would like to believe CO2 will give us a lot of warming.)
There is no direct control from the sun, but a slow one where PDO and AMO more directly controls the climate. That is at least what correlations of a few hundred years of data tells us, as well as historical data from proxies.
But to summarize this in and answer to your question: If the temperature (and not solely GISS, but rather satellite data only) goes up and the sun activity stays very low I think that is a blast on the sun-climate connection hypothesis – no new El Ninos taken into account. I think that some few years of almost flat temperature doesn’t tells us much in either way.
–
BTW: The improved energy balance for climate models from Miskolczi has in an empirical study been proven to give an adequate result; the GHG concentration has been constant for 60 years. Look here:
http://landshape.org/enm/significance-of-global-warming/
No extra GHG means no extra warming from GHG, doesn’t it? Thus it’s more likely that the most active sun in more than 1000 during the late 20th century caused the warm climate late in that century.
And the result from the Aqua – less water vapor when it’s warm – seems to be correct…
I can’t believe that they are baffled. Maybe the couse is the same thing that is causing the long inactivity of the sun spot cycles. Just a wild guess…
Moderator…isn’t “mangle” a bit strong? LOL.
The solar magnetic field has had quite a few perturbations over the last three days.
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/ace/MAG_7d.html
Anyone have an idea of why this occurred? Was it the crossing of the SC24 sunspot that occurred recently?
Bruce Cobb (07:05:28) :
“….Since we’re asking questions, how much longer would we need to have: increasing ice in the Arctic as well as the Antarctic, cooling oceans, and global temperatures dropping before you people stop believing in the myth of manmade C02-induced climate change?”
You have defined the difference between a denier and and a sceptic. Why don’t you make some attempt at answering the question posed before going of and clutching the little straws left to gain some credence for your ‘cooling religion’?
The Arctic ice is very much on a decreasing trend, oceans are getting warmer (the short dip due to the large La Nina last winter) and temperatures are recovering and gaining after the aforementioned La Nina.
Most of the posters on this blog are true sceptics, they have a point of view and argue their case. A small minority such as yourself just want to keep picking away, answer questions with another question, the points of which are usually either plain false or misleading. I’ve responed to your points, become a sceptic and answer John’s.
man made co2 is the only reason that counts…
This is just an observation by the folks at NASA, they aren’t predicting anything. It would indicate that we are at a low point in the solar cycle, but we already knew that. I imagine people like Leif don’t make any predictions because we will only know if the solar cycle is in some sort of protracted minimum after 5-10 more years. The only thing to do is to collect data and wait for something interesting to happen.
Re: F Rasmin “While I am here, perhaps the shrinking protective bubble occurs every 100,000 years, thereby allowing such an increase in cosmic rays that we rapidly enter a full ice age due to an increase in cloud cover.”
This wouldn’t explain why the timing of ice ages went from acting on a 41,000 year cycle in the Pliocene and Early-Pleistocene to a 100,000 year cycle during the Mid- and Late-Pleistocene.
A bit OT:
What happened over on the Arctic Sea Ice Chart? October heat wave?
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
I wrote (07:23): “If the temperature (…) goes up and the sun activity stays very low I think that is a blast on the sun-climate connection hypothesis”
1998 shows us this must not be a problem. A more than 100 years record strong(?) El NIno raised the temperature 1998.
Also I should have used the word “theory”, not hypothesis. The sun-climate connection is at least a strong theory (if not even proven science).
Bruce Cobb (07:05:28) :
Since we’re asking questions, how much longer would we need to have: increasing ice in the Arctic as well as the Antarctic,
The trend in the Arctic over the last 30 years is down.
cooling oceans
they might have stopped warming for a couple of years but I’m not sure I’d say they were cooling.
and global temperatures dropping
Are they? I might go with ‘flattening’ but ‘cooling’ – definitely not. Also remember that there is supposedly around a ~0.1 deg difference between solar max and solar min which means we can expect an increase of 0.1 deg over the next 5 years from the development of SC24 alone .
before you people stop believing in the myth of manmade C02-induced climate change?
You’re the second person recently who has accused me of being an “AGW believer”. Bruce, Just because someone doesn’t accept every crackpot solar theory as fact it doesn’t automatically mean they are AGW supporters. I can point to a number of blogs where I’ve argued with AGWers. Funnily enough, though, whichever line of argument is put forward, “anti-AGW” or “anti-Solar”, the drift of the debate is quite similar. As I wrote recently.
Many sceptics are not sceptics at all. Quite the opposite, in fact. They’re quite prepared to believe anything as long as it undermines the AGW cause.
I’m cool with it as long as there’s enough time for me to see all the episodes of Fawlty Towers : P
Word.
Peter Taylor (06:55:39) :
graphic data base of the neutron flux (as good as any measure of how galactic rays penetrate as far as Earth’s atmosphere ) – and this shows a recent influx consequent upon the current very quiet sun, as well as other peaks for the previous cycles back to 1964.
There are many such cosmic ray stations. The continuous record goes back to 1952. Here are the records for some representative stations: http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRayFlux.png
What is noteworthy is that at solar minimum the cosmic ray flux returns to the same value since 1952. There is one little subtlety: every second minimum is slightly lower that the others. There is a reason for this having to do with how cosmic rays diffuse through the heliospheric magnetic field, which reverses polarity at every solar maximum. But apart from this second order [and understood effect] the remarkable fact is that the un-modulated cosmic ray flux has been constant the last 50+ years.
Hey….NSIDC’s Arctic ice graph has recently gone BONKERS! WHOA.
NSIDC ice graph commits Hari-Kari
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png
How does this sound?
It is 10 degrees colder today than at this time yesterday. If this trend continues, we will all freeze to death in two weeks.
I should have been a journalist. Making up stuff, and selling it to P.T.Barnum’s clientele.
Pamela Gray says:
Might we already be a quarter of the way to maximum?
Now that is a very interesting thought.
AGW has been outside the realm of science for quite some time…
PearlandAggie (06:48:00) :
well, with TSI so low…
and the solar flux so low…
is it really any wonder that the heliosphere is shrinking? seems pretty logical to me despite the fact that it has gone largely unreported.
It has gone unreported because it is unremarkable. TSI, solar flux, and sunspots go low every 11 years.
What’s so difficult about all this climate shift stuff?
We go into Minimum, we freeze our butts off.
We go into Maximum, the world starts melting.
Somewhere in between the two life is good, until the power fails.
Is Earth – pop. 9 billion enough, or should we go for 18 billion?
Now, there’s a problem.
John Finn: “How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?”
You give a very subjective question. The answer depends on how long it goes without the expected condition and the level of belief. The same goes for AGW believers. Many of them have converted to the other side but some have such a deep seeded belief that AGW will have to be pried from their cold dead fingers. Me personally I see a great deal of scientific evidence that AGW is a sham and very little to contradict solar influence. I am not completely sold but have a time will tell stance. I believe this will be a very interesting decade either way.
We know that the earth is (over)due for a magnetic pole shift. Could an important reduction in solar winds be the triggering event that everyone is looking for? The reduction in solar winds will also reduce the strength of the Induced Magnetic Field around the earth. Would there we a correlation between the solar activity and the pole reversals?
Here is a possible explanation that was given in 2006. At the end there is a positive side to a reduced solar activity… the eventual closing of the ozone hole.
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=934519BDABEC7B834F559D3EB3534109.tomcat1?fromPage=online&aid=534044
ABSTRACT:
It is suggested that we are already in the weak solar cycles series since the start of cycle 23. The interplanetary magnetic filed and the solar wind speed and density are expected to drop considerably during the approaching second weak cycle number 24 and the following ones leading to inflation of the magnetosphere. The corona is also expected to cool down relative to normal cycles corona. A daily background coronal index is proposed. The mechanism of production of weak cycles is tied to the rapid rotation of the photospheric layer which is deeply rooted in the bottom of the convection zone. This rapid surface and subsurface rotation implies slower rotation of the tachocline. Slower dynamo rotation leads to reduction of the strength of the magnetic cycle. One of the very important sequences of the weak cycles, is the expected cooling of the Earths air and sea surface temperatures which would have negative effects on agriculture with increased drought-flood hazards. The reduction of solar UV flux can lead to the closure of the ozone hole on the long run.
Funny coincidence how Leif’s first graph lines up with temp fluctuations over the recent decades… But that is just a coincidence, and if you can prove it by comparing with at temperature record that is full of unrelated effects, effects like the geographical distribution of economic activity, and how well it correlates to the geographical distributions of temperature rises.
All you have to do to accomplish this is endlessly repeat your mantra “Hansen is always right.” and to yourself silently “this paper never happened.”
http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/jgr07/jgr07.html
How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?
—————–
What “relatively high levels” would you be refering to. In the last decade, most of the temperature run-up of the last 100 years has been given back.
Leif,
True. I guess I never really considered that the heliosphere shrinks during EVERY solar minimum! Oops! 🙂
Since we’re asking questions, how much longer would we need to have: increasing ice in the Arctic as well as the Antarctic,
The trend in the Arctic over the last 30 years is down.
——————-
30 years ago, the PDO flipped from a cold phase to a warm phase. It has just flipped back to it’s cold phase.
If you examine the arctic record for a period longer than 30 years, you will find that there is no trend. Just a 60-70 year long oscillation.
As a part of my research into heliosperic current interaction with planetary magnetospheres I attempted to calculate relative value of solar dynamo at time of solar minima. Preliminary results are shown on the graph. http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/solar_dynamo.gif
Numbers are minima before SC No.
I am not certain that my method was correct but it does confirm today’s news about weakening of Heliosphere by 25% in last 50 years.
WARNING: THESE ARE ONLY PRELIMINARY RESULTS!
So the geomagnetic dipole has been in decline for a century and a half, the solar poloidal field is down 20-30%, the solar wind, in which the IMF is carried, is down 25% over the last decade, the noctilucent clouds are perfectly anti-correlated with solar minimums and at an all time high, the toroidal fields are less evident than at any time in over a century, …
“All right, folks, nothing to see here. The sun get’s like this every eleven years. Move along now…”
The Arctic Sea Ice Chart had a seizure and now it’s back on track and WHAT a track (it may be warming globally, but the ice returneth up North:
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/N_timeseries.png
As a part of my research into heliospheric current interaction with planetary magnetospheres I attempted to calculate relative value of solar dynamo’s strength at times of solar minima. Preliminary results are shown on the graph.
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/solar_dynamo.gif
Numbers are minima before SC No. I am not certain that my method was correct but it does confirm the news about weakening of Heliosphere by 25% in last 50 years.
WARNING: THESE ARE ONLY PRELIMINARY RESULTS!
Leif Svalgaard:
Says: “TSI, solar flux, and sunspots go low every 11 years.”
Yes, but to be accurate, its not every 11´th year we set record in for example the Oulu Neutron monitor:
http://www.klimadebat.dk/forum/attachments/oulu.jpg
To this you might say: “Well thats not much of a record! And its only in the measurements since 1964”.
True, but try to see how close the peaks are to each other every 11´th year.
Compared to this narrow and constant level, the peak and the duration of the peak 2008 actually appaers somewhat different. (In fact the very latest data from Oulu are a little higher.)
So maybe you can say they “go low every 11 year”, but i dont realy think that is a perfect picture of the situation.
my god, its everytime i write to Leif, someone else have written the exact same. Sorry Leif!
PearlandAggie (10:35:38) :
True. I guess I never really considered that the heliosphere shrinks during EVERY solar minimum! Oops! 🙂
It is a bit more complicated [and I should have said that earlier]. The TSI/F10.7/SSN that you referred to are low at EVERY minimum, but the solar wind flow pressure has a more convoluted history. The pressure, P, is defined as P ~ n * V^2, where n is the density and V is the speed. The speed is often high during the declining phase of a cycle, thus making P high there. On the other hand, V is often low at solar maximum, making P lower there. Finally, the density is the quantity that is most difficult to measure and there are systematic differences [up to 20% or more] between spacecraft, so some of the long term trends are uncertain. You can see a long discussion of this at http://omniweb.gsfc.nasa.gov/html/omni2_doc.html#pla_i
Just to remind you of the run of P:
http://www.leif.org/research/SolarWindFlowPressure.png
Re; Pamela Gray, and Leif Svalgaard comments.
Pamela, you mentioned the Cosmic ray flux cycle “flattening” every 22 years; and that seems to me to relate to the full magnetic cycle related to sunspots.
Given that the earth’s cosmic ray/charged particle flux is influenced by both solar and earth magnetic fields, and that the sunspot polarity switches every 11 year cycle; the total manetic effect on charged particles has to have this 22 year cyle as those two components “aid” or “interfere”
I’m not nearly smart enough to do the vector sum of the sunspot, and earth fields, even if I knew what the solar component looked like; but I expect some 22 year cycle, and as you say, it does show up in the obseved CR flux, and also apparently in earth climate warming/cooling. I can’t quantify the cosmic ray/climate effect but I find the work on this by our Scandinavian friends to be quite compelling; through a cloud formation mechanism.
I’m with Leif on this new cloak flap. I have no idea why it might wax and wane, but I’m not surprised it does. Now what would really surprise me, would be if that shield suddenly disappeared altogether. The local universe environment would have to change in some inexplicable way to have no blanket.
Right now cosmic rays don’t seem to be exactly frying our brains, and I suspect the effect of a small increase, will not be a problem, at least radiationally; but what about the effect on the earth temperature.
To my simple brain, more cosmic rays means easier cloud formation in the tropics, and cooler surface temperatures due to the combined effect of increased albedo, and increased absorption by clouds.
It is becoming increasingly difficult for anyone to convince me that solar behavior both magnetically (related to sunspots), this security blanket, cosmic rays, and ocean evaporation, are NOT all in cahoots in controlling the mean earth surface temperature, through cloud modulation.
I think it is time to stick a stake through Arhennius and his CO2 thesis. It was great while it lasted; and made a lot of money for Al Gore; but enough is enough.
You do dig out a lot of interesting stuff here Anthony.
George
Just for fun I took the .jpg of Solar Wind Flow Pressure from Lief
http://www.leif.org/research/SolarWindFlowPressure.png
& overlayed it with a plot of USHCN temps
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/CO2HCNlongterm.jpg
to see if there was any visual correlation. From 1965 to 1995, it is somewhat interesting and appears to have a positive correlation (inc flow pressure = inc temps). However, after 1995, it completely falls aparts – no visual correlation, positive or negative. If Solar wind flow pressure is a factor, it appears (at least with the datasets on hand) to be a much less significant factor compared to factors such as cyclical oceanic circulation patterns (PDO, ENSO, etc)
See :
http://www.weatherquestions.com/Global-warming-natural-PDO.htm
and
http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?ref=rss&a=151
Rom,
It is fifty years since I had any involvement in cosmic rays, and very little at that. One signature of cosmic ray variability is the formation of radio-carbon 14 from atmospheric nitrogen. The early days of radio carbon dating, were based on the assumption that the rate of C14 formation in the atmosphere was absolutely constant. this led to some carbon artifacts being incorrectly dated.
Tree ring studies based on the Bristle-cone pines, that grow in the White Mountains in the Cal/Nev region were used to “correect” the radio carbon time scale, at least back for about 4000 years, and actually ended up changing some world history, when pottery kiln and shards form Spain, were found to be older than the middle eastern ones which had been assumed to be the origin of that particular pottery culture, indicating that that technology had gone east, from its source; and not west from mesopotamia.
One intersting note is that the absence of C14 in fossil fuels, because of their age, is supposed to be one signature of man made CO2 in the atmosphere. But a lower than “normal” C14 abundance, can also be a signature of a period of lower cosmic ray flux; and by inference lower cloud formation and a warm period on earth (and one NOT caused by fossil CO2)
But Radio Carbon 14 is not long lived enough to go very far back in the geologic history to look for cosmic ray fossils.
In any case; much of the CR activity takes place in the upepr atmosphere, and the charged particle showers resulting from such events are rather mundane creatures whose main influence on us or climate would be through water droplet formation. Uncharged particles like neutrons, are going to go charging right through the atmosphere mostly, and might result in stable isotopes of unusual occurrence frequency.
If it were me, I would put the research dollars into looking at more current solar/earth physics, than worrying about what happened during the Cambrian
Leif,
This is out of topic, but I am curious.
In the magnetogram of SOHO, 10/21 17:25
there is a track visible!! white, at 10:00 oclock north, close to the tiny Tim of Catania
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_mag/512/
If it were black , I would thinkg “dead pixels”. Can it be a cosmic track in the detector? Have you seen something like this before?
I am waiting for the next update.
@Anthony’s Reply to me at 6:14:11
I didn’t mean any disrespect in asking who Leif is. I had googled his name and checked out his website, but I couldn’t get a clear cut answer. His website doesn’t tell me much (autobiographical) other than give his research. There were only 13,500 google hits (which is a low amount) and the top several pages returned didn’t give any indication.
To be sure, I found more on him being a programmer then I did solar scientist. Nothing immediately pops up that makes me say “oh, no kidding he’s pretty important”. I assumed that as you respected him, he is worth respecting, which is why I asked who he was.
I’m also not a scientist and only a daily reader of your blog. I also don’t subscribe to scientific publications. So, it’s my casual reader position that led to my ignorance.
So I apologize if it came off the wrong way, I didn’t mean to. I had done research and it resulted in me not finding much. Sometimes it’s easier just to ask people in the comments section as it yields quick and concise results.
I’ve always been interested in this solar wind “pressure”. Do you have a reference for “decreases with the square of the distance”? Is there observational evidence that supports this? Thanks Leif. I always enjoy your comments.
Stevie B (12:35:06) :
To be sure, I found more on him being a programmer then I did solar scientist. Nothing immediately pops up that makes me say “oh, no kidding he’s pretty important”. I assumed that as you respected him, he is worth respecting, which is why I asked who he was.
Stevie, I’m not going to tell you how “important’ I am. This is not my nature. As some indication I may point out that I am on the NASA panel of solar experts to predict solar cycle 24. Let that suffice.
George,
I think it is time to stick a stake through Arhennius and his CO2 thesis. It was great while it lasted; and made a lot of money for Al Gore; but enough is enough.
That’s a bit harsh on Arrhenius. He’s not responsible for what people have done with his observations subsequently and as I understand it thought that rising CO2 would be relatively beneficial. The real *******s came later!
Lansner, Frank (11:03:23) :
In fact the very latest data from Oulu are a little higher.
The cosmic ray flux at any given observatory varies with the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field at that location. So different observatories report slightly different results over time because of different long-term trends of the Earth’s field. Here is a comparison of the counting rate at Moscow and Oulu: http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRayFlux3.png
In order to compare the two stations on the same plot the Oulu data has been normalized to have the same mean [over same time] as the Moscow data. The green curve is the average. You can see the different trends of the blue and red curves. If one normalizes many stations, the picture that emerges is that the minimum peaks are very much the same to within a fraction of a percent.
If you go to http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/alerts/solar_indices.html
you’ll see that the Neutron Monitor flux % of background for yesterday was 99.9%. The day before that is was 100.1%. All this means is that the cosmic ray flux is just where is should be consistent with no [or almost no] solar cycle modulation. It is at the long-term background. In spite of the ‘protective bubble being smaller’.
Leif,
I appreciate the response. I read your posts and take them seriously. No disrespect was ever intended. Thanks for frequenting these message boards and weighing in on the articles. Everyone else seemed to know who you were, so I figured I’d ask.
nanny,
many physical phenomena (including Newton’s law of universal gravitation, radiation, and acoustics) vary inversely with the radius (distance) squared. the r^2 term usually has to do with the fact that the surface area of a sphere is 4*Pi*r^2, so whenever a spherical area term is used, 1/r^2 will be in the equation.
Sorry, O/T but I can’t find an e-mail address to send this to:
Interesting story about North Greenland shoreline. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/10/081020095850.htm
Apparently, it was warmer 6000-7000 years ago than it is now. Of coruse, the scientist uphold the faith with
“Changes that took place 6000-7000 years ago were controlled by other climatic forces than those which seem to dominate today,” Astrid Lyså believes.
nanny_govt_sucks (13:03:19) :
Solar wind must comply with the inverse square law as it is expanding in a sphere. It does fluctuate though.
… Just because someone doesn’t accept every crackpot solar theory as fact it doesn’t automatically mean they are AGW supporters.
Which “crackpot solar theory” did you mean, John? Why the straw man? I thought only AGWers did that. Your original question “How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts” wasn’t a question at all but a statement, another common trick of AGWers. I mimmicked your question to show how ridiculous it was.
Leif, I have a question.
Stereo B is ~38 degrees behind earth in orbit. I believe that it’s final destination will be at 90 degrees behind earth and, with stereo A at 90 degrees in front of earth, will be able to show the entire sun surface.
My question — How will this affect the spot count?
I know this will be great in forcasting space weather for dangerous storms ETC.
The culprit is OBVIOUSLY the historically unprecedented increase of man-made objects that the human race has carelessly, in its continuously wanton destruction of natural enviroments, spread around the solar system. Plus, probably Voyager punctured the Helioshphere when leaving and its been leaking away ever since.
These man-made objects have increased by eleventy billion percent since 1957. There are no other possible answers that would explain this phenomenon.
Only denialist enemies of mankind would deny this obvious truth.
Thanks Anthony, Leif, and all those who contribute. You make this blog well worth a daily visit!
Leif
First a toast for all prominent Danes in the debate, Svalgaard, Svensmark and Lomborg 😉 Even though you have different opinions to some degree.
And then thanks for reply.
I have read a lot of your writings. I get a general impression that you, should we say, are slightly sceptical of the “sceptics”?
As you can see in blogs like this, we are many that expects colder global temperatures due to cold PDO, sun etcetc.
My question 1: Would you be surpriced if the world was indeed cooling down from now on and into the next decades? Do you have an opninion on this?
Just your overall opinion/estimate 🙂
Then another thing.
I personally think it would be so easyly understandable if the suns behaviour could be related to the suns movement around the centre of the solar system. Some tidal forces could contribute to solar activity, as you have been talking about/against some times.
To some degree there seems to be a more-than-random match between solar movement and temperatures at earth?
http://landscheidt.auditblogs.com/files/2007/05/sunssbam1620to2180.gif
But I as an eager debator in Denmark, i dont use this in my argumentation, because theres something in the match thats not perfect.
For example in the Dalton minimum, og the period 1940-77 we do indeed see that the sun slows down around the center. BUT. It does so in the second half of the cooling period!??
Have you any idea why this is?
The Dalton minumum is approx 1800-1830 but the sun first realy slow down around 1820. And in the cool period 1940-77, the sun slows down around 1960. (And there is a vulcano, but first in 1815…)
So on one hand for me it DOES seem striking, that more-than-randomly, the sun has a slow down when temperatures cool down on earth, but its just not that perfect a match.
quetion 2:Howcome we have a more-than-random-match and still these not-perfect timings? Could it be that the slowing down of the suns movement around the center of the solar system has an effect on tidal forces 10-20 years from the slowest point in the suns movement?
Gary Gulrud (10:56:49) :
So the geomagnetic dipole has been in decline for a century and a half, the solar poloidal field is down 20-30%, the solar wind, in which the IMF is carried, is down 25% over the last decade, the noctilucent clouds are perfectly anti-correlated with solar minimums and at an all time high, the toroidal fields are less evident than at any time in over a century, …
The folks deserve better than this.
So the geomagnetic dipole has been in decline for a century and a half
Has nothing to do with the Sun, just fluff.
the solar poloidal field is down 20-30%
The solar polar fields are down 44% thereby predicting a solar cycle also down 44%
the solar wind, in which the IMF is carried, is down 25% over the last decade
As it would be at the minimum after a full cycle. The ‘last decade’ presumably means the average over the last 10 years. And said average will be higher than the minimum value, 31% in fact, so a vacuous statement if the intent was to show that the value now is unusually low.
noctilucent clouds are perfectly anti-correlated with solar minimums and at an all time high
‘perfectly’? The clouds are due to water molecules. Perhaps there is more water in the mesosphere? Ultraviolet radiation from the Sun breaks water molecules apart, reducing the amount of water available to form noctilucent clouds. At solar minimum there is less UV and that minimum value doesn’t vary from cycle to cycle [as we know from the amplitude of the Sq-variation], so no dependence on solar activity or long term trend.
the toroidal fields are less evident than at any time in over a century
Muddled. The toroidal fields are just sunspots and that number falls to pretty much zero at every minimum.
The sun get’s like this every eleven years.
At least you got that right.
Perhaps would you be interested by this new ?
http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE49K6Y720081021
Stevie B (13:37:16) :
Thanks for frequenting these message boards and weighing in on the articles. Everyone else seemed to know who you were, so I figured I’d ask.
Thanks for asking. I used to have my C.V. on my website, but it seemed to attract unsavory persons, so I stopped.
You are correct for picking up on the programming bit. I was co-implementer of a historically important operating system [RC4000] and worked many years in the computer industry.
Ted Annonson (13:56:47) :
Stereo B is ~38 degrees behind earth in orbit. I believe that it’s final destination will be at 90 degrees behind earth and, with stereo A at 90 degrees in front of earth, will be able to show the entire sun surface.
It will not have a final destination [you can’t just stop in space] but will continue to lag behind and eventually come full circle and be in front of the Sun.
My question — How will this affect the spot count?
I know this will be great in forcasting space weather for dangerous storms ETC.
We don’t know how we’ll deal with this. My advice is that it should not affect the spot count in order to maintain the historical series. At some point a century from now when we have complete coverage all the time, we will simply double the historical count.
Lansner, Frank (14:27:44) :
<i.I get a general impression that you, should we say, are slightly skeptical of the “skeptics”?
I find that everyone with an agenda plays dirty. The ‘skeptics’ are too skeptical and as a result create their own dogma [“it’s the Sun, stupid”]
My question 1: Would you be surprised if the world was indeed cooling down from now on and into the next decades? Do you have an opninion on this? Just your overall opinion/estimate 🙂
No, not at all. I expect it to cool down because of the pseudo-periodicity of its ‘internal oscillations [PDO etc].
So on one hand for me it DOES seem striking, that more-than-randomly, the sun has a slow down when temperatures cool down on earth, but its just not that perfect a match.
And since the match is not so good, I personally don’t think it is other than rough coincidence.
2:Howcome we have a more-than-random-match and still these not-perfect timings? Could it be that the slowing down of the suns movement around the center of the solar system has an effect on tidal forces 10-20 years from the slowest point in the suns movement?
That has been discussed to death here and elsewhere. There are two problems:
1) the sun is in free fall in its orbit and feels no forces
2) other that tidal forces from the planets and those are minuscule.
I had a long discussion with Carsten on this. His question was why the Sun’s motion around the barycenter would not be reflected in the distance between the Sun and the Earth [it isn’t].
Leif
Thanks for the info.
Cathy (10:59:16) :
“The Arctic Sea Ice Chart had a seizure and now it’s back on track and WHAT a track (it may be warming globally, but the ice returneth up North:”
Arctic ice returning in late October….and still below the mean extent…what a story!
anna v (12:21:33) :
In the magnetogram of SOHO, 10/21 17:25
there is a track visible!! white, at 10:00 oclock north, close to the tiny Tim of Catania
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_mag/512/
If it were black , I would thinkg “dead pixels”. Can it be a cosmic track in the detector? Have you seen something like this before?
I am not Leif, but that is certainly a cosmic ray. It is very common in digital astronomical imaging, there are special calibration techniques to remove them in images etc.
Nothing special.
[…] is the original: Comment on Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking by Lansner, Frank Tags: climate, climate-skeptic, Dalton Minimum, global-warming, national-post, obama, […]
Leif, thanks again for your answer.
You say: “I find that everyone with an agenda plays dirty.”
Thats very very true.
If i have an opinion, however, its not the same as agenda. I shifted opinion this february, purely on basis of logic and arguments. I became “sceptic”.
But i understand if you feel that there is an agenda around, because we´re in the middle of what seems to be a dirty war. Very dirty.
Pressure generates contrapressure. If the sceptics sometimes appears as havig an agenda, it did not come from nowhere.
Then your believe in “coincidence” to explain a lot of things concearning sun-earth-temperature relationships: Just a simple math will reveal, that pure coincidence is in fact very unlikely. I just dont find that explanation/argumentation enough to move anything, to be honest.
Its not an agenda, but to believe is such proportions of coincidence is just not possible. There must be a better explanation.
K.R. Frank
The very short mean, that is. Indeed, what a story. What will you say when it exceeds the mean?
Leif Svalgaard (15:09:07) :
I had a long discussion with Carsten on this. His question was why the Sun’s motion around the barycenter would not be reflected in the distance between the Sun and the Earth [it isn’t].
I am still schizophrenic to some degree on the issue, although I accept that if the variation in measurments of TSI does indeed match the theoretical effect of the elliptic earth orbit, to a precision better than measurement accuracy, it is hard to get around. Still puzzling from a gravity point of view though.
Partly due to that discussion, I made a new simulator showing the sun’s motion around the barycenter, also looking for clues on solar flares and other things:
http://arnholm.org/astro/sun/sc24/sim2/
What this tells me, is that the motions are slow but interesting. It is very hard to see that gravitational effects can play any major role, although the gravity force on the sun varies a little. It is still in free fall.
This spells s-c-a-m. And it spells it WRONG, too.
http://tubbotwins.wordpress.com
[…] Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking From the UK Telegraph – source link The protective bubble around the sun that helps to shield the Earth from harmful […] […]
Mary Hinge (15:24:35) :
Arctic ice returning in late October….and still below the mean extent…what a story!
Interesting that the mean extent is calculated from 1979 (assuming when satellite records started)….a rather cold period I would suspect. I wonder how the mean extent would look if 1956 was used as the base year?
Well, is that an assumption, or is it based on observations?
When I look at pictures of heliosphere bow shock, I see a pretty clear delineation at the shock front. Not what I would expect from a “pressure” that falls off with the square of the distance.
Lansner, Frank (16:22:46) :
Then your believe in “coincidence” to explain a lot of things concerning sun-earth-temperature relationships: Just a simple math will reveal, that pure coincidence is in fact very unlikely.
This is not quite what I meant. If you look at a noisy correlation, some of the wiggles might line up by chance or coincidence. If you are a firm believer you will tend to accept these chance alignments as real [i.e. caused by the driver you are considering] and to classify the ones that don’t as just noise. This will bias you perception of the relationship. There is a time-honored way of resolving this, and that is to be specific: select the two time series you believe shows the ‘best’ correlation. There are standard statistical tests for deciding if the relation is ‘statistical significant’ at a given level of confidence. We can do this for all to see. Now, a counter-argument that I often are met with is that that is too much work for something that thousands of peer-reviewed papers already show to be true. So what shall it be?
Lansner, Frank (14:27:44) :
To some degree there seems to be a more-than-random match between solar movement and temperatures at earth?
http://landscheidt.auditblogs.com/files/2007/05/sunssbam1620to2180.gif
But I as an eager debator in Denmark, i dont use this in my argumentation, because theres something in the match thats not perfect.
For example in the Dalton minimum, og the period 1940-77 we do indeed see that the sun slows down around the center. BUT. It does so in the second half of the cooling period!??
Have you any idea why this is?
The Dalton minumum is approx 1800-1830 but the sun first realy slow down around 1820. And in the cool period 1940-77, the sun slows down around 1960. (And there is a vulcano, but first in 1815…)
I first saw Carl Smith’s graph (your link) a few months back which lead me onto further research. While I am not convinced on barycenterism it does show a “relationship” between the planets and the sun thru time. Some of the dates you have supplied in your question are confusing but i do see a correlation at 1650, 1830, 1970 and now with less solar activity and also noted the planetary positions at that time. I have researched your point about 1830 not being the start of the Dalton, but at the same time also realize that the sunspot records pre 1850 are not considered reliable. Leif’s 10Be records altho not conclusive do throw some extra doubt on the pre 1850 records.
Carl’s graph shows us the next year or so could be interesting and should prove the theory either way. Carl is very sick and his prognosis is not good, and i have agreed to moderate his site.
I made a small report using his graph and solar views that you might be interested in.
http://users.beagle.com.au/geoffsharp/gasgiants.pdf
nanny_govt_sucks (17:22:42) :
Solar wind must comply with the inverse square law as it is expanding in a sphere.
Well, is that an assumption, or is it based on observations?
That is an observational fact. It was also expected because of conservation of mass: the number of solar wind particles passing through two spheres around the sun must be the same, and the area of those spheres scales with the square of the radius.
When I look at pictures of heliosphere bow shock, I see a pretty clear delineation at the shock front. Not what I would expect from a “pressure” that falls off with the square of the distance.
At the shock the solar wind is effectively stopped and there is no further fall-off [as it doesn’t go any further as an organized flow].
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (16:35:07) :
it is hard to get around. Still puzzling from a gravity point of view though.
It puzzles me that that should be puzzling. Using the laws of gravity, JPL [ http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?ephemerides ] calculates theoretically the distance between any two solar system bodies, and the calculated distance between the Sun and the Earth is just what it should be from the Earth following a simple ellipse around the Sun [apart from very, very small planetary perturbations].
nobwainer (17:32:38) :
I have researched your point about 1830 not being the start of the Dalton, but at the same time also realize that the sunspot records pre 1850 are not considered reliable.
There is doubt about the relative number of spots, but after 1810 not about the timing of max and min.
I don’t know if this question has been answered already, but here goes… I’m in my 50’s. I remember reading about the first solar neutrino detection experiments in the newspapers years ago (late 1960’s?). Apparently, the solar neutrino flux (number of neutrinos from the sun per year) was way below original estimates. Physicists were saying that either their theories were totally out to lunch, or else the sun had “shut down internally”. I totally forgot about that long ago, until reading this discussion woke up some old memories. I assume that those questions have been answered by now. Any idea what happened?
Still puzzling from a gravity point of view though.
From a previous thread:
Because the barycenter is mainly determined by Jupiter [apart from the sun, of course] it moves but slowly [12 years to go round – or if you like, the Sun moves but slowly]. Launch a spacecraft from the [almost stationary] barycenter such that the spacecraft’s circular orbit takes it around the Sun. Because of its proximity to the Sun, the spacecraft will move very fast, completing its orbit [and returning to the barycenter] every few hours. Its distance from the Sun’s center is constant, yet “every object in the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter”. What does the spacecraft do? does it go around the barycenter in a circular orbit every few hours? yet passes through the very barycenter every few hours. What would your simulator say?
And for clarification:
The spacecraft and the Earth are both planets [albeit of different size]. They are both ‘primary’ bodies of the solar system. Same gravity laws apply for both.
Walter Dnes (18:26:33) :
Apparently, the solar neutrino flux (number of neutrinos from the sun per year) was way below original estimates […] I assume that those questions have been answered by now. Any idea what happened?
Yes this has been resolved. It turns out that neutrinos have mass [tiny] and that allows them to oscillate between the three kinds of neutrinos that can exist. The Sun only produces the so-called electron-neutrino. En route to the Earth, a third of these become muon-neutrinos and another third becomes tau-neutrinos [actually they change back and forth many, many times]. The first neutrino detectors could only detect electron-neutrinos, so only observed a third of the expected flux. Modern detectors have managed to detect all three kinds, and there is no longer a ‘neutrino problem’. On the contrary, the neutrino measurements show that our ideas about the solar interior and the energy production were correct.
Thanks so much, Anthony, for another great article. I’m no scientist, but I love your website!
If the sun continues to generate such fascinating news, maybe we can stop worrying about those lawn mower emissions pretty soon…
[…] Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking […]
Leif Svalgaard (18:13:48) :
There is doubt about the relative number of spots, but after 1810 not about the timing of max and min.
The 1790 maximum is perhaps the group that doesnt fit the SSB graph which has also been questioned by at least one paper as we have talked about previously and will probably be impossible to prove or disprove. But as you say the accuracy before 1810 is patchy but the sunspot numbers after that are also important if we are trying to follow a correlation. It is plausible to me that there could have been a “phase catastrophe” in the 1790 cycle that caused the following solar slowdown and was then later backed up in 1830.
Leif Svalgaard (13:04:52) :
Ah, a lesson in humility, eh? 🙂 At least SC24 is a great learning experience.
nobwainer (19:29:05) :
The 1790 maximum is perhaps the group that doesnt fit the SSB graph
The 1788.0 maximum is pretty well constrained by geomagnetic data going back to 1781. Little doubt about that one.
Ric Werme (19:50:50) :
“I am on the NASA panel of solar experts to predict solar cycle 24.”
Ah, a lesson in humility, eh? 🙂 At least SC24 is a great learning experience.
humility is always good. In this particular case I’m not the least humble as I’m predicting a cycle 24 that will be the lowest in a 100 years http://www.leif.org/research/Cycle%2024%20Smallest%20100%20years.pdf
I’ll feel really humble, though, should the NASA-crew turn out to be correct and SC24 is a supercycle.
That seems to conflict with the inverse square law.
Personally, I don’t think we can jump to the conclusion of a single study.
For all we know this is a natural cyclical thing.
nanny_govt_sucks (21:13:10) :
At the shock the solar wind is effectively stopped and there is no further fall-off
That seems to conflict with the inverse square law.
Once the plasma becomes part of the interstellar medium its connection with the Sun is effectively broken and its further movement is controlled by forces outside of the solar system. Considering again two Sun-centered spheres, but this time so large that they are completely and far outside the heliosphere. Now it no longer holds that the same amount of matter has to go through the surfaces of both spheres, because matter, moving independently of the solar system, could come ‘in from the side’.
So, no longer an inverse square law. Rather, the density will tend to be uniform, independent of distance to the Sun [at least as long as we are inside our ‘local’ interstellar bubble:
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/L/Local_Bubble.html ]
Leif Svalgaard (20:02:38) :
The 1788.0 maximum is pretty well constrained by geomagnetic data going back to 1781. Little doubt about that one.
Beg to differ….I have plotted the aa numbers and as you can see the aa group that peaks around 1790 is far from settled. According to the aa records it has an extreme length and displays a most unusual trend as does the aa group that peaks around 1830. Also you might note the peaks do not match the sunspot counts in particular the 1830 and 1840ish peaks. To me it correlates with the SSB graph. I might add the sunspot numbers so we can see it better on one graph.
http://users.beagle.com.au/geoffsharp/aagraph.jpg
Will we see SC23 act in a similar way as it did around 1790, continuing for 15 years before SC24 finally starts and reaches a very low sunspot number like the Dalton? Did they have the technology to determine which cycle, sunspots belonged to in 1790?
[…] See the original post here: Comment on Sun’s protective ‘bubble’ is shrinking by Ric Werme […]
Just a question on the Dalton Minimum (min in terms of sunspots). Is there actually any evidence that the period covering the Dalton Minimum was significantly cooler than the period immediately before it.
The CET certainly doesn’t show it. There seems to be a sharp cooling around 1780 but this precedes the ‘long’ cycle (4) and the 2 weaker cycles (5&6). There is a cool(er) period in the mid-1810s but at least some of this can be explained by the Tambora eruption (1815).
Leif:
Interesting article of yours:
http://www.leif.org/research/Cycle%2024%20Smallest%20100%20years.pdf
! I must say i believe more your prediction than Hattaways.
Leif Svalgaard (18:00:29) :
It puzzles me that that should be puzzling. Using the laws of gravity, JPL [ http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?ephemerides ] calculates theoretically the distance between any two solar system bodies, and the calculated distance between the Sun and the Earth is just what it should be from the Earth following a simple ellipse around the Sun [apart from very, very small planetary perturbations].
Most software are based on some assumptions, and it isn’t clear to me whether the above is designed to take the solar orbit onto account. It appears to have some approximations built in http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/?planet_pos
If it is really a full implementation of time integration of an N-body system where both the Sun and the planets are free to move according to the laws of gravity, I agree it would be a good test. But it seems to be an approximation based on orbital elements, like my own simulator?
Leif Svalgaard (18:28:19) :
From a previous thread:
Because the barycenter is mainly determined by Jupiter [apart from the sun, of course] it moves but slowly [12 years to go round – or if you like, the Sun moves but slowly]. Launch a spacecraft from the [almost stationary] barycenter such that the spacecraft’s circular orbit takes it around the Sun. Because of its proximity to the Sun, the spacecraft will move very fast, completing its orbit [and returning to the barycenter] every few hours. Its distance from the Sun’s center is constant, yet “every object in the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter”. What does the spacecraft do? does it go around the barycenter in a circular orbit every few hours? yet passes through the very barycenter every few hours. What would your simulator say?
And for clarification:
The spacecraft and the Earth are both planets [albeit of different size]. They are both ‘primary’ bodies of the solar system. Same gravity laws apply for both.
As noted, this has been visited in the earlier thread. My reply then was that my wording “every object in the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter” was imprecise, as I meant to communicate “every object directly gravitationally bound to the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter”. “Gravitationally bound” would mean that its speed is less than the escape velocity for the system in question. We all know that some objects, for example the moon (Luna) does not directly orbit the solar system barycenter, and the same is obviously true for the moons of Jupiter, Saturn etc. These moons are gravitationally bound to their parent planet.
So does the Earth orbit the solar system barycenter? Almost. The Earth has as we know a large moon (Luna), i.e. the Earth and Moon are gravitationally bound to each other. The Earth/Moon system has its own barycenter 1710 km below the Earth’s surface, around which the Earth and Moon orbit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth-Moon_barycenter . It is the Earth/Moon system that orbits the solar system barycenter, or if you like: The Earth/Moon barycenter orbits the solar system barycenter.
Then back to your example with the spacecraft launched from the solar system barycenter and assuming a circular orbit around the Sun. This is a case similar to the Earh/Moon example above, except that the mass ratios are many orders of magnitude different. But it is still a 2-body subsystem with a common barycenter. It is just that the spacecraft is of such small mass that the Sun/spacecraft barycenter is extremely close to to the mass center of the Sun. But if I for example choose a bigger spacecraft with a mass similar to, say Jupiter, the principle is the same, just much more noticeable.
So the answer to your question “What does the spacecraft do? does it go around the barycenter in a circular orbit every few hours?” is that the spacecraft orbits the Sun/spacecraft barycenter since we must assume that the spacecraft is gravitationally bound to the Sun. The Sun/spacecraft barycenter is probably just a few nanometers from the mass centre of the Sun, but they are not identical points.
Then you ask “What would your simulator say?”. My simulator would not have any opinion because it isn’t designed to answer such questions. It uses orbital elements for the planets to compute their positions for any given time, and from that deduce the position of the Sun, using the mass of the planets, their positions and the mass of the Sun. It is essentially a standard engineering-type centre of mass calculation. What it does not do, is perform time step integration to estimate the positions of all major solar system objects using Newton’s law of gravity. Thinking about it, it could be an interesting experiment to use an existing (or write an new) simulator that was 100% gravity based, not assume any special role for the Sun and provide initial conditions (mass, orbital positions and speed vectors) from my current simulator to make things realistic. Then one should be able to compute a theoretical sun-earth distance graph as a function of time and see if it agreed with observations.
Leif Svalgaard (20:02:38) :
The 1788.0 maximum is pretty well constrained by geomagnetic data going back to 1781. Little doubt about that one.
Here is the aa data compared to the sunspot data. Fairly close match in the main but not super reliable….interesting how it deviates from 1960 to 2000.
pink =ssn
black=aa
http://users.beagle.com.au/geoffsharp/aassn.jpg
Data sources.
ssn: ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/STP/SOLAR_DATA/SUNSPOT_NUMBERS/YEARLY.PLT
aa: http://www.gao.spb.ru/database/esai/aa_mod.txt
Dr Svalgaard
I followed this strand with the thought ‘Where is Leif Svalgaard’? And there you were, finally, with the usual refreshing dose of cold water!
John Finn
“How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?”
‘Relatively high’ compared to what time period?
Also, ‘global temperature’, is one thing, ‘global temperatures’ are another. One can certainly point to regions where temperatures have not been increasing over the past 100 years e.g the Southeastern states of the U.S.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (02:09:10) :
Most software are based on some assumptions, and it isn’t clear to me whether the above is designed to take the solar orbit onto account. It appears to have some approximations built in
I’m amazed how one can so desperately search for support. The JPL site also have approximate formula for those not needing the full accuracy. Here is what the site says:
Keplerian Elements for Approximate Positions of the Major Planets.
This page contains sufficient information and data to allow computation of approximate positions for the planets.[…]
You are reminded that these formulae and data provide approximate positions for the planets. They should not be used unless the errors (tabulated below) are acceptable for your application. High precision ephemerides for the planets are available via our HORIZONS system.
Even the error using the approximate formulae is small, e.g. 6000 km = 1% of a solar radius for the Earth’s orbit.
The HORIZONS system ephemerides are the best modern astronomy can do and have no approximations. The only assumption is that the laws of gravity are correct.
nobwainer (06:11:57) :
Here is the aa data compared to the sunspot data. Fairly close match in the main but not super reliable….interesting how it deviates from 1960 to 2000.
This is because the aa-index is wrong [too low] before 1957 as I have shown elsewhere, e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/Analysis%20of%20K=0%20and%201%20for%20aa%20and%20NGK.pdf
and
http://www.leif.org/research/IHV%20-%20a%20new%20long-term%20geomagnetic%20index.pdf
John Finn (01:01:28) :
Just a question on the Dalton Minimum (min in terms of sunspots). Is there actually any evidence that the period covering the Dalton Minimum was significantly cooler than the period immediately before it.
The CET certainly doesn’t show it. There seems to be a sharp cooling around 1780 but this precedes the ‘long’ cycle (4) and the 2 weaker cycles (5&6). There is a cool(er) period in the mid-1810s but at least some of this can be explained by the Tambora eruption (1815).
The standard AGW answer [ 🙂 ] is that CET is not global, so doesn’t count. I may note that the sharp cooling in the 1780s coincides with the very large solar cycle that peaked in 1788.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (04:05:27) :
As noted, this has been visited in the earlier thread. My reply then was that my wording “every object in the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter” was imprecise, as I meant to communicate “every object directly gravitationally bound to the solar system, no exception, orbits the barycenter”. “Gravitationally bound” would mean that its speed is less than the escape velocity for the system in question.
Is still imprecise, or rather wrong. ‘Gravitationally bound’ has nothing to do with it. Consider two comets travelling side by side. One has an eccentricity of 0.999,999,999 [a parabola – thus bound] and the other has an eccentricity of 1.000,000,001 [a hyperbola – thus not bound]. These two objects will have almost identical orbits swinging around the barycenter. If not, we just through in some more 9s and 0s.
So the answer to your question “What does the spacecraft do? […] is that the spacecraft orbits the Sun/spacecraft barycenter
And so does the Earth orbit the Sun/Earth barycenter which is 1650 times closer to the center of the Sun than ‘the’ barycenter based on Jupiter, hence the distance to the Sun does not need to take the Jupiter barycenter into account.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (02:09:10) :
Most software are based on some assumptions, and it isn’t clear to me whether the above is designed to take the solar orbit onto account. It appears to have some approximations built in
Excerpts from the JPL documetation [why didn’t you care to check – its online too]:
STATEMENT OF EPHEMERIS LIMITATIONS
To produce an ephemeris, observational data (optical, VLBI, radar & spacecraft) containing measurement errors are combined with dynamical models containing modeling imprecisions. A best fit is developed to statistically minimize those errors. The resulting ephemeris has an associated uncertainty that fluctuates with time.
[…]Uncertainties in major planet ephemerides range from 10cm to 100+ km in the state-of-the-art JPL/DE-405 ephemeris, used as the basis for spacecraft navigation, mission planning and radar astronomy.
,…] Relativistic effects are included in all planet, lunar and small body dynamics, excluding satellites. […]
Deflections due to other gravity fields can potentially have an effect at the 10^-4 arcsec level but are not currently included here. Satellites of other planets, such as Jupiter could experience deflections at the 10^-3 arcsec level as well. Light time iterations are Newtonian. This affects light-time convergence at the millisecond level, position at ~10^-6 arcsec level.
The JPL DE-406/LE-406 extended ephemeris covers the interval from 3000 B.C. to A.D. 3000. This ephemeris is identical to the shorter DE-405 in the sense it is the same data-fit (solution) and the same numerical integration as DE-405. However, it has been stored with slightly less accuracy to reduce its size.
For the Moon, DE-406 recovers the original integrator state to within 1 meter, other bodies within 25 meters (maximum error). This difference can be less than the uncertainty associated with the trajectory solution itself, thus is insignificant for all but the most specialized circumstances. The short-span version, DE-405, recovers the integrator state to the millimeter level.
[…]
There should be no doubt that a full [even including relativistic effects] numerical integration is carried out. The result is generally good to the meter level and is used for all spacecraft navigation.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (02:09:10) :
Most software are based on some assumptions, and it isn’t clear to me whether the above is designed to take the solar orbit onto account. It appears to have some approximations built in
And here is how the ephemeris is computed:
http://iau-comm4.jpl.nasa.gov/de405iom/de405iom.pdf
The elements of the planets etc are obtained from radar ranging [which you so disparaged] taking into account even the shape of the planets [see especially the section on Mercury].
From the document:
“DE406, The New JPL Long Ephemeris.
The full precision numerical integration covered the interval 3000 BC to 3000 AD … ”
The unwieldy numerical results from the integration are then fitted to a large set of polynomials for interpolation [just like the tables you see in Meuus’ book] and actual use.
Can we now put this to rest?
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (02:09:10) :
It appears to have some approximations built in
Just in case you do not take the trouble to read the documentation, I’ll state the conclusion here:
“DE405 represents the most accurate planetary positions available”.
Leif Svalgaard (07:58:17) :
Allow me to correct myself:
‘Gravitationally bound’ has nothing to do with it. Consider two comets travelling side by side. One has an eccentricity of 0.999,999,999 [an ellipse – thus bound] and the other has an eccentricity of 1.000,000,001 [a hyperbola – thus not bound]. These two objects will have almost identical orbits swinging around the barycenter. If not, we just throw in some more 9s and 0s.
Leif Svalgaard (08:53:00) :
Can we now put this to rest?
Let me remind you that my comment was initiated by you referring to me by name. I really don’t see why my post on the issue appears to agitate, it surely was not designed to. I am going to review the information you have provided with interest and see what I make of it. Then I reserve the right to make thoughtful comments as and when I find it relevant.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (09:18:38) :
I really don’t see why my post on the issue appears to agitate, it surely was not designed to.
I don’t think I implied that at any time.
I am going to review the information you have provided with interest and see what I make of it. Then I reserve the right to make thoughtful comments as and when I find it relevant.
One cannot ask for more than that.
Carsten
wow, gjett om jeg har lett etter en slik simulator.
Is this all about the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy? When all the large planets move from between the sun and the galaxy center to the other side of the sun, the sun has to move closer to the galaxy center because the angular momentum of the system must be preserved. In other words, the radius of the solar system center of mass orbit around the center of galaxy can not change over a short timespan. And if the sun is moving like this it means it’s motion is changing direction, i.e the sun is beeing accelerated. Why then is it so unthinkable that this acceleration is causing turbulence in the sun?
lgl (12:33:01) :
Is this all about the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy?
And why limit this to the Galaxy?. Our Galaxy is a member of the ‘local group’ of 19 gravitationally bound galaxies, including the might Andromeda Galaxy. Just imagine what kind of turbulence that could stir up… And there are indications that the local group belongs to an even larger cluster, this gets worse and worse. I better go and reinforce the roof of my house before it is too late. 🙂
Good idea Leif, then we will probably see an even better match with the Maunder and Dalton and all 🙂
Why isn’t the sun affected by the change of it’s motion?
It also seems to be affected by the Earth-Moon system’s 13-gon orbit.
With the quiet sun the last year I can even see it in the weather where I live.
http://virakkraft.com/TSI-temp.jpg
Moon at perigee (blue dots in diagram) > TSI low > high max temp
(I guess it’s more accurate to say temp peaks 14 days after TSI peaks)
lgl (14:41:30) :
Why isn’t the sun affected by the change of it’s motion?
Because all particles of the Sun move the same way. Consider two particles on opposite sides of the Sun. It is the barycenter of these two [the center of the Sun] that orbits whatever barycenters are out there. For every other particle of the Sun, you can find its partner on the opposite side of the Sun, their barycenter is also the center of the Sun.
lgl (14:57:51) :
It also seems to be affected by the Earth-Moon system’s 13-gon orbit.
Start your plot 2007/01/01
The orbit around the barycenter is not my point. The sun changes course on it’s travel through the universe, it’s accelerated, which should have some consequences.
It’s been a few hours since the last post here, so I may be joining in just after the thread has died, but here goes anyway :
John Finn (02:15:04) asked :
A question often asked of AGWers is this. How much longer would global temps need to remain flat in order for the GCM results to be falsified.
So, for all those who believe that recent ‘changes’ in the behaviour of the sun will result in plunging temperatures on earth, I’ll rephrase this question
How much longer would global temperatures need to remain at current relatively high levels for you to be convinced that the sun is not, in fact, a major factor in short-term climate shifts?
There have been some very good replies as well as some scathing ones and some that attack the wording of the question.
My strong feeling is that, regardless of how wedded to AGW John Finn may be, we all must be prepared to field awkward questions – JF included.
Returning to the question – how long must temperatures fail to decline before we skeptics have to concede that either the sun is not as big an influence as we thought or that some other influence (which obviously could be CO2) is stronger?
Note that I have removed “short term” from the question because it is irrelevant (the IPCC has already acknowledged short term solar influence and we are all concerned with the long term and agree that the short term doesn’t matter – don’t we?), though short term influences could clearly confuse the issue.
Looking at the graphs on the Danish Cosmoclimatology website, there can be a delay of up to about 2 years before cosmic ray changes show up in low clouds. There could then be a further timelag before ocean temperature get transported across the land and through the atmosphere. Perhaps 5 years would be reasonable???
So we are looking at a period of say 7 years + or – a few years as the answer to JF’s question.
But that period must start from when the sun started being less active which was probably somewhere in 2000-2005???
It’s all very imprecise, and others can no doubt give some better numbers, but I would say that if the sun remains relatively inactive and temperatures are higher than the 1999-2008 average in 2-3 years time, then solar-focused skeptics are in trouble.
Given that AGWers are expecting +0.2 deg/decade??? then they are equally in trouble if temperatures do not rise within the same timescale, 2-3 years, regardless of what the sun does.
Obviously if the sun picks up, then the argument can’t be settled this way, because both sides would be expecting a temperature increase.
No matter what precise words and numbers I have used, I believe the same way of judging must be applied to both sides. If one side wants the other to be judged on a particular period, then they must accept the same period for their side.
PS. Which temperature measure should be used. Since CO2 warming takes place in the troposphere, where the Urban Heat Effect is absent???, I suggest the best temperatures to use are the UAH and RSS average of global lower troposphere temperatures.
Leif, I tried that but the sun was quiet enough only half of 2007 so only 7 perigees line up with TSI dips, and it was so cloudy that max temp is a bad proxy. Instead I have included precipitation and you can see the cycle towards the end of the year, rain/no rain every 14 days.
http://virakkraft.com/TSI-temp-2007.jpg
lgl (16:25:53) :
Leif, I tried that but the sun was quiet enough only half of 2007 so only 7 perigees line up with TSI dips
I know I could find it online somewhere, but you may have it handy: a list of Moon perigee back to beginning of 2003?
I’m going to run a small experiment.
egrey (16:24:55) :
if the sun remains relatively inactive and temperatures are higher than the 1999-2008 average in 2-3 years time, then solar-focused skeptics are in trouble.
Could you elaborate on this? What does it mean? Are the people that are skeptical about if the Sun is a major driver in trouble?
Well, well, well. A cycle 23 sunspot could strike again. There is a clear cycle 23 area near the equator on the magnetogram. Must have energizer batteries in the damn thing.
By “solar-focused skeptics” I meant skeptics of AGW who believe instead that the sun is the major driver.
Given that the sun has been a bit inactive recently, if the sun is indeed the major driver then at some time the temperature should drop. This, I believe, was the essence of JF’s challenge : if we think the sun is the main driver of climate then with an inactive sun how long do we have to wait for cooler temperatures before we change our minds.
Now I know that we have cooler temperatures already, but the AGWers are still in denial about them [they don’t even contemplate the possibility that the 1998 El Nino was a natural phenomenon driven by the long period of active sun that preceded it]. But JF’s challenge opened up the possibility that AGWers (well, JF) might change their minds if temperatures declined further. If, on the other hand, the sun remains inactive yet temperatures are higher in 2-3 years, then the idea that climate is still driven by the sun maybe starts to look a bit shaky – provided that, for even-handedness, AGWers are prepared to state now that their theory starts to look a bit shaky if temperatures have NOT started to go higher within 2-3 years. Same time period for both sides.
Not very well explained, but it will have to do.
Incidentally, I suggested lower troposphere temperatures for the challenge. These are obviously relevant for AGW, but if solar inactivity results in low clouds then for the solar side of the challenge maybe the LT is too high an altitude???
And another ‘incidentally’ – my comments about El Nino look pretty reasonable in light of Roy Spencer’s latest paper linking cloud changes and PDO.
egrey (21:07:39) :
By “solar-focused skeptics” I meant skeptics of AGW who believe instead that the sun is the major driver.
You can be a skeptic of AGW and believe in other causes than the Sun, PDO, for instance. A complicated system as the climate does not need a driver to account for small fluctuations as it would be very hard to maintain perfect equilibrium. It does for large ones, like glaciations, but there we do have a credible mechanism, so no problem there.
Maybe it is just psychology that is at play here. Say you want to debunk AGW, then if you come up with ‘the climate changes are just random internal fluctuations’, you might be laughed at or dismissed out of hand. If, however, you say ‘it’s the Sun’, the opponents will have to argument against a seemingly serious cause [that was at a time in the past a very acceptable idea] and that is a lot harder to do. So, simply for the desire of having something better than unspecified random fluctuations, the AGW opponent will migrate to the sun-climate connection. Not because of good science, but because it is easier to argue against AGW. This, in my book, is not valid.
Leif Svalgaard (21:35:00) :
You can be a skeptic of AGW and believe in other causes than the Sun, PDO, for instance.
If Leif thinks the the Sun and Cosmic Rays/Clouds is not the driver but perhaps the PDO is responsible for our variation in temperatures ….i wonder where the heat is coming from to drive a warm PDO phase?…CO2 perhaps?
Leif, I have used this calculator: http://www.fourmilab.ch/earthview/pacalc.html
nobwainer (22:11:22) :
If Leif thinks the the Sun and Cosmic Rays/Clouds is not the driver but perhaps the PDO is responsible for our variation in temperatures ….i wonder where the heat is coming from to drive a warm PDO phase?…CO2 perhaps?
The oceans hold many hundreds times as much heat as the atmosphere. Lots of heat to go around.
lgl (22:13:13) :
Leif, I have used this calculator: http://www.fourmilab.ch/earthview/pacalc.html
thanks
‘Well, well, well. A cycle 23 sunspot could strike again. There is a clear cycle 23 area near the equator on the magnetogram. Must have energizer batteries in the damn thing.’
It’s stuck in Lodi, Pam. And over half of the last SC24 spot (1005) recorded activity is under scrutiny by some for being a “CCD imaging enhancement”. Eager Beavers anxious to help the counts along, Catania leading the charge all the while it’s Continuum2 image was showing blanks. The very last day of supposed 1005 activity saw Mt. Wilson’s drawing indication zero spots (it last recorded it Oct 12) with a seeing of 4 out of 5 on the Bortle Scale.
I saw an 11 with seeing of 3 out of 5 right in my own backyard with a wimpy 70mm Refractor
, but Catania apparently can see spots nobody else can.
If you want you can look here and see the seeing of Mt. Wilson:
‘http://cleardarksky.com/c/MtWilsonOBCAkey.html?1’
and my place:
‘http://cleardarksky.com/c/MssrHlObCAkey.html?1’
As you can see, I have it pretty good for No. Ca.
Maybe Catania has seeing off the Bortle Scale.
It really upsets me to see an Observatory bending the rules.
Bend the light, not the rules.
‘Well, well, well. A cycle 23 sunspot could strike again. There is a clear cycle 23 area near the equator on the magnetogram. Must have energizer batteries in the damn thing.’
It’s stuck in Lodi, Pam. And over half of the last SC24 spot (1005) recorded activity is under scrutiny by some for being a “CCD imaging enhancement”. Eager Beavers anxious to help the counts along, Catania leading the charge all the while it’s Continuum2 image was showing blanks. The very last day of supposed 1005 activity saw Mt. Wilson’s drawing indication zero spots (it last recorded it Oct 12) with a seeing of 4 out of 5 on the Bortle Scale.
I saw an 11 with seeing of 3 out of 5 right in my own backyard with a wimpy 70mm Refractor
, but Catania apparently can see spots nobody else can.
If you want you can look here and see the seeing of Mt. Wilson:
cleardarksky.com/c/MtWilsonOBCAkey.html?1
and my place:
cleardarksky.com/c/MssrHlObCAkey.html?1
As you can see, I have it pretty good for No. Ca.
Maybe Catania has seeing off the Bortle Scale.
It really upsets me to see an Observatory bending the rules.
Bend the light, not the rules.
Robert Bateman (23:17:27) :
Maybe Catania has seeing off the Bortle Scale.
It really upsets me to see an Observatory bending the rules.
Bend the light, not the rules.
It is OK for Catania to see the tiny Tims. The faults lies with SIDC. They should accord Catania a very low k-value to compensate. Another problem is that k may not be constant, but varies with the size of the spot. Put that blame on Wolf.
One solution would be to put 60-odd duplicates of Wolf’s telescope [which still exists and is being used by Thomas Friedli to count spots] out at the observatories. That is a money [and staffing] problem and cannot easily be solved. So we have to do with what we have. BTW, Mt. Wilson is also WAY too big a ‘telescope’ for this.
Leif Svalgaard (21:35:00) : You can be a skeptic of AGW and believe in other causes than the Sun, PDO, for instance.
nobwainer got it in one – PDO is probably driven by the sun.
Leif : A complicated system as the climate does not need a driver to account for small fluctuations as it would be very hard to maintain perfect equilibrium. It does for large ones, like glaciations, but there we do have a credible mechanism, so no problem there.
Not sure I follow you. My understanding is that glaciations are solar driven. There have been theories re earth axis changes and a few other things, but all the research I have read indicates that insolation is the key factor. You seemed to be saying there was a different driver.
egrey (23:36:05) :
Not sure I follow you. My understanding is that glaciations are solar driven. There have been theories re earth axis changes and a few other things, but all the research I have read indicates that insolation is the key factor. You seemed to be saying there was a different driver.
No, but changes in the the orbit and axis changes the solar insolation. Take an extreme case: shrink the orbit to half its size, solar insolation would go up four-fold without any change of the Sun itself. More realistically, image that you change the tilt of the axis, then you change the seasons. If there were no tilt, for instance, there would be no seasons, no winter, no summer.
The orbit is not circular, and we are now closest to the Sun in January and get 7% more heat then than in July. Make the orbit more circular and that changes.
For more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
Leif Svalgaard (23:15:06) :
The oceans hold many hundreds times as much heat as the atmosphere. Lots of heat to go around.
Nicely sidestepped…..so when the next warm PDO comes around…where will the heat come from?….has to come from somewhere.
egrey
Thanks for your reply to my question. You are the only one to attempt to provide a timescale for the supposed cooling to come. Just to clarify my position. I don’t support the view that CO2 increases will result in ‘catastrophic’ or even problematic warming. By the same token I haven’t seen anything which shows that the climate is overly sensitive to solar activity. After following Leif Svalgaard’s arguments both here and on CA I’m even less convinced that a predictable solar/climate link exists. Put it this way if solar activity has a direct influence I don’t expect it to become evident for several decades.
The PDO is certainly a factor in climate change. Whether the sun is a factor in driving the PDO – possibly – but my main point concerns the fact that AGW sceptics (skeptics in the US) are less than sceptical about theories which claim to counter AGW.
‘BTW, Mt. Wilson is also WAY too big a ‘telescope’ for this.’
I can still see most of what Mt. Wilson can see, with pretty much the same seeing as they have.
The reason for that is that the Sun is a high signal to noise ratio target. What I lack is the resolution for fine detail that Mt. Wilson’s large scope has.
Catania is getting these spots and extending them by use of H-Alpha and CCD /image histogram stretching. That’s cheating. Pure & simple.
nobwainer (00:46:21) :
Nicely sidestepped…..so when the next warm PDO comes around…where will the heat come from?….has to come from somewhere.
The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
Robert Bateman (03:46:08) :
I can still see most of what Mt. Wilson can see, with pretty much the same seeing as they have.
Perhaps one day I’ll come up [from Petaluma] to visit your observatory…
Wouldn’t that be like hunting deer at night with a flashlight? That’s illegal and can merit you a hefty fine and even jail time. But then such rules are only for the common person. Certainly not for corporations and government bodies.
Leif, I remember when we were little filling the cattle trough with water to use as a swimming pool. If we didn’t get in right away; and mind you, this water came from the well and it took our breath away and made our lips turn blue; it turned into a hot tub soon enough.
lgl (12:33:01) :
Carsten
wow, gjett om jeg har lett etter en slik simulator.
Svaret er ja, men se under.
Is this all about the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy?
No, it has nothing to do with the solar system’s orbit around the center of the galaxy. It shows the sun’s movements near the center of the solar system, as it reacts to the gravitational forces of the planets. It is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on. To me it is/was also a tool for investigating potential correlations with solar activity. So far I have found none.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (07:42:05) :
It [the simulator] is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on.
No, it actually gets the distances [and therefore very likely other things] wrong.
I’m in the process of remodelling the 16″ Newt for some faster integration times.
Love those distant galaxies forming on the downloads.
You are welcome any time. I didn’t know you were in the Bay Area, it’s a small world indeed..
Can you get my email off this list?
Robert Bateman (10:26:07) :
Can you get my email off this list?
No, but you can send it to me leif@leif.org
Check out my son’s stuff at http://www.leif.org/mikael/
He once had of his images [of the veil nebula] on APOD.
APOD is here http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
Carsten
But aren’t you now back to what Leif usually is calling barycenter nonsense?
If the barycenter was at rest relative to a fixed point in space (if one exists) I would agree that you should not find any trace of the gravitational forces in solar activity, but I find it hard to understand that the situation is not different when the sun is moving very fast having a tremendous linear (over short timespan) momentum.
It’s easier to understand that a wiggling orbit may create turbulence in a star’s ‘atmosphere’. And considering the hugh momentum, how can the gravitation of the planets change the sun’s moving direction?
b t w shouldn’t that change depend on the speed of the barycenter through space, which is not in your model at all, puh .. I need a rest ..
Leif Svalgaard (23:49:08) :
For more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
Not particularly relevant, but I am pleased that even if indirectly, name of Milutin Milankovic came up, since I spend my academic years in the lecture halls, where some years earlier, he was a professor and the entrance is guarded by statue of Nikola Tesla.
Leif,
Don’t be so hard on him, he did write “illustrative”.
Are you refuting that the sun is moving roughly like these patterns (say within 10%, which is more that good as an illustration)?
And are you refuting that it actually is the barycenter that is moving in a straight line through space (short timespan) and not the sun?
Leif Svalgaard (10:13:54) :
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (07:42:05) :
It [the simulator] is nothing new, but quite illustrative to what is actually going on.
No, it actually gets the distances [and therefore very likely other things] wrong.
Well excuse me, but it does not calculate distances in its present form at all. I don’t know what your problem is.
John Finn (01:45:16) : After following Leif Svalgaard’s arguments both here and on CA I’m even less convinced that a predictable solar/climate link exists. Put it this way if solar activity has a direct influence I don’t expect it to become evident for several decades.
re ‘predictable’: I don’t think we’re very good yet at predicting what the sun will do. But to a certain extent climate can be predicted for given solar changes. That goes back to William Hershel (and NASA identified a solar-activity link to ancient Egyptian records). There’s a good summary IMHO of some of the solar/climate knowledge in Jasper Kirkby’s paper
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0804/0804.1938v1.pdf
re ‘several decades’: Maybe, but I think the evidence suggests there can be a faster reaction than that.
John Finn (01:45:16) : that AGW sceptics (skeptics in the US) are less than sceptical about theories which claim to counter AGW.
Human nature being what it is, that applies to both sides, of course. In some cases, in spades. Having read the IPCC report very carefully, I am totally convinced that they have heavily misrepresented the situation. There is remarkably strong empirical evidence of links between sun and climate for which the mechanisms are not yet fully known, which are acknowledged in the IPCC report but then ignored. [Not their only error]. Of all the climate theories, the links between sun and climate via cosmic rays and clouds seem the most promising, but my mind is open to any other theory too.
The other angle that I follow is to see what is/has actually happening/ed (temperatures, ice, etc) and it is extremely difficult to believe that CO2 is driving it. IMHO of course.
Leif Svalgaard (05:49:34) : The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
Neatly sidestepped again. With more insolation (plus ‘feedbacks’) the oceans warm more, which in time contributes more warmth to the climate. And vice versa. It’s the changes in the sun and climate that we’re talking about.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway (11:52:55) :
Well excuse me, but it does not calculate distances in its present form at all. I don’t know what your problem is.
Well, I apologize for being presumptive without actually checking what it does. The screen-shot says that the simulator shows the orbit of the solar system’s center of mass with respect to the Sun. You need to know where the Earth is [and all the other planets, as well] to calculate where the center of mass is. So, if you calculate where the Earth is you also have the distance to the Sun [you even showed a graph of that]. The definition of the barycenter is sum(r[i]*m[i])/sum(r[i]) over all i, where r is the distance and m the mass. So, you must have calculated all the r[i]s, thus all the distances. Alternatively you could have worked in rectangular coordinates and calculated x, y, and z, but then you also have the distance r = sqrt(x^2+y^2+x^2). In any case the calculated r should be the same as JPL calculates, and I think this whole discussion got started because you from your calculations found a distance that did not conform to the actual distance [as calculated by JPL and as measured with TSI].
lgl (11:23:27) :
Are you refuting that the sun is moving roughly like these patterns (say within 10%, which is more that good as an illustration)?
No, I’m quibbling about the word ‘actually’ which implies that that is how it actually is without 10% [or any other large] slop.
And are you refuting that it actually is the barycenter that is moving in a straight line through space (short timespan) and not the sun?
With a time span short enough everything is moving in a straight line. Assuming the Sun is gravitationally bound to the Galaxy, then the solar system moves under the influence of the gravitational field of the Galaxy [which is almost uniform across the solar system because the solar system is much smaller than the Galaxy]. And a system of bodies acted upon by a uniform force moves as if the force was applied to the center of mass, so the system moves accordingly, thus no need to refute anything.
egrey (14:04:16) :
re ‘predictable’: I don’t think we’re very good yet at predicting what the sun will do.
Yet most people here seems to think that solar activity is on a downslope and thus confidently predict a cooling. So, what do they know [or blatantly just assume] that you don’t.
re ’several decades’: Maybe, but I think the evidence suggests there can be a faster reaction than that.
what evidence? the ‘cooling’ that started a few years ago corresponding to the downslope of solar activity that happens during the declining phase of EVERY sunspot cycle, including the ones 10, 20, 30, etc. years ago?
There is remarkably strong empirical evidence of links between sun and climate
I think here is where we part ways. I’m fairly well versed in this, having studied the field for 40+ years and having carefully read almost all of the serious literature on this [there is non-serious lit. too, e.g. this http://landscheidt.auditblogs.com/papers-by-dr-theodor-landscheidt ] and have not found any of the hundreds of articles [including some of my own, e.g. ‘Solar magnetic sector structure: relation to circulation of the earth’s atmosphere.’ by Wilcox, J. M.; Scherrer, P. H.; Svalgaard, L.; Roberts, W. O.; Olson, R. H. Science, Vol. 180, p. 185-186, 1973] to pass muster. There are no shortage of outrageous claims but no coherent picture has emerged, and certainly not a ‘remarkable’ one.
my mind is open to any other theory too.
And it is not about an open or closed mind. My own has been open to this for decades. I desperately want there to be a sun-climate connection. It would make my skill set much more valuable and grants would be rolling in. But, alas, in the heart of my hearts, if I have to be honest with myself, I cannot, with integrity intact, claim that there is such a linkage. Other people may have come to other conclusions, but I guess we all have own ideas about what is acceptable.
The other angle that I follow is to see what is/has actually happening/ed (temperatures, ice, etc) and it is extremely difficult to believe that CO2 is driving it. IMHO of course.
What bothers [the hell out of] me is that invariably the belief/denial of AGW is woven in with the totally separately and unconnected problem of sun-climate relations.
Leif Svalgaard (05:49:34) : The Sun shines every day heating the oceans which stores the heat for future use.
With more insolation (plus ‘feedbacks’) the oceans warm more, which in time contributes more warmth to the climate. And vice versa. It’s the changes in the sun and climate that we’re talking about.
Sure, and I [and many others] have repeatedly calculated that the warming of 0.1% change of insolation [I note the slight change of wording here – changes of insolation do occur causing glaciations coming and going] or, since you explicitly say ‘changes in the sun’, of TSI would amount to less than a tenth of a degree. The ‘feedback’ [and I shall also use quotes – a sign that none of us know what they are] expected from a warmer world would be negative – more evaporation -> more clouds -> cooling, possibly countered by a positive feedback in that water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas. In any event, no great temp changes is to be expected from a 0.1% change of TSI. And sure enough, it has been very hard to establish a solar cycle effect exceeding 0.1-0.2 degrees [and even that small effect is marginal].
Leif Svalgaard (15:11:08) :
It is hard to be perfect: The definition of the barycenter is sum(r[i]*m[i])/sum(m[i]) over all i.
Carsten Arnholm, Norway
Thanks so much for providing the Solar Sim2, beautiful piece of software, I will use it often.
Teacher, can I go home now? My tummy hurts.
In mathematical language that would be [h(t*r)/tum%] over all s, where h=desire to go home, t=teacher, and r=reading math language, divided by % tummy acid.
Don’t ask me what s means. I can’t remember because my brain has tripped a circuit.
Leif
And a system of bodies acted upon by a uniform force moves as if the force was applied to the center of mass
So it is the barycenter moving in a straight line, i.e the sun is not so it is accelerating. (you know what timespan we are dealing with since this is about solar cycles, and you know I do not mean an exactly straight line)
Turning into black
Rising of the dead
The dying has begun
Beneath a dying sun
lgl (23:38:54) :
So it is the barycenter moving in a straight line, i.e the sun is not so it is accelerating.
and so is the Earth in its orbit, and the space station in its orbit around the Earth, and the astronaut on a spacewalk with his lost glove moving alongside, and a man and his dog in an elevator when the cable is cut. They are all in free fall [constantly accelerating], but feel no forces [because every particle is accelerating the same way].
In my view (since it appears there is no agreement and I doubt that there would be one) climate is affected by both: solar cycles and by AGW. To that extent I would like to draw your attention to graph:
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/mgt.gif
Derivation and properties of ‘Maunder curve’ (Y2) is directly related to solar cycle; see:
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk
and follow link solar current (page3).
It follows that if there is no further increase in AGW then over the next 10 years we can expect global cooling of approx. 0.2-03 degree C from the current global temperatures.
Leif
but feel no forces
This is where I’m falling off the space station. This ever changing direction of the sun’s orbit means it will feel acceleration.
Man, when the Sun hit that snooze button the last time, I think it is sleeping through the rest of the alarms. I do that sometimes. Even the magnetogram is nearly blank.
I love the picture of the orange bubbly Sun. I wish we could post a short video of the current Sun. It would be fun to watch it boil.
lgl (05:45:59) :
This is where I’m falling off the space station. This ever changing direction of the sun’s orbit means it will feel acceleration.
The space station is not moving in a straight line, so is changing direction, thus, accelerated, all the time, too.
lgl (05:45:59) :
“This is where I’m falling off the space station. This ever changing direction of the sun’s orbit means it will feel acceleration.”
The space station is not moving in a straight line, so is changing direction, thus, accelerated, all the time, too.
The poor guy and his dog in a free-falling elevator with a cut cable are also accelerating all the time [at least until they hit the bottom]. The point is that acceleration per se is not the important issue. To create ‘turbulence’ and other havoc inside the Sun [creating or modulating solar activity] you need to have differences in acceleration. Like if the guys feet would accelerate faster than his head. That would be a major problem for him as he would be stretched thin, literally, but as long as all parts of him are accelerated the same way, he fells nothing. Same thing with the Sun, thus no sunspots as the result of the Sun’s motion.
Leif
But that’s not the same thing. The Earth’s gravitation is the only force acting on the space station and it’s constant, always perpendicular to the motion. The sun is pulled by the galaxy in the same way but in addition there is a varying force from the planets dragging it all over the place (right, only a couple of sun diameters, you don’t have to say it 🙂 How can that be free fall? It’s orbit is not smooth like the space station’s orbit.
lgl (08:41:55) :
How can that be free fall? It’s orbit is not smooth like the space station’s orbit.
Free fall is motion with no acceleration other than that provided by gravity [google ‘free fall’]. And the orbit is a lot smoother than the space station’s [seen from e.g. the barycenter or the Sun, just try to imagine what the orbit on the Simulator ‘window’ would look like]. But that is not the point. The point is that all particles of the Sun partake equally in whatever motion the Sun has, so there is no ‘turbulence’ or other havoc created. For that to happen you would have that different parts of the Sun would be pulled differently by the planets. [They are. They are raising ‘tides’ and the tide raised by Jupiter is 0.0005 meter high – hardly of significance when you consider that in the ‘boiling’ motions of the Sun’s atmosphere, plasma rises and falls at speeds of 1000 to 2000 meter per second for 10 minutes on average].
Leif
I simply can not believe that all particles of the Sun partake equally in whatever motion the Sun has when it is wiggeling around it’s ‘average orbit’
but it’s ok with me to end the barycenter nonsense for now, thanks for your time. (and if free fall does not mean you will feel no forces, then I don’t know what free fall is).
Dr. Svalgaard
Looking trough
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/presentations/20070216_NSSTC.ppt#32
I came across your prediction (from 2005) for SC24 as 75+-8. Have you since made any updating?
Two months ago on SC24.com
DrS: “spare us the details, what is the predicted sunspot number and when is maximum for SC24?”
MV: “Maximum predicted in 2012 (possibly the second half), peak amplitude 135 to 140”
Today I was reminded that in Jan 2004 I wrote:
http://xxx.lanl.gov/ftp/astro-ph/papers/0401/0401107.pdf
(pages 2 and 3): An approximation for the overall amplitude’s envelope, for the period 1800-2000,
can be obtained by using sub-harmonics with periods of: P1 = 118 (as above) and P2 = 3 x 96.5 = 289.5 years and again T0 = 1941. The equation is:
Y= A [B + Cos (3pi /2 + 2pi (t-T0)/P1 + 0.5Cos 2pi (t-T0)/P2]
A=60 and B=2 are the normalising coefficients.
The above equation gives:
For 2012 max = 85; 2013 max = 82.
Since the old SC24.com is not active any more I would like to take this opportunity to correct my numbers.
That GCR and high energy protons peturb the ozonsphere is well described in the literature through various photochemical process is well understood (EG Paul Crutzen). The coupling with the surface and other atmospheric observations os also interesting.
Sensitivity of Surface Temperature and Atmospheric Temperature to Perturbations in the Stratospheric Concentration of Ozone and Nitrogen Dioxide
V. Ramanathan, L.B. Callis, and R.E. Boughner
Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences
Article: pp. 1092–1112
ABSTRACT
The present paper examines, with the aid of a radiative-convective model, the sensitivity of the globally-averaged surface temperature and atmospheric temperature to perturbations in the concentration of O3 and NO2 within the stratosphere. The analysis considers reductions in stratospheric O3 with and without a simultaneous increase in the stratospheric concentration of NO2. Ozone is reduced uniformly in a region between 12 and 40 km within the stratosphere. The ratio of the percentage change in NO2 to the percentage change in O3 is denoted by δ; three values of δ (0, −6 and −10) are considered.
For all the cases considered, it is shown that reducing stratosphere O3 cools the atmosphere and the surface. If the reduction in O3 is accompanied by a simultaneous increase in NO2, the increase in solar absorption by NO2 partially compensates for the reduction in solar absorption due to a decrease in stratospheric O3. Consequently, the decrease in atmospheric and surface temperatures is smaller for larger values of −δ. The results for the surface temperature changes depend on the adopted cloud model. The change in the surface temperature for the constant cloud-top temperature model is 1.6 times larger than that for the constant cloud-top altitude model.
The model also indicates that the surface temperature is sensitive to the vertical distribution of O3 within the atmosphere. Increasing (or decreasing) the altitude at which O3 density is maximum has a cooling (or warming) effect an the surface temperature. The consequences of O3 reduction to the latitudinal energy distribution are also discussed.
The results should be considered as reflecting the sensitivity of the present model rather than the sensitivity of the actual earth-atmosphere system. However, the present results should be indicative of the potential environmental consequences due to perturbations in the stratospheric concentrations of O3 and NO2.
Leif : Yet most people here seems to think that solar activity is on a downslope and thus confidently predict a cooling. So, what do they know [or blatantly just assume] that you don’t.
The sun has become a lot less active recently, and there is a time-lag. Looks like the temperature drop has started, and is likely to continue for a while regardless of what the sun does tomorrow, because of what the sun has done already. There is reasonable evidence of solar cycles which does suggest that the cooling could last for at least a couple of decades, but that would be more open to question.
Leif : I think here is where we part ways.
Maybe, but give it another shot. I have downloaded Landsheidt’s paper and will read it. Have you read Kirkby’s paper?
Leif : The ‘feedback’ [and I shall also use quotes – a sign that none of us know what they are] expected from a warmer world would be negative – more evaporation -> more clouds -> cooling, possibly countered by a positive feedback in that water vapor is a potent greenhouse gas. In any event, no great temp changes is to be expected from a 0.1% change of TSI. And sure enough, it has been very hard to establish a solar cycle effect exceeding 0.1-0.2 degrees [and even that small effect is marginal].
1. The IPCC report has a very large positive feedback for clouds. See 8.6.3.2 where they up the ECS from 1.2 to 1.9 for water vapour and then to 3.2 for clouds. I think they are up the creek and so it seems do you.
2. The IPCC report in 1.4.3 states that the 11-year solar cycle can change global temperature by “several tenths of a degree centigrade”. That sounds like a bit more than your estimate.
[I am short on time today and haven’t double-checked the IPCC para #s]
correction : Landscheidt
The sun has become a lot less active recently, and there is a time-lag. Looks like the temperature drop has started
Global temperatures dropped in response to the recent La Nina. Unless La Nina makes a comeback global temperatures will gradually return to the background levels of the past decade or so. We’re currently in a “deep” solar minimum, so temperatures should be ~0.1 deg cooler than they might be otherwise.
There’s nothing, in any of the temperature observations (MSU or surface), to suggest that this particular solar cycle is having any more effect on global temperatures than previous cycles.
Keep watching John…..its just starting, this cycle could still go for a couple more years yet, followed by 2 much lower cycles. PDO and AMO cool and no el nino’s in sight.
On earth, when the tide rises 0.0005 meters, a heck of a lot of water has moved to do that. Why can’t that seemingly small tide on the surface of the sun represent a huge movement of mass, and hence, more effect than you may have imagined?
============================================
Leif – I misread your post – I thought you were recommending Landscheidt’s paper but it seems it was actually an example of what you disagree with. Please can you recommend a peer-reviewed paper that I should read.
I would still like you and JF to read Jasper Kirkby’s paper and see what you think.
JF said : Global temperatures dropped in response to the recent La Nina.
El Ninos and La Ninas are part of the natural cycle. No-one knows yet exactly how it all hangs together, but it’s probably no coincidence that the 20th century’s largest El Nino came at the end of the period of higher solar activity, and the recent La Nina came after solar activity had started dropping. It’s not 1:1 of course, but these things do go in phases/cycles.
What I am saying is that El Ninos and La Ninas – overall – are probably part of the ‘feedback’ that demonstrably makes the sun have more effect on climate than just its raw TSI. Cosmic rays and clouds are looking very likely to be part of the overall pattern. The Kirkby paper explores some of this, and a recent paper by Roy Spencer looked at the cloud-PDO connection. I’ll have to do more work on the PDO-ENSO connection (if any).
Leif, you said earlier : What bothers [the hell out of] me is that invariably the belief/denial of AGW is woven in with the totally separately and unconnected problem of sun-climate relations.
This I find hard to accept. The AGWers have to deny that the sun has much effect on climate, because their case collapses if it does (the sun was increasingly active through the 20thC). ANYONE interested in climate should surely be interested in the link with the sun, because it has been the major influence for so long. The idea that suddenly it has no effect is absurd.
kim (18:27:36) :
Why can’t that seemingly small tide on the surface of the sun represent a huge movement of mass, and hence, more effect than you may have imagined?
Because it also has to operate or work on an even larger [hugher?] mass, namely the Sun itself. At it will drown in the much much larger completely random boiling granulation where millions of Texas sized chunks of mass move vertically and horizontally something like at least 10,000,000 meter all the time. The 0.0005 meter does not seem to have much impact on such huge overturning movements. But if you can suggest a specific mechanism that nevertheless overcomes this huge difference in scale i’m all ears [as Ross Perot once said].
egrey (19:40:36) :
Please can you recommend a peer-reviewed paper that I should read.
paper on what? planetary influences? astrology?
I would still like you and JF to read Jasper Kirkby’s paper and see what you think.
I have read all of Henrik’s and Jasper’s papers [that I could lay my hand on – there might be some difficult to access internal reports that I couldn’t get to and don’t know about] from the very beginning. I do not find them convincing. Now, I might spend the several weeks it would take to do justice to that corpus and produce a paper on it, and I might do that if there were even the smallest chance that I could convince even ONE enthusiast to agree with me. My experience with human nature tells me, though, that it would be completely futile, so I won’t bother. [I might do it anyway, if I can find the time, but it not on my ever-growing list of things to do]
but it’s probably no coincidence that the 20th century’s largest El Nino came at the end of the period of higher solar activity, and the recent La Nina came after solar activity had started dropping.
Unless you can somehow quantify the probabilities you cannot say that it is ‘probably no coincidence that …’. You can say that you believe that it is no coincidence, but that is quite a different story. There was an even bigger cycle in the 1950s and an even bigger drop in the 1960s. Where were the even bigger Nino/Nina then? Or do you invoke a 40-year lag?
Roy Spencer looked at the cloud-PDO connection. I’ll have to do more work on the PDO-ENSO connection (if any).
But that does not seem to have anything to do with the Sun per se. I have read Spencer’s papers [and book] and I failed to see where he invoked the Sun as the causative link between PDO and clouds [I could have missed it, so tell me where].
The AGWers have to deny that the sun has much effect on climate, because their case collapses if it does (the sun was increasingly active through the 20thC).
But such denial is not science because the reason for the denial is fear of collapse rather than the result of observations/calculations/models/etc/
ANYONE interested in climate should surely be interested in the link with the sun, because it has been the major influence for so long. The idea that suddenly it has no effect is absurd.
ANYONE interested in climate should surely be interested in if there is a link with the sun. But it has not been shown that solar has been the major influence for so long. Rather, the evidence [such as there is] is very weak. There are good reasons [and I have referred to this repeatedly] that recent solar activity has been overestimated [e.g. the counting of ‘Tiny Tims’ that has been discussed elsewhere in the blog]. There is good evidence that the sunspot number in the 1850-1870s was not different than in 1980-present, yet the temperatures during those periods are markedly different [unless you argue that the temperature curves are just garbage, but if you do that you cannot claim any meaningful correlation anyway].
Indeed, ‘the idea that suddenly the effects from like solar activity would be so different is absurd’, if the Sun were the primary driver. If you claim the effect of the ‘primary driver’ depends on other things, then the primary driver(s) must be sought among those other things.
My point is that we should not move from ‘the science is settled, it’s CO2, stupid!’ to ‘the science is settled, it’s the Sun, stupid!’ Both are equally dogmatic and unsuitable for policy making.
The duality of the behavior of light might have some effect if both the Sun and AGW acted in concert. Something has to cause long-term changes or we are left to conclude that they simply do not exist. (i.e. – as the Earth cools the Sun continues up the Main Sequence and it’s all in equilibrium).
If satellites were actively measuring the amount of reflection (albedo) at all wavelengths by day for the next several solar cycles as well as a few previous cycles in addition to measuring the escape of heat at night we might have something else to look at.
My point being:
If we are looking for explanations as to long term climate changes and are not finding what we want it is more probable that either we are looking in the wrong places than the right ones or that we aren’t yet looking at things in the right manner.
How many times has science come so close yet missed it by that much only to find out that someone almost got it 50 years ago but just yesterday it all made sense?
Good luck with the search.
Leif (00:01:55) The amount of mass moved by a tide of 0.0005 meters on the sun dwarfs anything the size of Texas. But a specific mechanism, I lack, though if acting, it may well be magnetic. Something modulates the sunspot activity during the minimums. What might that mechanism be?
=================================================
nobwainer (17:16:32) :
Thanks so much for providing the Solar Sim2, beautiful piece of software, I will use it often.
Thanks for that, glad it could be of some use. Use it with wisdom! 🙂
kim (04:21:04) :
The amount of mass moved by a tide of 0.0005 meters on the sun dwarfs anything the size of Texas.
Except that there are millions of these at any given time all heaving at 1000-2000 meter per second.
kim (04:21:04) :
The amount of mass moved by a tide of 0.0005 meters on the sun dwarfs anything the size of Texas.
“Except that there are millions of these at any given time all heaving at 1000-2000 meter per second”
And these cells penetrate to a depth of 200,000,000 meters…
Leif (05:02:04) Yes, and their net movement is zero, which is less than the net movement of the tidal mass.
=======================================
Analogously, you might tell me that ocean waves have a height of several feet, but the tide is an inch. You cannnot tell me that the ocean wave has moved more mass than the tide.
=========================================
Mr. Bateman
I noticed that dip in the global temperature around 1860,1915 and 1969 coincided with changeover in the North-South sunspot number excess (for the relevant cycles 10, 14 and 20 the monthly peak was at least 20% lower than in the neighbouring cycles on either side).
http://www.vukcevic.co.uk/MaunderN-S-excess.gif
kim (07:21:14) :
Yes, and their net movement is zero, which is less than the net movement of the tidal mass.
The net movement of tidal mass is also zero because the Sun’s mass is constant [on the time scale of interest]. But this is barking up the wrong tree. The tidal movements are minute, slow and large-scale and the movement from one area is very nearly the the same as that for another area far away, so will not create ‘turbulence’ or disruptions that lead to solar activity. What create effects are differences. What create violent weather are differences in temperature or in pressure. The whole issue is like the effect of an ant crawling across the oval track of a Stock Car Demolition Derby.
=======================================
25
10
2008
kim (07:39:19) :
Analogously, you might tell me that ocean waves have a height of several feet, but the tide is an inch. You cannnot tell me that the ocean wave has moved more mass than the tide.
kim (07:39:19) :
Analogously, you might tell me that ocean waves have a height of several feet, but the tide is an inch. You cannnot tell me that the ocean wave has moved more mass than the tide.
Is disingenuous, because ocean waves are a surface phenomenon while the solar convection zone extends 200,000,000 meters into the Sun. Had the ocean waves persisted to the equivalent depth of 1000 meters, they certainly move more mass than the one foot [not one inch] tides, so I guess I just told you.
Leif Svalgaard : You puzzle me a bit. I have re-read every post of yours on this thread, to try to work out just where you do stand on the issue of sun-climate link (or lack of). I ought to read some of your papers too, and will try to do so (time!). In going through some of your statements here, I would like to assure you that I am trying to be constructive, and not doing it for nit-picking.
On this board, perhaps your post 23/10 16:23:52 says most. no great temp changes is to be expected from a 0.1% change of TSI
I am sure that your thoughts can’t possibly have stopped at that level, so I find it a curious statement. The sun-climate link just isn’t going to be that simple or someone would have put it to bed years ago.
On 25/10 00:48:30 you said : I have read Spencer’s papers [and book] and I failed to see where he invoked the Sun as the causative link between PDO and clouds
He didn’t. He was just researching the link between cloud changes and PDO.
Many things are intertwined. One researcher connects solar activity and GCRs, another connects GCRs and clouds, another connects clouds and PDO, and so on.
And these lines of research are non-trivial. For example, it certainly is the case that relatively small changes in global cloud cover can have a large effect on climate (IPCC Report 1.5.2 says An albedo decrease of only 1%, bringing the Earth’s albedo from 30% to 29%, would cause an increase in the black-body radiative equilibrium temperature of about 1°C, a highly significant value, roughly equivalent to the direct radiative effect of a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration.)
23/10 16:23:52 you also said What bothers [the hell out of] me is that invariably the belief/denial of AGW is woven in with the totally separately and unconnected problem of sun-climate relations.
That seems a bit disingenuous to me. OK, if you are speaking as a pure scientist maybe it’s a reasonable statement. In pure science it would be enough to simply demonstrate that the IPCC got it (the effect of greenhouse gases) wrong, but unfortunately the debate long ago left the domain of pure science. Inevitably it has ranged into the consideration of alternatives, of which the sun-climate link appears to be the major one.
There are a couple of points of yours that I haven’t replied to yet but should deal with in time.
Finally, on 25/10 00:48:30 you said : My point is that we should not move from ‘the science is settled, it’s CO2, stupid!’ to ‘the science is settled, it’s the Sun, stupid!’ Both are equally dogmatic and unsuitable for policy making.
I agree. Unfortunately the world’s news media and policy-makers do not.
According to two scientists from Russian Institute of Solar-Terrestrial Physics
http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FIAU%2FIAU2004_IAUS223%2FS1743921304007197a.pdf&code=dfadf43d763586d014e1b68b258da7cd
over the last 500 years TSI has been increasing at rate of 0.058W per decade. Are these figures verifiable?
Radun (06:02:57) :
According to two scientists from Russian Institute of Solar-Terrestrial Physics:
File not available. [S1743921304007197a.pdf].
over the last 500 years TSI has been increasing at rate of 0.058W per decade. Are these figures verifiable?
Would like to see the paper [not available], but the last 30 years of spacecraft measurements do not support such a systematic change [0.2 W/m2].
Sorry, the above link for TSI article should be:
http://journals.cambridge.org/download.php?file=%2FIAU%2FIAU2004_IAUS223%2FS1743921304007197a.pdf&code=71b800b797677eaa9ea5e022a6df2e32
Leif, (11:45:03) You’ve only dealt with the flaw in my analogy, which I almost accounted for to begin with, but I finally decided you’d not deign to address it. What about the fact that the net movement of all your Texases is zero, and the net tidal movement on the sun is huge?
============================================
Leif (11:39:13) Ah, I see you’ve addressed the tidal movement. Does the ant on the speedway have butterfly wings to flap?
================================
egrey (23:43:19) :
Leif Svalgaard : You puzzle me a bit. I have re-read every post of yours on this thread, to try to work out just where you do stand on the issue of sun-climate link (or lack of).
Thank you for taking the trouble.
On this board, perhaps your post 23/10 16:23:52 says most. no great temp changes is to be expected from a 0.1% change of TSI
I am sure that your thoughts can’t possibly have stopped at that level, so I find it a curious statement. The sun-climate link just isn’t going to be that simple or someone would have put it to bed years ago.
Well, my thoughts did stop at that level. I have mentioned this several times: When Jack Eddy drew attention to the Maunder Minimum in the 1970s it was thought [Abbot’s measurements of ‘solar constant’] that the solar cycle variation of TSI was ten times as large [actually two schools of thought back then: 1-2% or 0%]. With such a large variation the connection with the LIA was reasonable. When it turns out that TSI varied ten times less, the TSI-LIA connection was observationally refuted. As simple as that: your theory predicts X, X does not happen, out goes your theory.
An albedo decrease of only 1%, bringing the Earth’s albedo from 30% to 29%, would cause an increase in the black-body radiative equilibrium temperature of about 1°C, a highly significant value
Don’t disagree, except that the albedo is not observed to vary as solar activity, so again an observational refutation.
23/10 16:23:52 you also said What bothers [the hell out of] me is that invariably the belief/denial of AGW is woven in with the totally separately and unconnected problem of sun-climate relations.
That seems a bit disingenuous to me. OK, if you are speaking as a pure scientist maybe it’s a reasonable statement. In pure science it would be enough to simply demonstrate that the IPCC got it (the effect of greenhouse gases) wrong, but unfortunately the debate long ago left the domain of pure science. Inevitably it has ranged into the consideration of alternatives, of which the sun-climate link appears to be the major one.
Since the link is already observationally refuted, the main reason for opponents of AGW to cling to it anyway is to have a major alternative to AGW, regardless, so they ignore the refutation, often excusing their stance with “but it so complex and intertwined that anything can happen”.
Finally, on 25/10 00:48:30 you said : My point is that we should not move from ‘the science is settled, it’s CO2, stupid!’ to ‘the science is settled, it’s the Sun, stupid!’ Both are equally dogmatic and unsuitable for policy making.
I agree. Unfortunately the world’s news media and policy-makers do not.
This is partly because in opposing AGW, people use the observationally refuted solar-climate connection as a major argument, and when your main argument is flawed, no wonder you don’t make much headway. The AGW-crowd even use the solar connection against you: “the main natural cause is the Sun, but solar activity has been decreasing the last 20 years, while temps have not, ergo AGW”. You are giving them the ammo they need for this kind of nonsense.
kim (06:50:43) :
What about the fact that the net movement of all your Texases is zero, and the net tidal movement on the sun is huge?
The average [over some interval] of the Texases is not ZERO, but some number much smaller than 200,000,000, but still much larger than 0.0005. To calculate a measure of ‘movement’ maybe you should consider the Root-Mean-Square value of the two cases.
kim (06:58:20) :
Does the ant on the speedway have butterfly wings to flap?
There were, unfortunately ripped off in a close encounter with a 1948 Studebaker.
Leif Svalgaard (08:34:45) :
kim (06:50:43) :
What about the fact that the net movement of all your Texases is zero, and the net tidal movement on the sun is huge?
What is important are the energies involved. The tidal movements have a certain kinetic energy, and the convection has a certain kinetic energy. The ratio [T/C] between these is minuscule. The text line is almost not long enough to hold all the zeroes after the decimal point 🙂
Sorry about the link; it is a bit too long so it does not copy properly into the ‘comments’ box. If you enter in ‘Google’ :
Changes in solar irradiance in an 11-yr cycle and on a secular timescale
hopefully it will turn up; authors are: A.V. Mordvinov and N.G. Makarenko
However I think their graph is somewhat misleading, their TSI trend line should start from 1663W/m2.
Must clean the keyboard. That should be 1363W/m2
Radun (09:22:44) :
However I think their graph is somewhat misleading, their TSI trend line should start from 1363W/m2.
Yeah, one does not calculate trends based on single-point outliers. But, in any case, the trend is much too large because the TSI reconstructions are obsolete. Modern reconstructions [Lean, Krivova, Preminger, Svalgaard] show an insignificant trend [or none].
Leif
Since the link is already observationally refuted
How come nobody believe the ISCCP data? http://virakkraft.com/lowclouds.htm
(unfortunately they switched to a new dataset or something in oct 2002 so I have taken the liberty to adjust post-2002)
Leif (08:27:34) We are gathered here today, not to praise Studebakers, but to bury barycentrism.
I once remarked to a fella with a Studebaker T-shirt on that I understood that parts for old Studebakers were relatively easy to come by, and he laughed and told me that he had a whole hillside of old Studebakers.
===================================
lgl (11:35:09) :
“Since the link is already observationally refuted…”
How come nobody believe the ISCCP data?
But we do. As you can verify for yourself there is no solar cycle signal [as there is none in the albedo either]
kim (11:59:12) :
Leif (08:27:34) We are gathered here today, not to praise Studebakers, but to bury barycentrism.
It is like a zombie, burying it doesn’t help.
BTW, that ratio I talked about comes to about 1 in 400,000,000,000
Leif : OK, I think I understand you now – your whole thinking is driven by the idea that the solar-climate connection has been observationally refuted. Therefore you can dismiss any individual piece of evidence quite easily, until the whole case gets put together (which won’t happen if you are right).
My position is that the IPCC cherry-picked and were biased in their reports, that AGW is a significant multiple less significant than their estimates, and that the IPCC’s Summary for Policymakers is a disgraceful document with a highly inadequate scientific basis, which risks science itself being brought into disrepute.
Cherry-picking example. TS.2.4 : the cosmic ray time series does not appear to correspond to global total cloud cover after 1991 or to global low-level cloud cover after 1994. Together with the lack of a proven physical mechanism and the plausibility of other causal factors affecting changes in cloud cover, this makes the association between galactic cosmic ray-induced changes in aerosol and cloud formation controversial. Dismissed, based on a short time period, and IMHO not the same standard as applied elsewhere when it suits them. I have questioned two “AGW” scientists on this issue, and the replies were the same “we didn’t understand the mechanism so we left it out“.
In the meantime, the evidence of a solar-climate link is already at least as strong as for AGW and – although I agree with you that the science still has a long way to go – should be brought into the open and investigated properly. As should all aspects of climate science.
egrey (17:48:21) :
Leif : OK, I think I understand you now – your whole thinking is driven by the idea that the solar-climate connection has been observationally refuted. Therefore you can dismiss any individual piece of evidence quite easily, until the whole case gets put together (which won’t happen if you are right).
I don’t think the refutation is an ‘idea’. And each new purported piece of ‘evidence’ should not be just dismissed, but evaluated on the spot to see it it passes. If not, then dismiss, or put on back-burner for now.
My position is that the IPCC cherry-picked and were biased in their reports[…]
Could very well be, but has no bearing on purported Sun-Climate relationships.
In the meantime, the evidence of a solar-climate link is already at least as strong as for AGW
Both are weakening as we speak. With small sample sizes and older technology one could formulate various hypotheses. As more, and better, data accumulates, it becomes harder and harder to defend ideas that are not right.
should be brought into the open and investigated properly.
Sun-Climate connection has been under scrutiny in the open for 400 years. To be investigated properly the link to AGW and dependence on AGW must be severed completely.
Leif 18:52:36 : Sun-Climate connection has been under scrutiny in the open for 400 years. To be investigated properly the link to AGW and dependence on AGW must be severed completely.
There is no link or dependence between them in my mind (or, as we have established, in the Roy Spencer paper (eg.)). I explained why IMHO the debate keeps mentioning both.
Scientists need to examine all climate hypotheses properly. That includes AGW, and sun/GCRs/clouds/etc.
The latter has not been eliminated. In an earlier post, you said “When Jack Eddy drew attention to the Maunder Minimum in the 1970s it was thought .. that the solar cycle variation of TSI was ten times as large … With such a large variation the connection with the LIA was reasonable. When it turns out that TSI varied ten times less, the TSI-LIA connection was observationally refuted. As simple as that: your theory predicts X, X does not happen, out goes your theory.”. Well, I would say that only that particular TSI-LIA theory was observationally refuted. To extend it to be a refutation of all solar-climate connection is plain wrong.
egrey (22:06:15) :
There is no link or dependence between them in my mind (or, as we have established, in the Roy Spencer paper (eg.)). I explained why IMHO the debate keeps mentioning both.
I expressed that badly. The ‘link’ is that AGW’ers need the Sun to explain variations at times before CO2. To wit: every time I mention the Sun, they complain how bad IPCC’s reports are.
Scientists need to examine all climate hypotheses properly. That includes AGW, and sun/GCRs/clouds/etc.
They do. It is the lay persons that don’t.
The latter has not been eliminated. […] Well, I would say that only that particular TSI-LIA theory was observationally refuted. To extend it to be a refutation of all solar-climate connection is plain wrong.
I don’t extend that. The refutation of the cosmic ray theory is that cosmic rays were assumed to influence clouds which in turn would change the albedo. Hence the albedo should vary as the sunspot cycle. Observations show it doesn’t, thus observational refutation.
I don’t know of any other viable sun-climate connections. It is true that there could be some we don’t know about and therefore cannot have refuted, but it would be a stretch to claim that we have strong evidence that ‘it’s the Sun’ in some way we don’t know about.
This is, of course, only my considered opinion. I wish that there were a solar connection and once thought that there was. With time, as more data and knowledge has accumulated, I have realized that I was wrong in that belief. Others will still have to follow their own way to enlightenment.
egrey (22:06:15) :
Scientists need to examine all climate hypotheses properly. That includes AGW, and sun/GCRs/clouds/etc.
The latter has not been eliminated.
Another observational refutation of the GCR hypothesis is that the Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years. That means that GCRs should have increased over that time with a steady cooling as the result. Such cooling over the last 150 years has not been observed, most people would claim instead a significant warming.
egrey (22:06:15) :
GCRs/clouds/[…] The latter has not been eliminated.
GCRs were supposed to control the low clouds. Here is observational refutation of that idea:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/CloudCoverAllLevel%20AndWaterColumnSince1983.gif
The variation does not follow the [inverse] solar cycle/GCR flux.
egrey (22:06:15) :
GCRs/clouds/[…] The latter has not been eliminated.
GCRs were supposed to control the low clouds. Here is observational refutation of that idea:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/CloudCoverAllLevel%20AndWaterColumnSince1983.gif
The variation does not follow the [inverse] solar cycle/GCR flux.
Leif
GCRs were supposed to control the low clouds
You can not compare pre- to post-2001 directly (2002 in my prev post is wrong, it should be oct 2001)
There are plenty of evidence and ISCCP explain it on their pages.
Here’s a couple of examples: http://virakkraft.com/NET-SRF-low-unadj.jpg
Clearly the jumps late 2001 are not real.
Nor can you expect to see the sun-cloud signal in the albedo, which is the total of several signals, volcanism in particular. The eruptions early 80s and 90s preclude the signal, in addition, the lack of large eruptions second half of the 90s makes it even worse.
lgl (11:24:19) :
Clearly the jumps late 2001 are not real.
Is the definition of ‘not real’ that it doesn’t fit the theory?
Nor can you expect to see the sun-cloud signal in the albedo
I thought that was the mechanism, no?
There is a clear relationship between cloud cover and albedo:
http://www.leif.org/research/albedo.png
http://www.leif.org/research/cloud-cover.png
Plot of low clouds show no solar cycle [GCR] signal:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/CloudCoverAllLevel%20AndWaterColumnSince1983.gif
lgl (11:24:19) :
There are plenty of evidence and ISCCP explain it on their pages.
Their plot of low clouds:
http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/zD2CLOUDTYPES/B32glbp.anomdevs.jpg
The data up to ~2000 shows the correlation that Svensmark latched on to. If the correlation was due to the underlying cause of solar cycle modulation of GCRs, then it should continue in time after its first discovery. As is so often the case with Sun-Climate correlations, it didn’t. This is then observational refutation.
As Donald R. said: “There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns”.
Leif
Is the definition of ‘not real’ that it doesn’t fit the theory?
No it is when it does not fit anything. Take a look here then: http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/projects/browse_fc.html
NET-SRF for instance, late 2001, very likely?
NET-TOA, a cooling after 2002 of Pinatubo magnitude, very likely?
I contacted ISCCP and they confirmed the drop late 2001 is not real, you have to subtract the similar step-up of LW UP TOA late 2001, which is not real either. In NET-TOA you see the impact of volcanoes, also found in ALBEDO.
I thought that was the mechanism, no?
I thought the mechanism was modulation of low level cloud cover, albedo is much more.
http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/zD2CLOUDTYPES/B32glbp.anomdevs.jpg
The drop late 2001 is probably mainly caused by the lat. -30,-60 drop I have shown, it’s not real.
lgl (14:03:18) :
The drop late 2001 is probably mainly caused by the lat. -30,-60 drop I have shown, it’s not real.
Nowhere on the ISCCP website do I see any mention of this. One would think that such a serious error would be front and center, no?
The website has a list of known errors:
1. The BT for METEOSAT-7 from 06/1998 to 09/2001 for IR channel has a couple of systematic errors.(have been corrected)
2. The clear sky composite for 1.6 micron channel is biased a little low.
3. Missing DX Geostationary 1st additional channel [ARAD(1)]
4. Spurious satellite zenith angle dependence (artifact in Indian sector)
5. Change in land surface pressures from TOVS
6. Incorrect snow cover (has been corrected)
7. Incorrect precipitable water amounts and surface temperatures (has been corrected)
8. Spurious sea ice reports
9. Flipped array indices in North Polar DX (has been corrected)
10. Spurious land pixels in METEOSAT DX
11. D2 versions 0,1,2 contain un-corrected METEOSAT-3 reflectances (has been corrected)
12. Cloud top temperature/pressure error
13. Change to daily atmospheric temperature profiles
14. Error in monthly-mean atmospheric temperature profiles
15. Missing GOES-7 visible data
16. Error in normalized calibration of GOES-8/9 water vapor channel
17. Systematic decrease in surface temperatures due to changes in NOAA operational sounder analysis
Which one(s) of these errors is the ‘step’ related to?
Once we are down to discussing errors in the various datasets that are available to the public [via government websites], I usually take a step back and look at my understanding of how things should work. For a long time, my main argument against the Svensmark idea has been this: The Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years. That means that GCRs should have increased over that time with a steady cooling as the result. Such cooling over the last 150 years has not been observed, most people would claim instead a significant warming. This is independent of dataset, step correction, volcanoes, albedo, etc.
To me this is so devastating for the GCR theory that one can stop right there.
An amusing example of the contortions people go through trying to salvage a dead relationship can be found here:
http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce/news/2005ScienceMeeting/presentations/thur_am/Stager_Lake_Victoria.pdf
From 1896 to 1927 AD, a strong (0.87) correlation existed between SSN and the levels of Lake Victoria, then the correlation went away. This is the classic textbook example of the ‘case of the disappearing correlation’. Much later it seemed that the correlation surfaced again [and became ‘visually appealing”. Page 15 of the powerpoint presentation is particularly telling. Note how the correlation is back! But also note the strange red curve [the SSN], hint: look when minima and maxima are for this ‘SSN’ curve!
Leif – thanks for the various posts. It’s going to take me a while to work through the information. I appreciate the time you have spent on the issues raised here, and the extra food for thought that you have supplied.
Leif Svalgaard (15:31:28) :
The Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years. That means that GCRs should have increased over that time with a steady cooling as the result. Such cooling over the last 150 years has not been observed, most people would claim instead a significant warming. This is independent of dataset, step correction, volcanoes, albedo, etc.
To me this is so devastating for the GCR theory that one can stop right there.
Even looking at your reconstruction of 10Be records and aa records shows a rise in solar magnetism up to around 2000 that would surely outweigh the reduced earth’s magnetic field?
It would be interesting to see a combined graph.
nobwainer (18:30:56) :
To me this is so devastating for the GCR theory that one can stop right there.
Even looking at your reconstruction of 10Be records and aa records shows a rise in solar magnetism up to around 2000 that would surely outweigh the reduced earth’s magnetic field?
We can do better than that. We have values of the Sun’s magnetic field [in the Heliosphere where it counts] since 1836. See page 20 of http://www.leif.org/research/Seminar-SPRG-2008.pdf and read the whole paper if you want to know how we derive the heliospheric field, HMF.
It is clear that the HMF the last 30 years is no different from what it was in the mid-1900s. Cycle 23 is almost a replica of cycle 13, 107 years ago [page 26]. So there has been no steady upwards change of the HMF.
It would be interesting to see a combined graph.
Leif Svalgaard (18:51:01) :
nobwainer (18:30:56)
The last para should have been:
“It is clear that the HMF the last 30 years is no different from what it was in the mid-1800s. Cycle 23 is almost a replica of cycle 13, 107 years ago [page 26]. So there has been no steady upwards change of the HMF.”
Not 1900s; I was thinking of 19th century, of course. Grrr. Wouldn’t it be handy with a preview/edit function…
Interesting paper Leif…not sure i understand it all but get your drift. Your method of reconstruction if proven accurate would certainly change how we calculate any solar involvement in GCR theory….but what i cant quite understand is if the earth’s magnetic field is down 10% and the sun has remained fairly static why are we seeing a steady decrease in the 10Be records that coincides with sunspot activity over the past century or so?
One explanation could be the GCR’s are themselves fluctuating as we circle the galaxy…but the 10Be records do seem to line up nicely with the sunspot records?
nobwainer (20:44:02) :
why are we seeing a steady decrease in the 10Be records that coincides with sunspot activity over the past century or so?
We argue that the 10Be records are not calibrated correctly:
http://www.leif.org/research/Comment%20on%20McCracken.pdf
http://www.leif.org/research/TSI%20From%20McCracken%20HMF.pdf
nobwainer (20:44:02) On about a 60 million year cycle our solar system moves in and out of the band of maximum galactic radiation. I think we’re about 10 million years now from a maximum.
=========================================
kim (07:19:50) A tip of the toppah to Adrian Melott a for thattah.
=======================================
Leif
Which one(s) of these errors is the ’step’ related to?
Regarding radiation, I guess this: http://isccp.giss.nasa.gov/projects/browse_fc.html
“However, the sudden increase in upwelling LW flux in late 2001 may be exaggerated because it is associated with a spurious change of the atmospheric temperatures in the NOAA operational TOVS products that are used in the calculations.
I don’t know how the radiation data relates to the cloud data but when both sets start jumping all over the place at the same time even my simple brain is able to link the two.
Here’s one from -30,-60 high clouds: http://virakkraft.com/high-clouds.jpg
high clouds always peak mid-year and decrease towards end-of-year, but not in 2001. peak middle of year, start to decrease then suddenly increase 2 % and then continue the normal decrease until end of year. Errors just don’t get more visible than this. Believe whatever you need to feel comfortable but the sun-cloud link is not refuted by observation.
Leif,
… one more thing, The sun is not the only player. If you expect to find a perfect correlation between cloud cover and solar activity you assume that all other factors have remained constant over the same period, at least volcanism has not.
lgl (10:40:49) :
“However, the sudden increase in upwelling LW flux in late 2001 may be exaggerated because it is associated with a spurious change of the atmospheric temperatures in the NOAA operational TOVS products that are used in the calculations.
I don’t know how the radiation data relates to the cloud data but when both sets start jumping all over the place at the same time even my simple brain is able to link the two.
First, they don’t say that the step is spurious, just that it is bigger than it should be, so there is a real step too. Second, the cloud analysis does not depend on the temperatures, so although your ‘simple brain’ sees what it wants, that may be jumping to conclusions.
Here’s one from -30,-60 high clouds: […] Errors just don’t get more visible than this.
If you think 2001 has errors, omit the year. If you do that, the variation doesn’t look too bad. Now, when Svensmark and company make there correlations do they also use ISCCP? If so, isn’t their correlation marred by the same ‘errors’?
The sun is not the only player. If you expect to find a perfect correlation between cloud cover and solar activity you assume that all other factors have remained constant over the same period, at least volcanism has not.
I most certainly don’t expect to find such a correlation. I do expect to find a good correlation between cloud cover and albedo and there is such a good correlation. The albedo does not correlate with solar activity, so now we have to say that other factors [volcanoes] determine the albedo to the extent that the solar connection is lost in the noise.
You did not react to my main point, so I’ll repeat it here and hope for a reaction next time:
Once we are down to discussing errors in the various datasets that are available to the public [via government websites], I usually take a step back and look at my understanding of how things should work. For a long time, my main argument against the Svensmark idea has been this: The Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years. That means that GCRs should have increased over that time with a steady cooling as the result. Such cooling over the last 150 years has not been observed, most people would claim instead a significant warming. This is independent of dataset, step correction, volcanoes, albedo, etc.
To me this is so devastating for the GCR theory that one can stop right there.
Leif
I know you too see that 2001 looks totally different all other years. No other year shows an icreased high level cloud cover second half of the year (and it appears to happen around october but I haven’t checked the numbers)
I don’t have any opinion on the GCR theory, it’s too new and unproven and I don’t have the knowledge. And I have no idea how reliable 150 years old records of earth’s magnetic field are, nor do I know what impact it will have at different latitudes. But I know the oct. 2001 ‘event’ makes it impossible to compare before and after directly and that makes the data useless for refuting the sun-cloud connection, and it’s not necessarily a GCR-cloud connection.
lgl (13:57:00) :
But I know the oct. 2001 ‘event’ makes it impossible to compare before and after directly and that makes the data useless for refuting the sun-cloud connection, and it’s not necessarily a GCR-cloud connection.
makes THAT data useless for refutation, but also for claiming the connection. But, there are other data and none I have seen support the GCR-connection. [I think it was you that asked me to look at the ISCCP data].
and it’s not necessarily a GCR-cloud connection.
Tell Svensmark that 🙂
This was billed as a clear-cut GCR-cloud connection from the beginning IIRC, then it became low-clouds only, and now it is not necessarily a GCR-cloud connection…
And I have no idea how reliable 150 years old records of earth’s magnetic field are, nor do I know what impact it will have at different latitudes.
But I do, and this is textbook stuff.
Leif…I read your McCraken papers, but did not find your arguments compelling. Your work on reconstructing the 10Be, geomagnetic aa, sunspot counts and TSI is in my opinion controversial and needs to be supported more by further research….but wish you luck.
Basically from what i have read you are suggesting a floor for the solar proxy records arguing that solar activity is predominately flat. I have difficultly with your outcomes and in particular wonder how your theory stacks up against the temperature record from 1900 on. If solar activity is not linked to temperature then what accounts for the global rise from 1900 to 1950 and then the decline towards 1970 and then the rise in the 80’s and 90’s (that curve correlates nicely to the other 10Be, aa, TSI and sunspot records) I know there are other factors (volcanoes, nuclear testing, sulfur dioxide and PDO, AMO, ENSO etc) but i would not see them as the driver of climate but more as secondary mechanisms.
My observations lead me to think that both the Sun and Earth are not totally autonomous and ARE affected by outside influences…this is probably in direct contrast to your observations but look forward to the puzzle being solved.
nobwainer (16:45:52) :
I read your McCraken papers, but did not find your arguments compelling.
Let’s take one thing at a time. The very short Comment on McCracken has three sections each setting out one argument. What are your specific problems with those three? There is a simple rule in peer-reviewing that it is not enough to say that an argument is not compelling, or wrong, or weak, or whatever. The reviewer must also state why the argument is not compelling, wrong, weak, or whatever. Only in that way can the author respond in any meaningful manner.
Something that was not very clear in the version on my website is that Rouillard and Lockwood agree [personal communication] that their 1901 data point is in error. I have uploaded the revised version, also taking into account comments from the referee.
Leif Svalgaard (17:34:43) :
The reviewer must also state why the argument is not compelling, wrong, weak, or whatever.
————————————————————-
1. The Lockwood et al. [1999] reconstruction has been superceded, resolving the disagreement with Svalgaard and Cliver [2005]
While encouraging its one paper that is closer to yours and if i am not mistaken compares aa records…it wasnt clear to me what brought about their reconstruction? I have seen many instances where the aa data and 10Be records dont align…around 1830 and 1840 in particular.
2. The Solanki et al. reconstruction is not independent of Lockwood et al.
If it is proven that Solanki tweaked the model to agree with Lockwood’s earlier work then it would be one area McCracken would lose support. Are there other papers that support McCracken and what other 10Be studies have been done that might support McCracken? this is not clear in your comment.
3. The McCracken 1426-2005 HMF reconstruction needs to be re-examined
You cast doubt on the 1933-1951 portion of McCrackens data but mainly disagree because it does not match your findings and Rouillard et al. This is much like point 1. If this portion is found to be incorrect would that also negate the 1428-1930 section that also shows many dips and would that section need to be adjusted up in amplitude or would it remain?
You have perhaps showed some weaknesses in 2 papers that supported McCrackens paper but that does necessarily mean his paper is in error.
kim (07:19:50) :
nobwainer (20:44:02) On about a 60 million year cycle our solar system moves in and out of the band of maximum galactic radiation. I think we’re about 10 million years now from a maximum.
Our galaxy orbit time is estimated at around 226 millions years which suggests multiple bands of high galactic radiation…..glad we have 10 million years up our sleeve altho i thought i read somewhere recently that we are due for an iceage based on previous cycles…might have to research that further.
nobwainer (19:09:40) :
Now you are talking.
————————————————————-
1. The Lockwood et al. [1999] reconstruction has been superceded, resolving the disagreement with Svalgaard and Cliver [2005]
While encouraging its one paper that is closer to yours and if i am not mistaken compares aa records…it wasnt clear to me what brought about their reconstruction?
There are only two groups in the world that have made serious inroads in this area, Mike Lockwood’s and our own. The story started back in 1977 when I suggested, based on the aa-index, that the solar magnetic field had doubled. In 1999 Lockwood brought the analysis up-to-date in a famous paper in Nature and confirmed the [actually a bit more than] doubling. It seemed then to be a solid result and was widely accepted. Because of the importance of the conclusion, a concerted effort was made by myself and colleagues to verify the constant calibration of the aa-index on which everything was based. Unfortunately, it turned out that the aa-index did not have constant calibration, but was too high before 1957. Fortunately, it was possible to quantify the error and correct the aa-index as well as constructing special indices [IHV and IDV] that have the two important properties:
1) anybody can readily calculate them from public data [no subjective judgement as for the aa-index]
2) in combination both the HMF and the solar wind speed can be determined from them.
The two papers that define the indices and show that aa is wrong are
http://www.leif.org/research/The%20IDV%20index%20-%20its%20derivation%20and%20use.pdf
and
http://www.leif.org/research/2007JA012437.pdf
Warning: this is heavy going, but there is no way around it [but see below before reading the papers].
Predictably, Lockwood put up a spirited fight, but was countered effectively by our response:
http://www.leif.org/research/Reply%20to%20Lockwood%20IDV%20Comment.pdf
As a direct result of this, he and his group realized that their previous attempt was flawed and quietly abandoned their approach and instead used a variation of our method. The result was very close to what we found. [Their method-paper is still under review, but is solid]. Alex Rouillard from their group has kindly supplied us with their data, which we plotted in the McCracken Comment paper. So, the matter is settled [to use a dangerous – but in this case, correct – phrase].
2. The Solanki et al. reconstruction is not independent of Lockwood et al.
If it is proven that Solanki tweaked the model to agree with Lockwood’s earlier work then it would be one area McCracken would lose support.
If you read the Solanki papers you will find [as we quote] that they say that the model was constructed in order to account for Lockwood’s finding. In the sense that they showed that one could explain a doubling under certain assumptions about the Sun’s magnetic field. Their model was not tweaked. They simply showed that there was a combination of assumptions and adjustable parameters that could explain the doubling. But since the doubling didn’t happen in the first place, there is no need to try to find that set of assumptions that would explain it.
Are there other papers that support McCracken and what other 10Be studies have been done that might support McCracken?.
No, and in fact one of his other recent papers [with Caballero-Lopez] comes to a different result. The main figure is reproduced here on page 13. That paper is also a shorter and easier version of the IHV & IDV result than the original ones quoted above.
3. The McCracken 1426-2005 HMF reconstruction needs to be re-examined
You cast doubt on the 1933-1951 portion of McCrackens data but mainly disagree because it does not match your findings and Rouillard et al. This is much like point 1.
The point here is that our own and Rouillard’s findings are it. There are no other groups doing this. Some attempts by Clilverd and by Mursula have come close [and we reference those in our papers], but are flawed in various ways.
If this portion is found to be incorrect would that also negate the 1428-1930 section that also shows many dips and would that section need to be adjusted up in amplitude or would it remain?
One can ‘rescue’ McCracken’s paper by shifting the pre-1948 data upwards [just removing the jump ~1948], but he should redo the analysis and correctly this time.
You have perhaps showed some weaknesses in 2 papers that supported McCrackens paper but that does necessarily mean his paper is in error.
Yes it does. This is how science works: The determination of HMF by several independent methods and groups has reached the point where there is general agreement [among the workers in this area http://www.leif.org/research/Seminar-LMSAL.pdf ] to about 10%. McCracken [who did his work before this agreement was achieved] makes in a sense a prediction. He says, in effect: if my calibration of 10Be is correct, here is the HMF I would predict [or would follow from his data]. When the ‘consensus’ HMF determination became available, McCracken’s prediction was falsified, especially during the critical time 1935-1950 where we have very good geomagnetic data and everybody [in the business] agree, as we point out in section 3.
One of the problems with this whole thing is that it is lengthy and complex and therefore requires for its understanding a wider attention span than most people are willing to accord it.
Even this very post is above most people’s tolerance level, especially if the thesis expounded here is at variance with their views.
nobwainer (19:09:40) :
If this portion is found to be incorrect would that also negate the 1428-1930 section that also shows many dips and would that section need to be adjusted up in amplitude or would it remain?
I forgot to mention that the strange dips are due to volcanic activity that pump aerosols into the stratosphere where they interfere with the 10Be deposition. Some of the more important of the eruptions are shown on page 19 of http://www.leif.org/research/Seminar-LMSAL.pdf
Leif Svalgaard (20:28:53) :
nobwainer (19:09:40) :
Now you are talking.
That background information astounds me (dont doubt you). I am very surprised to hear the small amount of people involved in this research. If this was made plain in your comments paper it would definitely have more punch for those not quite “in the know”.
That extra information has me looking at your work in another light….but would like to see it backed up by a few more groups to test thoroughly.
I think Leif’s background information would be useful to a lot of people on this blog.
Perhaps Anthony could run a story on it?
nobwainer (21:20:54) :
That extra information has me looking at your work in another light….but would like to see it backed up by a few more groups to test thoroughly.
It is quite usual that the finer details are ‘known’ or ‘understood’ or ‘cared about’ by only a handful of people. The vast majority of scientists trust these few people to do ‘their thing’ so that most people can just assume that it is being done. Scientific trust is built on quality papers or reliable ‘service’ in the past. Any scientist can recognize a high-quality paper [or a low-quality one, for that matter] in any field. That ‘smell test’ takes about 10 seconds.
It is not likely that a ‘few more groups’ will test this more thoroughly, ever. Take the example of the aa-index. It is the work of a single person [whom I knew very well – we even co-authored papers] P-N Mayaud, and no-one has [or will] ever tried to duplicate his work. Why should one? it was already done, and there are all reasons to trust that Mayaud was an expert at his work [because he wrote meaningfully about it and explained it to people for decades]. Having said that, that does not exclude that one cannot do even better. The aa-index is based on two stations only and was a massive undertaking that no-one would even try today. But our computing power is so great that we can now do what Mayaud could not: incorporate data from dozens or hundreds of stations and that way obtain cross-checks and double-checks that simply were not feasible in his time [a scant 30 years ago], so we can do better and that lies behind the success of our new indices. The aa-index was a major advance and a lot of good science has flowed from it. What I and Lockwood were trying to do, was pushing the aa-index beyond what it could deliver, so a new approach was needed. Such is the progress of science.
Because of the political aspects of climate change the trust has gone out the window. In politics you don’t trust. You lie and cheat because the end justifies the means. We have a Danish proverb that says “a thief thinks everybody steals”. So, people transfer that to scientists and think that they lie and cheat as well, which for the largest part they don’t. The reason that cheating doesn’t work is very simple: Science is self-correcting, the bad stuff simply dies and is ignored and forgotten if it is wrong or not useful or predicts things that don’t happen.
In the small, scientists are people too and have the same foibles and flaws as everybody. They will try to block publication of contrary papers or steal each others ideas or mislead the public and all that, but this is all transitory. In the end, such antics are self-defeating, and no long-term harm comes of it [unless politicians try to use the bad science – Gore and Lysenkoism come to mind].
Perhaps Anthony could run a story on it?
I think that I have spouted it all over the place for months. In addition, such information is lengthy and involved and the reader soon suffers from overload. Plus that when such background information clashes with deeply held convictions, venom and attacks ensue. Such is the human condition. But I’m always willing to try to explain, the best I can, what the science is [as I see it – what else can one do?]. Often people forget that a lot of science is tentative and preliminary. A scientist can try to convey that by hedging with words like “it seems to me”, “there are indications that”, “the data suggests…”, etc, but then he is accused of using ‘weasel words’ and it is also very tedious to always have to qualify every sentence, so statements are made that are too strong on their face, and the public forgets that everything is implicitly qualified.
Gee, I thought I would just respond with a couple of lines, ah well …
As an example of the self-correcting nature of science I may want to use the example of TSI. Did you know that TSI is different on Fridays? Probably not; neither did I until yesterday:
http://www.leif.org/research/TSI-SORCE%20Friday%20Effect.pdf
This is a minor error and will be corrected [one may hope], but illustrates well that everything comes out eventually.
Leif
makes THAT data useless for refutation, but also for claiming the connection
Absolutely not. Low clouds at -30,-60 (the most dense band) is perfect except that jump and very well correlated globaly.
But I do, and this is textbook stuff
So you are confident there will not come another Svalgaard in a few years claiming the field has been stable, that the decline was caused by wrong methods 🙂
I’m reading “The field deflects the speeding particles toward Earth’s Poles”
Could a weakening magnetic field decrease the GCR in the arctic, or are only particles from the sun deflected?
lgl (08:19:07) :
Absolutely not. Low clouds at -30,-60 (the most dense band) is perfect except that jump and very well correlated globaly.
Correlated with what?
So you are confident there will not come another Svalgaard in a few years claiming the field has been stable, that the decline was caused by wrong methods
We have been able to measure the Earth’s magnetic field accurately for two hundred years. The result will not change. The great Gauss told us how to. You count the swings of a suspended magnets for a minute. The number of swings is a measure of the magnetic field strength: the fewer swings, the stronger field. People could count back then.
Could a weakening magnetic field decrease the GCR in the arctic, or are only particles from the sun deflected?
all charged particles no matter where they come from are deflected
lgl (08:19:07) :
Could a weakening magnetic field decrease the GCR in the arctic, or are only particles from the sun deflected?
A weaker field increases the GCR flux everywhere.
some background info:
http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGU2007/06554/EGU2007-J-06554.pdf
Some time ago, Mr. Radun wrote about UV, Gamma rays etc. and the effect on phytoplankton as a function of declining magnetic field. Here is an alternative route: Oceans’ phytoplankton that takes apparently more then 50% of CO2 from the atmosphere, relies on iron for photosynthesis.
Is it possible that the oceans are entering an era where they are depleted of iron to a degree which might affect effectives of photosynthesis?
Has the reduction in the Earth’s magnetic field further altered iron balance in the oceans?
Somewhat OT, but don’t those dark patches on the EIT images of the sun at the SOHO page look ominous?
Fred Nieuwenhuis (10:57:26) :
Somewhat OT, but don’t those dark patches on the EIT images of the sun at the SOHO page look ominous?
Those are coronal holes from where most of the solar wind comes. Without such holes [they are dark simply because the material that was there has ended up in the solar wind which in turn protects against cosmic rays, etc. So they are good. But after all, it is Halloween, so a little scare is OK.
Thanks for the explanation. I haven’t seen them so pronouced before. But I have been only looking at the SOHO site for the past year or so.
Leif
Correlated with what?
With solar activity of course, I’ve linked this before: http://virakkraft.com/lowclouds-filer/slide0003_image003.jpg
all charged particles no matter where they come from are deflected
which should mean less GCR in the arctic> less clouds> warmer.
Most of the warming is at high latitudes, problem solved.
But in your next post you write “A weaker field increases the GCR flux everywhere” even if the paper concludes
“We have shown that CRII variations in these two regions are dominated by changes caused by the migration of the geomagnetic pole, which exceed those variations due to solar activity changes.” and
“We conclude that local effects in variations of the cosmic ray flux, which may dominate over the globally averaged changes in some locations, should be taken into account in long-term studies of solar-terrestrial relations.”
lgl (11:46:11) :
With solar activity of course, I’ve linked this before: http://virakkraft.com/lowclouds-filer/slide0003_image003.jpg
Except that the correlation breaks down after 2000, as most spurious correlations eventually do.
all charged particles no matter where they come from are deflected which should mean less GCR in the arctic> less clouds> warmer. Most of the warming is at high latitudes, problem solved.
I think you have this backwards: weaker field means more GCR [even in the Arctic] thus cooling.
“We conclude that local effects in variations of the cosmic ray flux, which may dominate over the globally averaged changes in some locations, should be taken into account in long-term studies of solar-terrestrial relations.”
All they are saying here is that locally you may find cases that are exceptions to the general rule [which still dominates]. Just as with temperature.
Dr. Svalgaard
Proceedings for Royal Society published in 2007 an article by Lockwood and Frohlich
http://publishing.royalsociety.org/media/proceedings_a/rspa20071880.pdf
On page 9 Fig. 4c shows a graph for open solar flux (1900-2000), admittedly different from standard Lockwood graph, but in no way flat. Further more he states :”… the long-term decline in cosmic rays over much of the twentieth century (seen in figure 4d and caused by the rise in open solar flux seen in figure 4c)….”
What is your view of the this graph and the statement regarding solar flux .
Leif
october 2001…
I think you have this backwards
My idea (probably not a good one) was that if the magnetic field deflects GCR towards the polar regions then a weaker field will give less GCR there.
But even if this is not the case, more clouds in the arctic winter means warming 🙂 Are there GCR records from Alaska and Siberia somewhere?
vukcevic (13:29:28) :
On page 9 Fig. 4c shows a graph for open solar flux (1900-2000), admittedly different from standard Lockwood graph, but in no way flat.
Lockwood is getting closer. What the geomagnetic method measures is not the open flux, but the total magnetic field, B. The total field consists of three components, one of them, Br, along the radial to the the Sun. One measure of the ‘open flux’ is the area of a sphere surrounding the Sun times the size of this radial component, which is unknown and has to be derived somehow from the total field. On average Br = 0.5 B.
If you look at Figure 3 of http://www.leif.org/research/Comment%20on%20McCracken.pdf you can see that we basically agree on the B is [he still has some problems with the early data, but from 1910 on he is pretty close – the difference comes from we using data from more stations than Lockwood]. So, how to calculate Br?. The problem is that the Heliospheric field is highly variable in direction on short time scales. Such variability decreases the value of Br averaged over an hour or a day [he uses the latter interval]. To see how this is so important, remember that there is a ‘sector structure’ in the HMF: every 7-10 days [with lots of spread] the sign of Br changes, so if you average over a whole solar rotation you have as much negative Br as positive Br and |Br|~0, so the length of the averaging interval is crucial.
We discuss this in detail in section 2 of http://www.leif.org/research/Reply%20to%20Lockwood%20IDV%20Comment.pdf . Based on our arguments [especially Figure 2] we find that “We therefore do not find any of the conclusions based of the calculation of |Br| by LRFS06 to be valid”. This includes the very low values of |Br|/B in the beginning of the 20th century. Therefore the open flux calculated by Lockwood is too low at that time. One could, of course, chose to ignore our analysis and press on regardless.
About the cosmic ray flux “over much of the twentieth century”, direct measurements since 1952 show no such decline, e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRayFlux.png
None of these issues are important for Lockwood and Froehlich’s main conclusion, namely that the solar variables since the 1980s do not follow the temperature variation. What happened before that time is not so relevant.
Often, a simpler approach is more compelling. A current overhead in the polar ionosphere creates a magnetic perturbation on the ground that is readily measured [since 1883!]. In http://www.leif.org/research/AGU%20Spring%202006%20SH51A-06.pdf we detail this phenomenon. It turns out that the current in the polar cap is given by the electric field in the solar wind mapped down to the ionosphere along magnetic field lines. A measure of this electric field is the product of the solar wind speed V and B; thus VB is proportional to the magnetic perturbation on the ground. For the solar minimum years 1902-03 and 1912-13 the VB measured in this way comes out to be 2000 km/s*nT. For the past two years 2007-2008, VB measured by spacecraft has been 1990. We must therefore conclude that conditions back then are very much as they are right now, and that includes Br and the open flux, unless everything was very different but just conspired to look the same. E.g. we can have a very low Br [and thus B], but then V would have to be higher back then than anything measured in modern times. This is not excluded, but I feel that it is very unlikely.
lgl (13:55:57) :
My idea (probably not a good one) was that if the magnetic field deflects GCR towards the polar regions then a weaker field will give less GCR there.
But even if this is not the case, more clouds in the arctic winter means warming 🙂 Are there GCR records from Alaska and Siberia somewhere?
Is the South Pole high enough latitude for you? 🙂
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 112, A12102, doi:10.1029/2006JA011894, 2007
Long-term decline of South Pole neutron rates
J. W. Bieber et al.
Abstract
The count rate recorded by a neutron monitor at South Pole, Antarctica, displays a long-term decline over the 32-year span from 1965 to 1997. The neutron rate follows an 11-year cycle with maxima at times of low solar activity, but the 1997 peak rate was approximately 8% lower than the 1965 peak rate based on 27-d averages. This change is much larger than that recorded by any other neutron monitor […].
At lower latitudes [and globally] there is no such decline:
http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRayFlux.png
Thank you Dr. Svalgaard.
I shall look through the material you quoted, I am sure there is a lot there I will find useful. Thanks again.
vukcevic (13:29:28) :
Dr. Svalgaard
Proceedings for Royal Society published in 2007 an article by Lockwood and Frohlich
http://publishing.royalsociety.org/media/proceedings_a/rspa20071880.pdf
A couple of things stood out to me in the above paper.
Is Lockwood referencing out of date papers?
There is considerable evidence for century-scale drifts in various solar outputs, in addition to the solar cycle variations (Lean et al. 1995; Lockwood et al. 1999; Solanki et al. 2001, 2004;Lockwood 2004, 2006; Beer et al. 2006; Rouillard et al. 2007)
And using GISS records to show global temps makes his paper weak in my view. He is attempting to show the anti correlation between solar activity and global temps and uses the GISS records in a cherry picking manner that go to 2000. If he used satellite data to 2008 i think his case would look much weaker. Plus i dont think i saw anything on PDO or ENSO effects that might have some influence i would suspect.
lgl (13:55:57) :
My idea (probably not a good one) was that if the magnetic field deflects GCR towards the polar regions then a weaker field will give less GCR there.
It looks to me that by selecting different specific times and different specific locations almost any correlation can be supported because there are such a large variety of results. One can find correlations that support almost anything if you look hard enough. Proof or disproof by way of correlations using faulty data sets with ‘steps’ and calibration issues and picking only data and times where it works [or the opposite, if you want to prove the opposite] is just so questionable that it is hardly worth the effort. A standard way to check if correlations hold up with time is simply to wait and see. A correlation is a ‘prediction’ in the sense that if causal it should work in future as well.
nobwainer (16:41:19) :
Is Lockwood referencing out of date papers?
There is considerable evidence for century-scale drifts in various solar outputs, in addition to the solar cycle variations (Lean et al. 1995; Lockwood et al. 1999; Solanki et al. 2001, 2004;Lockwood 2004, 2006; Beer et al. 2006; Rouillard et al. 2007)
Evidently, especially the Lean 1995, and Lockwood 1999 papers.
Now Lockwood has a double goal: not only is it about climate, he is also fighting a ‘rearguard’ action to protect his own reputation [scientists are human too]
And using GISS records to show global temps makes his paper weak in my view.
If correlations [pro and con] depend so critically upon which data set is used they are typically spurious anyway. Forgetting the decimals it is clear that temps have gone up since 1980 and that solar activity has gone down. I think that Lockwood was mainly supporting the knee-jerk reaction of AGWers that any variation not ascribable to AGW is due solely to the Sun, which means that we just have to subtract the Sun and all the rest is AGW. Too many natural causes or factors is a potential danger because it becomes hard to disentangle them from AGW.
Leif (18:21:38) Quibbling a bit, but temperatures have peaked and are now trending down, consistent with the PDO flipped to its cooling phase.
Perhaps the sun-climate link through cosmic rays is not a simple function of the decrease in the earth’s magnetic field. If there is such a link, the temperature course of the last century would indicate that the link is not simple or direct.
===================================================
kim (18:55:38) :
Perhaps the sun-climate link through cosmic rays is not a simple function of the decrease in the earth’s magnetic field. If there is such a link, the temperature course of the last century would indicate that the link is not simple or direct.
This could very well be the case, but the problem I’m having is when people claim that there is ‘strong evidence’ for this or that.
kim (18:55:38) :
Quibbling a bit, but temperatures have peaked and are now trending down
Trending down like in 1999 and 2000, following the 1998 peak?
Leif – going back to something I said a while ago, and your reply:
egrey : but it’s probably no coincidence that the 20th century’s largest El Nino came at the end of the period of higher solar activity, and the recent La Nina came after solar activity had started dropping.
Leif – Unless you can somehow quantify the probabilities you cannot say that it is ‘probably no coincidence that …’. You can say that you believe that it is no coincidence, but that is quite a different story. There was an even bigger cycle in the 1950s and an even bigger drop in the 1960s. Where were the even bigger Nino/Nina then? Or do you invoke a 40-year lag?
My wording was loose, but I really did mean that it probably was no coincidence – ie. that there were circumstances in which an El Nino was an above-average probability. An item by Joe d’Aleo Pacific Decadal Oscillations Closely Tied to ENSO http://www.intellicast.com/Community/Content.aspx?ref=rss&a=151 shows increased El Nino incidence during warm PDO phases, and increased La Nina incidence during cool PDO phases. The warm/cool PDO phases line up with what I understand to have been the periods of greater/lesser solar activity, so I think my statement was reasonable. Of course, there is no significance to the exact timing of the El Nino in question at exactly the end of the PDO phase – it could have happened at any time during that phase or been smaller, or (less likely) not have happened at all, since we are dealing in probabilities. A graph in d’Aleo’s paper gives a clear picture.
[The d’Aleo item predated my entry by a few days, but I hadn’t seen it at that time. I did expect though that something like what he found was in fact the case.]
kim (18:55:38) :
Quibbling a bit, but temperatures have peaked and are now trending down
My turn to quibble:
peak?http://www.wunderground.com/data/images/latest_monthlytempanomalysmall.gif
kim (18:55:38) :
http://www.wunderground.com/data/images/latest_monthlytempanomalysmall.gif
“Trending down like in 1999 and 2000, following the 1998 peak?”
Not hardly. ’98 peak followed minimum by two years and the trend down immediately thereafter. This time the peak occurred at the beginning of minimum. This minimum is longer by at least a year and deeper and the cooling concurrent.
The next ‘peak’ of consequence will follow 24 max.
egrey (03:52:42) :
The warm/cool PDO phases line up with what I understand to have been the periods of greater/lesser solar activity
The 1940-1950s were cool PDO and solar activity was very high [cycle 19 was the largest ever recorded, without the possible exception of cycle 4 in 1788].
Gary Gulrud (07:25:02) :
“Trending down like in 1999 and 2000, following the 1998 peak?”
The next ‘peak’ of consequence will follow 24 max.
I should have put a smiley on my little joke. But I do agree that there will be a peak some time after 24 max.
Leif
a long-term decline over the 32-year span from 1965 to 1997
Thank you, interesting, maybe we can assume something like that in the north as well.
What about your refutation then,
“Another observational refutation of the GCR hypothesis is that the Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years”
when observations are showing stable or declining GCR?
lgl (10:53:00) :
maybe we can assume something like that in the north as well.
No, the neutron monitors in the North show no such decline. The South pole is unique [as the article said].
What about your refutation then,
“Another observational refutation of the GCR hypothesis is that the Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years”
when observations are showing stable or declining GCR?
Only South Pole show a decline [maybe you can check the temps there?]. The record we have since 1952 is too short to show any increase, although some will take Oulu as an example of increasing flux. Some people say that the high solar activity lately has just exactly canceled the expected GCR increase, but that argument cannot be used in the past back to the Dalton minimum or beyond.
lgl (10:53:00) :
Temp trend at South Pole is cooling:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NewImages/images.php3?img_id=17257
in spite of the strongly declining GCR flux there. Maybe it is because there are no low clouds there at all. 🙂
lgl (10:53:00) :
“Another observational refutation of the GCR hypothesis is that the Earth’s magnetic field has decreased 10% in the last 150 years”
Lest you think that it is only during the last 150 years, I’ll add that the Earth’s dipole moment has decreased 25% over the last 2000 years. Now, maybe that explains the Hockey Stick very neatly 🙂
lgl (10:53:00) :
At http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRays-GeoDipole you can see the relationship between the strength of the Earth’s magnetic field and cosmic ray intensity [14C proxy] over the last 10,000 years. The sudden downturn at the right-hand end [now] is called the Suess effect and results from dilution of the atmospheric concentration of 14C from the combustion of fossil fuels [and should be ignored as not related to cosmic rays].
In another thread there was a long discussion about it being warm [in Greenland at least] 6000-7000 years ago. As you can see from the graph, the cosmic ray intensity then was a lot higher that today [because the dipole moment was small]. A high cosmic ray flux should mean cooling according to Svensmark theory. But maybe the GCR theory only posits something about low clouds [and only some of the time, perhaps] and nothing about albedo and temperatures. A direct and major climate driver should operate all the time and should be clear and obvious.
lgl (10:53:00) :
http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRays-GeoDipole.jpg
I don’t know why WordPress sometimes mauls the URL.
Leif
Temp trend at South Pole
I think I’ll go for their first expl.
“One possible explanation is that the warmer temperatures in the surrounding ocean have produced more precipitation in the continent’s interior, and this increased snowfall has cooled the high-altitude region around the pole”
Much of the low clouds ending up over the continent are probably formed over the ocean anyway.
Leif
In another thread there was a long discussion about it being warm [in Greenland at least] 6000-7000 years ago
Remember the summer insolation on greenland was much higher 6000 years ago, several 10ths W/m2 I think.
Also the ‘averaged-data trap’ is always there. The tropics and the arctic are different planets, even the arctic winter and the arctic summer are different planets and so on, so global averages are dangerous.
A direct and major climate driver should operate all the time and should be clear and obvious.
What if there are several major drivers, and they are interdependent. Then they will not be clear and obvious. For instance, maybe you need both some volcano material (say SO2) and cosmic rays to really boost cloud formation, and maybe that will have less effect if a third factor is changed, hopeless…
It should say ‘several 10s of W/m2’ I guess
lgl (16:11:00) :
What if there are several major drivers, and they are interdependent.
They can’t all be ‘major’. And there certainly are many drivers, including simple oscillations of a complex system, that does not need any driver at all. My criticism of all the wide-eyed enthusiasts that peddle their thing exclusively is precisely that there is no single primary driver and that the various correlations that claim to be obvious are worthless because one can never know what fraction of what is caused by what, until we learn what they all are in great quantitative detail.
As I have said many times, geomagnetic activity is a very nice analogy. In the 1850s this was a great mystery and little progress was made in the next 100 years; even up to 1970 we were mostly ignorant of the basic mechanisms [(s) because there are several]. Today, [almost] everything is crystal clear and we can account for geomagnetic activity in exquisite quantitative detail given only data on the solar wind. And even turn the table and use geomagnetic data from centuries ago to tell us about the solar wind.
lgl (16:11:00) :
Remember the summer insolation on greenland was much higher 6000 years ago, several 10ths W/m2 I think.
True enough, the insolation decreased by 5 W/m2 per 1000 years the last 10,000 years, including the last 1000 years. So, for the past 2000 years, by 10 W/m2. With the increase of GCRs because of the 25% decrease of the dipole moment, those two effects would combine to a very significant steady cooling over the past 2000 years if GCRs were the primary driver, which is not observed.
Leif Svalgaard (17:33:04) :
that there is no single primary driver
I forgot to qualify this: ‘except the orbital changes’. And the [very] slow secular change of solar luminosity over billions of years. It is too tedious to say this all the time, so that is, clearly, understood.
Leif (21:06:19) On 10/29 Trending down after the 1998 peak? Hardly, Leif, you can eyeball better than that. The peak of the natural cycle was early this century sometime in the 2002-2004 area, and clearly trending down in the last couple of years.
================================================
Leif
those two effects would combine to a very significant steady cooling over the past 2000 years if GCRs were the primary driver, which is not observed
What? GCR decreased over 1700 of those 2000 years, there probably was a significant cooling over 1700 years, minimum around 1700 when it was much colder than today, GCR looks very similar to the famous hockey stick.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation
kim (00:30:16) :
Hardly, Leif, you can eyeball better than that. The peak of the natural cycle was early this century sometime in the 2002-2004 area, and clearly trending down in the last couple of years.
Is was also cold for a couple of years after 1998. An a couple of years do not a trend make. anyway, it was meant as a joke, to show how silly it is to say that a couple of years variation makes a climate trend. But, hey, in this game, anything goes, it seems.
lgl (01:30:50) :
What? GCR decreased over 1700 of those 2000 years, there probably was a significant cooling over 1700 years, minimum around 1700 when it was much colder than today, GCR looks very similar to the famous hockey stick.
GCR increased over the 2000 years because the Dipole decreased 25%. On top of this general and significant increase there has been smaller scale variations [the wiggles on http://www.leif.org/research/CosmicRays-GeoDipole.jpg ] that don’t matter much in the grand scheme.
GCR looks very similar to the famous hockey stick
Indeed, if GCRs were the primary driver, the hockey stick would rule and the recent increase in temps would have to be AGW. Many people think so, BTW.
Leif
Indeed, if GCRs were the primary driver, the hockey stick would rule and the recent increase in temps would have to be AGW
What strange argument. The GCR graph is also a hockey stick, rapid decrease after 1700.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Carbon14_with_activity_labels.svg
I know the last part is not real but Be-10 is showing the same
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Solar_Activity_Proxies.png
lgl (09:55:53) :
I know the last part is not real but Be-10 is showing the same
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Solar_Activity_Proxies.png
The reliable 10Be record stops in 1930 [the ice near the surface is not suitable for the measurements]. So, the 10Be is ‘spliced’ onto the Neutron Monitor record [inverted to 10Be concentration]. This is where the problem creeps in. I have referred to this many many many times, but here goes one more time: http://www.leif.org/research/Comment%20on%20McCracken.pdf
line 90
Leif (09:13:34) Got your point about trends, but I believe in Easterbrook’s thesis about the PDO. You can see it cycle throughout the 20th Century, and it peaked about 2003. That’s the main reason I believe we are in a 20-30 year cooling trend. And yeah, I missed the joke; I’ve run across too many snide comments from warmistas who complain that we skeptics cherry-pick 1998 as a starting point for a trend. My starting point for the new cooling trend is early this century.
=================================
kim (11:45:49) :
but I believe in Easterbrook’s thesis about the PDO.
I’m kinda a believer myself. Of course, the next question is what causes the PDO…
Leif
Does that mean you agree 0 AD to 1930 is no ‘threat’ to the GCR theory?
Post-1930 is ok. No warming between 30 and the climate shift in 77, (which there is no reason to believe is man-made). Taking the two large volcanoes into account there was no warming between early 80s and 97, and the warming after 97 has disappeared again. No need for anthropogenic causes.
Leif (12:07:05) Why, it’s the sun, but how, even kim doesn’t know.
Not yet, anyway.
=========================================
lgl (13:13:53) :
Does that mean you agree 0 AD to 1930 is no ‘threat’ to the GCR theory?
GCR is completely dominated by the Earth’s dipole. Solar activity is just small wiggles. Climate is completely dominated by the orbital changes, all the rest are just small wiggles. The orbital effects have been linear the past 10,000 year so should just give a linear trend in T [downwards]. CGRs have been increasing the past 2000 years because the dipole has been decreasing, thus also a linear down trend in T. Added together there should have been a linear trend. There is not, there are warmings, and LIA’s and lots of variation. All of these show that there are internal oscillations in the system not related to the external drivers and that these variations are the dominant ones. On top of that, there is no doubt that all kinds of effects are in play, TSI, volcanoes, land-use, etc. So, to ‘agree’ the GCR effects should have been quantified [also in relation to all of the other effect], so much for insolation, so much for GCRs, so much for volcanoes, so much for clouds, land-use, etc. Only when these thing are accounted for and compared with [almost non-existing good T data] can one even begin to discuss how well things fit. My point all along is that it is not correct to claim that there is strong, exceedingly good, exceptional, etc., evidence for any of these mechanisms [besides insolation and dipole effects].
Leif
http://geo.oregonstate.edu/people/faculty/publications/clarkp/Clark-AGU-2007.pdf This is showing a 7-kyr cycle. Do you have more records of the dipole, a few 10000 years back?
lgl (15:03:00) :
Do you have more records of the dipole, a few 10000 years back?
I think so. Will take me a little while to find it in my notes. Patience.
Leif
Evidence?
http://www.uibk.ac.at/geologie/pdf/christl.pdf
lgl (05:29:52) :
Evidence? http://www.uibk.ac.at/geologie/pdf/christl.pdf
I’ll look at it.
Of, course, for every claim, there is a counterclaim:
[another threas] Pierre Gosselin (06:19:42) :
I just happened to stumble onto this report in the German FAZ newspaper
http://www.faz.net/s/RubC5406E1142284FB6BB79CE581A20766E/Doc~EA76668E9105E490AAEE2DE0CE7CC317C~ATpl~Ecommon~Scontent.html
via a sceptic German site.
Summing the main points of the report in English:
1. Two researchers at the Ludwig-Maximilians-University in Munich have determined that the Earth’s magnetic field and earth climate are coupled.
2. Whenever the earth’s magnetic field was weak, average global temperatures increased slightly.
Weak field => more GCR => cooling, but they found warming…
Leif,
Found some other interesting stuff here:
http://www.eolss.net/ebooks/Sample%20Chapters/C01/E6-16-04-01.pdf
so I made this:
http://virakkraft.com/PDO-mag-dec.jpg
Must be the moon, last lunar minor standstill was in 1997.