Researchers have considered the possibility that the sun plays a role in global warming.
From NASA GSFC: Solar Variability and Terrestrial Climate
In the galactic scheme of things, the Sun is a remarkably constant star. While some stars exhibit dramatic pulsations, wildly yo-yoing in size and brightness, and sometimes even exploding, the luminosity of our own sun varies a measly 0.1% over the course of the 11-year solar cycle.
There is, however, a dawning realization among researchers that even these apparently tiny variations can have a significant effect on terrestrial climate. A new report issued by the National Research Council (NRC), “The Effects of Solar Variability on Earth’s Climate,” lays out some of the surprisingly complex ways that solar activity can make itself felt on our planet.
Understanding the sun-climate connection requires a breadth of expertise in fields such as plasma physics, solar activity, atmospheric chemistry and fluid dynamics, energetic particle physics, and even terrestrial history. No single researcher has the full range of knowledge required to solve the problem. To make progress, the NRC had to assemble dozens of experts from many fields at a single workshop. The report summarizes their combined efforts to frame the problem in a truly multi-disciplinary context.
One of the participants, Greg Kopp of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, pointed out that while the variations in luminosity over the 11-year solar cycle amount to only a tenth of a percent of the sun’s total output, such a small fraction is still important. “Even typical short term variations of 0.1% in incident irradiance exceed all other energy sources (such as natural radioactivity in Earth’s core) combined,” he says.
Of particular importance is the sun’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation, which peaks during the years around solar maximum. Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more. This can strongly affect the chemistry and thermal structure of the upper atmosphere.
Several researchers discussed how changes in the upper atmosphere can trickle down to Earth’s surface. There are many “top-down” pathways for the sun’s influence. For instance, Charles Jackman of the Goddard Space Flight Center described how nitrogen oxides (NOx) created by solar energetic particles and cosmic rays in the stratosphere could reduce ozone levels by a few percent. Because ozone absorbs UV radiation, less ozone means that more UV rays from the sun would reach Earth’s surface.
Isaac Held of NOAA took this one step further. He described how loss of ozone in the stratosphere could alter the dynamics of the atmosphere below it. “The cooling of the polar stratosphere associated with loss of ozone increases the horizontal temperature gradient near the tropopause,” he explains. “This alters the flux of angular momentum by mid-latitude eddies. [Angular momentum is important because] the angular momentum budget of the troposphere controls the surface westerlies.” In other words, solar activity felt in the upper atmosphere can, through a complicated series of influences, push surface storm tracks off course.
Many of the mechanisms proposed at the workshop had a Rube Goldberg-like quality. They relied on multi-step interactions between multiples layers of atmosphere and ocean, some relying on chemistry to get their work done, others leaning on thermodynamics or fluid physics. But just because something is complicated doesn’t mean it’s not real.
Indeed, Gerald Meehl of the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) presented persuasive evidence that solar variability is leaving an imprint on climate, especially in the Pacific. According to the report, when researchers look at sea surface temperature data during sunspot peak years, the tropical Pacific shows a pronounced La Nina-like pattern, with a cooling of almost 1o C in the equatorial eastern Pacific. In addition, “there are signs of enhanced precipitation in the Pacific ITCZ (Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone ) and SPCZ (South Pacific Convergence Zone) as well as above-normal sea-level pressure in the mid-latitude North and South Pacific,” correlated with peaks in the sunspot cycle.
The solar cycle signals are so strong in the Pacific, that Meehl and colleagues have begun to wonder if something in the Pacific climate system is acting to amplify them. “One of the mysteries regarding Earth’s climate system … is how the relatively small fluctuations of the 11-year solar cycle can produce the magnitude of the observed climate signals in the tropical Pacific.” Using supercomputer models of climate, they show that not only “top-down” but also “bottom-up” mechanisms involving atmosphere-ocean interactions are required to amplify solar forcing at the surface of the Pacific.
In recent years, researchers have considered the possibility that the sun plays a role in global warming. After all, the sun is the main source of heat for our planet. The NRC report suggests, however, that the influence of solar variability is more regional than global. The Pacific region is only one example.
Caspar Amman of NCAR noted in the report that “When Earth’s radiative balance is altered, as in the case of a chance in solar cycle forcing, not all locations are affected equally. The equatorial central Pacific is generally cooler, the runoff from rivers in Peru is reduced, and drier conditions affect the western USA.”
Raymond Bradley of UMass, who has studied historical records of solar activity imprinted by radioisotopes in tree rings and ice cores, says that regional rainfall seems to be more affected than temperature. “If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.” This fits in with the conclusion of the IPCC and previous NRC reports that solar variability is NOT the cause of global warming over the last 50 years.
Much has been made of the probable connection between the Maunder Minimum, a 70-year deficit of sunspots in the late 17th-early 18th century, and the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America were subjected to bitterly cold winters. The mechanism for that regional cooling could have been a drop in the sun’s EUV output; this is, however, speculative.
Dan Lubin of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography pointed out the value of looking at sun-like stars elsewhere in the Milky Way to determine the frequency of similar grand minima. “Early estimates of grand minimum frequency in solar-type stars ranged from 10% to 30%, implying the sun’s influence could be overpowering. More recent studies using data from Hipparcos (a European Space Agency astrometry satellite) and properly accounting for the metallicity of the stars, place the estimate in the range of less than 3%.” This is not a large number, but it is significant.
Indeed, the sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion. (Note: Penn and Livingston were not participants at the NRC workshop.)
“If the sun really is entering an unfamiliar phase of the solar cycle, then we must redouble our efforts to understand the sun-climate link,” notes Lika Guhathakurta of NASA’s Living with a Star Program, which helped fund the NRC study. “The report offers some good ideas for how to get started.”
In a concluding panel discussion, the researchers identified a number of possible next steps. Foremost among them was the deployment of a radiometric imager. Devices currently used to measure total solar irradiance (TSI) reduce the entire sun to a single number: the total luminosity summed over all latitudes, longitudes, and wavelengths. This integrated value becomes a solitary point in a time series tracking the sun’s output.
In fact, as Peter Foukal of Heliophysics, Inc., pointed out, the situation is more complex. The sun is not a featureless ball of uniform luminosity. Instead, the solar disk is dotted by the dark cores of sunspots and splashed with bright magnetic froth known as faculae. Radiometric imaging would, essentially, map the surface of the sun and reveal the contributions of each to the sun’s luminosity. Of particular interest are the faculae. While dark sunspots tend to vanish during solar minima, the bright faculae do not. This may be why paleoclimate records of sun-sensitive isotopes C-14 and Be-10 show a faint 11-year cycle at work even during the Maunder Minimum. A radiometric imager, deployed on some future space observatory, would allow researchers to develop the understanding they need to project the sun-climate link into a future of prolonged spotlessness.
Some attendees stressed the need to put sun-climate data in standard formats and make them widely available for multidisciplinary study. Because the mechanisms for the sun’s influence on climate are complicated, researchers from many fields will have to work together to successfully model them and compare competing results. Continued and improved collaboration between NASA, NOAA and the NSF are keys to this process.
Hal Maring, a climate scientist at NASA headquarters who has studied the report, notes that “lots of interesting possibilities were suggested by the panelists. However, few, if any, have been quantified to the point that we can definitively assess their impact on climate.” Hardening the possibilities into concrete, physically-complete models is a key challenge for the researchers.
Finally, many participants noted the difficulty in deciphering the sun-climate link from paleoclimate records such as tree rings and ice cores. Variations in Earth’s magnetic field and atmospheric circulation can affect the deposition of radioisotopes far more than actual solar activity. A better long-term record of the sun’s irradiance might be encoded in the rocks and sediments of the Moon or Mars. Studying other worlds might hold the key to our own.
The full report, “The Effects of Solar Variability on Earth’s Climate,” is available from the National Academies Press at http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=13519.
Author: Dr. Tony Phillips | http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/08jan_sunclimate/
See also the December Solar slump here
Should I respect NASA again???
From the report [page 7]:
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in TSI rather than to anthropogenic influences”
REPLY: That’s an important point readers should embrace. They should also embrace the fact that NASA is considering the possibility and has convened a group to study it. One mechanism I see as a possibility is related to UV variation and ocean algae/plankton variation changing the albedo. NASA is keeping an open mind, looking for mechanisms. To me, that’s a good thing, and the way of science. – Anthony
Very similar to my work of the past 5 years.
“Researchers say ….”.
When NASA researchers say something it is big news; when an independant researcher says the same thing here on WUWT it is ignored.
Now where did I read it’s not the Sun?
In the tags at the bottom of the post I read ‘leave a comment’ as ‘Leif, a comment?’
“The cooling of the polar stratosphere associated with loss of ozone increases the horizontal temperature gradient near the tropopause,” he explains.
This sounds like they are already making up excuses as to why global warming failed but its still man’s fault.
Whoa, I thought the science was settled. This sounds like “We” need a great deal more study. pg
It’s nice to hear that solar amplification mechanisms are getting some research attention, despite the genuflection to the IPCC altar of CO2 (“…This fits in with the conclusion of the IPCC and previous NRC reports that solar variability is NOT the cause of global warming over the last 50 years…”). I guess I’ll take what I can get.
So, it seems like there are more influences and more complications to the Earth’s climate than just CO2 abundance in our atmosphere?
Bravo to NASA and NRC.
Only true scientists with an open mind and without prejudice can deal with this interesting problem.
This is nice to hear. The CAGW alarmists have taken the cooling of the stratosphere to prove that an increased greenhouse effect is preventing radiated heat from getting to the stratosphere.
Solar and the Earth magnetic fields act in concert – result is natural temperature variability.
Solar magnetic field effect is at its strongest in the high geo-latitudes, where also geo-polar temperature amplification is the greatest.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/ATO.htm
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 8:34 am
REPLY: They should also embrace the fact that NASA is considering the possibility and has convened a group to study it.
NASA has always been considering the possibility. Here is a report from 1978: http://www.leif.org/EOS/Sun-Weather-Climate.pdf
where, by the way, my work [with colleagues] on this has a prominent place.
‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.
http://sdo.gsfc.nasa.gov/gallery/main.php?v=item&id=164
I’m getting: “server not found”.
Did obama and hansen make them take it down?
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 8:34 am
“From the report [page 7]:
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in TSI ”
And I agree that TSI alone will not change anything very much. This is about rays and UV. Time to think about changing your tune, Dr S.
Reblogged this on Public Secrets and commented:
From the “We’ve been trying to tell you” department. The exact mechanism may be in dispute, but it defies reason to assert that that great big ball of flaming plasma in space has less influence on the Earth’s climate than the very questionable influence of human-introduced CO2. Very interesting article, well worth reading.
Hansen is losing his grip? Models are giving way to data?
Makes the claims of AR4 even more dubious.
Has NASA and NRC gone back to trying to do science?
Budget Cuts are imminent?
Of the 16 identified drivers of climate… CO2 done it.
Sorry to be flippant but the number one rule of bureaucracy is cover your butt.
From the idiocy of claiming to rule out solar influence on our climate, allowing staff to operate Real Climate on paid time, to Moslem outreach, NASA and its sub-departments are not looking so good.
If the NRC is doing good science here, my thanks to the staff, but do we have adequate information, to make useful correlation that hint at causation?
Does the data from the new solar satellites help yet?
Sounds like another tiny step away from the CAGW altar.
No mention of Svensmark here. I really dislike people who don’t give others their due.
Wow, who would have thunk it. Small variations in the big energy source are more significant than small variations in the immeasurable.
Anthony:
Thankyou for this report.
The article includes these statements
and
Some years ago, during a conversation at a RS meeting in London where he was a speaker, Henrik Svensmark told me that relatavistic effects enabled galactic particles – modulated by solar effects – to penetrate to the lower atmosphere. Thus, they can affect cloud nucleation low in the atmosphere. However, he was unwilling to discuss these effects because any mention of relatavistic effects induced suspicion of his hypothesis.
If solar-induced climate effects are “complex” then they will be difficult to unravel when some occur in the upper atmosphere (as the article says) while some happen in the lower atmosphere (as Svensmark claims). All the solar effects are likely to interact with each other and with other climate effects.
In these circumstances simple correlations are not likely to disprove any hypothesis of solar effects in the atmosphere.
Richard
O, NOW you tell us. (If I had a dime for every time, over the past ten years, an Alarmist told me the sun had no effect on temperatures, I’d really be jingling. Worst, they always sneered as they said it.)
{ REPLY: That’s an important point readers should embrace. They should also embrace the fact that NASA is considering the possibility and has convened a group to study it. One mechanism I see as a possibility is related to UV variation and ocean algae/plankton variation changing the albedo…………Anthony }
And increasing cloud cover in response to UV. More here on DMS.
http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/viewArticle.do?id=45946§ionid=1000
Finally, NASA seem to have broken free of the “settled science” that the IPCC imposed. Climate science was effectively frozen for thirty years and NASA are now getting back to where they were in the 1970s. The last valuable contribution they made was Herman and Goldberg’s, “Sun, Weather and Climate”, in 1978.
It was an article about this scientific block by IPCC that triggered the first of my current lawsuits. Here is that article, slightly amended so Anthony and I likely don’t have to worry about another lawsuit.
http://drtimball.com/2011/corruption-of-climate-science-has-created-30-lost-years/
It appears this publication also marks the breaking of the control Hansen had over climate research at NASA. The comments of Hansen’s boss indicate the degree of political power Hansen had as a bureaucrat. What Hansen was doing publicly and politically probably should have been censured, even prosecuted under the Hatch Act.
http://drtimball.com/2012/nasa-scientist-out-of-control/
I understand that upper management were advised by much higher authority not to touch Hansen. When you look at the manipulations used by Senator Wirth for his appearance before Al Gore’s committee it is not surprising.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/hotpolitics/interviews/wirth.html
This article is a small break through scientifically, but its political implications are profound. Put this with the revisions at the UKMO, and it marks an even greater shift. Can the mainstream media be far behind? They will all want to be on the winning side, especially if it affects funding and credibility.
Ironically, some of the scientists will have more trouble adjusting. As Tolstoi reportedly said,
“I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives.”
This will particularly apply to those scientists who also hold the political view of those who hijacked climate science for a political agenda.
I think NASA and others who let themselves be bullied must be held accountable. I remember in Winnipeg three Environment Canada employees telling me after a presentation that they agreed with me but would lose their jobs if they spoke out. I used to have sympathy for this position – not any more. It is precisely this type of coercion that must be countered at all levels. Why is there need for a whistleblower law in a supposedly open and democratic society.
Maybe now the person(s) who leaked the emails from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) will reveal themselves.
Nothing that can be construed as conclusive. Looks to me heavy on PR “see what we do” stuff. Where do they address the SST increase?
>>Meehl and colleagues have begun to wonder if something in the Pacific climate system is acting to amplify them.
The suspected amplification was measured before and after AR4. Stott, et al, “Do Models Underestimate the Solar Contribution to Recent Climate Change?”, 2003, was dismissed by IPCC from AR4 on irrelevant grounds. Will IPCC recognize Tung, et al., “Constraining model transient climate response using independent observations of solar-cycle forcing and response”, 2008, in AR5?
A most likely cause is obvious. It is variable cloud cover, and hence variable Bond albedo. It is bipolar: a negative feedback to global warming from all causes, and a positive feedback to solar radiation.
Cloud cover albedo is the most powerful feedback in all of Earth’s climate because it gates the Sun. Clouds are perpetually building in proportion to Earth’s effective surface temperature and the Clausius-Clapeyron relation. At the same time, clouds are perpetually burning off on the morning side of Earth in proportion to solar radiation intensity.
The absence of variable cloud cover is just one of a bunch of fatal flaws in the pre-AR5 GCMs.
Slightly OT, but really, we need to silence denier skeptics like this (given that all this science is settled):
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/09/us-usa-cancer-watson-idUSBRE90805N20130109
Slightly OT, but really, we need to silence denier skeptics like this:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/01/09/us-usa-cancer-watson-idUSBRE90805N20130109
/sarc;>
Blimey, a Wikipedia graph linked to climate that doesn’t ascribe to CAGW and hasn’t been removed by Willy & Co:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Solar_Activity_Proxies.png
Beryllium-10 as a proxy for solar activity does indeed suggest a grand maximum of notable proportions (I hesitate to use the word’unprecedented’…) in the second half of the 20th century.
Dr Svalgaard, what’s your view on Be10 versus SSN as a proxy for solar activity and potential impact on Earth’s climate please? To my layman’s eyes it certainly seems to be a better fit to records of observed temperatures than the CO2 record is. I know there’s no single factor in determining climate, but is Be10 a better candidate than CO2 for a starring role?
Agust Bjarnason says: January 9, 2013 at 8:57 am
Bravo to NASA and NRC.
Only true scientists with an open mind and without prejudice can deal with this interesting problem.
=================================
Well, they have some of those, too.. maybe.
This subject fasinates me because as the onion is pealed, a new, unkown layer is exposed. It serves to remind even the most intellegent among us that we have just begun to explore the mysteries of our universe. NASA, of all oranizations, should not be surprised at this revelation.
“Caspar Amman of NCAR noted in the report that ”
Caspar Amman: http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2008/8/11/caspar-and-the-jesus-paper.html
The fact that scientists work for a government bureau or a corporation doesn’t necessarily mean their scientific results are biased. In fact while a group may superficially accept a certain position, e.g. AGW, doesn’t mean that the individual members are in intellectual lock step. This fact was clear in the CG-1 email release. Also, within a given domain, say NASA, there are always entrenched individuals and a number of others who would like to displace the entrenched “leaders” from their position. The self-evident general weakness of existing AGW theory – it is obviously too simple for a nonlinear system, it is not nearly as well stocked with multidisciplinary backup as it needs to be, etc., – leaves you wondering how Hansen has managed to retain his position as long as he has. It is fairly clear that he is losing influence within NASA. Since he is in his seventies, it’s likely that many other scientists are looking ahead to his retirement RSN. This is classic Kuhnian style paradigm change.
Moderator–I intended to note that my comment was sarcastic (for those who might not pick up on that); pls feel free to add “sarc” to it. Thanks!
[Reply:OK. -ModE]
Tiny variations do have significant effect on climate and weather, the NH weather especially since 2007 is evidence of it. The mechanism involving the sun and positional changes in the jet stream are unknown and need researching. Decreasing albedo likely is at least in part the result of general changes in the jet stream positions. This is where a mechanism involving the sun has significant changes, when decreasing global low cloud albedo, increases TSI over the surface area of the land/ocean.
This is getting very close to the narrative set out in my New Climate Model:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=6482
“A New Climate Model – First Review ”
and I went into the likely mechanisms here:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=6645
“How The Sun Could Control Earth’s Temperature”
Whatever defects may be found it seems that my work might well have been a lot closer to the truth than that from any of the climate professionals.
“Using supercomputer models of climate, they show that not only “top-down” but also “bottom-up” mechanisms involving atmosphere-ocean interactions are required to amplify solar forcing at the surface of the Pacific. ”
Been saying just that for several years. Didn’t need a supercomputer.
“If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.”
Ditto
“The NRC report suggests, however, that the influence of solar variability is more regional than global. ”
Ditto.
The bit they fail to get as yet is that those circulation changes alter global cloudiness to alter the amount of solar energy able to enter the oceans which skews ENSO towards El Nino or La Nina for an effect on global tropospheric temperatures until the solar changes fade away again.
It would have been nice to have had some attribution given the overlap with my earlier work and the similarity of the language used.
NASA saying this: Look, we are very, very smart and have assembled a team to consider whether the sun can affect climate change. It’s very complex and we have the people who are uniquely qualified to understand this, which until now, we didn’t even consider.
I believe NASA knows the jig is up, and want to save face by doing the research they have been in “denial” of. The true deniers/NASA are starting to change course –but they will need more funding to unravel the truth. Sickening that it’s taken this long for them to jump on that which they have denied in the most anti-science way for so long.
I am sad that NASA has become a political scheming tax drain worth less than the sum of its parts.
I notice that once again, in an important paper Svensmark is not mentioned, at least I couldn’t find his name mentioned where one might expect it.
Interesting, but they’re not accounting for the energy from the solar wind. The solar wind puts a positive charge on the ionosphere. The earth has a negative charge. During high solar activity (high sunspot count, high sfu) the solar wind has greater net positive charge, putting a larger positive charge on the ionosphere. The earth’s atmosphere is a leaky capacitor. Lightning is a spark (charge equalization) between the positive ionosphere and the negative earth surface. Clouds are the conducting medium. Lightning is not formed in the clouds as current theory holds. The energy from lightning heats the atmosphere. This energy source is not accounted for in current theories and models. IMHO.
I find it comical that NASA can finally admit that other non-TSI solar phenomena like high energy solar protons/electrons, solar wind/galactic cosmic ray flux, UV flux, etc., play a role in Earth’s climate, yet won’t attribute last century’s 0.6C of warming to solar influences, despite the strongest solar cycles in 11,400 years occurred between 1933 and 1996.
When the strong solar cycles ended, the warming trend ended the following year, so we now have 16 years of no warming despite the fact that yearly CO2 emissions have increased 60% since 1997. Hmmmm…. Something seems amiss.
We’re now in the lowest solar cycle since 1906 and the next solar cycle 25 will be the weakest since the Maunder Minimum ended in 1715.
How long will this CAGW charade go on? This year looks to be heading for another La Niña cycle, which will most likely lead to 17 years of no warming…..
And so it goes……until it doesn’t.
The arrogant audacity! How dare these researchers say that the Earth’s climate is complex. We have been told CO2 drives the climate and it’s very simple : CO2 rise = temperature rise.
Now as the truth emerges, Rube Goldberg would indeed envy any true graphical representation of the hugely complex and interwoven stimuli that drive our climate.
I posted this on the Solar activity thread, but it is pertinent here too:
I think something that has been missed in the attempts to prove a GCR climate linkage is that the comparisons to cloud coverage data have been done mainly using a global scale. The reality is that the GCR cloud linkage should only be seen strongly in areas of the atmosphere where lack of cloud formation nuclei is the limiting factor in cloud formation. In areas where moisture content of the atmosphere is the limiting factor, changes in GCR flux should not have a noticeable effect, and may actually have a reverse effect on cloud formation by providing even more nuclei for limited moisture volumes to condense around, thus further reducing the moisture available to form clouds that would have any impact on climate.
With regard to that concept, I have always looked at the tropical pacific as the most likely place to be able to see GCR flux amplification of the solar impact on climate, because the abundant moisture in the atmosphere and the relative lack of land areas make cloud formation nuclei likely to be the limiting factor on cloud formation. I find it interesting that NCAR is out looking for a mechanism for the larger than expected effect of the 11 year solar cycle in this area. My advice is to stop sampling water and start sampling air and GCRs in the tropical pacific troposphere.
Adding to this is that lower energy particles emitted by our own sun are most affected by Earth’s magnetic field at the equator, so changes in GCR flux should be more clearly measured at the equator and more subject to changes in the relatiosnhip between the solar and terrestrial magnetic fields.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:10 am
‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science.
No comment.
And that is why we are in such a muddle at the moment with co2 insanity. The models are failing and they don’t know why. Ha.
@Lief Svalgard: ‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.
An open mind has ?nothing? to do with science?! I submit that the greatest scientific discoveries were done with a mind open to unconventional theories that better fit observations than the accepted conventional theories/dogma.
Do you really think an “open mind” = “Blindly accpting any ideas” that come your way?
An open mind coupled with healthy skepticism is the very driver of science.
Something else I forgot to mention is that I believe there was some noise recently about changes in sulfate concentrations in the lowest levels of the tropical atmosphere in relation to changes in water temperature. If so, fluctuations in sulfate aerosols over the tropics could boost or reduce the effect of GCR impacts on cloud formation and would have to be corrected for in any study looking for correlation. If a simple relationship between tropical water temps and sulfate concentrations in the air exists (somewhat doubtful I think), it could be an easy proxy to use to make the adjustment.
Interesting read. Grabbed the full report – nice to see an option on the NAP download ‘registration’ for ‘private citizen’.
And you were not alone.
I think to make sense of solar energy’s potential impact on the climate, we have to take it down to very, very tiny rates of energy that can accumulate in / be lost to the Earth system over time, each day, and/or over many years.
For example, the amount of energy which is accumulating in the Oceans and Land-Ice-Atmosphere is on the order 0.5 X 10^22 joules/m2/year. And there is 5 X10^14 m2 on the planet.
But the Sun’s energy is 386.4 X 10^22 joules/m2/year (+/- 0.14 10^22 in the solar cycle).
So if we can measure a 0.5 10^22 joules/m2/year there should be no reason to not assume some of the Sun’s energy can accumulate each year. There is no way every single 0.1 10^22 joules/m2 is balanced out by the emitted radiation ALL the time. We are talking about photons of energy here and they are not going be exactly balanced all the time.
A tiny, tiny difference in the Sun’s energy received versus the energy emitted each day is going to accumulate over time. I’m just saying, noone has ever looked at the issue this way that I am aware of.
NASA is just laying groundwork to build a new narrative. The sun causes cooling that HIDES AGW! The fact that they are entertaining some science at this early stage is just obfuscating cover.
What this report acknowledge is something said in numerous papers including mine since 2005 widely discussed on this blog.
It is nice to know that NASA is rediscovering its true mission of studying space phenomena and their relevance to humanity and are realizing that the empirical evidences for a significant solar effect on climate are too strong to be denied further just because the GCMs (such as Hansen’s GISS model) do not reproduce those effects.
About figure 2 showed above, which plots the various TSI satellite measurements on a common scale, note that the pattern resembles the ACRIM TSI composite pattern with a TSI increase from 1980 to 2000 and a decrease afterward. This contradicts both the PMOD pattern that the solar activity decreased since 1980 used by the IPCC and Leif’s flat-sun model.
So, NASA is finally getting around to acknowledging solar variations as a climate driver. But by insisting such effects are “regional” they avoid crossing up the United Nations IPCC story that solar variations have little effect on global climate (and therefore said variations are “manmade”).
It seems to me such announcements are further evidence of various scientific bodies beginning to distance themselves from AGW theory while simultaneously pretending fealty to that political hot potato.
Perhaps recognition of the need to save face has motivated the practice of science.
David Oliver Smith says:
January 9, 2013 at 10:10 am
“Clouds are the conducting medium. ”
If so I must revise my previous understanding that clouds are electrical insulators and that property causes a space charge to develop across them. This space charge promotes an electro-scavenging process that helps to nucleate cloud droplets. But my memory is a bit fuzzy on this.
Report says: “Much has been made of the probable connection between the Maunder Minimum, a 70-year deficit of sunspots in the late 17th-early 18th century, and the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America were subjected to bitterly cold winters. The mechanism for that regional cooling could have been a drop in the sun’s EUV output; this is, however, speculative.”
I guess the experts they got together failed to look at all the data showing that the LIA was a global not a regional event. They mention the “biterly cold winters”, but since crops failures leading to starvation were a summer event the summers were no great shakes either.
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Paper shows solar activity at end of 20th century was near highest levels of past 11,500 years.
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/paper-shows-solar-activity-at-end-of.html
NSA,
Raymond Bradley of UMass states,
If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.” This fits in with the conclusion of the IPCC and previous NRC reports that solar variability is NOT the cause of global warming over the last 50 years.
Much has been made of the probable connection between the Maunder Minimum, a 70-year deficit of sunspots in the late 17th-early 18th century, and the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America were subjected to bitterly cold winters. The mechanism for that regional cooling could have been a drop in the sun’s EUV output; this is, however, speculative.
Perhaps someone will explain why solar variability is NOT considered the cause of global warming over the last 50 years when its activity was at an 11,500 year high and yet it is speculated that it could be the cause of the Maunda minimum, also how can the sun only effect the Northern hemisphere.
Since I am interested in the CETs long record, in the report I found a good reference on page 20.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Report-p20.htm
their TSI is at odds with one being ‘sold’ by Dr.Svalgaard.
I detect a , “oops we got it wrong on co2 but let’s slowly reveal the why we did have some warming”
I am way over my head on the science but can assure you that among “great unwashed” we assume that the Sun affects weather, climate, and temperature based on our personal expeirence. Statements against that belief helped lead to the general AGW skepticism the polls show. I will say that the “complexity” hedge in this statement and the recent UK Met Office statement is different in tone than what we were hearing in 2009/10 leading to COP. The big team does seem to be sticking with the general line for now but fraying around the edges is noticable. I agree with Tim Ball on the need for a good house cleaning. No amnesty.
I’m sure Mann et all are NOT happy being upstaged by a bunch of sophisticated and specialized scientists convened by NASA. But then, them’s the breaks!
This paper is exciting. It would be wonderful if this multi-disciplinary approach could someday result in the ability to make ex ante climate predictions that are borne out by reality.
But I can see that the paper is laced with phrases designed to tread lightly around AGW and to automatically pooh-pooh the idea that the sun could be responsible for warming in the last century.
The climate is very complicated and I think climate researchers in general really ought to use the “method of multiple working hypothesis” where one entertains multiple hypothesis simultaneously. This way the author doesn’t end up being biased trying to support “his” hypothesis; instead, he considers what the evidence means for each of his hypothesis.
Jeff Glassman says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:42 am
“Cloud cover albedo is the most powerful feedback in all of Earth’s climate because it gates the Sun.”
When a cloud forms it is in local thermal equilibrium with the strata of the atmosphere that formed it. That means the energy balance at that level remains unchanged; there is more scattered shortwave going up and more reflected longwave going down. The inputs and outputs still balance and the overall energy balance is unaffected. So our senses can deceive us about the effect of clouds, but having said that there is still an effect. Clouds form at low altitude so the air parcels that rise to form them do not need as much of an energy boost as they would for clear air convection which would otherwise take place, and which pushes air parcels to a much higher altitude. So the difference is in surface temperatures, which are reduced in either case. All convection generates a negative feedback factor, but clouds are more negative than clear air. And precipitation is most negative of all. The point here is that clouds are somewhat more negative than clear air, but precipitation dwarfs them both. Gray and Schwartz discuss this.
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/reprint/albedo_and_olr.pdf
David Y says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:42 am
Slightly OT, but really, we need to silence denier skeptics…
————————————————————————–
Joe Stalin couldn’t have put it better.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 8:34 am
From the report [page 7]:
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in TSI rather than to anthropogenic influences”
————————————————————-
This statement is not based on this new report, but a reference to the party line, see the following sentence:
“The IPCC Fourth Assessment23 and the recent National Research Council report on climate
choices agree that there is no substantive scientific evidence that solar variability is the cause of climate change in the last 50 years.”
Can we have our R-12 and R-22 back now? It looks like the sun is what causes these ozone fluctuations, maybe it’s time to go back and check those models that show that hydrofluorocarbons cause the ozone decrease.
It is said that in Science, lies have short legs and don’t run far.
While it is heartening to see (finally) some serious consideration of solar effects, it has been in the long term inevitable that real Science wins out over socially acceptable semi-science.
Some attendees stressed the need to put sun-climate data in standard formats and make them widely available for multidisciplinary study.
A thousand climate alarmists heads just exploded with this statement. “But, but, we have to keep the data to ourselves.”
Stephen Rasey says:
January 9, 2013 at 10:36 am
I submit that the greatest scientific discoveries were done with a mind open to unconventional theories that better fit observations than the accepted conventional theories/dogma
And I submit that you are wrong on this. Progress comes when new data and observations make the old theories untenable [and when old scientists die off].
Nicola Scafetta says:
January 9, 2013 at 10:52 am
the ACRIM TSI composite pattern with a TSI increase from 1980 to 2000 and a decrease afterward. This contradicts both the PMOD pattern that the solar activity decreased since 1980 used by the IPCC and Leif’s flat-sun model.
As Werner Schmutz [SORCE 2011] concedes: “Observed data do not support a measurable TSI trend between the minima in 1996 and 2008!”
Robuk says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:09 am
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Perhaps someone will explain why solar variability is NOT considered the cause of global warming over the last 50 years when its activity was at an 11,500 year high
Because it is not true that activity is at an 11,500 year high.
Manfred says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:38 am
From the report [page 7]:
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in TSI rather than to anthropogenic influences”
This statement is not based on this new report
Read it on page 7.
This is encouraging. I suggest a number of additional meetings will be needed in the not to distant future. I think we need a higher degree of skepticism. That said, it is encouraging that many seem to recognize the logic associated with the sun’s activities and conditions here on earth. Something most of us of the “great unwashed mass” figured out about 5K years ago at the least. Now the trick is keep everyone cooperating and sharing ideas and suppress those all to highly inflated egos of many researchers. Everyone needs to be reminded that empirical measures are king and numerical models are tools not results.
Bill Illis
I’m just saying, none has ever looked at the issue this way that I am aware of.
You are probably right since all papers trying to explore this would have been blocked in peer-review by Leif S.
“Understanding the sun-climate connection requires a breadth of expertise in fields such as plasma physics, solar activity, atmospheric chemistry and fluid dynamics, energetic particle physics, and even terrestrial history”.
Yes……and “Climate Scientst” …….is not mentioned.
Egyptians knew about solar fluctuations 4500 years ago and the effect’s on climate – That,s why they raised the Sun stature to a God RA which had direct influence over every aspect of their lives. In addition Khonsu God of the Moon was also worshipped and understood as a mayor influence on life on earth through regeneration/tides etc..
They were a lot smarter than many of the so called see no sun influence scientists of today!
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:10 am
“‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.”
Word-Smith.
Two words … magnetic reconnections. The amount of energy generated is huge.
@ Leif Svalgaard
Note that they didn’t say:
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in”
TSIsolar variation “rather than to anthropogenic influences”Assuming this team was assembled to actually investigate the possibilities and not to determine the best way to prop the dogma against the idea then I salute the effort.
Obviously, TSI variation is too small to greatly affect climate directly unless climate sensitivity is way higher than we think.
To dismiss solar variation out of hand just because the mechanism is unknown is absurd. At one time the mechanisms for CO2 to affect temperature and for temperature (ocean) to affect atmospheric CO2 concentration were unknown. While I can’t say I’m anywhere near convinced that solar variation is a significant driver (let alone dominant) of global average temperature (sigh), I do realize that a correlation is stronger positive evidence than a correlation with CO2 since there are mechanisms for the CO2 to Temp cause and effect to be either way, no such possibility exists (or at least none that are remotely feasible) for global average temperature to affect solar activity. Such that, IF there is a strong correlation between global average temperature and sunspot numbers then there’s almost definitely a common cause and some mechanism for that common cause to affect global average temperature. There’s certainly enough reason to warrant an exploration/investigation that I think of as the “Rawls Objection”.
I would also salute investigations into other objections to the CAGW meme:
An increase in atmospheric (thin hollow sphere) internal energy (increasing CO2 concentration slightly increases the average number of molecular degrees of freedom in the atmosphere) necessarily increases the outgoing radiation not just the down-welling radiation. “Lindzen Objection”.
Feedbacks being strongly net-positive are highly unlikely given the billions of years that temperature has remained within a narrow range. “RGB Objection”
Cloud feedbacks aren’t necessarily small or positive. “Spencer Objection”
Extreme weather events don’t increase with warming. “Christy Objection”
Surface temperature record inadequately accounts for UHI and other effects. “Watts Objection”
Earth’s climate/weather systems encompass mechanisms to dump excess heat. “Willis Objection”
The cost of adaptation is orders of magnitude less than mitigation efforts which would most likely be ineffectual anyway. “Monckton Objection”
The so-called evidence for unprecedented warming is wrought with statistical errors. “McIntyre Objection”
I want it warmer: Tropics from Pole to Pole! “West Objection” (LOL)
(Yes, I realize there’s a lot of overlap between the “players” and the objections and that this “list” is nowhere near complete.)
Should have lots of photodetectors floating in the ocean at a depth of 100 m or so, reporting how much SW radiation (mostly UVA & blue light) penetrates to that depth, measured in W/m². It depends on
1. solar short wave
2. clouds
3. organic stuff floating
Determines ocean volume warming/cooling, as opposed to thermal infrared, which is absorbed at surface.
Why haven’t we had a conference like this before?
At last some research of note into solar-climate-weather co0nnections. They are real and this is well overdue…way too much research money wasted on CO2, etc, so far, by a country mile or trillion dollars or so!!!
Perhaps it’s a minor point, but isn’t the variation in solar output 0.2%, and not 0.1%? From the graph it looks like 3 W/m2 out of ~1362, or about 0.2% …
w.
“The NRC report suggests, however, that the influence of solar variability is more regional than global. ”
Implying the evidence for GHG warming is global. Which is false.
Change in a global average isn’t evidence for a global effect.
Until we start to look at individual stations in relation to other local variables, clouds, aerosols, DMS, surface albedo, humidity, etc, and at what times of day warming/cooling occurs, we are never going to find out what actually drives surface temperatures. Nor are we going to know what proportion of local warming is due to global effects.
IMO the biggest impediment to understanding the climate is climate science’s mania for global (and large scale) averages.
richardscourtney says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:35 am
“However, he was unwilling to discuss these effects because any mention of relatavistic effects induced suspicion of his hypothesis.”
One would think that would be long since resolved. It’s one of the first observable effects of Special Relativity one learns in upper level physics.
It doesn’t seem to me there will be any difference in main-stream thinking. This article convinces the reader that the problem will be back in 2020.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn23060-has-global-warming-ground-to-a-halt.html
John West says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:50 pm
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in” TSI solar variation “rather than to anthropogenic influences”
——————————————–
You are right, dismissing only TSI is a very weak formulation with almost no information content. That Leif Savalggard jumped on that is a bit disappointing.
They have probably crafted this statement carefully, so the take-away should be that they deliberately excluded other solar parameters in this statement. That’s the real memo.
David Oliver Smith says:
January 9, 2013 at 10:10 am
It does, but I ran the numbers once. It’s not that large an effect, particularly when averaged over the globe. It does, however, increase the thermal cycling rate of the thunderstorm.
Roughly, it’s 5 gigajoulses/strike, and about 60 billion strikes per year. That’s about 300 gJ/year, which is a lot. On a continuous basis, thats about 10e+12 watts … but there’s about 5.1e+14 square metres of surface area on the planet, so we only end up with a net heating of 0.02 W/m2 as a global average.
w.
John West says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:50 pm
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in” TSI [solar variation] “rather than to anthropogenic influences”
IF there is a strong correlation between global average temperature and sunspot numbers then there’s almost definitely a common cause
But since there is no such strong correlation…
Willis Eschenbach says:
January 9, 2013 at 1:10 pm
Perhaps it’s a minor point, but isn’t the variation in solar output 0.2%, and not 0.1%? From the graph it looks like 3 W/m2 out of ~1362, or about 0.2%
Depends on the time scale, from day to day it can be as much as 0.4%, but for yearly average the variation is about 0.1% [again depending a bit on the cycle – for the current one probably less, 0.06% so far]
January 9, 2013 at 1:30 pm
John West says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:50 pm
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in” TSI [solar variation] “rather than to anthropogenic influences”
IF there is a strong correlation between global average temperature and sunspot numbers then there’s almost definitely a common cause
But since there is no such strong correlation…
Willis Eschenbach says:
January 9, 2013 at 1:10 pm
Perhaps it’s a minor point, but isn’t the variation in solar output 0.2%, and not 0.1%? From the graph it looks like 3 W/m2 out of ~1362, or about 0.2%
Depends on the time scale, from day to day it can be as much as 0.4%, but for yearly average the variation is about 0.1% [again depending a bit on the cycle – for the current one probably less, 0.06% so far]
Manfred says:
January 9, 2013 at 1:26 pm
You are right, dismissing only TSI is a very weak formulation with almost no information content.
TSI is where almost all the energy is, that is the strong informational content. Dismissing the overwhelming energy source is the weak viewpoint.
‘You are probably right since all papers trying to explore this would have been blocked in peer-review by Leif S.
”
Do you believe we landed on the moon?
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:10 am
‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.
================
I’ll add, insatiable curiosity.
To avoid piling on.
vukcevic says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:17 pm
…..the solar/earth magnetic field effect is at its strongest….. http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/ATO.htm
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 1:01 pm
“There is no such effect”
Consequently, there is no such thing as the climate change !
“It would have been nice to have had some attribution given the overlap with my earlier work and the similarity of the language used.
”
Simple, make a quantitative prediction ( use numbers ) .
“The bit they fail to get as yet is that those circulation changes alter global cloudiness to alter the amount of solar energy able to enter the oceans which skews ENSO towards El Nino or La Nina for an effect on global tropospheric temperatures until the solar changes fade away again.”
1.What variable changes in solar output.
2. What circulation change does it create.
3. How is cloudiness altered
4. What is the change in input to the oceans
5. under what cases does it sku to El nino and what cases la Nina
You must put numbers on this to verify or falsify. Suggesting what data to look at PRIOR to the solar changes would be a real test. And the sun is cooperating as the next 5 years should be interesting.
in fact its a perfect time for folks who think the sun dunnit to propose testable theories.
Looks like we are at a max or approaching one. So predict away? what will change in the climate? and will that change happen right away or be lagged. Not to hard a question.
vukcevic says:
January 9, 2013 at 2:01 pm
Consequently, there is no such thing as the climate change !
The correct statement would be: “there is no such thing as Vuk-‘science'”
Has anyone checked in with RealClimate? Not that I would give them the traffic.
“Suggesting what data to look at PRIOR to the solar changes would be a real test”
Already done in my various articles and in exchanges with Leif on this very site.
I’m just going to sit back and laugh 🙂
I’ll help Steven Mosher out a bit :
1.What variable changes in solar output ?
Changes in the mix of particles and wavelengths so as to alter atmospheric chemistry especially as regards ozone thereby altering the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere and interfering with the gradient of tropopause height between poles and equator.
2. What circulation change does it create ?
The climate zones and jet stream tracks are then enabled to slide to and fro latitudinally beneath the tropopause.
3. How is cloudiness altered ?
More meridional or equatorward jets increase the length of the lines of air mass mixing to produce more clouds
4. What is the change in input to the oceans?
Less clouds when the sun is active and the jets more poleward or zonal allows more energy into the oceans especially beneath the expanded subtropical high pressure cells.
5. Under what cases does it skew to El nino and what cases la Nina ?
More energy into the oceans skews ENSO in favour of El NIno and less energy into the oceans skews ENSO in favour of La Nina. The basic ENSO oscillation continues in the background.
All that and more is already set out in detail in my work and in my past blog posts.
NASA apparently agrees with me but I think I am several steps ahead without the aid of supercomputers or vast amounts of grant money.
IF there is a strong correlation between global average temperature and sunspot numbers then there’s almost definitely a common cause
Leif responds: But since there is no such strong correlation…
Maybe there is no correlation because the temperature record has been incorrectly adjusted. It’s going to be difficult to determine the effects when we can’t trust the temperature numbers.
Raymond Bradley of UMass, who has studied historical records of solar activity imprinted by radioisotopes in tree rings and ice cores, says that regional rainfall seems to be more affected than temperature. “If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.”
Everything that happens in weather is local or regional, with general effects due to general circulation. The “climate” is merely all of the weather, with analytical focus on the spatio-temporal distributions of measurements (rainfall, temperature profiles, wind, humidity, etc), and the gross energy flows (jetstreams, currents, hurricanes, “blue northers”, sciroccos, etc.) Bradley’s comment is almost as useless as if he had said: “Changes in solar activity are mostly unrelated to climate change because every photon falls in a particular place.”
Steven Mosher: 1.What variable changes in solar output.
2. What circulation change does it create.
3. How is cloudiness altered
4. What is the change in input to the oceans
5. under what cases does it sku to El nino and what cases la Nina
I agree but I would replace “change” with “changes” — a minor rhetorical change. If any reliable correlations (and other models of vector time series like polynomial co-integrated VARs) are computed between attributes of solar change and attributes of climate change, those provide clues of where to look for mechanisms responsible for the correlations (a paraphrase of a point from “Causality” by Judea Pearl.)
The great discoveries are soon backed up by new data and observations, but on the basis of the new proposed mechanism. The theory often comes first.
Galileo didn’t show heavy things fall as quickly as slow ones because the data changed. He proposed an experiment after he worked out the theoretical issues.
There was precious little new data when Newton worked out his inverse square law of gravity. He was just clever enough to invent calculus first, so he could actually prove his theory. I bet others had the idea, but didn’t have the maths.
Dirac proposed anti-matter long before it could be found. Entirely on theory without a shred of evidence. So much so that he almost regretted suggesting it.
Plate tectonics didn’t rely on new data, just a better interpretation of current data.
There are many, many examples of theory preceding new data, especially at the paradigm shift level.
The “observations make the new theories untenable” way of working is very rare (although it was what drove quantum theory, for example). All theories pretty much have holes in them all the time. Only sometimes do they collapse under their own weight. The rest of the time they limp on, often which enormous holes – for centuries even.
There’s major issues with the “standard model” of particle physics. Yet no-one can construct a better model. When they do, it will be because someone makes the intuitive leap (or discovers the requisite maths) not because the old data is untenable. It has been untenable for decades now.
The reason the IPCC SOD allowed a role for solar variation is now apparent, for those who can connect the dots: It was given a heads-up as to what the likely outcome of this confab would be.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:10 am
Leif Svalgaard says:
………………………….
‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.
—————————————————————————————————————-
Indeed that’s true. But that can also mean that ones views can become entrenched, inflexible and fixed! The theory of Lord Kelvin earth’s core cooling period comes to mind which was subsequently found to be substantially in error.!
Leif Svalgaard: TSI is where almost all the energy is, that is the strong informational content. Dismissing the overwhelming energy source is the weak viewpoint.
Isn’t one of the points of this re-examination that variations in some constituents may cause variations in the upper atmosphere that in turn cause variations in how much of TSI actually penetrates to the Earth surface? And that effects of the changes in those constituents may depend on season and latitude?
FrankK says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:38 pm
The theory of Lord Kelvin earth’s core cooling period comes to mind which was subsequently found to be substantially in error.!
The theory was not found to be in error on theoretical grounds. Nothing wrong with the model or the math. Kelvin’s theory faltered on new data and observations, e.g. the finding of a heating source unknown to Kelvin: radioactivity, and on the empirical discovery of radioactive decay that provides an absolute age of minerals and meteorites.
Mooloo says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:29 pm
Plate tectonics didn’t rely on new data, just a better interpretation of current data.
The better interpretation came after new data [on magnetic stripes on the seafloor and age determination of said floor]. Once the data had shown the way to a better theory everything fell in place.
There’s major issues with the “standard model” of particle physics.
The standard theory just got a major boost from the discovery of the Higgs boson…
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:01 pm
“As Werner Schmutz [SORCE 2011] concedes: “Observed data do not support a measurable TSI trend between the minima in 1996 and 2008!””
Evidently Schmutz does not know well the TSI data. Both ACRIM and PMOD TSI composite agree that there is a downward trend between the minima in 1996 and 2008 as shown here:
http://acrim.com/TSI%20Monitoring.htm
as I have already stated, your own presentation slides page #4, #5, #7, #19, #30, #31, #32, #33, #35, #39, #40, #41, #42, #43, #44.
http://www.leif.org/research/The%20long-term%20variation%20of%20solar%20activity.pdf
demonstrate that there was a downward trend between the solar minima in 1996 and 2008.
You do not understand your own presentation, do you?
For a second I was starting to respect NASA again, until I read this in the press release:
“…The NRC report suggests, however, that the influence of solar variability is more regional than global. …Raymond Bradley of UMass, who has studied historical records of solar activity imprinted by radioisotopes in tree rings and ice cores, says that regional rainfall seems to be more affected than temperature. “If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.” This fits in with the conclusion of the IPCC and previous NRC reports that solar variability is NOT the cause of global warming over the last 50 years. ”
Fitting with the party line that the MWP was regional (despite a thousand papers to the contrary), NASA is now claiming that Solar variation only has regional effects here on Earth.
So tell me this NASA:
Who’s controlling the magnifying glass?
For a second I was starting to respect NASA again, until I read this in the press release:
“…The NRC report suggests, however, that the influence of solar variability is more regional than global. …Raymond Bradley of UMass, who has studied historical records of solar activity imprinted by radioisotopes in tree rings and ice cores, says that regional rainfall seems to be more affected than temperature. “If there is indeed a solar effect on climate, it is manifested by changes in general circulation rather than in a direct temperature signal.” This fits in with the conclusion of the IPCC and previous NRC reports that solar variability is NOT the cause of global warming over the last 50 years. “
Fitting with the party line that the MWP was regional (despite a thousand papers to the contrary), NASA is now claiming that Solar variation only has regional effects here on Earth.
So tell me this NASA:
Who’s controlling the magnifying glass?
Nicola Scafetta says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:58 pm
Evidently Schmutz does not know well the TSI data.
It seems that nobody knows the TSI data, except the great [misguided] Nicola.
Leif.
Whilst I agree with you, that there is no way that cyclical changes in total TSI can be driving climatic changes directly, I am still open to the possibility that these changes do drive the climate somewhat in combination with connected changes in the Earth’s climate processes.
After all this is what drives us in and out of glacial periods. The changes in total TSI received in the Milackoviitch cycles are in no way large enough to do this directly.
Unfortunately, due to the length of time it takes for these types of cycles and the paucity of accurate data, compared to the time periods involved, it is going to take hundreds if not thousands of years of observations and measurements to get a sufficiently strong correlation.
I very much doubt that CO2 is going to produce the effects predicted by the alarmists as the Earth’s history, since life evolved, shows that the Earth does not react long term in this way to increased RF.
It might all be that, with such a complicated system as the Earth’s climate, that the current warming is just a random variation in a system that cannot possibly ever be completely stable for any length of time and therefore must be moving up or down at any one period of time.
Alan
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 4:13 pm
Nicola Scafetta says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:58 pm
Evidently Schmutz does not know well the TSI data.
It seems that nobody knows the TSI data, except the great [misguided] Nicola.
***************
Leif, Is this your only argument to support your flat-sun theory? Don’t you have any other arguments than ad-hominems?
As I have already stated, both ACRIM and PMOD TSI composite and your own presentation slides at page #4, #5, #7, #19, #30, #31, #32, #33, #35, #39, #40, #41, #42, #43, #44
http://www.leif.org/research/The%20long-term%20variation%20of%20solar%20activity.pdf
and also figure 2 in the above article
demonstrate that there was a downward trend between the solar minima in 1996 and 2008.
If you want to propose a flat-sun theory, you are free to do it by proposing valid scientific arguments. However, you should not promoting your extremist theory by continuously misleading the readers of this blog by claiming that everybody already agrees with your theory. Sometime people needs to be honest also in science.
@David Oliver Smith If the Earth maintains a negative charge in a sea of positive solar wind, how is that negative charge replenished (and we know it is)?
Nicola Scafetta says:
January 9, 2013 at 4:45 pm (replying to )
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 4:13 pm
While both of you are here, let me ask a more general question.
I am using TSI as a a function of Day-of-Year (DOY) to calculate the received radiation at each degree latitude on earth on each day between June 22 and Dec 22.
Bason, who has made total and indirect radiation measurement in the high arctic over the period of interest in his paper, uses
Flux (DOY) = Flux (Solar Constant at TOA) * (1.033 * cos [360 * (DOY – 3)/365] )
and sets his solar constant at 1367 watts/meter sq.
This would cycle top of atmosphere flux between 1412 and 1321. True?
Other sources have used 1370, 1366 watts/m^2, 1360, 1362, etc for their TSI values. Others have “anchored” their “Day-of-Year equation to a different offset (that is, not 3 days from January 1.)
Earlier in this and other threads on the sun and sunspots, while talking about “recalibrating” and calibrating received TSI from satellite measurements, 1360 was said to be the “new” calibrated standard for 1 year.
What is the “official” standard equation for radiation at top of atmosphere for each day of the year?
Does this value (if using a simple year-long cos function) vary significantly with the earth’s rotation about the earth-moon barycenter, and not a sun-earth average radius on the elliptical?
How about thinking outside the square!
It is just possible that the effects of the level of solar cycle upon the Earth’s climate is “amplified” by the possibility that lunar atmospheric tides (driven by lunar orbital cycles) act in symphony with the solar activity cycles.
Even if you not willing to listen to a person that Leif considers a “pseudo-scientist” you might want to read about the research work of Dr. Claire Perigaud.In collaboration with her research colleagues Dr R. Gross, Caltech/ JPL, USA, Dr E. Rignot, Caltech/JPL and UC Irvine, USA,
Dr D. Waliser, Caltech/JPL, USA
ENSO modulation by 14.7 day and 18.6 year Lunar Cycles
http://www.aviso.oceanobs.com/fileadmin/documents/OSTST/2009/poster/Perigaudabstract.pdf
ENSO modulated by Lunar Cycles
http://www.aviso.oceanobs.com/fileadmin/documents/OSTST/2009/poster/Perigaud.pdf
Biweekly Oceanic and Atmospheric – Tropical Instability Waves
http://coaps.fsu.edu/scatterometry/meeting/docs/2009_may/posters/perigaud.pdf
Importance of the Earth-Moon system for reducing
uncertainties in climate modelling and monitoring
ftp://ftp.cerfacs.fr/pub/globc/exchanges/GOASIS/Fermat_2009.pdf
Earth-Moon-Sun alignments influencing El Niños and water/air mass momentum
http://web.gps.caltech.edu/seminars/yly_seminar/past/2011.htm
Caveat #1
“Hal Maring, a climate scientist at NASA headquarters who has studied the report, notes that “lots of interesting possibilities were suggested by the panelists. However, few, if any, have been quantified to the point that we can definitively assess their impact on climate.”
Caveat #2
“Finally, many participants noted the difficulty in deciphering the sun-climate link from paleoclimate records such as tree rings and ice cores. Variations in Earth’s magnetic field and atmospheric circulation can affect the deposition of radioisotopes far more than actual solar activity. ”
Many in this thread seem to be crowning themselves correct way too soon.
I got banned for saying there’s more to the sun than TSI.
Maybe I should email Cook and see if he’ll un-ban me now. /sarc
richardscourtney says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:35 am
In these circumstances simple correlations are not likely to disprove any hypothesis of solar effects in the atmosphere.
====
How about lack of correlation for 15, 16, … er 17 years and counting? Doesn’t finding no correlation actually prove AGW highly unlikely?
Doesn’t lack of correlation actually tells us more than finding a correlation, because lack of correlation is proof that something is false, while correlation is only evidence that something is true?
Kudos to this effort. To me this says the science is not settled which should have been said by all scientists involved all along.
I’m not a fan of any method or model that lumps together unknowns to make up a total unknown which can be used for (you guessed it) every unknown imagined.
Some interesting unknown variables can be used in this vague assertion “This can strongly affect the chemistry and thermal structure of the upper atmosphere”. Has the chemical composition of the atmosphere changed recently? Can it be attributed to this model of TSI? is it anthropogenic in nature?
And there you have it, the sun now causes unknown chemistry and thermal change in the upper atmosphere related to a model.
Stephen Mosher;
Simple, make a quantitative prediction ( use numbers ) .
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Based on the format established in AR5, I predict that in the future temperatures will be higher, lower, or the same (though not exactly the same) as they are now.
@Lief Svalgard: ‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. I would say, rather the opposite, namely healthy skepticism, not blindly accepting any ideas that comes your way.
+++
This thinking suggests that a closed mind has everything to do with science. And I know you cannot mean that… but it’s what your words suggest.
NASA, IPCC, NOAA and you have been closed to the idea. All of these collective minds have been shut closed to the idea that the sun has much to do with our climate changing all the time. Your team has strongly put forth a strawman argument that the only affect on climate the sun has is the TSI.
Leif, please retract or modify your statement. You are brilliant and I love your posts, however they do seem closed to the idea that the sun’s variance has an effect on our climate. To suggest otherwise polarizes the very idea of science being open to possibilities which may be different than your preconceived notions –that must be true no matter what.
I say, people in your camp will start to face the possible reality that it’s more than a simplistic argument that TSI varies little therefore it can’t significantly affect our climate.
Leif please explain what you mean.
Hey, at least he didn’t lump you in with half the US population who he thinks believes the Earth is just 6000 years old. (September 11, 2009 at 5:20 am post)
Nicola Scafetta says:
January 9, 2013 at 4:45 pm
both ACRIM and PMOD TSI composite demonstrate that there was a downward trend between the solar minima in 1996 and 2008.
PMOD suffers from uncompensated degradation [As Schmutz also says] as I show here: http://www.leif.org/research/PMOD%20TSI-SOHO%20keyhole%20effect-degradation%20over%20time.pdf
If ACRIM agrees with PMOD then ACRIM has the same problem.
If you want to propose a flat-sun theory
Not ‘flat’. You should not misrepresent me like that [as you say ‘people needs to be honest also in science’ – apply that to yourself]. There is considerable solar cycle variation, but it is also clear that there is no variable ‘background’, that is what the issue is. Educate yourself on that.
bacullen says:
January 9, 2013 at 5:03 pm
@David Oliver Smith If the Earth maintains a negative charge in a sea of positive solar wind, how is that negative charge replenished (and we know it is)?
The solar wind is not positive, it is neutral and so is the Earth. If the solar wind were positive then the sun would become more and more negative as all that positive charge left. After some time the electric attraction between the negative sun and the positive wind would prevent any more wind from escaping. That is why the solar wind has to be neutral.
RACookPE1978 says:
January 9, 2013 at 5:10 pm
Flux (DOY) = Flux (Solar Constant at TOA) * (1.033 * cos [360 * (DOY – 3)/365] )
and sets his solar constant at 1367 watts/meter sq.
This would cycle top of atmosphere flux between 1412 and 1321. True?
True enough for most uses. But use 1362 instead of 1367.
What is the “official” standard equation for radiation at top of atmosphere for each day of the year?
It is extremely complicated and you don’t want to go there.
Does this value (if using a simple year-long cos function) vary significantly with the earth’s rotation about the earth-moon barycenter, and not a sun-earth average radius on the elliptical?
The simple cos function does not take into account the Moon, but the Moon’s effect is very small.
Ninderthana says:
January 9, 2013 at 5:42 pm
Even if you not willing to listen to a person that Leif considers a “pseudo-scientist” you might want to read about the research work of Dr. Claire Perigaud.
By all means listen to her.
Tom in Florida says:
January 9, 2013 at 5:44 pm
Many in this thread seem to be crowning themselves correct way too soon.
Called confirmation bias.
Birdieshooter says:
January 9, 2013 at 6:37 pm
Kudos to this effort. To me this says the science is not settled which should have been said by all scientists involved all along.
All scientists would [and should] say that the science is never settled. Only Al Gore & Co and the skeptics claim the science is settled [although on opposite conclusions].
OMG Leif
“Ongoing discussion of the role of solar variations [including variations of the individual components] in the early 20th century has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in temperature in the last half century could also be due to changes in TSI [just the total] rather than to anthropogenic influences”
Returning to the acid copper plating solution with a couple dozen organic components I might say:
Ongoing discussion of the role of organic component variations in the plating solution has given rise to the unfounded conjecture that the observed increase in striations could be due to changes in TOC rather than to temperature variations that was previously blamed.
So, with the above statement I haven’t ruled out organic component variation or temperature but have ruled out TOC. Similarly, the NASA statement doesn’t ruled out solar variation or anthropogenic effects but does rule out TSI.
Stephan
Thanks for the help. Now a few more questions
I’ll help Steven Mosher out a bit :
1.What variable changes in solar output ?
Changes in the mix of particles and wavelengths so as to alter atmospheric chemistry especially as regards ozone thereby altering the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere and interfering with the gradient of tropopause height between poles and equator
1. What particles
2. What wavelengths
3. What changes in chemistry
4. How will the verticle temperature profile change
5. What changes to the gradient
‘altering” changing.. are not testable unless you SPECIFY in advance the kinds of changes you expect. Without quantifying this you have no theory to test.
2. What circulation change does it create ?
The climate zones and jet stream tracks are then enabled to slide to and fro latitudinally beneath the tropopause.
1. what climate zones’
2. how are they defined
3. how do you measure a jet stream ‘track”
4. what do you mean numerically by “to” and “fro”
5. how quickly will this change happen in reference to changes in solar output?
3. How is cloudiness altered ?
More meridional or equatorward jets increase the length of the lines of air mass mixing to produce more clouds.
1. Which types of clouds
2. how quickly does this effect take to become detectable
3. how quickly does the effect dissipate?
4. What is the change in input to the oceans?
Less clouds when the sun is active and the jets more poleward or zonal allows more energy into the oceans especially beneath the expanded subtropical high pressure cells.
1. which types of clouds.
2. what level of “solar activity” induces this effect
3. How much more poleward
4. How much more energy can we expect to see into the oceans
5. would the change be detectable in argo data
6. You mention expanded high pressure cells. Define what constitutes high pressure.
7. how much expansion.
5. Under what cases does it skew to El nino and what cases la Nina ?
More energy into the oceans skews ENSO in favour of El NIno and less energy into the oceans skews ENSO in favour of La Nina. The basic ENSO oscillation continues in the background
1. what do you mean by “skews”
2. given we are coming to a max, do you expect
A) more el nino? less
B) more la nina or less
C) more intense el nino? or less
D) more intense la nina or less
E how much more intense?
3. what is the deta energy input required to trigger the effect
All that and more is already set out in detail in my work and in my past blog posts
Err, no it has not, otherwise i would not have to ask for an explaination. As always you never quantify your ‘theory’ it remains untestable. So vague in fact that its consistent with evrything and testable by nothing
So we stand at a Max or very close to one. How many more clouds? what type? where will we see them? will argo change? numbers. testable predictions.
Leif Svalgaard: The theory was not found to be in error on theoretical grounds.
Nevertheless, it was wrong, as was subsequently shown by evidence.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/16/onset-of-the-next-glaciation/#comment-1090817
Allan MacRae says: September 26, 2012 at 3:32 am
So are you saying that the global cooling observed during the Maunder Minimum (circa 1645 to 1715) had nothing to do with reduced solar activity?
Leif Svalgaard says: September 26, 2012 at 5:09 am
Essentially, yes. As the Sun does not vary enough.
Dr Norman Page says: September 26, 2012 at 7:32 am
The Maunder minimum is almost certainly the result of reduced solar activity – specifically reduced solar magnetic field strength which leads to an increase in incoming GCRs and the resulting increase in cloudiness and albedo.
Allan says:
OK…… Glad we cleared that up.
Could possibly resolve this question through a scintillating game of rock, paper, scissors?
🙂
With so many candidates in the running and the CAGW 100 Year Dash to 2 degrees now reduced to 87 years, it is time to pick a winner (just one) in the “Who is the Lance Armstrong of climate science?” competition. I know climate alarmism is a Team sport but in the end there can be only One.
With this paper it appears the NASA team is having doubts about who should be wearing the Yellow Jersey.
Leif and Mosher: Because you claim to not be aware of evidence and studies that conflict with your expertise, does not make you right. It makes you both deniers of science and closed to discussion. Not skeptics, but deniers. There is a difference. Your arguments pretend that there are no plausible alternatives to your singular strawmen arguments.
You could be open to some logic and read some of Tisdale’s work for instance.
When it cools in 10 years, you will be saying it has nothing – nothing to do with the sun, because TSI is everything and it does not vary. Right? You’ll say, correlation is not causation, right? One does not have to prove that the world will probably continue to spin and tomorrow will be another day, but I know I can count on that there will be another day coming within each 24 hour period.
RACookPE1978 says:
January 9, 2013 at 5:10 pm
Can I chime in too? Oh yeah, of course I can. 🙂
That cosine thing is a pretty crude approximation. However, it is likely plenty good enough. It’s not too hard to figure out the Sun – Earth (or barycenter) distance, but IIRC, you can’t go from date to location. Stupid integral that can’t be solved. You can converge it readily or go from location to date or something like that. I wrote code for that on a TRS-80. 100 ms per transcendental call. Don’t get Leif & me started. My current code seems to run a lot faster….
Some ancient links to books I used are at http://wermenh.com/eqoftm.html . Mills has the better explanations, Meeus (who posts here occasionally) has equations with second and third order effects but no explanation.
Don’t worry about the barycenter – the Earth’s wobble is very small compared to the Earth-Moon distance and much smaller compared to difference between perihelion and aphelion.
The barycenter completely messes up trying to figure out a reference point for the date of perihelion. When I concluded that’s why perihelion was not 0.2422 days 1/24000 of a year later each year, I dug up old Old Farmers Almanacs looking for perihelions near full moons and came up with a decent date. Those USNO folks do take those minor effects into account!
Here’s recent USNO data:
I’m happy with mine. I like my layout better too:
John West says:
January 9, 2013 at 8:10 pm
Similarly, the NASA statement doesn’t rule out solar variation or anthropogenic effects but does rule out TSI.
splitting hairs is not a useful exercise. TSI is where the energy is. Anything else is just special pleading. When Jack Eddy introduced the idea that the Maunder Minimum was the cause of colder climate, it was believed that TSI varied enough to account for that. So a scientific experiment was carried out: we send up satellites to actually measure TSI to verify the theory. And guess what: the theory was roundly falsified, TSI did not vary enough. The Scientific Method should then compel us to drop the theory that the Maunder Minimum was the cause of the colder climate. At the SORCE science dinner in Sonoma 2003 Eddy gave the dinner talk and told us just that. But, no, somehow people don’t want to accept that.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 9, 2013 at 8:46 pm
“The theory was not found to be in error on theoretical grounds.”
Nevertheless, it was wrong, as was subsequently shown by evidence.
As I said: new data and observations are what drive science and make scientists believe new theories.
Allan MacRae says:
Dr Norman Page says: September 26, 2012 at 7:32 am
The Maunder minimum is almost certainly the result of reduced solar activity – specifically reduced solar magnetic field strength which leads to an increase in incoming GCRs and the resulting increase in cloudiness and albedo.
Regardless of who said what, the GCR hypothesis has not held up over time.
Mario Lento says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:31 pm
Leif and Mosher: Because you claim to not be aware of evidence and studies that conflict with your expertise, does not make you right.
Neither do those conflicting studies make the people who peddle them right. Nor does the almost religious fervor displayed in most comments here make the believers right. For me, the question is simple: is there compelling evidence that would get me off the fence? No such evidence has been forthcoming to my satisfaction, so I stay on the fence. The believers never even got onto the fence in the first place, for them no evidence is needed.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:54 pm
FrankK says:
January 9, 2013 at 3:38 pm
The theory of Lord Kelvin earth’s core cooling period comes to mind which was subsequently found to be substantially in error.!
………. Nothing wrong with the model or the math. Kelvin’s theory faltered on new data and observations, e.g. the finding of a heating source unknown to Kelvin: radioactivity, and on the empirical discovery of radioactive decay ……………….
—————————————————————————————————————–
Goodness me LS!
If Kelvin didn’t account for all factors then his model was wrong. To say his model was right is just nonsense and astonishing. If all factors that count are not included in a model (as per the AGW type) then the model is wrong. The discovery of the other factors, doesn’t mean the original model integrity stays intact.
@Lief: 12:01pm Progress comes when new data and observations make the old theories untenable [and when old scientists die off].
New data and observations are insufficient conditions for progress. Progress comes only when new theories [or previously discarded ones] make better sense of existing data and/or new data. New Theories do not germinate in closed minds — whether or not the old scientists are breathing.
Where can we get a graph of UV versus time? Anthony Watts mentions it varies by factors of ten.. but Leif mentioned in another post that UV was similar to TSI in that varied very little..
One avenue of enquiry which might be interesting for the modellers to pursue is this;
How did the release of CFCs and the subsequent depletion of the ozone layer affect the responsiveness of the earth’s stratosphere/troposphere/atmosphere to incoming solar/galactic particles??
This is a system with a fairly clear and bounded start and finish point (the start was the mass manufacture of fridges containing CFCs and its endpoint was a few years after CFCs were banned.
It would provide a fine discrete model for evaluating responsiveness of the earth’s atmosphere to incoming particles, assuming that real-time data for ozone levels exist over a sufficiently long period to make modelling useful.
Has this already been done and if not, is it possible?
FrankK says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:00 pm
If Kelvin didn’t account for all factors then his model was wrong.
It was only wrong if the factors were known at the time. We will never know all the factors involved in anything, so all models and theories are always wrong. This is not a useful way of thinking about the problem. Models and theories can be correct within their paradigm, even though with a later paradigm can see that the models was incomplete.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:04 pm
Progress comes only when new theories [or previously discarded ones] make better sense of existing data and/or new data.
New theories are forced upon us by new data and observations.
How many new theories have you formed? What is your experience with that process, that you can opine on it with some authority?
Andrejs Vanags says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:11 pm
Where can we get a graph of UV versus time? Anthony Watts mentions it varies by factors of ten.. but Leif mentioned in another post that UV was similar to TSI in that varied very little..
UV creates the ionosphere. Winds in the ionosphere carry the ions across the Earth’s magnetic field lines creating a dynamo which makes an electric current whose magnetic effect we can measure on the ground. This measurement is thus also a measure of UV. http://www.leif.org/research/CAWSES%20-%20Sunspots.pdf
http://www.leif.org/research/Rudolf%20Wolf%20Was%20Right.pdf
@Lief Svalgard: “………. Nothing wrong with the model or the math. Kelvin’s theory faltered on new data and observations, e.g. the finding of a heating source unknown to Kelvin: radioactivity, and on the empirical discovery of radioactive decay ……………….”
A none problem with people who stick with and life by models. It is the ultimate downfall of MANY engineers who arrogantly believe their models model the whole process… even when there is good evidence showing the model is plain wrong. Using models REQUIRES an open mind which Lief says IS NOT part of science.
When observation shows a model to be wrong… there IS something wrong with it. The math might be right as a model outcome, but that outcome is just as wrong as the model itself. Having some proof is not required when the model cannot lead to the answer we all look for.
The model is wrong Lief. SAY IT… have an open mind and say it. Show some willingness to admit what you know is true.
Good work, Anthony. What this conference shows me is that we have only really begun to scratch the surface of understanding about how the sun influences climate, and how anything else ultimately influences climate. It is far more complicated and prone to multiple causes that are yet to be fully established. Finally, NASA as an organization is beginning to see this and do the job they were hired to do.
If I were a policy maker right now, I would be saying: keep studying, keep measuring, keep examining, keep debating, and don’t cause panic. There is absolutely no fair way to know what policy measures can be taken to deal with the phenomena we experience today. It will take a LOT more time to figure these things out. And I continue to suspect that the draconian solutions are NOT the answer under any circumstances.
If it all boils down to, as I’ve been preaching since 2009 when the Sun entered it’s current solar grand minimum and following the dead body count from freezing world conditions, “It’s the Sun Stupid”, I’ll be a monkeys uncle. No pun intended.
@Lief: 12:01pm Progress comes when new data and observations make the old theories untenable [and when old scientists die off].
Notice that it ‘and’ not ‘or’ when old scientists die off…:)
@Larry in Texas says:
January 10, 2013 at 12:19 am
Good work, Anthony… Finally, NASA as an organization is beginning to see this and do the job they were hired to do…
++++++
You’re being too positive about NASA Larry. James Hansen of NASA’s Goddard Institue is not beginning to see anything except they know that more people will know they are wrong headed. They see that it is inevitable that they will be found on the wrong side of the “politically motivated science propaganda” debate. We should NOT be paying them to fool us any longer.
As a kid, I was so proud of NASA for what they were doing. Now, I feel embarrassment for the US to go with the rest of the world monetizing fear…
@Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 12:01 pm – And I submit that you are wrong on this. Progress comes when new data and observations make the old theories untenable [and when old scientists die off].
+++++++
tick tock… will you evolve or perish before you see and appreciate the new data and observations…
Haven’t had time to read the original yet, but I wonder, from the press release: any credit to Svensmark, Solanki, Shaviv, Veizer, Baliunas and many others? To all those ‘sceptics’ who worked for years / decades on exactly this kind of question?
Further queries from Steve Mosher so replies as follows:
1.What variable changes in solar output ?
Changes in the mix of particles and wavelengths so as to alter atmospheric chemistry especially as regards ozone thereby altering the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere and interfering with the gradient of tropopause height between poles and equator
1. What particles – Solar protons and any others that affect the chemical composition of the upper atmosphere so as to change the vertical temperature profile.
2. What wavelengths- Those that most affect chemical composition. Most likely UV and EUV
3. What changes in chemistry- Most likely the balance of ozone creation and destruction
4. How will the verticle temperature profile change- Cooling stratosphere and mesosphere
when the sun is active. Warming when inactive. Apparently the lower stratosphere above Antarctica has been warmer than usual recenty and ozone amounts have been recovering
5. What changes to the gradient- When the Earth is warming the tropopause at the poles must become higher (positive AO and AAO) relative to that at the equator and vice versa (negative AO and AAO) when cooling.
‘altering” changing.. are not testable unless you SPECIFY in advance the kinds of changes you expect. Without quantifying this you have no theory to test- noted but I gave Leif just such a list some time ago.
2. What circulation change does it create ?
The climate zones and jet stream tracks are then enabled to slide to and fro latitudinally beneath the tropopause.
1. What climate zones’- All of them from ITCZ poleward.
2. How are they defined- As per standard climatology. The Earth has a collection of permanent climate zones.
3. How do you measure a jet stream ‘track”- Averaged over time both as to latitudinal position and degrees of zonality and meridionality.
4. What do you mean numerically by “to” and “fro”- Sometimes the net position drifts poleward. Sometimes equatorward.The trend is sufficient for basic diagnostic purposes.
5. how quickly will this change happen in reference to changes in solar output?- Unclear in the short term due to chaotic variability within the system but changes on decadal timescales and longer seem clear enough. There was a documented poleward drift during the warming spell which I observed to stop and reverse from 2000 onwards. There are substantial differences between MWP and LIA and LIA and today.
3. How is cloudiness altered ?
More meridional or equatorward jets increase the length of the lines of air mass mixing to produce more clouds.More zonality or poleward positioning reduces cloudiness.
1. Which types of clouds- All of them subject to internal system variability affecting type.
2. How quickly does this effect take to become detectable- As long as it takes for the climate zones and jets to shift.
3. How quickly does the effect dissipate?- It doesn’t unless the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere changes again but in reality that profile it is always changing from solar and oceanic influences.
4. What is the change in input to the oceans?- Less clouds when the sun is active and the jets more poleward or zonal allows more energy into the oceans especially beneath the expanded subtropical high pressure cells.The net effect should be revealed by OHC data. I understand that OHC stopped rising when the jets became more meridional after 2000.
1. Which types of clouds- All of them subject to internal system variability affecting type..
2. What level of “solar activity” induces this effect- Any that affects atmospheric composition but it is too small to distinguish from internal system variability on short timescales.The differences involved in Maunder Minimum and Dalton and the mid 20th century cooling period and now with stalled warming all seem to be enough.
3. How much more poleward- As much as necessaryu to keep top of atmosphere energy balance stable.
4. How much more energy can we expect to see into the oceans- Potentially unlimited over enough time but the convective processes and water cycle plus more radiation from warmer water under less cloudy skies keep the system stable by ramping up and matching energy in at TOA with energy out.
5. Would the change be detectable in argo data- Should be over enough time.
6. You mention expanded high pressure cells. Define what constitutes high pressure – any region with pressure above 1000mb. Generally though it is enough to refer to the high pressure cells described in standard climatology.
7. how much expansion- Whatever is necessary to maintain top of atmosphere radiative balance.
Is there anything more you would like to know ?
Some of the wording in this article looks made to let it get past the filters. For instance, similarly, I’ve seen more and more studies on the MWP in recent years have language to emphasize such not being totally global (when actually the Medieval Warm Period was as much global as the Modern Warm Period of “global warming,” neither being totally global and both having more warming at high northern latitudes than elsewhere, in no coincidence due to both having the same cause).
Though there are a number of demonstrations of solar/GCR and climate correlation, the most utterly blatant correlation I’ve seen (more so than that in this article, although the article is interesting) of demonstrating the large effect is what can be shown with global atmospheric humidity as in one of the plots in http://s7.postimage.org/69qd0llcr/intermediate.gif .
Heh, NASA’s finally coming to the sort of realization I came to years ago when first gazing into the pacific Leif’s curiosity. What keeps the amplifying mechanism from going out of control? Well, seems to be albedo, probably clouds in myriad interactions, and sun/galaxy interaction. There is enough steadiness of all of these ‘forces’, and enough potential for negative feedback mechanism to account both for climatic excursions, and climate steadiness.
But, to salute Leif’s incursion to blogdom in search of the mechanism(s?), we are all still marching to the beat of curiosity, destination unknown.
==============
@Peter Hannan:
Didn’t see any. “Scientists” play an interesting game. It is most suited to people who like to play Bridge. (That, BTW, is a mild insult in my world view… as Bridge has much artifice in it…) They make complicated movements based on artifice and guile inside a system designed to consume much time in artificial complexity. The purpose of all this is the entertainment value to themselves as much as actually “winning”. So you get endless bickering over the minutia of thesis vs theory vs hypothesis vs law vs conjecture. Much less discussion of actual understanding and rapid discovery of truth. Similarly all the layers of nuance (that, too, is an insult in my world view…) attached to what is a ‘paper’ vs a ‘comment’ vs a presentation at a conference that wasn’t quite a paper or a comment…
It all makes grand sense to them as they bid “2 Spades no trump” knowing all the time the sub-rosa sniffle will tell their partner to spike that bet in “review”… the ‘game within a game’…
So one of the “rules” is that if you didn’t play Bridge in THEIR tournament, you didn’t play at all. Unless you were officially recognized as part of the bid round, you simply don’t exist. Sniff.
Things never “officially published” are not “papers” so do not have “standing” and thus are not in existence. One does not recognize that which does not exist. Sniff sniff…
It’s all so terribly silly and so terribly boring. (Not to mention wasting a lot of time and impressing no one but the Bridge Devotees…)
While I would hope that in the age of “never forgetting” internet archives some future historian will recognize who actually discovered what “way first”; don’t hold your breath waiting.
There’s a long history in “science” of folks finding other folks writings to plagiarize and call it “research”. And as long as your “paper” is accepted on the bid first, you are the one who is in the Bridge game and only you can ever be recognized by all the other players. That’s one of the rules after all…
Frankly, that behaviour is one of the largest “issues” I have with science as it is practiced today. The sheer layers of artifice and games layered on top of what ought to be simply gentlemanly search for truth, sharing of it, and recognition of who had the idea first. It’s become too much like a court of law where if you don’t have the right chain of custody and chops from the right strokers your evidence of existing is disappeared… So don’t expect those not ‘in the club’ to be recognized by the judges of the show…
(No, not all players, and not all the time. Every one in a million an upstart makes it to the table… but only after paying the right dues and making the right bids and often stroking the right egos… )
Leif Svalgaard says:
When Jack Eddy introduced the idea that the Maunder Minimum was the cause of colder climate, it was believed that TSI varied enough to account for that. So a scientific experiment was carried out: we send up satellites to actually measure TSI to verify the theory. And guess what: the theory was roundly falsified, TSI did not vary enough. The Scientific Method should then compel us to drop the theory that the Maunder Minimum was the cause of the colder climate.
The hypothesis that the Maunder Minimum “caused” the colder climate was not falsified; only TSI being the varying attribute of the Maunder Minimum that caused the colder climate was nearly falsified; the TSI variance can’t be eliminated entirely until observed during cycles like during the Maunder Minimum. I suggest the observations certainly haven’t eliminated other solar variations being the cause of the colder climate associated with the Maunder Minimum and haven’t even completely ruled out TSI, unless y’all managed to get a satellite back to the Maunder Minimum.
What I don’t understand is why you’re being so resistant to components of solar variation being tested as individual variables instead of lumped together in TSI.
John West says:
January 10, 2013 at 5:08 am
What I don’t understand is why you’re being so resistant to components of solar variation being tested as individual variables instead of lumped together in TSI.
Because TSI [as Eddy emphasized] is where almost all the energy is. [the elephant in the room]. And because all the other variables vary the same way as TSI: is nearly cyclic with the well-known sunspot period.
TSI is simply a weak proxy for more influential solar variables.
As George Box famously said: “All models are wrong, some are useful”
Nature is not compelled to follow the models that we devise. Rather, our models can only attempt to explain , and on occasion successfully predict , what Nature is doing, or will do.
So, models (even Ptolemy’s Epicycle model) can be said to be “correct”, to the extent that they are “well-formed” in some practice and “useful”.
So, yes, astrological horoscopes are “useful” (and thus correct) in the sense that they make money for their publishers and entertain their readers. (But also nonsense in terms of modern science).
The sunspot peaks appear not to influence the temperature TREND of the globe, As a matter of fact, there is a slight cooling at the peaks. But the TREND of solar energy out put is closely followed buy the TREND in the temperature.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:59 pm
FrankK says:
January 9, 2013 at 11:00 pm
If Kelvin didn’t account for all factors then his model was wrong.
It was only wrong if the factors were known at the time. We will never know all the factors involved in anything, so all models and theories are always wrong. This is not a useful way of thinking about the problem. Models and theories can be correct within their paradigm, even though with a later paradigm can see that the models was incomplete.
Therefore incomplete models will either be way off the mark (eg phlogiston) or nearly right some of time (Kepler’s planetary motion?) what we have to decide is how “good” the current paradigm is? For me, as a rule of thumb the more variables you can think of the more likely the current paradigm is going to change. Ergo CAGW is likely to be wrong and the current paradigm will change frequently.
Leif said:
“TSI [as Eddy emphasized] is where almost all the energy is”
It isn’t the location of the energy that matters. It is the speed of throughput within the atmosphere that matters and the amount that the atmosphere refuses to accept as a result of reflection (albedo).
So, if solar variations alter the chemical composition of an atmosphere then the effect on the change in the rate of throughput can be out of all proportion to any change in the amount of energy being supplied.
Furthermore, if such changes alter cloudiness (as they do seem to do) then there is a huge potential amplifying factor in the denying of energy to the oceans altogether (increased global albedo) or the adding of more energy to the oceans (decreased global albedo).
It is changes in chemical composition and consequent albedo changes that we must look to for an explanation of solar induced climate change.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 8:02 am
It isn’t the location of the energy that matters. It is the speed of throughput within the atmosphere that matters and the amount that the atmosphere refuses to accept as a result of reflection (albedo).
You can’t get more energy out than you put in. And your statement is extremely muddled: ‘Location?’, ‘Speed?’, ‘Refuses?’, etc
Alot of effort to support the “it’s the sun” conjecture, but I see nothing convincing. Even Mosher somewhere above asked some proper skeptical questions. Dr S has the patience of a stone.
When you see the road you’ve taken is a dead-end, turn back…
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 8:02 am
It isn’t the location of the energy that matters. It is the speed of throughput within the atmosphere that matters and the amount that the atmosphere refuses to accept as a result of reflection (albedo).
___________________________________________________________________________
Makes a great deal of sense to me – but how can something so insignificant as the sun have much impact 😉 Surely climate variations have to be attributable to something more major, like the piffling affect that CO2 has – NOT?
TC
TC says:
January 10, 2013 at 9:10 am
Makes a great deal of sense to me – but how can something so insignificant as the sun have much impact 😉 Surely climate variations have to be attributable to something more major
This is precisely the point. The ‘major’ element is the energy coming from the Sun, but people don’t want to consider that; instead they in desperation attribute climate change to the insignificant ‘other’ variables. Go figure…
The initial part of this blog post speaks about the ways in which the relatively large increases in UV radiation at the peak of a solar cycle can create more stratospheric ozone, which in turn might change circulation patterns in the troposphere, thus alterning temperature patterns and average temperatures.
A few months ago, a solar researcher named Joanna Haigh was castigated on WUWT (I don’t remember who did the castigating). But Haigh well known for linking changes in UV radiation with changes in upper atmosphere ozone, and thus in earth’s temperature and circulation patterns. Perhaps she is owned an apology?
Leif Svalgaard: As I said: new data and observations are what drive science and make scientists believe new theories.
You seem unwilling to accept that the error was of any importance. Yet the error had at least two components that are quite relevant to discussions of possible error in climate science. (1) Rutherford (it was Rutherford, wasn’t it, instead of Lord Kelvin? Was it both?) was supremely confident in his result (in this he was followed by generations of physicists); (2) he assumed that something not known did not in fact exist, a perversion of Occam’s razor which is a sort of warning against unfounded assumptions.
Now to TSI: it may be an error to assume or assert that variations in a fraction of incoming sunlight necessarily change the fraction of TSI that hits the Earth surface; but it is equally an error to assert that variations in fractions of incoming sunlight necessarily do not have any such effect. Variations in some aspects of solar output seem to have some association with variations in Earthly weather: instead of confidently asserting that no such variations can have any effect because TSI is the only thing that matters (thereby possibly repeating “Rutherford’s Error”), it would make a lot more sense to hold open the possibility (as the report of this thread does) and examine all possibilities in detail, as diverse researchers are doing.
Paraphrasing Planck, established scientists do not have open minds, but graduate students and other new entrants to the field do have open minds. It would be a disservice to them to advocate that they close their minds now and adopt your established view. In my humble opinion, anyway, though it may sound harsh in writing.
Leif Svalgaard says:
( all of the above LS responses))
—————————————————————————————————-
So Leif given you give the impression you have all the answers what caused the Medieval Warm Period and the Little ice age ??
Mario Lento says: January 10, 2013 at 1:09 am
@Larry in Texas says:
January 10, 2013 at 12:19 am
Good work, Anthony… Finally, NASA as an organization is beginning to see this and do the job they were hired to do…
++++++
You’re being too positive about NASA Larry. James Hansen of NASA’s Goddard Institue is not beginning to see anything except they know that more people will know they are wrong headed. They see that it is inevitable that they will be found on the wrong side of the “politically motivated science propaganda” debate. We should NOT be paying them to fool us any longer.
As a kid, I was so proud of NASA for what they were doing. Now, I feel embarrassment for the US to go with the rest of the world monetizing fear…
==================================
The great mission of NASA, i.e., exploration of the solar system, has reached its bounds. They are casting about for a new role to enthrall the public.The global-warming bandwagon holds the best prospects of generating the funding levels that NASA needs to sustain itself. NASA still dreams of a space station:
“A radiometric imager, deployed on some future space observatory, would allow researchers to develop the understanding they need to project the sun-climate link into a future of prolonged spotlessness.”
These big government entities are positively organic in nature.
mpainter
Leif Svalgaard: Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 8:02 am
It isn’t the location of the energy that matters. It is the speed of throughput within the atmosphere that matters and the amount that the atmosphere refuses to accept as a result of reflection (albedo).
LS response: You can’t get more energy out than you put in. And your statement is extremely muddled: ‘Location?’, ‘Speed?’, ‘Refuses?’, etc
Are you being dense on purpose? Nobody has asserted that “you” can “get more energy out” than “you” put in. Energy out does not equal energy in at every place in the climate system at all times, or else there would never be any temperature changes: such a state is called “steady state” and the Earth doesn’t have it.
“Refuses”: absorption in the upper atmosphere, reflection from the top of the clouds, friction in air and water .
“Speed”: rate of transfer of heat from one part of the climate system to another fluctuates, as when jet streams alter course, when cyclones form over oceans and traverse their courses, when cold masses of air move from the poles toward the Equator, when water evaporates and then cools and descends as rain.
“Location”: some parts of the Earth absorb more energy from the sun than other parts (e.g. tropics vs poles”; and some parts radiate more to space than other parts (poles vs. cloud-shrouded areas.) All of the energy transfer processes in the climate happen in particular places at particular times, and face particular impedences. This is the fact, or rather a large collection of facts, overlooked in the “equilibrium” portrait of climate as presented in such books as Pierrehumbert’s “Principles of Planetary Climate”.
oops: (tropics vs poles), not (tropics vs poles”
Plenty of interesting comments here. I would reaffirm that even though the sun may vary by 0.1%, that is significant in that the volume of energy and the type of energy can have exclusivity in how it affects another system. For example, the energy of GCR’s compared to the visual spectrum, or ultraviolet radiation. And the problem of volume in that 0.1% of the ocean compared to 0.1% of my morning coffee; we see how statistical numeration affects our perception and weighted importance.
My point is, I have been on the wagon that the sun, though varies little in TSI, because it is the master of a wide variety of energy regimes, has been the driver of global temperatures, all else being equal.
Leif said:
“You can’t get more energy out than you put in”
I never said you could. But you can alter the speed of throughput by one mechanism (GHGs absorbing more energy) and have a negative system response to cancel it (changed air circulation).
and:
“The ‘major’ element is the energy coming from the Sun,”
So what ?
We are considering what happens within the atmosphere as a result of solar effects on chemical composition and not absolute energy input.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 10, 2013 at 10:30 am
Are you being dense on purpose?
I am trying [in vain] to get Stephen to put numbers to his assertions, without which he has no theory, just hand waving.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 10:43 am
So what ? We are considering what happens within the atmosphere as a result of solar effects on chemical composition and not absolute energy input.
So, now we are considering an apparatus [a ‘box’] where by your mechanisms we can change the temperature more than by the total energy applied to the box. Correct?
FrankK says:
January 10, 2013 at 10:14 am
what caused the Medieval Warm Period and the Little ice age ??
The climate system has variations on the order of 1000-2000 yr duration. There is no good evidence that these are caused by the Sun. If you claim they are, then what caused those variations of the Sun? You can accept such changes in the Sun but not in the climate…
“So, now we are considering an apparatus [a ‘box’] where by your mechanisms we can change the temperature more than by the total energy applied to the box. Correct?”
A distinctly perverse interpretation.
We are considering a box in which one factor can change the speed of throughput and another can negate it but the net outcome is a change in circulation pattern leaving surface temperature and top of atmosphere balance unchanged but a noticeably different arrangement of climate zones and jet stream tracks.
The irritating thing is that Leif knows perfectly well by now the nature of my propositions (much the same as now belatedly produced by NASA) yet in every post in which he attempts a rebuttal he behaves as if he has no idea and comes up with an infinite variety of avoidance measures.
It’s like dealing with one of those toys with a large round base that pop up again however hard one hits them.
All we have to do is wait and see. All the evidence is going my way.
“I am trying [in vain] to get Stephen to put numbers to his assertions, without which he has no theory, just hand waving.”
The numbers are not currently available as you well know.
However there is data of various kinds and I constantly link to it.
The changes in trends over the past 1000 years are clear enough and the correlation with solar activity is becoming clearer with time. Even Leif’s flattened sunspot charts have not rubbed it out.
A hypothesis/theory does not require numbers. It does need data of some sort but observed changes in trends are good enough as data to form the basis of a workable proposition without it being decried as ‘hand waving’.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:24 am
FrankK says:
January 10, 2013 at 10:14 am
what caused the Medieval Warm Period and the Little ice age ??
The climate system has variations on the order of 1000-2000 yr duration. There is no good evidence that these are caused by the Sun. If you claim they are, then what caused those variations of the Sun? You can accept such changes in the Sun but not in the climate…
—————————————————————————————————————–
Leif with the greatest of respect, your answer is deflective – did I say the sun caused them?
You have not answered my question:
What in your opinion caused the Medieval Warm period and the Little Ice Age??
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:34 am
We are considering a box in which one factor can change the speed of throughput and another can negate it but the net outcome is a change in circulation pattern leaving surface temperature and top of atmosphere balance unchanged
So the unchanged surface temperature is what they call Global Warming?
“Researchers have considered the possibility that the sun plays a role in global warming.”
I assume the petroleum industry means “a role in the current global temperature anomaly.” Note that all of the evidence shows the sun has had no effect at all on Earth’s current global temperature. The fact, over the past 33 years the sun has cooled by a very tiny amount, with the energy budget being -0.04 watts per meter squared, plus or minus 0.02 watts per meter squared. Only human-released CO2 explains the global temperature increase, which is a damn shame.
“So the unchanged surface temperature is what they call Global Warming?”
As you should know from my work there is no change from GHGs.
However there is a change from the global air circulation altering to allow more or less energy into the oceans.
But from GHGs it is insignificant as compared to the changes wrought by the interactions between sun and oceans. I have said that many times but as usual you raise dead debating points by simply ignoring everything I said in the past.
And I have NASA on side as regards the solar effects on circulation.
Is that why you are grumpy ?
Desertphile says:
January 10, 2013 at 12:17 pm
Only human-released CO2 explains the global temperature increase, which is a damn shame.
———————————————————————————————————
Of course Desertphile you have left out of your theory the last 16 to 18 years of no statistical warming .
And I will ask you the same question:
What caused the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age? Could not have been human generated CO2 now could it?
Lleif Svalgaard: I am trying [in vain] to get Stephen to put numbers to his assertions, without which he has no theory, just hand waving.
I think that you are trying to do more: you are asserting that there is no value in trying to develop quantitative theories of the sort that Stephen Wilde is working toward; based on the fact that the quantitative theories are not now available.
FrankK says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:43 am
……..
Here is an alternative view.
We have a good record of the MWP and LIA proxies and many written records, mainly related to the N. Hemisphere.
The N. Hemisphere climate can and I think it does change depending on the ratio of the energy absorbed and released. This is mainly controlled by the polar jet stream. Change the jet stream’s direction from longitudinal to meridional and you changed the N. Hemisphere’s climate.
Critical factor here is the semi-permanent atmospheric pressure system known as the Icelandic Low, the cause of jet-stream ‘blocking’. The Icelandic Low pressure system is direct consequence of the down-welling both South and North of the Iceland where several hundred W/m2 is released into atmosphere.
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/slides/large/04.18.jpg
Intensity of down-welling is dependant on the balance of warm and cold currents flowing through the Denmark Strait.
Why this would change, it is not exactly known but the geological records from the area show a good correlation with the CET, the longest temperature record the science has:
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/CET-NAP.htm
The most interesting aspect of this is that the same geological records also correlate well with the solar activity
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SSN-NAP.htm
Since Earth can’t influence the sun, it is either the sun or some other common cause (e.g. some planetary configuration) which is the driver of these events.
I suggest take also a look at
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/ATO.htm
It should be remembered that the magnetic field is reflection of what is going on in the Earth’s interior, also the GCR modulation by the Earth’s magnetic field is an order of magnitude stronger than the modulation by the heliospheric magnetic field.
More on the subject in the near future.
Leif Svalgaard says:
Stephen Rasey says:
I submit that the greatest scientific discoveries were done with a mind open to unconventional theories that better fit observations than the accepted conventional theories/dogma
And I submit that you are wrong on this. Progress comes when new data and observations make the old theories untenable
———————————————————————————————————
Leif, you are wrong to say Stephen Rasey is wrong. It’s so obvious that lots of the greatest scientific discoveries were made exactly as Stephen says. One can think of examples straight away, concerning the greatest discoveries. Newton. Copernicus. Galileo. Kepler. Etc.
But the fact that you are wrong on the above count, does not make your second sentence wrong. It is not even too different to what Stephen says. You simply miss the unfortunate fact that there are lots of trained scientists who will defend their pet theories to the death, rather than admit they are untenable, even when new (or even pre-existing) data and observations are available and even pointed out repeatedly. And such people are not the people who ever make great science breakthroughs. They are the ones who stifle them.
That’s largely what WUWT has been about. Countering folk like Michael Mann and IPCC.
Leif, you have a lot of expertise that is precious. But I’ve never heard you admit to having been wrong, in exchanges here. It would endear you a lot more to a lot of us, if you were to do so sometimes. This seems to be an obvious place to do so.
Leif Svalgaard says:
“Because TSI [as Eddy emphasized] is where almost all the energy is”
So? H2O and clouds is where almost all the GHE energy is.
“But from GHGs it is insignificant as compared to the changes wrought by the interactions between sun and oceans.”
And yet the world’s scientists for the past 170+ years have said, and are still saying, the exact opposite. Golly, I wonder why?
“Of course Desertphile you have left out of your theory the last 16 to 18 years of no statistical warming.”
Oddly enough, the data shows a very sharp increase in global average temperature for the past “16 to 18” years, more than two SD above the pre-industrial average (i.e., statistically significant warming). How do you justify your lie?
“What caused the Medieval Warm Period”
… a regional event, that was cooler than now….
“and the Little Ice Age?”
… also a regional event….
“Could not have been human generated CO2 now could it?”
No scientist claimed otherwise.
[snip. Over the top and insulting. Take it elsewhere. — mod.]
[snip. Read the site Policy. Abide by it or go elsewhere. — mod.]
Leif Svalgaard says: “Because TSI [as Eddy emphasized] is where almost all the energy is”
No. Solar variation does not affect Earth’s climate— a fact NASA stated, and Watts even quoted NASA saying that…. at the very same time Watts claimed NASA said the opposite.
John West says: “So? H2O and clouds is where almost all the GHE energy is.”
Yes, more or less. WV and CO2 are what has caused and is causing the anomalous retention of unprecedented retention of heat. As NASA and others have pointed out (including me in one of my latest YouTube videos), solar variation has zero effect on Earth’s climate. In the past 1.2 billion years the sun’s change caused three climate changes, but none in the past 800 million years.
[snip. Your insults about WUWT are not welcome here. Take them elsewhere. — mod.]
Funny isnt, we say sun has influence on climate and get told what ignorant simpletons we are.. Nasa says it and suddenly it is a maybe and could be and needs further study by an old buddy of mine response. geeze.
Desertphile says:
“…the world’s scientists for the past 170+ years have said, and are still saying, the exact opposite.”
Not really. Credible scientists like Lindzen, Spencer, Eschenbach, Christy, Watts, Idso, Miskolczi, and many others would probably disagree.
Next, Desertphile claims:
“… the data shows a very sharp increase in global average temperature for the past “16 to 18″ years, more than two SD above the pre-industrial average…”
Mendacious nonsense. In fact, no credible scientist now believes that global warming is accelerating. Even the ultra alarmist Met Office now admits that global warming has stalled.
Next, Desertphile says regarding the MWP and LIA:
“… a regional event, that was cooler than now…” “… also a regional event…”
Mere assertions, and wrong. Numerous ice cores show conclusively that both events were world wide; they occurred at the same time in both hemispheres.
Stating the facts is “insulting?” The NRC stated the exact opposite of what Watts’ headline here states. Stating that fact is not an “insult.”
[snip -policy violation using the d-word to label people isn’t allowed here -mod]
FrankK says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:43 am
Leif with the greatest of respect, your answer is deflective – did I say the sun caused them?
With reference to the title of this post [let me remind you: “NASA on the sun…”] one might surmise that you meant the Sun, otherwise you comment would be [shudder] OT, and you wouldn’t stoop to that, would you?.
What in your opinion caused the Medieval Warm period and the Little Ice Age??
I have said many times [as you should know – and if you pretend not to know reflects badly on you] that every sufficiently complex and non-linear system [and I surmise that the climate qualifies – do you disagree?] has natural, internal, almost stochastic fluctuations on many time-scales. The climate seems to have such fluctuations on times of 1000-2000 years. Perhaps one day we’ll have figured out the cause of those, or perhaps it is just chaos that we can’t predict, control, or understand the details of.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 12:35 pm
“So the unchanged surface temperature is what they call Global Warming?”
As you should know from my work there is no change from GHGs.
then you are a bit wrong. There is definitely some effect of GHGs, otherwise the temperature would be about 33 degrees cooler. What you wanted to say was ‘no significant change from GHGs’, but then we are down to ‘how much is significant?’, i.e. a number. Without such a number your statement cannot be tested and you are nowhere.
And I have NASA on side as regards the solar effects on circulation.
Your irrelevant [and incorrect] reference to NASA, reminds me of the Dunning–Kruger_effect: “The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which unskilled individuals suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly rating their ability much higher than average. This bias is attributed to a metacognitive inability of the unskilled to recognize their mistakes.”
You are in good company, though, many other people here suffer from the same to varying degrees.
Is that why you are grumpy ?
Not grumpy. I feel that as a publicly funded scientists I have an obligation to perform EPO [if you don’t know what that is, see here: http://aim.hamptonu.edu/team/4team.html ]. Explaining Science, the Scientific Method, correcting Mistakes and Misconceptions, etc are important for the education of future generations. That, rather than personal glory and gloating, should be the driving force.
@LiefS 11:59 pm
New theories are forced upon us by new data and observations.
While not false, that is an incomplete statement with respect to at least two dimensions.
“New Theories” are not animate objects. Nor are they spontaneous; growing autonomously like weeds. They do not FORCE themselves upon US.
New Theories are hatched and incubated in and between open minds. Bad New Theories die young when they fit data no better than favored theories. Good New Theories, those that appear to reduce the residual “error” find a home in open minds. It is evolution on the intellectual plane. New Theories can co-exist with other favored theories. New Theories don’t force their way into closed minds — They are invited into open minds.
How many new theories have you formed? …. that you can opine on it with some authority? Argumentum ad hominem et ad verecundiam? OK, I’ll play. My CV and <a href=http://wiserways.com/articles/index.htmlpubs As an exploration geophysicist most of my adult life, I have had to deal with multiple, albeit small scale, theories in realms of high uncertainty, subjectively using Bayesian updating of multiple working hypothesis on decision and probability trees, always with an eye on economics. From that experience I can point to the second missing dimension of your argument.
When confronted with a seismic volume or section, you are applying geological strat-structural theories to make sense of the geophysical data. On more than one occasion, you step back from the cube and posit, WHAT IF that is a Fault Propagation Fold instead of a diapir? (to name one example). No more data than yesterday — just new theories to test. Does the new theory better fit the existing data? The only FORCE involved is the desire to find a theory and plan to improve the reward/risk ratio by reducing uncertainty and potential error to find the better places to put your capital.
New Theories are invited into Open Minds. They stay if they fit in. They are sent away if they don’t. Furthermore, they don’t have to displace the Older Theories. Einstein might be more right than Newton, but we still use Newton to orbit Saturn because the math is easier and good enough for the job.
@mpainter: “A radiometric imager, deployed on some future space observatory, would allow researchers to develop the understanding they need to project the sun-climate link into a future of prolonged spotlessness.”
+++++++
I think it would take the Mars Curiosity to find some underground dwellers living on the planet to be deserving of any major funding. At this point, I certainly can do without paying them to tell us the sun might, maybe has a little more to do with climate than once believed.
@LiefS.
Maybe I don’t have authority you respect. Let’s try Feynman:
It is a great, if over referenced, quote. New Theories aren’t force upon us — they are invited in as guesses.
I humbly think two points need to be added. First, if the guess agrees with observations, you cannot say it is right, only that the guess/theory might be useful. The weakest part of Feynman’s quote is that “wrong” is a fuzzy concept. It can be wrong and still useful if it is “good enough”. My favorite quote from Asimov:
It is the theories’ incompleteness and their domains of validity that allow different theories to be compatible.
“Your irrelevant [and incorrect] reference to NASA”
Please explain.
It is clear that the report of their findings contains several statements that mirror the position that I have been setting out for several years and the general approach is identical in all essential features to my previously expressed diagnoses of climate features.
Leif thinks progress only comes from data.
Guess he never heard of thinking differently than before about the same data.
And that explains a whole lot.
@LiefS 8:24pm:
I surmise that the Sun is a sufficiently complex non-linear system. So shouldn’t we expect, natural, internal, almost stochastic solar fluctuations on many time-scales?
You seem to be saying that the Earth can have significant climate fluctuations of 1000-2000 years because it is a non-linear system, but that the Sun’s non-linear systems are incapable of significant fluctuations on those time scales. What is the basis for such certainty?
Stephen Rasey
Thanks for the quotes from Feynman and Asimov.
I was a great consumer of Asimov’s work as a youth and the style of my narratives owes much to the sensible and logical verbal expression of scientific principles which he applied in his many articles designed for the intelligent layman.
As regards climate and ‘usefulness’ I have previously pointed out to Leif and others that the relationships I propose between various solar and climate phenomena can produce some useful predictive skill as regards the discerning of current trends and the most likely sequence of future trends.
For example:
As long as the sun stays quiet we will continue to see:
(i) More meridional jets than in the late 20th century, probably with a net equatorward shift of the average tracks in due course.
ii) A cessation of any increase in ocean heat content, possibly with a falling in due course.
iii) A continuing cessation of stratospheric cooling probably with warming in due course. In that respect I noted a report of record lower stratospheric warming over Antarctica recently and of course there is much in the news at present about sudden stratospheric warming events above the Arctic.
iv) More frequent and lengthier incursions of cold polar air across mid latitudes and likewise more frequent and lengthier incursions of warm dry equatorial air across the same regions. That is what leads to more weather extremes, not absolute temperature.
v) Continued cessation of tropospheric warming with possibly a cooling to come.
vi) Continuing higher levels of global cloudiness and albedo than was observed in the late 20th century.
vii) Continuing weakness of El Nino relative to La Nina over and above what we would expect from the background 60 year Pacific Multidecadal Oscillation.
All of that is implicit in my earlier work and indeed now at last n the NASA report but currently I am way ahead of them in interpreting the data and the interconnected climate consequences of the various observations.
For the past 5 years I have been awaiting climate events that might go contrary to the above list of ‘predictions’. None have occurred as yet.
As for qualifications I find that 60 years of observations and the obsessive study of weather and climate trumps the formal paperwork of narrow specialists who have the arrogance to move to such a complex multidisciplinary field and think that they have something useful to say after a few years of ‘dipping their toes into the water’.
That is where astrophysicists went wrong with their radiative equations which fail to take adequate account of non radiative processes and so led to a daft theory that humans could make a significant difference to climate trends just from GHG emissions.
Of course I could be wrong but it is the real world that will tell me and not some big headed paper laden newbies living high on the hog from grant money, with nice safe pension arrangements or with vast funds in their pockets from the sale of assets to oil billionaires such as the Quatari Royal Family or from the commercial exploitation of technologies that are more destructive of the environment than modern methods of fossil fuel usage or from the carbon trading Ponzi schemes that seem to go down the drain as soon as they are created.
Do I seem annoyed ? 🙂
Mario Lento says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:20 pm
@mpainter: “A radiometric imager, deployed on some future space observatory, would allow researchers to develop the understanding they need to project the sun-climate link into a future of prolonged spotlessness.”
+++++++
I think it would take the Mars Curiosity to find some underground dwellers living on the planet to be deserving of any major funding. At this point, I certainly can do without paying them to tell us the sun might, maybe has a little more to do with climate than once believed.
=================================
NASA [snip] thinks to hook some skepticals. Note the carefully pitched appeal to the notion of “sun-climate link”. But then note above how Caspar Amman and Raymond Bradly are also allowed their spins. This is a very carefully crafted press release, a product of a perpetual campaign to trump up support, and should be taken for nothing more. The fact is, NASA has pinned its hopes on surfing the AGW wave. That is why they have put up with the antics of James Hansen.
If they wise up, they then will play up the skeptical side and play down the AGW point of view, for as it stands now, their credibility is hurting and it won’t be easy to remedy that. IF they wise up, but such organizations have tremendous inertia. The first sign of an improved NASA will be the retirement of that Hansen miscreant.
Bill Illis says:
January 9, 2013 at 10:47 am
“A tiny, tiny difference in the Sun’s energy received versus the energy emitted each day is going to accumulate over time. I’m just saying, no one has ever looked at the issue this way that I am aware of.”
It’s not energy, but I’ve been looking at the daily temperature difference between today’s temp rise, and tonight’s drop in temps.
http://www.science20.com/files/images/1950-2010%20D100_0.jpg
This is the average daily anomaly North of 23 lat for 1950-2010 time 100.
http://www.science20.com/files/images/Global%20Annual%201940-2010%20Diff_1.jpg
Here’s a similar graph for the continental US.
With regard to palace intrigue at NASA, I suspect that Hansen was tossed under the bus because investigation of variations in Solar output is, A.) more likely produce funding for space-based programs and B.) affords NASA first-tier access to all data obtained. This allows them to continue to control the message and access to data in much the same way they did when Hansen was slinging his AGW BS.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 11, 2013 at 12:21 am
You seem to be saying that the Earth can have significant climate fluctuations of 1000-2000 years because it is a non-linear system, but that the Sun’s non-linear systems are incapable of significant fluctuations on those time scales. What is the basis for such certainty?
The Earth’s fluctuations are observed. We have no observations of the Sun’s variability on that scale. But your claim that I think the sun is incapable of such is wrong. Your use of the word ‘certainty’ is disingenuous, there are no certainties in science.
New Theories aren’t force upon us — they are invited in as guesses.
How often do we not hear the statement “these new observations show that X [does something] more than previously thought”. New data and observations are what cause us the change our theories. We only change/reject/update/accept new theories when forced to do so by new data. This is my personal experience. It is not that new theories bubble out of thin air and then we go and see if we can find data that support them. Geology is actually a good example. Plate tectonics was forced upon us by observations of magnetic stripes on the sea floor, and did not spring from open minds.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 9, 2013 at 1:35 pm
“TSI is where almost all the energy is, that is the strong informational content. Dismissing the overwhelming energy source is the weak viewpoint.”
Wouldn’t the majority of the energy from the sun come from the shorter wave lengths UV-X-Ray? And while most doesn’t make it to the earths surface, it interacts with the upper atm.
MiCro says:
January 11, 2013 at 7:28 am
Wouldn’t the majority of the energy from the sun come from the shorter wave lengths UV-X-Ray?
No, 93% of the energy comes from visible and infrared wave lengths.
MiCro says:
January 11, 2013 at 7:28 am
Maybe “majority” isn’t the right word, but the higher energy of the shorter wave lengths even with a lower flux rate would still be a huge amount of energy, all deposited into the upper atm.
MiCro says:
January 11, 2013 at 7:56 am
Maybe “majority” isn’t the right word, but the higher energy of the shorter wave lengths even with a lower flux rate would still be a huge amount of energy, all deposited into the upper atm.
The 93% I quoted is not the flux of photons but the total energy they carry. ‘Huge’ amount is relative. Compared to the total it is not huge, but you are somewhat correct about the upper atmosphere. It is heated to 1000 degrees, but the air is so thing [a trillionth of the density at the surface] that there is actually very little energy up there [you would freeze to death if put there]. And it does not get down to the surface.
“According to the report, when researchers look at sea surface temperature data during sunspot peak years, the tropical Pacific shows a pronounced La Nina-like pattern, with a cooling of almost 1o C in the equatorial eastern Pacific.”
This is not true for 1969 and 1979 as the solar wind was slower then:
http://snag.gy/UtqpX.jpg
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ensostuff/ensoyears.shtml
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 11, 2013 at 8:33 am
“The 93% I quoted is not the flux of photons but the total energy they carry. ‘Huge’ amount is relative. Compared to the total it is not huge, but you are somewhat correct about the upper atmosphere. It is heated to 1000 degrees, but the air is so thing [a trillionth of the density at the surface] that there is actually very little energy up there [you would freeze to death if put there]. And it does not get down to the surface.”
It as you note about 7% of the Suns output, and iirc it varies a lot over the solar cycle.
I also recall a unexpectedly large drop in the troposphere (stratosphere?) height during the last Solar minimum.
But, I think it is very easy to proof it’s not CO2, whatever the real cause is. You can buy a $70 IR thermometer and point it up at a clear sky, on a 35F day when it wasn’t picking up energy from the Sun it read the minimum it will read, -40F, and while pointed closer(though not at) to the Sun it read it’s Max 608F. Pointing at clouds reads close to air temp.
If I had any doubts it isn’t CO2 causing the warming at the surface, this experiment proves to me it can’t be. I think if more people saw this, it would change their minds, and the next clear day I plan on getting some pictures.
MiCro says:
January 11, 2013 at 9:18 am
It as you note about 7% of the Suns output, and iirc it varies a lot over the solar cycle.
If that drives the temperature then the temperature has to vary a lot over the solar cycle and it does not.
Leif,
I have a question. Given the article discusses changes in individual components of TSI as possible climate change drivers, is there enough data to determine if there are long term trends / cycles in the spectral composition of TSI? Not total energy, just the distribution across the spectrum.
By long term I mean anything longer than a single solar activity cycle.
MattS says:
January 11, 2013 at 9:38 am
By long term I mean anything longer than a single solar activity cycle.
There is a lot of confusion about this, If the spectral distribution is the same in every cycle then the effect of that should also be the same in every cycle [modulated by the size of the cycle], so the long-term variation should follow that of the solar cycle. We have very good evidence that UV does in fact just follow the cycle [since 1722]. If one postulates that the change in spectral distribution is brand new and has never been seen before, then it is hard to ascribe long-term climate change to a recent, unprecedented change in spectral distribution.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 11, 2013 at 9:22 am
“If that drives the temperature then the temperature has to vary a lot over the solar cycle and it does not.”
While I agree that is a reasonable comment, as the topic of this thread points out there could be more subtle interactions involved. possibilities of altering the jet stream, or longer temp thermal cycles imparted into the thermal mass of the oceans, cloud production, distribution of clouds, etc, etc.
I do not buy that because we can’t think of a better reason, it therefore has to be CO2, I did not think this was how science was suppose to work.
MiCro says:
January 11, 2013 at 9:58 am
I did not think this was how science was suppose to work. […]
there could be more subtle interactions involved
Science does not work with vague ‘could-be’, ‘possible’ interactions either.
Leif Svalgaard: Your irrelevant [and incorrect] reference to NASA, reminds me of the Dunning–Kruger_effect:
Please tell us in detail, quoting him, the previous point he addressed, and NASA exactly, how Stephen Wilde was both incorrect and irrelevant.
I think you cite “Dunning-Kruger” whenever you lack a cogent and correct reply to a point that you don’t like to acknowledge.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 1:36 am
Here Wilde presents a few of relationships: “more of this will follow from more of that.” Lots of scientific knowledge of practical value is incorporated in such rank orderings, such as: treatment of HIV with reverse transcriptase inhibitors will retard the development of AIDS and reduce the transmission of HIV; or continued undisciplined use of antibiotics will continue to produce extensively drug resistant populations of gonorrhea, syphilis, TB and MRSA. A perfectly legitimate non-quantitative hypothesis, probably testable, is that a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere, starting now, will induce a mean Earth surface temperature change of less than 10% of the standard deviation of temperature changes observed during the last 150 years (or less than 10% of the RMSE of the “equilibrium” approximation to the Earth surface temperature across time and the Earth surface. I am not sure what the “equilibrium temperature of the Earth is now [perhaps 289K?], but clearly every point on Earth has a different temperature than that almost all of the time, and RMSE is the square root of the average of squared errors across the sampled points of the Earth’s surface, the errors computed hourly at every place for a year.)
Although the calculated change of the notional “equilibrium” temperature caused by CO2 increase follows a quantitative law, what exactly it is in the Earth climate system that the “equilibrium” temperature relates to has never been quantitatively specified, in part because the Earth climate system is never in “equilibrium”, or even “steady state”. It isn’t an act of “Dunning-Kruger contumely to point this out.
Lief,
While the article specifically talks about UV, I am thinking more broadly. Thinking about it at the broadest level, what the article says is that the spectral composition rather than total energy can cause changes in atmospheric composition that affect albedo and thus affects how much energy the climate system actually absorbs from TSI. I would think that the solar cycle is to short for spectral changes tied to it to have a significant impact on temperature. However what if there are longer term variations.
I am not positing a new or novel change in spectral distribution.
Are there any observational datasets on TSI composition that could be analysed for trends / cycles NOT connected to the 11 year solar cycle? I am not looking for / asking about datasets tracking specific components such as UV but observations of the full composition across the EM spectrum. If such a dataset exists, how far does back?
Leif Svalgaard: If the spectral distribution is the same in every cycle then the effect of that should also be the same in every cycle
That assumes that the response of the Earth climate system is linear across the spectrum. Is that known to be true?
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:04 am
“Science does not work with vague ‘could-be’, ‘possible’ interactions either.”
True, but I didn’t imply I knew what the cause of modern warming is either, only what isn’t.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:07 am
Please tell us in detail, quoting him, the previous point he addressed, and NASA exactly, how Stephen Wilde was both incorrect and irrelevant.
You can read his comments yourself. He has several times expressed annoyance with the fact that NASA did not give him credit for his ideas. And that ‘NASA now sides with him’, that essentially everything he says are backed up by NASA, etc. These remarks [which are incorrect] are classic D-K symptoms. As such they are irrelevant to the science at hand.
Sunspot variability may not provide sufficient energy variability but, as I calculate magnetic field interactions, may well act as the control valve.
This type of control permeates throughout most if not all electronic circuits.
For those not familiar with electronics, just consider energy required to open or close hydro-power station sluice gate and the amount of the stored energy released by such action.
Oceans are reservoir of the energy. In the North Atlantic the ‘gate’ is opened and closed regularly following a pattern we know as the AMO.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/GSC1.htm
Matthew R Marler says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:07 am
Please tell us in detail, quoting him
If you really want to have it rubbed in here is a smattering:
Stephen Wilde says:
Very similar to my work of the past 5 years.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 9, 2013 at 9:58 am
This is getting very close to the narrative set out in my New Climate Model
Whatever defects may be found it seems that my work might well have been a lot closer to the truth than that from any of the climate professionals.
It would have been nice to have had some attribution given the overlap with my earlier work and the similarity of the language used.
NASA apparently agrees with me but I think I am several steps ahead
All the evidence is going my way
And I have NASA on side as regards the solar effects on circulation
It is clear that the report of their findings contains several statements that mirror the position that I have been setting out for several years and the general approach is identical in all essential features to my previously expressed diagnoses of climate features.
All of that is implicit in my earlier work and indeed now at last in the NASA report but currently I am way ahead of them in interpreting the data and the interconnected climate consequences of the various observations
…
@LiefS: 7:13am The Earth’s fluctuations are observed. We have no observations of the Sun’s variability on that scale.
I could say that “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence,” but I have epistemological problems with that phase. If you look hard for something your theory says should be there and you don’t find it — well maybe the theory is wrong and it is really absent. Be that as it may, we don’t have 2000 years of satellite data and 10Be data isn’t conclusive.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: The Maunder Minimum and the Little Ice Age. Is it an elephant or a mouse?
The Maunder might be a real event. It might be a measurement artifact as a result of poor calibration and stubborn observatory directors.
The Little Ice Age might be a real global climate event, a regional climate event, an extreme weather event that became folklore.
If either the Maunder or the LIA were not real, that would put the kibosh on a solar-climate link.
Even if the Maunder was real and the LIA was a real global event, the link could be anywhere in a spectrum of causal to purely coincidental.
I read here that you are involved in a team project to recalibrate the historical observed sunspot number records. Where do the Maunder and Dalton cycles currently stand within this project? What is the name of that project for future reference?
Meaning no disrespect, meaning no disingenuity, I gather from “We have no observations of the Sun’s variability on that scale.” that you think any Maunder and LIA link is at most coincidental and probably insubstantial.
Leif Svalgaard: You can read his comments yourself.
Indeed I did. You made a possibly baseless assertion that his comments were false and irrelevant. I request that you back it up, so we know in detail which of his comments you think are false and irrelevant, and why.
@LiefS: 7:13am It is not that new theories bubble out of thin air and then we go and see if we can find data that support them
Now you are being disingenuous. I’ve been careful to emphasize testing new theories on existing data.
Plate tectonics was forced upon us by observations of magnetic stripes on the sea floor, and did not spring from open minds.
Run the clock back further. The (incomplete) Theory of Continental Drift brewed up in the open minds of Wegner and others before him, long before paleomagmetic ocean floor data. They were trying to make sense of observed geographical, geological, and zoological data from the continents separated by oceans
Indeed, why would anyone fund a project to magnetically map the Atlantic Ocean floor if there were not competing theories to test? Good experimental design first requires a hypothesis.
Leif said:
“He has several times expressed annoyance with the fact that NASA did not give him credit for his ideas. And that ‘NASA now sides with him’, that essentially everything he says are backed up by NASA”
No annoyance, just sadness but I’m pragmatic about it.
Not everything either, just certain basic essentials and in any event I go further than them in considering the logical implications and working them into a more complete climate description.
Is not Leif suffering from D-K syndrome ? Also perhaps denialism and projection?
My comments cannot be incorrect or irrelevant to the science in hand because my previously published work clearly sets out the very processes that are at the heart of their article.
MattS says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:14 am
I would think that the solar cycle is too short for spectral changes tied to it to have a significant impact on temperature. However what if there are longer term variations.
There is no evidence for such, on the contrary, the evidence we have of UV going back centuries argues against such, e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/GC31B-0351-F2007.pdf
Are there any observational datasets on TSI composition that could be analysed for trends / cycles NOT connected to the 11 year solar cycle?
Not that I know of.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:14 am
That assumes that the response of the Earth climate system is linear across the spectrum. Is that known to be true?
no, it just assumes that the response is equal for solar cycles of equal size.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 11, 2013 at 10:51 am
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room: The Maunder Minimum and the Little Ice Age. Is it an elephant or a mouse?
it is an elephant, for sure
The Maunder might be a real event. It might be a measurement artifact as a result of poor calibration and stubborn observatory directors.
It is not an artifact.
The Little Ice Age might be a real global climate event, a regional climate event, an extreme weather event that became folklore.
The LIA is real too
the link could be anywhere in a spectrum of causal to purely coincidental.
And I put in in the latter category.
I read here that you are involved in a team project to recalibrate the historical observed sunspot number records. Where do the Maunder and Dalton cycles currently stand within this project? What is the name of that project for future reference?
There are TWO projects. One about SSNs [ http://ssnworkshop.wikia.com/wiki/Home ] and one about the longer-term variations http://www.leif.org/research/Svalgaard_ISSI_Proposal_Base.pdf
We are working our way back in time. Activity before 1826 is the topic of the next meetings [first one in Tucson, AZ, in about a week].
that you think any Maunder and LIA link is at most coincidental and probably insubstantial.
Yes, I think so. I have some thoughts on the MM here: http://www.leif.org/research/Another-Maunder-Minimum.pdf [a large ppt file with animations here http://www.leif.org/research/Another-Maunder-Minimum.ppt ] and here http://www.leif.org/research/Solar%20Wind%20During%20the%20Maunder%20Minimum.pdf
My working hypothesis [which is speculation, of course] is
1. The Maunder Minimum was not a deficit of magnetic flux, but
2. A lessening of the efficiency of the process that compacts magnetic fields into visible spots
3. This may now be happening again [the so-called Livingston and Penn effect]
4. If so, there is new solar physics to be learned
Stephen Rasey says:
January 11, 2013 at 11:00 am
Indeed, why would anyone fund a project to magnetically map the Atlantic Ocean floor if there were not competing theories to test? Good experimental design first requires a hypothesis.
The measurements were not made to test Continental Drift [which was pretty much discarded at the time].
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 11:00 am
My comments cannot be incorrect or irrelevant to the science in hand because my previously published work clearly sets out the very processes that are at the heart of their article.
More D-K in my opinion. Your ‘work’ is too vague to be tested and does not ‘clearly’ set out any of the processes, and is in any case [and rightly] not considered by NASA.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 11:00 am
Not everything either, just certain basic essentials
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:59 pm
“identical in all essential features”
So, my comments are indeed correct and relevant but Leif simply judges that my work lacks practical utility whereas in fact I have listed ways in which it could show predictive skill.
He should apologise for his baseless assertions.
“Not everything either, just certain basic essentials
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:59 pm
“identical in all essential features”
Not inconsistent at all. Being identical in all essential features does not imply that they support everything I say.
Kindly apologise.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 12:21 pm
So, my comments are indeed correct and relevant
not al all. I just showed how you try to overplay your hand.
my work lacks practical utility
It is worse than that.
He should apologise for his baseless assertions.
Lief,
From your link “hus the geomagnetic evidence is that there has been no secular change in
the background solar minimum EUV (FUV) flux in the past 165 years.”
What about the maximums?
Leif Svalgaard: no, it just assumes that the response is equal for solar cycles of equal size.
How is that different from linear across the spectrum, and how is it known to be true, or sufficiently accurate?
Leif Svalgaard: More D-K in my opinion.
On that we agree: it is your opinion.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 12:24 pm
“Not everything either, just certain basic essentials
Stephen Wilde says:
January 10, 2013 at 11:59 pm
“identical in all essential features”
Not inconsistent at all. Being identical in all essential features does not imply that they support everything I say.
Since when is ‘certain’ the same as ‘all’?
MattS says:
January 11, 2013 at 12:48 pm
From your link “thus the geomagnetic evidence is that there has been no secular change in
the background solar minimum EUV (FUV) flux in the past 165 years.”
What about the maximums?
The maxima just follow the ordinary sunspot number showing that each cycle in UV behaves the same as in other solar parameters.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 11, 2013 at 1:01 pm
How is that different from linear across the spectrum, and how is it known to be true, or sufficiently accurate?
Do I have to give you a numeric example? Assume y = x^2: cycle 1: x=1, y =1; cycle 2: x=2, y=4; cycle 3: x=1, y=1; cycle 4: x=2, y=4. Cycles 1 and 3 have like x and also like y; same for cycles 2 and 4, etc.
The result follows from the fact that to measurable accuracy equal cycles have had equal UV.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 11, 2013 at 1:04 pm
Leif Svalgaard: More D-K in my opinion.
On that we agree: it is your opinion.
You bar is obviously lower than mine. Fair enough.
My opinion of Leif is currently unprintable so I’ll just let others form their own views.
@MPainter: “The first sign of an improved NASA will be the retirement of that Hansen miscreant.”
I’m being nit-picky… but I prefer to see Hansen fired, and fined for intentional wrong doing. I’m sick thinking of paying for his retirement.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 2:19 pm
My opinion of Leif is currently unprintable so I’ll just let others form their own views.
It is nice of you to allow [‘let’] others form their own views.
@LiefS 11:38am: The [[Ocean Floor paleomag]] measurements were not made to test Continental Drift [which was pretty much discarded at the time].
The story of Plate Tectonics is more one of scientists with guesses making sense of observations, then going out to find more data to further test the guesses. Scientists are not a monolithic body with identical training, experience, and interests. Different experiences make some scientists open to a new idea sooner than others. Hess ran sonar profiles of the ocean bottom from his ship in WWII Pacific Theater. 1953 Dietz knew about the chain of sea mounts extending north from Midway.
Surface paleo mag interpretations in the 1950s became further support for some flavor of Continental Drift with an unknown mechanism, even an expanding Earth. Sea Floor spreading grew from Bruce Heezen’s (Columbia U.) mapping of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge in the ’50s, unfortunately for him, chasing an expanding earth theory. Sea Floor spreading blew up into a hot topic in 1960-61 in a priority dispute between Henry H. Hess (Princeton & Naval Reserve) and Bob Dietz (Scripts) on the key point of spreading at ridges, subduction at trenches and continents along for the ride. 1963 Vine, Matthews, and Morley postulated magnetic reversal stripes associated with ridge growth and pole reversals (idea ahead of data). Wilson identified transform faults and convergent zones in 1965, successfully predicting earthquake concentrations at the transforms (idea ahead of data). 1966 Pitman-Heirtzler discovery of symmetric magnetic bands on the Pacific-Antarctic Ridge. Rigid plate theory in 1967-68 by Morgan, McKenzie, and Parker quantitative movement of plates with poles of rotation.
(Ref: Sea Floor Spreading, R. N. Hey, U of Hawaii)
From: Hess 1962 History of the Ocean Basins (Buddington Volume): after a summary of 19 assumptions and conclusions:
Theory drives predictions.
Predictions drive the search for data.
Data drives the improvement in Theories.
-30-
Leif asked:
“Since when is ‘certain’ the same as ‘all’?”
When the certain essentials are qualified by the word ‘basic’ and the word ‘all’ is qualified by the term ‘essentials’.
One could say instead that all basic essentials of my work are reflected in their report. It is then up to me to define which essentials are basic and which are not.There are in fact several, all of which appear in the report.
Maybe I should give Leif the benefit of the doubt if English is not his first language but perhaps not because I judge that he is just scrabbling at a semantic straw in order to avoid acknowledging the falsity of his initial baseless allegations.
Leif,
If you are familiar with this S2000 E10.5 index, could you give us a summary? I believe it covers only the EUV portion of the solar spectrum and would guess that it includes the wavelengths that generate ozone?
ftp://ftp.ngdc.noaa.gov/STP/SOLAR_DATA/SOLAR_UV/SOLAR2000/E10_5_cycle_v120.jpg
Stephen Rasey says:
January 11, 2013 at 6:31 pm
The story of Plate Tectonics is more one of scientists with guesses making sense of observations, then going out to find more data to further test the guesses.
educate yourself: http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/stripes.html
Theory drives predictions.
Predictions drive the search for data.
Data drives the improvement in Theories.
This is very backwards. Not the way it usually works.
But if you are unwilling to concede that what more is there to say?
Stephen Wilde says:
January 11, 2013 at 6:53 pm
When the certain essentials are qualified by the word ‘basic’ and the word ‘all’ is qualified by the term ‘essentials’.
No, ‘certain’ here designates a true subset of essentials, but ‘all’ includes the full set of essentials.
Maybe I should give Leif the benefit of the doubt if English is not his first language
I have probably spoken English longer than you have [in addition to half a dozen other languages]
his initial [baseless?] allegations.
Stephen Wilde says:
Very similar to my work of the past 5 years.
This is getting very close to the narrative set out in my New Climate Model
Whatever defects may be found it seems that my work might well have been a lot closer to the truth than that from any of the climate professionals.
It would have been nice to have had some attribution given the overlap with my earlier work and the similarity of the language used.
NASA apparently agrees with me but I think I am several steps ahead
All the evidence is going my way
And I have NASA on side as regards the solar effects on circulation
It is clear that the report of their findings contains several statements that mirror the position that I have been setting out for several years and the general approach is identical in all essential features to my previously expressed diagnoses of climate features.
All of that is implicit in my earlier work and indeed now at last in the NASA report but currently I am way ahead of them in interpreting the data and the interconnected climate consequences of the various observations
—-
should constitute a sufficient basis. Which ones of those would you retract?
pochas says:
January 11, 2013 at 9:23 pm
If you are familiar with this S2000 E10.5 index, could you give us a summary? I believe it covers only the EUV portion of the solar spectrum and would guess that it includes the wavelengths that generate ozone?
E10.5 is a proxy for the solar EUV. It is nearly identical to the radio-flux F10.7. Its development and meaning is best explained here: http://spacewx.com/pdf/JGR_2002_E107.pdf
“Which ones of those would you retract?”
None. The published record is as it is.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 12, 2013 at 12:19 am
“E10.5 is a proxy for the solar EUV. It is nearly identical to the radio-flux F10.7. Its development and meaning is best explained here:”
Thanks
About the Dunning-Kruger syndrome: Has anybody here other than me studied psychological assessment? Tests and measurements; inter-rater reliability; test-retest reliability; structured interviews; criterion validity; false positives, false negatives and operating characteristics; negative predictive value, positive predictive value and such. Anybody have experience and training making actual diagnoses as opposed to merely interpreting superficial descriptions of a few symptoms? A special irony would occur if someone totally unqualified to do so were to call someone else an example of D-K.
Dunning-Kruger strikes me as the latest in a line of excuses (claims of inappropriate funding, projection, etc.) why atmospheric and other scientists do not feel they need to acknowledge gaps in their knowledge, or the importance of such gaps.
Leif Svalgaard: Do I have to give you a numeric example? Assume y = x^2: cycle 1: x=1, y =1; cycle 2: x=2, y=4; cycle 3: x=1, y=1; cycle 4: x=2, y=4. Cycles 1 and 3 have like x and also like y; same for cycles 2 and 4, etc.
You need to elaborate that example. if y1 = x1^2; y2 = x2^2; … ; yp = xp^2, and if x1, …, xp all increase by different % from different baselines (as is the case with changing insolation across the spectrum [x1, —, xp being the energies in different spectral bands], according to the target paper of this thread), then y1, …, yp do not all increase by the same % as x1, … xp. If, say, x1 increases from 3 to 4, and x2 changes from 4 to 5 (1/3 and 1/4 increases), then y1 changes from 9 to 16 (a change of 7/9) whereas y2 changes from 16 to 25 (9/16). Only for linear functions of y on x do % changes in y1 to yp match the % changes in x1 to xp.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 12, 2013 at 9:45 am
call someone else an example of D-K.
The suffers of D-K give themselves away strongly enough
if x1, …, xp all increase by different % from different baselines (as is the case with changing insolation across the spectrum…
The baseline is the same for all, namely zero.
Dr. Svalgaard I’ve notoced a ‘theme’ in the reports you link.. basically if there is a measurement of ‘something’ vs. time and there seems to be a correlation to the F10.7 data stream, but it is not perfect, then the thing measured is ‘corrected’ for trend in order to make the correlation match the F10.7 stream. If the ‘correction is not linear, the some reasonnis tried to be found for the discrepancy, and the F10.7 data is assumed more ‘correct’.
Why is that? what is so magical about the F10.7 data that makes it more ‘correct’ apriori?. Why do all measurements at various wavelengths have to be in lockstep with it? As far as I know The F10.7 is just a measurement at a single specific wavelength, nothing magical about it.
Recently there is a growing discrepancy between F10.7 and sunspots (cant remember where I saw that) Doenst that disprove the theory that everything is linear and in lock step with the F10.7 data?Wouldnt that imply those ‘corrections’ need revisiting?
Andrejs Vanags says:
January 12, 2013 at 11:20 am
Dr. Svalgaard I’ve noticed a ‘theme’ in the reports you link.. basically if there is a measurement of ‘something’ vs. time and there seems to be a correlation to the F10.7 data stream, but it is not perfect, then the thing measured is ‘corrected’ for trend in order to make the correlation match the F10.7 stream.
Here is an example: http://www.leif.org/research/MgII%20Calibration.pdf
Note, that the comparison with the F10.7 did catch an error in the calibration of the Spacecraft data.
Here is another one: http://www.leif.org/research/MWO%20MPSI%20-%20F107.pdf
Note, that the calibration of the magnetographwaschanged in 1982 [the whole instrument was upgraded with new technology].
And there are more.
Why is that? what is so magical about the F10.7 data that makes it more ‘correct’ a priori?.
There are several reasons.
The F10.7 measurement is simple, objective, and continuous using essentially the same instruments since the late 1940s. The telescopes were moved in the 1990s, but the effect on the data is small [1-2%]. The Canadian measurements are corroborated by similar measurements in Japan: http://www.leif.org/research/SHINE-2010-Microwave-Flux.pdf and http://www.leif.org/research/Solar-Flux-and-Sunspot-Number.pdf
Why do all measurements at various wavelengths have to be in lockstep with it? As far as I know The F10.7 is just a measurement at a single specific wavelength, nothing magical about it.
There is a bit of magic because all solar variables have been found [empirically] to match the F10.7 flux. Whenever discrepancies have been found, they have invariably turned to be calibration errors or other problems with the other solar indices. The physics behind the success of F10.7 lies in that there are two different contributions: one that measures the thermal background and one that measures the stronger magnetic fields of the sunspots: http://www.leif.org/research/F107-Causes.png
Recently there is a growing discrepancy between F10.7 and sunspots (cant remember where I saw that)
This problem [caused by the so-called Livingston-Penn effect; see e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/apjl2012-Liv-Penn-Svalg.pdf ] we think is due to ‘the Sun changing its spots’, that is that the process forming sunspots may be undergoing a change. We speculate that also happened during the Maunder Minimum and was the cause for the few visible spots during that time: http://www.leif.org/research/Another-Maunder-Minimum.ppt
[or the pdf file – which does not show the animations – http://www.leif.org/research/Another-Maunder-Minimum.pdf ]. This means that atsuch times, the sunspot number simply is not a valid indicator of true solar activity.
Doenst that disprove the theory that everything is linear and in lock step with the F10.7 data? Wouldn’it that imply those ‘corrections’ need revisiting?
So, everything is fine. The corrections have been necessary and are correct. We don’t make those lightly.
Andrejs Vanags says:
January 12, 2013 at 11:20 am
Why do all measurements at various wavelengths have to be in lockstep with it? As far as I know The F10.7 is just a measurement at a single specific wavelength, nothing magical about it.
I forget this one: http://spacewx.com/pdf/JGR_2002_E107.pdf
“The data that creates the E10.7 proxy results in a correlation coefficient of 0.947 with F10.7”
“E10.7 is the atmospherically relevant subset of a broader, self-consistent solar spectrum from 1-1,000,000 nm”
So F10.7 is remarkably good at capturing the longer-term variation of a much broader range of wavelengths.
Rasey:
Theory drives predictions.
Predictions drive the search for data.
Data drives the improvement in Theories.
LiefS: This is very backwards. Not the way it usually works.
In what ways is this “very backwards”?
Predictions are NOT driven by theory?
The search for data, the funding of research projects, is independent of predictions?
Improvements in Theories don’t need data, even old, existing data?
Data drives predictions without theory?
I don’t deny that the theory might be incomplete, even relatively wrong ;-), but it isn’t backwards.
Leif Svalgaard: The baseline is the same for all, namely zero.
When solar output changes from relatively low to relatively high (where this discussion began), you use 0 as a baseline for computing % change? I think you have given up on trying to write clearly.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 12, 2013 at 3:21 pm
I don’t deny that the theory might be incomplete, even relatively wrong ;-), but it isn’t backwards.
I’m not sure what you mean by ‘theory’here.Whose theory? yours?
What I meant was that new data and new observations drive new theories,especially when the new findings are unexpected. Very rarely is it the other way around. So believing that it is the other way around goes in the wrong direction, hence backwards. The case we were discussing was Plate Tectonics, where the direction is especially clear. In solar/space physics everything is driven by the data.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 12, 2013 at 6:04 pm
When solar output changes from relatively low to relatively high (where this discussion began), you use 0 as a baseline for computing % change? I think you have given up on trying to write clearly.
The path has become too tortuous to follow. Variation in UV comes from variation in the magnetic field from activer regions. At solar minima when the magnetic field essentially goes to zero, the portion of UV caused by the field goes to zero. This is the baseline we have to measure from. The UV from those active regions scales linearly with their number and strength. BTW, I’m not the one trotting out percentages. So when you claim this or that variability [10%, 500%, whatever] you are not being clear in your mind what you are saying.
Andrejs Vanags, You just don’t understand.. F10.7 will be how we count all of those nonexistant spots if the LP theory turns out to be correct. Leif has put all his eggs in that basket and is determined to “make it work” even if it means changing all of the other data to do so. Don’t bother with your answer Leif.. I’ve long ago stopped considering you to be any more than an agenda driven scientist.
pkatt says:
January 12, 2013 at 6:45 pm
Leif has put all his eggs in that basket and is determined to “make it work” even if it means changing all of the other data to do so.
This is a very serious accusation which you should be ashamed of.
I’ve long ago stopped considering you to be any more than an agenda driven scientist
And what you consider is really not important. It may be of passing interest, though, to inquire as to which agenda you think is driving me.
From the text that initiated the thread: One of the participants, Greg Kopp of the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, pointed out that while the variations in luminosity over the 11-year solar cycle amount to only a tenth of a percent of the sun’s total output, such a small fraction is still important. “Even typical short term variations of 0.1% in incident irradiance exceed all other energy sources (such as natural radioactivity in Earth’s core) combined,” he says.
Of particular importance is the sun’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation, which peaks during the years around solar maximum. Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more. This can strongly affect the chemistry and thermal structure of the upper atmosphere.
Percentage increases, and other relative increases from a baseline or earlier low value, were in there from the start,
Matthew Marler and Stephen Wilde and others…do not give up. Resist the psy-ops…and just continue to pursue the truth. Long live the scientific method. Here’s to the truth.
~Chris
Norfolk, Va, USA
Matthew R Marler says:
January 12, 2013 at 9:29 pm
Of particular importance is the sun’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation, which peaks during the years around solar maximum. Within the relatively narrow band of EUV wavelengths, the sun’s output varies not by a minuscule 0.1%, but by whopping factors of 10 or more. This can strongly affect the chemistry and thermal structure of the upper atmosphere.
Percentage increases, and other relative increases from a baseline or earlier low value, were in there from the start
You don’t get it. The variation of EUV is so large because the value at solar minimum is very close to zero, not because the actual amount is all that large at maximum [it is but a tiny fraction of the total TSI]. Note that Kopp does not use percentages when talking about EUV as they are meaningless when the base is near zero. The variation from minimum to maximum is linearly related to the number of sunspots [and their area and magnetic field]. This was discovered by Rudolf Wolf as far back as 1852. Our observations of that variation go back to 1722, so we know what UV was that far back. And we find no long-term trend from then to now. Whatever variation there is is simply linearly related to that of the sunspot number.
While breathing
1.1 Data drives the improvement in Theories.
1.2 Theory drives predictions.
1.3 Predictions drive the search for data.
Loop
(I rotated the cycle -120 degrees for the purposes of this argument and wrapped it in a loop structure for clarity)
LiefS 6:30pm: What I meant was that [2.0 new data and new observations drive new theories] , especially when the new findings are unexpected. Very rarely is it the other way around.
Your 2.0 and my 1.1 are almost identical rather than opposite.
For brevity, improvements in Theories contains the set of New Theories.
Yes, it is my theory; rather my restatement of the scientific method. I’m allowed aren’t I? I don’t have a union card, but I do have a silver diploma.
Scientific progress through the scientific method is a cycle. It has a non-zero curl.
I think we agree on (1.1). Data drives improvements in Theories.
New Theories are useless unless you put them to work making predictions. (1.2).
New Predictions require you to seek data, new or otherwise, (1.3)
for analysis to test predicions and revise/create theories (1.1) and repeat.
You seem to want to start with the data. (1.1) Fine.
Feynman started with the “guesses”, a.k.a. Theories. (1.2)
It really doesn’t matter where you start, because it is a never-ending cycle. Not to be restrictive, it isn’t a serial loop, but parallel processes with countless threads performed by millions. It is a scientific “Circle of Life.”
In Physics 101, you start with F=ma (1.2) and THEN go to the lab. (1.3)
Got error? Well there’s air resistance, friction, and rotational inertia to account for (1.1). Next chapter… see you next week.
1.3 assumes honesty in process of collecting data.
There can be a temptation to set Data = Prediction. No fair!
Don’t adjust or filter the data to meet Theory.
Even Einstein’s Thought Experiments were part of 1.3; they were experiments testing whether predictions would violate other theories and agree with current data.
In the development of Plate Tectonics, Hess (1960-62) rejected the Expanding Earth theory (Heezen 1960 and others) not because he had more data but because he rejected the problems it caused to other theories using the data he had. His theory of subduction meant he could allow for sea floor spreading, young ocean basins, and moving continents without the problems of an expanding earth.
savethesharks.
Thanks for the encouragement.
I won’t be giving up any time soon since I have made solid progress over the past 5 years and the evidence as to who first said what and when is out there, freely available.
One thing about being a lawyer is being accustomed to an adversarial process which provides an ability to resist what you refer to as psy-ops.
It is good that readers can see it for what it is.
It is now highly likely, as a result of reams of data, that something about solar variability affects the global air circulation by changing the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere above the poles. In particular, the intensity and shape of the polar vortices is affected which then drives the permanent climate zones and jet stream tracks poleward or equatorward changing jet stream zonality and meridionality in the process.
There is then an effect on global cloudiness, albedo, the amount of energy entering the oceans and the balance between El Nino and La Nina which then affects troposphere temperature trends.
As far as I know I was the first to set out that diagnosis.
Leif’s protestations about solar changes being insufficiently large to have such an effect therefore sound increasingly hollow.
There are a lot of scientists now coming to realise that the accumulating evidence is driving in that direction, hence the above NASA piece and some nice new hardware being sent up to measure temperatures and composition between tropopause and mesopause.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 13, 2013 at 12:54 am
1.1 Data drives the improvement in Theories.
1.2 Theory drives predictions.
1.3 Predictions drive the search for data.
Loop
Describes what Kuhn calls ‘normal science’ [which is what most scientists do on a daily basis]. The issue was with the emergence of a NEW theory, that breaks with the past [like Plate Tectonics]. This almost always only occurs when new and unexpected data becomes available. Such data forces us to seek a new theory, and forces acceptance of such. As always, there will be people that will not change their view, but time and mortality take care of that.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 13, 2013 at 3:50 am
something about solar variability affects the global air circulation by changing the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere above the poles. In particular, the intensity and shape of the polar vortices is affected which then drives the permanent climate zones and jet stream tracks poleward or equatorward changing jet stream zonality and meridionality in the process.
This has been looked numerous times and the result is generally the opposite of what you suggest, e.g.see http://www.leif.org/EOS/SWC-Extract.pdf
“This has been looked numerous times and the result is generally the opposite of what you suggest”
That would be because they have the sign of the atmospheric response to solar variability wrong in the stratosphere and mesosphere as Jo Haig and others have begun to suspect.
Funny how sudden stratospheric warming drives the jets equatorward and how the jets moved poleward when the stratosphere cooled.
I know you put it down to CO2 and CFCs but I think you were wrong.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 13, 2013 at 12:41 pm
“This has been looked numerous times and the result is generally the opposite of what you suggest” That would be because they have the sign of the atmospheric response to solar variability
This was a test, a trap you fell into. You did not even go to the link and read it. Here is what it actually says:
“The […] low-pressure […] seem to be closer to the pole in years of low sunspot activity and move towards the equator in high sunspot years. Storm tracks likewise seem to migrate equatorward as annual sunspot activity increases; this may be due to alterations of the latitudinal temperature gradient and planetary wave pressure structure”
Funny how sudden stratospheric warming drives the jets equatorward and how the jets moved poleward when the stratosphere cooled.
As we have discussed so many times [that it is not funny any more] the stratospheric warmings are caused by waves from the troposphere. So causality goes in the opposite direction.
I know you put it down to CO2 and CFCs but I think you were wrong.
You are wrong about what I put it down to.
“The […] low-pressure […] seem to be closer to the pole in years of low sunspot activity and move towards the equator in high sunspot years. Storm tracks likewise seem to migrate equatorward as annual sunspot activity increases; this may be due to alterations of the latitudinal temperature gradient and planetary wave pressure structure”
That was written back in 1978 and refers to single solar cycles at a time when meteorological observing techniques were very primitive.
Since then it has become abundantly clear that the opposite happens on multidecadal timescales involving several solar cycles.
“stratospheric warmings are caused by waves from the troposphere. So causality goes in the opposite direction.”
Doesn’t matter how they are caused.
It takes a warmer stratosphere near the poles to send surges of air equatorward.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 13, 2013 at 1:41 pm
That was written back in 1978 and refers to single solar cycles
Very wrong. Clayton used data from 1858 to 1920; Shaw [1928] published a similar result for 87 locations over many cycles; Angell and Korshover [1974] found the result using pressure maps from 1899-1967. Mitchell [1965] used data from 1780 to 1959, etc.
at a time when meteorological observing techniques were very primitive
Measurement of pressure has been accurate for a couple of centuries now. So nothing ‘primitive’ aboutit.
the opposite happens on multidecadal timescales involving several solar cycles
This is the hallmark of spurious correlations: they go away or reverse or are different over time. A lesson there.
LiefS 9:14: The issue was with the emergence of a NEW theory, that breaks with the past [like Plate Tectonics]. This almost always only occurs when new and unexpected data becomes available. Such data forces us to seek a new theory, and forces acceptance of such.
First, I think Plate Tectonics theory was far more evolutionary than you imply. Hess 1960 had 75% of Plate Tectonics on paper a year before the Zebra map. See details below.
Second, even when there is such powerful data that forces you to adopt a new theory… that doesn’t mean it will be the right theory. See “expanding earth” below.
Is it fair to point to the Zebra Map of Raff and Mason (GSA 1961) as an exampe of your “new unexpected data”? Let’s consider the following points.
1. Raff and Mason worked with the data for 3 years and in 1961 they still didn’t know what to make of it. They were collecting data over a known ocean ridge. Raff and Mason were not forced to adopt a theory.
2. By the late 1950’s Mid-Ocean ridges were known to have high heat flow, shallow moho.
3. Sea floor spreading was already in discussion with early estimates of spreading rates. Several authors (Egyed (1957), Carey (1958). Heezen (1960)) were being forced to accept (your words) an expanding earth theory, which any of us today would think daft. Hess 1960-62 spent a page outlining why he chose a different path.
4. It was Vine, Mathews and Morley in 1963-64 that took a) the Zebra of 1961, b) polar reversal paleomag work of 1957-1960, c) sea floor spreading and down-limb crustal destruction of Hess 1959-62 and Dietz 1961, diagnose what the zebra was, and then predict they would find the zebras on all mid ocean ridges. They found the predicted zebras (Vine 1966, 1968, Pitman 1966).
5. The Zebra Map turned out to be iconic evidence of spreading from mid-ocean ridges concept under discussion for at least 5 years. But spreading is less than half of the Plate Tectonic theory.
Plate Tectonics isn’t just sea floor spreading. It is Sea Floor Spreading at ridges PLUS sea floor destruction in subduction zones or what Hess 1960-62 called “jaw crusher of the descending limb”, PLUS a couple other details (transform faults, poles of rotation of rigid plates).
The Zebra map reminds me of another quote from Asimov:
“The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not Eureka! (I found it!) but rather, ‘hmm… that’s funny…'” – Isaac Asimov
Stephen Rasey says:
January 13, 2013 at 10:20 pm
First, I think Plate Tectonics theory was far more evolutionary than you imply.
Nobody predicted the zebra pattern, or the young age of the ocean bottom. Those were the new data that led Hess on the track and forced acceptance later on.
Second, even when there is such powerful data that forces you to adopt a new theory
Nobody said or implied that…
Hess did not predict the zebra stripes, and he was led to his ideas by the unexpected regularities in the spherical harmonics of the Earth’s topography http://www.leif.org/EOS/Hess1962.pdf
No matter how you cut it, it is almost always data that drives the theory. In my own fields [geophysics/solar-space physics] I know of only case of the reverse [Alfven waves]. Plate tectonics is a prime example of data-driven new theories: http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/developing.html#anchor10912731
“The discovery of magnetic striping naturally prompted more questions: How does the magnetic striping pattern form? And why are the stripes symmetrical around the crests of the mid-ocean ridges? These questions could not be answered without also knowing the significance of these ridges. In 1961, scientists began to theorize that mid-ocean ridges mark structurally weak zones where the ocean floor was being ripped in two lengthwise along the ridge crest. New magma from deep within the Earth rises easily through these weak zones and eventually erupts along the crest of the ridges to create new oceanic crust.”
Stephen Wilde says:
Funny how sudden stratospheric warming drives the jets equatorward and how the jets moved poleward when the stratosphere cooled.
Leif Svalgaard says:
As we have discussed so many times [that it is not funny any more] the stratospheric warmings are caused by waves from the troposphere. So causality goes in the opposite direction.
Sudden Stratospheric Warming has nothing to do with solar activity, CO2, Ozone or such like. It is triggered by the Kamchatka’s volcanic eruptions.
In Kamchatka in the last few weeks two volcanoes Sheveluch and Tolbachik are firing simultaneously
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/temperature/10mb9065.gif
Take a look at
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/intraseasonal/temp50anim.shtml
around 22-24 December when volcanic eruptions intensified.
Read more here:
http://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/docs/00/56/34/77/PDF/SSW.pdf
“This is the hallmark of spurious correlations: they go away or reverse or are different over time. A lesson there.”
Just integrate ocean cycles with the waxing and waning of AO and AAO and it isn’t so spurious.
A strong indicator is more meridional / equatorward jets in the Maunder Minimum, Dalton Minimum, and every other period when cooler temperatures coincided with lower solar activity.
Plus more poleward zonal jets in MWP and late 20th century and every other warmer period.coinciding with higher solar activity.
Due to the 60 year ocean cycles the correlation can be 5 or 6 solar cycles adrift depending on phasing characteristics.
You got it wrong in your 1978 article and are still getting it wrong today.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 14, 2013 at 2:57 am
A strong indicator is more meridional / equatorward jets in the Maunder Minimum, Dalton Minimum, and every other period when cooler temperatures coincided with lower solar activity.
Plus more poleward zonal jets in MWP and late 20th century and every other warmer period.coinciding with higher solar activity.
And yet you claim that
Stephen Wilde says:
January 13, 2013 at 1:41 pm
“That was written back in 1978 and refers to single solar cycles at a time when meteorological observing techniques were very primitive.”
Apparently they were not so primitive 1000 years ago…
Stephen Wilde says:
January 14, 2013 at 2:57 am
You got it wrong in your 1978 article
Not my article, but NASA’s conclusion in their Special Publication 426.
Speaking of NASA articles..in the image above, entitled “Atmospheric Structure,” is this what is called ionospheric precipitation?
In another recent aricle from NASA, a magnetic highway was discovered at the edge of the heliosphere.
NASA Voyager 1 Encounters New Region in Deep Space
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-381#9
December 03, 2012
PASADENA, Calif. — NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has entered a new region at the far reaches of our solar system that scientists feel is the final area the spacecraft has to cross before reaching interstellar space.
Scientists refer to this new region as a magnetic highway for charged particles because our sun’s magnetic field lines are connected to interstellar magnetic field lines. This connection allows lower-energy charged particles that originate from inside our heliosphere — or the bubble of charged particles the sun blows around itself — to zoom out and allows higher-energy particles from outside to stream in. Before entering this region, the charged particles bounced around in all directions, as if trapped on local roads inside the heliosphere.
The Voyager team infers this region is still inside our solar bubble because the direction of the magnetic field lines has not changed. The direction of these magnetic field lines is predicted to change when Voyager breaks through to interstellar space. The new results were described at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco on Monday. …
Do interstellar magnetic field lines “pile up,” at the heliospheric nose as the solar system travels on its orbit through the galaxy? Do they “pile up” and then snap in approx. every 11 or so years? If they don’t snap, do they just keep wrapping around the solar system? Thereby squashinging the polar regions of the sun as they wrap?
Did you hear the one about comet Love Joy?
Leif Svalgaard: Note that Kopp does not use percentages when talking about EUV as they are meaningless when the base is near zero.
True: he talked about ratios; like percentages, ratios are factors.
Matthew R Marler: You need to elaborate that example. if y1 = x1^2; y2 = x2^2; … ; yp = xp^2, and if x1, …, xp all increase by different % from different baselines (as is the case with changing insolation across the spectrum [x1, —, xp being the energies in different spectral bands], according to the target paper of this thread), then y1, …, yp do not all increase by the same % as x1, … xp. If, say, x1 increases from 3 to 4, and x2 changes from 4 to 5 (1/3 and 1/4 increases), then y1 changes from 9 to 16 (a change of 7/9) whereas y2 changes from 16 to 25 (9/16). Only for linear functions of y on x do % changes in y1 to yp match the % changes in x1 to xp.
The argument does not depend on using percentages, but applies to any factors when the functions of y on x are nonlinear. In our case, if the percent change of x1 + … +xp was different from the percent or multiplicative change of x1, then the percent change of y1 + … + yp will not be linearly predictable from the percent change of y1. This is the closest to the case of the paper of this thread, where x1 + … xp is TSI and x1 (“without loss of generality”) is UV or IR. You can not use a purely algebraic argument to prove that a large change in a minor constituent of TSI can not have a large change in the combined effects of all TSI changes just because the change in TSI is small relative to TSI. As asserted in the lead article, all the effects of all of the constituents of TSI have to be studied in order to completely characterize the effects of solar changes, even though the relative change of TSI is small.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 14, 2013 at 9:31 am
You can not use a purely algebraic argument to prove that a large change in a minor constituent of TSI can not have a large change in the combined effects of all TSI changes just because the change in TSI is small relative to TSI.
Since I am not making that claim, your protest is not relevant. What I’m saying is that UV changes linearly with the sunspot number, that we can [and have since 1722] keep track of UV, and that UV linearly tracks variation of TSI, hence whatever the climate effect from UV is can be monitored simply by monitoring the sunspot number.
Speaking of NASA articles, in the image above entitled, “Atmospheric Structure,” is this image also depicting ionospheric precipitation?
In another recent NASA article, it has been discovered that there is a “magnetic highway,” near the edge of the solar system.
NASA Voyager 1 Encounters New Region in Deep Space
December 03, 2012
PASADENA, Calif. — NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft has entered a new region at the far reaches of our solar system that scientists feel is the final area the spacecraft has to cross before reaching interstellar space.
Scientists refer to this new region as a magnetic highway for charged particles because our sun’s magnetic field lines are connected to interstellar magnetic field lines. This connection allows lower-energy charged particles that originate from inside our heliosphere — or the bubble of charged particles the sun blows around itself — to zoom out and allows higher-energy particles from outside to stream in. Before entering this region, the charged particles bounced around in all directions, as if trapped on local roads inside the heliosphere.
The Voyager team infers this region is still inside our solar bubble because the direction of the magnetic field lines has not changed. The direction of these magnetic field lines is predicted to change when Voyager breaks through to interstellar space. The new results were described at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco on Monday.
“Although Voyager 1 still is inside the sun’s environment, we now can taste what it’s like on the outside because the particles are zipping in and out on this magnetic highway,” said Edward Stone…
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-381#9
As the solar system travels or orbits through the galaxy, does this interaction with interstellar magnetic fields, cause the Interstellar fields to “pile up” at the helispheric nose? How often do they snap? How far does the sun travel in a solar cycle. Depending on the background Interstellar magnetic fields configuration, the heliosphere could sometimes be wrapped in more intensely above the N.solar pole (more top down squashing) or vis versus to S.solar pole.
1phobosgrunt says:
January 14, 2013 at 10:00 am
As the solar system travels or orbits through the galaxy, does this interaction with interstellar magnetic fields, cause the Interstellar fields to “pile up” at the helispheric nose?
Not any more than the solar wind magnetic field piles up at the nose of the Earth’s magnetosphere.
How far does the sun travel in a solar cycle.
About 9 billion km,or 60 times the distance between the sun and the Earth. This is actually somewhat smaller than the size of the heliosphere.
Depending on the background Interstellar magnetic fields configuration, the heliosphere could sometimes be wrapped in more intensely above the N.solar pole (more top down squashing) or vis versus to S.solar pole.
It is thought that interstellar magnetic field does not change its properties much over the time scale [centuries] that are of interest. On the time scale of tens of thousands of years, rather large changes can happen. These changes do not affect the Sun much as the solar wind keeps the interstellar medium at bay.
@LiefS: 11:29pm Nobody predicted the zebra pattern, or the young age of the ocean bottom. Those were the new data that led Hess on the track and forced acceptance later on.
From the chronology, Hess was presenting and writing his theories (1959-62) before the Zebra Map of Riff 1961. In Hess 1962 his latest citation is 1960 which implies that this is largely the public presentation of his 1960 report for the Off. Of Naval Research. He does not cite Riff. To be fair, Hess was an Admiral in the Naval Reserve and under contract for the ONR; who knows what he saw and heard behind the secret door.
The young ocean bottom, the scarcity of sea mounts, the appreciation for the mid-ocean ridges as “the largest topographic features on the surface of the Earth”, and indications that ridges might be spreading centers, were some parts of the data puzzle Hess was attempting to fit into a theory.
it is almost always data that drives the theory
We agree on this. (Rasey 1/13 12:54 am)
Where do we disagree?
‘Open mind’ has nothing to do with science. (LiefS 1/9 9:10 am)
An Open Mind has everything to do with science. An Open Mind is the nursery for New Theories.
New theories are forced upon us by new data and observations. (LiefS 1/9 11:59 pm)
The great discoveries are soon backed up by new data and observations, but on the basis of the new proposed mechanism. The theory often comes first. Mooloo 1/9 3:29 pm (Well said, I agree), reply to LiefS
Plate tectonics was forced upon us by observations of magnetic stripes on the sea floor, and did not spring from open minds. LiefS 1/11 7:13.
I think the chronology of 1957-1961 refutes that. Hess had the foundation for plate tectonics before the magnetic stripes was published. New Theory in Open Minds made sense of later data, such as the zebra.
I do believe, however, that the magnetic stripes were essential to force the idea of Plate Tectonics into closed minds.
We only change/reject/update/accept new theories when forced to do so by new data. LiefS 1/11 7:13 am
Replace “only” with “may” to make this one of many ways new theories get accepted.
Let’s go back to repeated observations by thousands of people for hundreds of years that the east coast of South America and the west coast of Africa are an unexpectedly good geographic fit. Add in the geology and zoology of the continents. A lot of unexpected new data, entirely correct in hindsight, yet did it force the acceptance of Wegner’s Continental Drift? No.
Did these data even force the acceptance that S. Am and Africa were somehow joined in the past? NO! Existing Theories trumped the data. Open Minds were smothered under consensus of Closed Minds for decades.
Shall we agree to disagree?
Stephen Rasey says:
January 14, 2013 at 11:42 am
Shall we agree to disagree?
Evidently.
Let’s go back to repeated observations by thousands of people for hundreds of years that the east coast of South America and the west coast of Africa are an unexpectedly good geographic fit. Add in the geology and zoology of the continents. A lot of unexpected new data, entirely correct in hindsight, yet did it force the acceptance of Wegner’s Continental Drift? No.
But it fostered Hess’s. I doubt very much that he would have come up with his ideas, if not forced by that particular observation [and many others]. New, unexpected, surprising, puzzling data is what makes new theories necessary and force us to take a different tack. But, obviously you disagree.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 14, 2013 at 11:42 am
I do believe, however, that the magnetic stripes were essential to force the idea of Plate Tectonics into closed minds.
you make the implicit assumption that most scientists minds are closed. This is very wrong. Scientists are as open-minded as they come. An open, curious mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist. That said, most scientists do not automatically subscribe to every harebrained idea that comes their way. Scientists are inherently a conservative lot, that want to see compelling, forceful data before accepting anything. But, again, we can disagree on this.
For Pete’s sake, Lief! The way you mis-represent what another writes…
Lief: An open, curious mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist.
YOU are the one that said an “Open Mind has nothing to do with science” ! (LiefS 1/9 9:10 am)
Lief: you make the implicit assumption that most scientists minds are closed. I do not. Only that there are many with closed minds. The opposition to Wegener’s observations is an extreme case of close-mindedness. Opposition to his THEORY of drift was proper; there were many problems with continents plowing through the crust. But when they dismissed the mechanism of the theory, they implicitly dismissed the observations, too. “S. Am and Africa never connected — their shapes are a coincidence.” Peer pressure against anything like drift was high for far too long. Even the editor of the AAPG Bulletin was an opponent.
It should be obvious that I put the early adopters of Plate Tectonics (spreading and subduction before the words were coined) into the open mind category. Not just Hess, but hundreds of others. But as you say, there were some, not most, some scientists that had to be FORCED (your word, not mine) by the Zebra data in to acceptance of a New Theory.
Lief: New, unexpected, surprising, puzzling data is what makes new theories necessary and force us to take a different tack. But, obviously you disagree.
I disagree with the word “force” and the notion that new data is a prerequisite and the only path to New Theories.
If Hess was “forced by that particular observation” to adopt the New Theory, then why were not hundreds of open minded scientists simultaneously arriving at the same Theory? New Theories are a product of an open human mind, triggered by new data and other new Theories, shaped by existing data and experience. The differences in experiences are key.
The data does not force new theories on scientists. If they did, there were be no mistaken theories. If they did, adoption of New Theories would be almost instantaneous without debate. New Data did not force Heezen to pursue an expanding earth theory.
Lief: most scientists do not automatically subscribe to every harebrained idea that comes their way
Where have I hinted they do? Here is a quote from four days ago where I said no such thing:
REPLY: You might want to learn how to spell Leif’s name before dissing him – Anthony
Leif Svalgaard: What I’m saying is that UV changes linearly with the sunspot number, that we can [and have since 1722] keep track of UV, and that UV linearly tracks variation of TSI, hence whatever the climate effect from UV is can be monitored simply by monitoring the sunspot number.
The feature report disputes your claim that TSI and all of its components always change by the same factor. And it affirms the possibility that different parts of the climate have different (possibly nonlinear) responses to different components of TSI. Your conclusion ( hence whatever the climate effect from UV is can be monitored simply by monitoring the sunspot number. ) is not supported by the evidence, if for “UV” we substitute “all of the components of solar irradiation”, as I did when I first referred to the whole spectrum. OR if the change in UV affects the Earth’s response to the rest of the spectrum nonlinearly in UV and the other components.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 14, 2013 at 4:23 pm
“An open, curious mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist.”
YOU are the one that said an “Open Mind has nothing to do with science”
Just having an open mind does not make you a scientist. Everybody breathes air, and breathing is a prerequisite for a scientist as well, but does not make you a scientist, either. You miss the difference between having an open mind and making a new theory. Note, I did not say that an open mind is a prerequisite for a new theory. Einstein was very close-minded in this opposition to quantum theory. Planck as well. So, one can be have an open mind and a closed mind at the same time, but for different things. And almost all scientists I know of [and that is many] have an open mind, but not all of them make great new theoretical discoveries, in fact, only a minute fraction do.
Only that there are many with closed minds.
Many? How many? Do you have a link to the numbers on this?
The opposition to Wegner’s observations is an extreme case of close-mindedness.
Do you have any evidence that all in the opposition [which was the vast majority – especially in America] were close-minded?
You just said that only some were close-minded, now you imply that the almost uniform opposition was because they were close-minded. Was everyone close-minded?
the Zebra data in to acceptance of a New Theory
The magnetic stripes were known in the 1950s, Hess explained them and three other pieces of data, some which have puzzled people for centuries. Theory follows data.
I disagree with the word “force” and the notion that new data is a prerequisite and the only path to New Theories.
You used that word yourself about how close-minded people were forced by the data to accept the theory. ‘only’ is a big word. How many new theories that overthrow past ones are not based on new data? 1%, 10%, 100%? What is your estimate? Back it up by suitable analysis, links, and data.
New Theories are a product of an open human mind, triggered by new data and other new Theories, shaped by existing data and experience. The differences in experiences are key.
New Theories are a product of human minds [open or not], triggered by new data and other new Theories, shaped by existing data and experience. The differences in experiences are key.
If they did, adoption of New Theories would be almost instantaneous without debate.
Plate Tectonics was adopted virtually overnight… The solar wind theory was adopted instantaneously once the data from the first interplanetary probe became available. And what prompted Parker to propose the solar wind theory? Observations of comet tails and of the hot million-degree corona.
New Theories are hatched and incubated in and between open minds.
This is a widely believed [but wrong] myth. They are the result of new, surprising, and puzzling data. It does not take an ‘open mind’ to go from there. Openness has nothing to do with it. What makes the difference is that there is a piece of data that needs explanation and scientists are good at [that is what they do] this. The explanation is not always right. In fact, most are wrong [open mind or not].
Matthew R Marler says:
January 14, 2013 at 4:31 pm
The feature report disputes your claim that TSI and all of its components always change by the same factor.
Sigh, once more [perhaps from a different angle will help]: TSI has the value it has because the Sun is 6000 degrees hot. If the Sun did not have a magnetic field, TSI would truly be the ‘solar constant’ [on human time scales]. The magnetic field increases TSU by about 1/1000. That tiny variation values linearly with the magnetic field. So does all the other variables as the magnetic field controls all the rest.
And it affirms the possibility that different parts of the climate have different (possibly nonlinear) responses to different components of TSI
When any one of those parts have a definite value, the climate may have a non-linear [or whatever] response, but the next time [perhaps a solar cycle later] that part has the same value, the climate will have the same response. These is no evidence for anything else.
What might vary is not the Sun’s influence but the longer (1000-2000 yr) [non-solar] fluctuations in climate on top of which the solar influence rides.
Thanks for all the replies Dr. S.
We have seen those sunspot cycle records going back 14,000 years, based on reconstructions of other data.
You are right about there being a ceiling and a floor over the period.
Doesn’t this also tell us what the background (Interstellar medium and magneticfield) have been? The variations in the solar cycle, length, strength is a reflection of the interstellar background.
We have learned recently that the background is not as homgenous as once believed. That smaller scale structures exist nearby (downwind).
We are now only beginning to “actually see” and collect data on of the nearby interstellar medium and magnetic field.
I know you have an open mind Dr. S.
Larger scale
1phobosgrunt says:
January 14, 2013 at 6:28 pm
Doesn’t this also tell us what the background (Interstellar medium and magneticfield) have been? The variations in the solar cycle, length, strength is a reflection of the interstellar background.
I don’t think so, as the solar wind effectively screens the sun from such influence from outside the heliosphere. Variations of the interstellar properties [none have been firmly established] could vary the amount of cosmic rays that reach the inner solar system [and us], but not change the sun in any measurable ways.
Leif Svalgaard: So does all the other variables as the magnetic field controls all the rest.
So the possibilities outlined in the feature report are not possible, on your authority, for the reasons that you have stated.
My favorite words in climate science are “maybe”, “might be” and so on. You might be right, but I think your reasoning is full of holes.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 14, 2013 at 8:45 pm
So the possibilities outlined in the feature report are not possible, on your authority, for the reasons that you have stated.
The report is full of maybe, might be, could be. Many things might be, but, as the report states, none have been shown to be compelling. “Hal Maring, a climate scientist at NASA headquarters who has studied the report, notes that “lots of interesting possibilities were suggested by the panelists. However, few, if any, have been quantified to the point that we can definitively assess their impact on climate.” Hardening the possibilities into concrete, physically-complete models is a key challenge for the researchers”.
First, my apologies to Dr. Svalgaard and Mr. Watts — stupid, close-minded, blind error in putting “I before e” in Leif’s name. You can look as something a dozen times, but that doesn’t overrule the dozen mistakes that burn it in.
On Closed minds, “How many? Do you have a link?” Well, you pointed out Einstein was close minded on quantum theory (odd, since he got the Nobel for the photoelectric effect). And we agree that a lot of American geologists and geophysicists were slow to accept Plate Tectonics.
Do you have any evidence that all in the opposition….
This is an example of what I mean by misrepresention. I wrote “extreme case of close mindedness”, an outlier case, which could be 1/3, 1/2, 3/4 of the opposition, not necessarily “all”. It is also referring to the length of time that Wegener’s observations lay fallow, 20+ years. As for a link to opposition, the AAPG 1926 debate is a short summary.
The magnetic stripes were known in the 1950s
Do you have a link? Hess 1962 cites neither Mason or Raff. Lawrence Morley wrote a personal history (Google “The Zebra Pattern” earthref.org/ERDA/download:292/) where he shows the Riff 1961 GSA zebra map as a key point. From page 80 of the pdf:
‘only’ is a big word
Yes it is. It excludes all other possibilities. That’s why I disagreed with it. So I have to show at least one counter example. As for examples, at the small scale, I can go back to the analysis of the seismic cube. Interpret with one structural concept (such as a diapir), the next day apply a fault-bend fold. Two theories, on the same data to see which better fits. On a grand scale, how about Einstein’s Special Relativity? Lorentz get’s credit for the transformation equations. Einstein made a better theory as a synthesis.
They are the result of new, surprising, and puzzling data.
Agreed. Occasionally it is a synthesis.
It does not take an ‘open mind’ to go from there.
It does. “An open, curious mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist.” – Leif S.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 14, 2013 at 9:18 pm
“The report is full of maybe, might be, could be. Many things might be, but, as the report states, none have been shown to be compelling.”
But this is exactly what we have now, as CS value pulled out of someone behind to make a simulator come up with the “right” number.
And while temperature trends are up( and I agree they are up), they torture the data to get it. Temperature is not linear across space, it has a feature called fronts, that’s as non-linear as you can get. Yet we homogenize (make up) data to compensate for inadequate sampling, and the idea that UHIE is a fraction of a degree effect is idiotic, and can be shown to be from a few degrees to a handful with a smartphone and a weather app just by switching local stations.
The critical temperature data is now much temps drop at night compared to how much they went up the day before, and there is no trend there, if there’s a co2 signal it’s unmeasurable, and a hand held IR thermometer pointed at a clear sky reads either over 600F or less than -40F, -40 is out to about 12.5u, about half way through the supposed IR band in question, but it takes days to cool a few hours of incoming energy from the Sun longer than 12.5u, and depending on the weather many days lose more temperature over night than they went up during the day, and in fact on low wind days of low humidity the temp can swing as much as 60F, 3 times the global average of ~18F. Water vapor/Clouds control temps, but the reason temperature trends are up is land use. Anyone who has a yard, doesn’t live in the city, and lives somewhere that get’s frost knows that you get frost on grass, trees, cars, but not driveways or streets, they don’t cool fast enough.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 15, 2013 at 1:21 am
an outlier case, which could be 1/3, 1/2, 3/4 of the opposition, not necessarily “all”.
So,you are claiming that ~half of scientists do not have an open mind, yet seem to agree with me that an open mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist. The implication is that you think the other half are bad scientists. I think at least half of scientists would disagree with you on that.
“The magnetic stripes were known in the 1950s” Do you have a link?
“As more and more of the seafloor was mapped during the 1950s, the magnetic variations turned out not to be random or isolated occurrences, but instead revealed recognizable patterns”
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/developing.html#anchor10912731
“The discovery of magnetic striping naturally prompted more questions: How does the magnetic striping pattern form? And why are the stripes symmetrical around the crests of the mid-ocean ridges?”
I don’t have a more precise link at hand, perhaps you can find one for me. When I was a student [of geophysics] in the early 1960s the development of Plate Tectonics was Big News which was ardently followed, so I’m quite familiar with the background and historical basis.
Two theories, on the same data to see which better fits.
If there had been no data [seismic cube] to begin with, there would not have been the two theories. Data drives theory. That does not mean that the same data always points to just one theory. More data is needed, and eventually that new data will show the road to take.
On a grand scale, how about Einstein’s Special Relativity?
Was a solution to the puzzling observation that the speed of light was constant. No such data, no special relativity.
“It does not take an ‘open mind’ to go from there.”
It does.
Since all good scientists have open minds, that can be taken out of the equation. It is not the open mind that drive discoveries. We all have that. Experience, being in the right place at the right time, dumb luck, intellectual powers, access to new data, etc are the ingredients that forge theories from data, not the open mind that we all posses.
I have made quite a number of scientific discoveries and yet people describe me as close-minded. So, let me be the counterexample to your notion.
Leif Svalgaard: However, few, if any, have been quantified to the point that we can definitively assess their impact on climate.
I don’t think anyone has disputed that. I have been disputing your Rutherford-like confident assertions that what remains to be learned can’t possibly be important in the climate debates.
Matthew R Marler says:
January 15, 2013 at 8:10 am
I don’t think anyone has disputed that. I have been disputing your Rutherford-like confident assertions that what remains to be learned can’t possibly be important in the climate debates.
Nothing here is black-and-white. What is important [to me at least – and what other measure can one have?] is whether what we have learned settles the question [e.g. ‘it is the Sun, Stupid’, or ‘the sky is falling – we are all gonna burn, or drown or …]. We have to go with what we have, not with what we might have, or possibly could have. Others will disagree [e.g. the precautionary principle], but that is their problem [or yours], not mine.
@LeifS 7:56 am: So, you are claiming that ~half of scientists do not have an open mind,
No, I hypothesize that scientists, even good scientists, do not have an open mind on every topic. Stochastically It follows on any given topic, some minds of good scientists are more open than others.
Normally that heterogeneity of minds would not slow scientific progress. Minds open to a topic will attract and quicken communication. There is probably some critical size that maximizes pace; too few and there is not enough spark, too many and there is too much friction and not enough ‘oxygen’.
However, if the close-mined on a topic clump in positions of power (Journal editor, reviewers, funding managers), it can slow down progress buy slowing communication and starving projects. I think the fallow period of Wegener’s observations falls into this category, although his death in 1930 is another undoubtable reason for Drift gaining little acceptance for 20 years. I read somewhere that Einstein once held up for many years in peer-review and consultation a six-dimensional treatment of General Relativity. I wish I could find again a link to that story, for if true, it was surely an injustice for Einstein to smother the author of a possible good theory that would compete with Einstein’s own.
But a more recent example, to name one, deals with Stein and O’Donnell (WUWT The Spectator on the Antarctic Ice Capades Feb 17, 2011. A parallel Spectator editorial contains:
@LeifS 7:56 am:I don’t have a more precise link at hand, perhaps you can find one for me.
The blockquote in my 1:21 am comment from Lawrence Morley (of Vine-Mathews-Morley theory) is good. Google docs link pdf
Oh wouldn’t it be interesting to see the rejection letters!
The Vine Sept 1963 Nature paper only showed his marine acquisition profiles with modeled mag susceptibility blocks, no zebra maps. The part that ties into spreading is a subtle 1.5 paragraphs midway in the paper.
Here is a biography of Scripts scientist Victor Vacquier: with interactions with Morley, Raff, and Mason. It claims that repeating anomaly profiles patterns were published by 1958. It strongly hints that the Raff 1961 is the earliest publication of the Zebra, but doesn’t reference it (because Vacquier wasn’t an author?)
Stephen Rasey says:
January 15, 2013 at 10:11 pm
No, I hypothesize that scientists, even good scientists, do not have an open mind on every topic. Stochastically It follows on any given topic, some minds of good scientists are more open than others.
I don’t think a mind wobbles in its openness. It is either open or not. It is like being pregnant, you either are or you are not. Science has nothing to do with the varying degrees of open mind you hypothesize. If one accepts anything it is usually because the case is strong enough to force acceptance [which is always preliminary]. But scientists are also people [although my wife has her doubts at times] and subject to the usual failings. Suppressing a paper in peer review is not a scientific deed, but a human failing, and is certainly not because of closed-mindedness. Being closed minded is excusable [you are what you are, so no sin], but suppressing a paper is a grave sin that cannot be excused. Again, it seems we disagree on that.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 15, 2013 at 10:32 pm
The blockquote in my 1:21 am comment from Lawrence Morley (of Vine-Mathews-Morley theory) is good.
Thanks for the links. They may be moot as it seems that Hess did not use the stripes or magnetic anomalies in developing his ideas, c.f. http://www.mantleplumes.org/WebDocuments/Hess1962.pdf
There were enough puzzling data of other kinds to guide him.
but suppressing a paper is a grave sin that cannot be excused. Again, it seems we disagree on that.
Are you implying that I think it is excusable to suppress papers?
Stephen Rasey says:
January 15, 2013 at 10:59 pm
Are you implying that I think it is excusable to suppress papers?
If that act is due to a closed mind [which one is born with as part of one’s personality] then, of course, you can’t help it, so no sin and therefore excusable. If you do it for other reasons [wounded pride, general nastiness, agenda, lots of badness here…] then it is not excusable. I thought I made that clear enough.
LeifS 10:45pm: Suppressing a paper in peer review is not a scientific deed, but a human failing, and is certainly not because of closed-mindedness.
“Certainly”?
What about editorial rejection of papers? Morley’s Feb 1963 letter to Nature, for example. An editor must apply some judgment of the paper’s importance. Different editors with different experiences can make different decisions. They are all human. So maybe the difference is in the individual mind’s state of reception to an idea.
Then there is the “Accepted subject to Revision”.
When does that change from being a “scientific deed to improve the paper with unavoidable delay”
to a “Purgatory of assuaging the many demands of” an anonymous reviewer while keeping the author away from the limelight as long as possible”?
When does a reviewer/editor cross the line from scientific deed to grave sin?
Trick question, there is no line — it’s a big fuzzy gradient gray patch.
If this is so, does the “scientific deed”/”grave sin” concept hold up? (Rhetorical question.)
Stephen Rasey says:
January 15, 2013 at 11:53 pm
What about editorial rejection of papers? Morley’s Feb 1963 letter to Nature, for example. An editor must apply some judgment of the paper’s importance. Different editors with different experiences can make different decisions. They are all human. So maybe the difference is in the individual mind’s state of reception to an idea.
Much more likely to be due to other concerns,such as agenda, group-think, inexperience, malice, [all of which I have experienced with regard to my own papers], etc. You seem to think that when an editor rejects a paper, that he has a closed mind for that specific paper, but when he accepts a paper, he has an open mind for that particular paper. Such selective application of your open/closed paradigm strains credibility.
LeifS 10:49: Thanks for the links. They may be moot as it seems that Hess did not use the stripes or magnetic anomalies in developing his ideas, c.f.
It is how it seems. (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/01/09/nasa-on-the-sun-tiny-variations-can-have-a-significant-effect-on-terrestrial-climate/#comment-1198060>Rasey 1/14 11:42am)
Actually, I’d be surprised if Hess didn’t see or hear of early Raff, Mason, Vacquier profiles at ONR in 1959-1960. Then again, Hess didn’t write the 1963 Vine-Mathews-Morley “Zebra stripe” theory.
@LeifS: 12:09am You seem to think that when an editor rejects a paper, that he has a closed mind for that specific paper, but when he accepts a paper, he has an open mind for that particular paper.
There you go again…. not “specific paper”, but on that “topic” or “theory”.
Editors can and do properly reject specific papers because of the quality of presentation. Editors can and do properly reject papers because the topic is outside of the domain of the journal. Editors must accept or reject well written papers based upon some judgment about the importance of the topic and this is where openness of mind comes into play.
Much more likely to be due to other concerns ,such as agenda, group-think, inexperience, malice,
“Group-think” I put into the category of close-mindedness, almost by definition.
“Settled Science” when it is a manifestation of Group-think is close-mindedness, too.
An open, curious mind is a prerequisite for being a good scientist. -LeifS
A closed mind on some topics is essential for being a good scientist, too.
Some topics really are “Settled Science”.
For how many seconds will you or I tolerate the notion that:
F=ma is wrong?
That the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Laws of Thermodynamics are wrong?
In the spirit of “The Relativity of Wrong”, F=ma has this asterisk which says “stay far away from the speed of light or it gets complicated”. That said, I don’t think I need to be open minded about changes to F=ma. It’s a good enough theory and there are bigger fish to fry. If someone shows me data adjusting it, I’m closeminded enough to look for other explanations.
Life is too short to be open minded on every topic.
Proposed paper: “South America and Africa were once joined”
…1940s Editor to himself, “will that myth ever die?”
The trick is to know on which topics to leave the door open at least a crack. Fortunately, there are lots of scientists with different experiences with their own doors cracked open.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 16, 2013 at 10:57 am
Editors must accept or reject well written papers based upon some judgment about the importance of the topic and this is where openness of mind comes into play.
This is nonsense. A topic is important in its own right and its own merit, not depending on somebody’s open mind.
“Settled Science” when it is a manifestation of Group-think is close-mindedness, too.
The settled science we use every day did not arise from close-mindedness. Group-think has more to do with Bandwagons and Herd-instinct. To jump on a Bandwagon is perhaps something ‘open-minders’ do more readily.
Life is too short to be open minded on every topic.
One is either open-minded or not. The notion that my mind opens and closes depending on what comes my way is silly, and not supported by evidence.
A topic is important in its own right and its own merit
You cannot put a topic into a spectrograph and objectively read of the topic’s importance on a chart recorder. The importance of a topic is a subjective judgement call.
To jump on a Bandwagon is perhaps something ‘open-minders’ do more readily.
An interesting point. I’ll agree.
There is a difference between taking a lap on the Bandwagon and choosing to live on it.
Then there are the people who never get on — who are they more likely to be?
Some Bandwagons, like Plate Tectonics, go far playing sweet music.
Some Bandwagons, like Expanding earth, are out of tune and the wheels fall off quickly.
Some day we may find out how many wheels stay on the M-Theory Rubber-Band-wagon.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 16, 2013 at 2:24 pm
You cannot put a topic into a spectrograph and objectively read of the topic’s importance on a chart recorder. The importance of a topic is a subjective judgement call.
Well, that sounds to me that you proposing just such a spectrograph. It is like you imagine a sort of Maxwell’s Demon sitting in front of the mind, looking at what comes its way, and deciding whether or not the open or close the mind. I’m not buying either.
Some day we may find out how many wheels stay on the M-Theory Rubber-Band-wagon
I would say it requires a VERY open mind to jump on that Bandwagon. Such lets in more junk than useful stuff.
The only Demon I see is an Editor in front of a computer screen gatekeeping a journal.
Either all submitted papers are on topics of equal importance, or there is a human editor, or editorial staff subjectively weighting importance and priority of topics. I don’t buy that all topics are of equal importance.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 16, 2013 at 11:12 pm
I don’t buy that all topics are of equal importance.
Of course they are not. The Editor judges each paper for appropriateness for the Journal, the selects a set of referees based on his knowledge of who would be competent to review the paper [often authors prominent in list of references obvious choices, or the author himself submit a list of half a dozen suitable referees]. The referees check the paper for adherence to some minimal standard [often set by the Journal] and for reasonable analysis and methods. Most often, the referee will ask for clarifications in a revised version, or for omission or, at least, qualification of certain statements that are deemed too strong for the evidence presented, an so on. The whole process is somewhat formal, as is proper, and although not perfect, about the best that can be done. That the referee disagree with the author is not a valid reason for rejection. At no point, does an ‘open mind’ come into play. I review a paper about every week [there are three in my pipeline, so I have to get back to work on them 🙂 ], and as far as I can tell from my own work and from the reviews I get of my own work over several decades, the open mind is not in evidence. And God forbid it were, as I would rather have a skeptical review that forces me to rework and improve my paper.
from the reviews I get of my own work over several decades, the open mind is not in evidence
I suspect a non-random sample. It is not likely minds closed to a topic would be reviewing papers on that topic. Reviewers who work to get papers improved and approved have open minds on the topic. Open minds don’t have to be push-overs.
Stephen Rasey says:
January 18, 2013 at 12:02 am
I suspect a non-random sample. It is not likely minds closed to a topic would be reviewing papers on that topic.
I don’t think it is possible to be truly selective in open/close mindedness depending on the topic. An open mind is an intrinsic property of that mind. It was perhaps wrong to ascribe Einstein’s rejection of quantum mechanics to closed-mindedness. Einstein believed that Nature was understandable but as Feynman has said “nobody understands quantum mechanics”. Einstein rebelled against the notion that Nature could not be understood. I actually would not call that being closed minded. Instead, the view that Nature can be understood expresses optimism and belief in the power of an intellect. The great German mathematician Hilbert expressed the same thought in his famous saying “Wir müssen wissen — wir werden wissen!”, a hope which Gödel and Turing later demolished.
Leif,
I would like to know your opinion about the following statement which can be found in the Italian website: http://daltonsminima.altervista.org/?p=24467.
I made a temporary translation of an excerpt of it: http://users.skynet.be/fc298377/Sun/Michele_19012013.pdf
(The translation could be better, but my only purpose was to let see the opinion of the author of the webpage, named ‘Michele’.)
a. He asserts that the solar flares could present a particular indication of the solar activity. Is this approach helpful?
b. Within the framework of this thread, I was asking if the cycles of flares and CMEs could have any importance regarding the climate change on earth. Could a solar cycle with a high activity of flares and CMEs have more impact on the earth than a solar cycle with a low activity? Possibly the process can be similar with a boiling kettle. The TSI of the kettle at 100°C remains constant but in the direction of the spout, the warming up is more substantial.
c. Can the evolution of the four last solar cycles (SC24 inclusive) be compared with a “damping in which the period is not constant but tends gradually to increase”? Could such an evolution be the beginning of a ‘Maunder minimum’?
Rik Gheysens says:
January 19, 2013 at 11:00 am
in the Italian website: http://daltonsminima.altervista.org/?p=24467.
I made a temporary translation of an excerpt of it
I read Italian, so no problem with the translation.
a. He asserts that the solar flares could present a particular indication of the solar activity. Is this approach helpful?
Solar flares are one [of several] indicators, so could be helpful.
b. Within the framework of this thread, I was asking if the cycles of flares and CMEs could have any importance regarding the climate change on earth.
Smaller flares [the C-flares that make up the bulk of the Figure on the Italian site] are so small [a C5 is 100 times smaller than an X5] so they are hardly important. The most energetic flares are so rare that they also will have but a small influence overall.
Could a solar cycle with a high activity of flares and CMEs have more impact on the earth than a solar cycle with a low activity?
One would think so, but remember that all the solar indicators vary together, so it is hard to say which one(s) are doing what, if anything.
c. Can the evolution of the four last solar cycles (SC24 inclusive) be compared with a “damping in which the period is not constant but tends gradually to increase”? Could such an evolution be the beginning of a ‘Maunder minimum’?
The solar cycle is not an oscillator in the usual sense, so the analogy would be poor from the outset. So, trying to fir the number of flares to a simple damped oscillator is not very helpful, especially if extrapolated into the future. There are other signs that we are approaching a low minimum. Whether it will be a Dalton or Maunder-type minimum remains to be seen.
Leif says (14 Jan)
What I’m saying is that UV changes linearly with the sunspot number, that we can [and have since 1722] keep track of UV, and that UV linearly tracks variation of TSI, hence whatever the climate effect from UV is can be monitored simply by monitoring the sunspot number.
Henry@Leif
The mechanism I have proposed for the Gleisberg weather cycle (average=88 years) is that a change in distribution in TSI, affecting UV mostly, causes a change in ozone- and NOx- and HxOx production on TOA which in turn affects incoming radiation. If there is more ozone and others more solar radiation is back radiated. Hence we are now cooling whilst ozone and others are increasing.
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/
Now, in another blog on same subject, you quoted this graph.
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-SSN-1700-2013.png
From there on, you argued with me that there is no 88 year solar cycle .
Could I just ask: what FFT stands for? What is the unit on the left hand side of the graph (y)?
I am slightly concerned about using SSN to determine cyclic solar periods. Does SSN not depend a lot on the relative strength of a person’s vision? Hence we must doubt the centuries old measurements.
That the 88 year Gleissberg (weather) cycle does exist is clearly not in doubt.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2003/2002JA009390.shtml
It has been determined physically.
If it does not show exactly in the SSN graph, there must be something wrong with it.
In light of the above I consider it possible that we should interpret the 2 peaks at 55 and 105, as found here,
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-SSN-1700-2013.png
as one, and taken together, peaking at around 88 (average).
Alternatively these two solar cycles just seem to act in tandem to produce the earthly average 88 year weather cycle.
Do you have any other graphs proving to me that there are only 55 and 105 year solar cycles and that indeed there is no 88 year solar cycle?
HenryP says:
January 20, 2013 at 5:25 am
I am slightly concerned about using SSN to determine cyclic solar periods. Does SSN not depend a lot on the relative strength of a person’s vision? Hence we must doubt the centuries old measurements.
The SSN is determined by using dozens of person’s observations, including photographs of the Sun.
If it does not show exactly in the SSN graph, there must be something wrong with it.
Much more likely that your assumption that the weather cycle [which is in doubt – e.g. by me] is caused bya similar solar periodicity….
Leif says
Much more likely that your assumption that the weather cycle [which is in doubt – e.g. by me] is caused bya similar solar periodicity….
Henry says
I am not sure what you mean here. That a 88 solar/weather cycle exists is not in doubt. Even the ancients (Egyptians/Hebrews) knew about it. They just looked at the flooding of the Nile.
I already quoted you this paper here:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2003/2002JA009390.shtml
It was again confirmed by the observations of the flooding of the Nile (by William Arnold) and now also by me, as explained here:
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/#comment-192
So I am counting quite a number of witnesses here now that say that the sine wave with wavelength 88 years for energy-in does exist, as opposed to only one person – namely you – asserting doubt.
So, I repeat the question @ anyone
Do we have any other graphs proving to me that there are only, 11, 55 and 105 year solar cycles and that indeed there is no 88 year solar cycle and there are no other cycles?
@Henry: I love reading your posts. You make a lot of sense. And I can’t help but hope that you are right about your assertions.
Rik Gheysens says
http://users.skynet.be/fc298377/Sun/Michele_19012013.pdf
Henry says
Interesting graph. Note that it follows my determination that the maximum acceleration of warming in degrees K / yr2 occurred in 1972 and we will reach our maximum rate acceleration into cooling by around 2016.
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/
just for Leif: that it has been cooling can be seen here:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2002/to:2013/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2002/to:2013/trend/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:2002/to:2013/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:2002/to:2013/trend/plot/rss/from:2002/to:2013/plot/rss/from:2002/to:2013/trend/plot/gistemp/from:2002/to:2013/plot/gistemp/from:2002/to:2013/trend/plot/hadsst2gl/from:2002/to:2013/plot/hadsst2gl/from:2002/to:2013/trend
Mario Lento says
You make a lot of sense.
Henry says: thanks
It is just a hobby for me, but I never lie and I would not say what I am saying if I was not 100% certain.
I am puzzled that the “solar” guys keep looking at obscure and subjective parameters when we should be looking at maximum temps. as it gives us a good sense of energy coming in (from the sun).
I anxiously await your predictions to come true… 2013 may have some warmth… but it is going out to space with the weak max we are in… 2014 and years after should continue a flat line and start decreasing our built up warmth. I am excited about a future of so many gullible people believing the hype starting to understand how they’ve been duped.
NASA says the suns temperature variability is causing this? Nooo… NASA says the opposite, and you pretty much linked to the very information that disproves what your article says. So..what to believe…Nasa, or a petroleum industries blog?
The effect is so SIGNIFICANT that the scientists Watts claimed he was quoting has said they have never observed it and cannot detect it.
REPLY: Dude, this article was written by NASA scientist Dr. Tony Phillips, not me. Get your facts straight before engaging your bloviator. See right at the bottom: Author: Dr. Tony Phillips | http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2013/08jan_sunclimate / – Anthony
@reanchi: You wrote: “So..what to believe…Nasa, or a petroleum industries blog?”
Your ignorance and offensiveness are not without notice. You have no idea where funding is for this blogsite. If you choose your beliefs based on ideology, that is certainly your problem. But at least get some education before you spew nonsense.