Usually, and that means in the past year, when you look at the false color MDI image from SOHO, you can look at the corresponding magnetogram and see some sort of disturbance going on, even it it is not visible as a sunspot, sunspeck, or plage area.
Not today.
Left: SOHO MDI “visible” image Right: SOHO Magnetogram
Click for larger image
Wherefore art though, cycle 24?
In contrast, September 28th, 2001
REPLY: If I intended to “shut him down”, I would have snipped the entire post and then posted that note. As it was I left it open for him to respond. – Anthony
Yes but why immediately put him on the defensive with such a Newspeak reply?
Why make a comment at all?
As I said before, there are plenty of other “plants” on here that deliver pages and pages of gibberish. I won’t mention any names Foinavon. LOL
I don’t know man….it just could have been delivered a little more respectfully to a man who is our grandfather’s age.
And so your comment to him was a type of shut-down.
A snipped statement is not a shut-down. It is a deletion. Make sense?
Anyway…thanks for allowing free speech.
And thanks for your efforts. They are much appreciated.
Back to TOPIC…Question: At what point in time or date does this minimum become officially “grand”?
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
REPLY: I would say when SC24 is so late that SC25 should be starting. – Anthony
@VG
Isn’t that interesting. Well well, weren’t we told Gehrlich was a lone wolf, an outsider, a kook and unworthy to publish in a “recognized” journal?
Even Steve M at CA refused discussion on G&T. What about now?
If temperatures plummet this year, it will become known as The Taunter Minimum.
Ohioholic (15:21:29) :
Well, I know Leif will be by, so one question I would love to pose is as follows:
If the sun’s effects are minimal on temperature, why the difference in day/night temperatures?
Don’t for get the slight tilt gets us winter LOL
Here we go again …
Looks like it is an SC23 in the Northern Hemisphere with white leading black on the magnetogram (even if it is high latitude). Looks like the sun’s refusing to allow itself to being pigeonholed — doing what it darn while pleases, while us critters on this little blue-green planet try to figure it out.
As for references to the Southern Hemisphere; that’s an SP (stuck pixel) that’s been there for quite awhile.
As for this latest pair of teensy specks — who knows, they may be gone in the morning. Maybe Zeus knows…
Joe Miner (17:09:49) :
Yup, no sooner than I posted this, one appeared. That’s Murphy for ya! – Anthony
Actually I think if you check back for the last six months or so whenever you mention the lack of sunspots on here, one shows up. 🙂
The Anthony Watts effect!
Basil (19:01:45) :
There’s a lot of variation in periodicities in temperature series, Bill. Especially on a regional level, it is going to depend a lot of the impact of how long term climate systems modulate the influence of TSI. …
Since you are using the CET series, you might want to take a look at Figure 1, Panel (b), in this:
CET was only one of 8 global locations used in the averaged spectrum. But it is interesting that my CET spectrum corresponds well with the spectrum in the article you reference, but in the average the 5 and 25 year peaks are very much reduced.
Whatever the sun is doing to influence terrestrial climate, it is “filtered” through complex interactions with oceanic … This will be especially the case for an island adjacent to a major ocean like Central England. I don’t think what happens in Central England is definitive for what happens everywhere else.
The average was from global locations. LP Filtering with a period of >11 years will get rid of the 11 year peaks (obviously!) but it will also remove the TSI variability and only show other solar variability.
What explains the long term trend since the mid 18th Century is something else. I’m not ruling out a role for solar, but I’ll concede (to Leif) that it isn’t the 11 year cycle in TSI.
I’d agree with that!
Well, I see one spot, high up, which is a cycle 24 signature, BUT the magnetogram gives the wrong polarity for 24.
from solarcycle24.com
A small new sunspeck has formed high in latitude in the northern hemisphere. It has the proper latitude of Cycle 24 but with the opposite magnetic polarity. It poses no threat for solar flares.
So either a rogue 23 or a rogue 25
Maybe 24 will be only 9 years long so we get the incoming tale of 25 😉
Well then, Anthony Watts, that’s one mighty strange SC23?? spot you have scared up. Twisted, just like some we saw earlier this year. An axis of dipoles running somewhere’s about 45 degrees.
Some have suggested SC24 died and SC25 spots are now trying out for Dancing with the Stars.
ice2020 (17:14:32) :
George, the high latitude would think of the cycle 24, but the polarity of the cycle is 23 … or maybe 25?
Simon
Ice Age (17:36:52) :
It’s a very small new sunspot according to the Solar Cycle 24 website
http://www.solarcycle24.com
“A small new sunspeck has formed high in latitude in the northern hemisphere. It has the proper latitude of Cycle 24 but with the opposite magnetic polarity. It poses no threat for solar flares.
This may indeed be a Cycle 25 speck.
Nasa may have let slip out that 24 is over. there has been 2 -3 year cycles in the past.
hareynolds (17:40:24) :
If the sun does a double pole change that would explain this minimum would it not?
savethesharks (19:43:12) :
I agree completely!
Gerry (18:02:00) :
we hope you reply here more.
REPLY: We don’t think much of barycentrism here. Too little mass to make any difference. Dr. Svalgaard has debunked it extensively here – Anthony
Sorry I missed his discussion, and I’m prepared to be corrected, but as I understand it, the barycenter effect has nothing to do with a barycenter mass… it has everything to do with the effect of acceleration and torque on a non-solid??? To get an idea, take a bowl of spinning water and place it on the edge of a rotating table. Now change the position of the bowl relative to the center of the table including going passed the center, (retrograde, as during the sun relation to barycenter in 1990) and observe the liquid contents! The mass involved is the mass of the sun itself and the effect the changing acceleration has on the suns very flexible gas make up.
I’m wondering if the retrograde effect may somehow be the cause of the high latitude cycle 23 type specs and or spots?
Stephen
anna v (21:09:36) :
have you seen this?
http://spaceweb.oulu.fi/~kalevi/publications/non-refereed2/ESA_SP477_lostcycle.pdf
I will suggest to call the existing sun minimum the “WATTS MINIMUM” !
REPLY: Thanks but I don’t need anything named after me – Anthony
The sun spot today–Galileo wouldn’t have seen it. You have to put a friggin circle around it in the photo from SOHO to see it.
Scroll down here to see what I’m saying :
http://solarcycle24.com/
“hareynolds (17:40:24) : (b) I can’t get ANY traction with this, but I keep trying if this IS a Minimum, shouldn’t it be named the Gore Minimum”
Al Gore’s name shouldn’t be attached to anything except the fact that children can’t sleep good after seeing his moving. This is the only thing he has earned being remembered for.
bill (16:57:27) :
If this is true then a FFT plot of total solar irradiance would show these regular cycles as peaks.
It does, although a better plot uses the sunspot number [my TSI is just derived from the SSN] as a proxy for TSI [and cosmic rays]. Here are some musings about FFTof sunspot numbers:
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-SSN-14C.pdf and this one:
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-Power-Spectrum-SSN-1700-2008.png that shows the effect of starting the data one year later successively for 11 years to show the end effects on pressing the data into periodic sine and cosine functions.
I think it is evident that there is no VISIBLE TSI influence on temperature. However there are apparent peaks at 7.8 years approx and possibly at 2.3, 3.5, 13 and 19 years.
You are perfectly correct. Although I have come across the argument that eye-balling with an open mind and a willing heart beats hard-nosed FFT and statistics every time.
Stephen (21:48:17) :
To get an idea, take a bowl of spinning water and place it on the edge of a rotating table. Now change the position of the bowl relative to the center of the table including going passed the center, (retrograde, as during the sun relation to barycenter in 1990) and observe the liquid contents!
The problem with your picture is that there is a coupling [namely friction] between the rotating table and the liquid in the bowl, but there is no coupling between the rotating Sun and its orbital movement. It has been suggested many times that as a planet goes around the Sun in an elliptical orbit, i.e. changing its orbital speed that it would rotate slower or faster depending on its orbital speed. This doesn’t happen either, again because there is no couple between the two. And that the Sun is not solid has nothing to do with it. The Earth is solid and is slowed down by friction of the tidal bulge due to the Moon, the couple being the physical contact and hence the friction.
But we shouldn’t really get into this again, it has been covered in almost every ‘sun-related’ post before, as the discussion always degenerates into visions of planetary influence on the Sun. Look though [just about] any of the older postings.
REPLY: We don’t think much of barycentrism here. Too little mass to make any difference. Dr. Svalgaard has debunked it extensively here – Anthony
REPLY: If I intended to “shut him down”, I would have snipped the entire post and then posted that note. As it was I left it open for him to respond. – Anthony
Hi Anthony, I hope it’s ok for others to respond too.
There is a theory which is a bit different to the other barycentric theories which has the correct order of magnitude effect, and a plausible physical basis with demonstrable mathematics. Using it, it’s author achieved a R=0.65 correlation for sunspot numbers spanning several centuries. I have on three seperate occasions tried to get Dr Svalgaard to have a look and comment on this theory, but have been ignored each time. I don’t think ignoring a theory amounts to “debunking” it.
The last time I was having a short exchange of posts with another contributor, lgl, on matters relating to solar and planetary motion, you did snip our entire posts, and replaced them with an injunction:
“No further barycentrics here.”
SInce then I have respected your preference and avoided the topic as far as possible, but given your responses on this thread I am left wondering whether your injunction applied to that thread alone, or the whole blog in general.
Given the failure of current mainstream solar theory to predict the sun’s behaviour, I would have thought that a spirit of free scientific enquiry and debate was in order, and that other theories, even though they may not be approved of by current mainstream solar physicists, should be up for discussion.
If you don’t want that discussion on your blog, fair enough, it’s your blog, but I don’t believe others should be misled by sweeping statements about all such theories having been “debunked”, because they haven’t.
I wrote:
“If temperatures plummet this year, it will become known as The Taunter Minimum.”
Even better would be “The Tauntem Minimum.”
Hi all,
Using the 13 month smoothed International Sunspot number (which I believe is the official number used for defining the beginning and ending of solar cycles), I plotted all 24 numbered solar cycles by month. The last month is the minimum, and as it started to increase again, I assigned that to the next cycle. According to this methodology, the most recent data available is from September 2008 (6 months ago, includes these most recent 6 months in the smoothing) and it indicates that cycle 23 had not yet ended.
So, inquiring minds are left wondering, what is the average length of a solar cycle and the standard deviation? Microsoft Excel was only too happy to provide me an answer! The average length of a solar cycle is 132.3 months (yes, almost exactly eleven years!). The standard deviation is 14.99 months (okay, just call it fifteen!). Here are the results…
No solar cycles were shorter than 102 months (8.5 years, avg – 2 sigma)
Solar cycles 2, 3, 8 and 21 were 103 to 117 months, between 1 and 2 sigma below the average.
Solar cycles 7, 12, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and 22 were 118 to 132 months (shorter than average but not in a statistically meaningful way).
Solar cycles 1, 5, 10, 11, 14, 20 and 23 are 133 to 147 months (longer than average but not in a statistically meaningful way). HOWEVER, it is worth noting that cycle 23 is not over, and is at 145 months so it is just 2 months short of hitting the next category! Also note SC#5 is part of the Dalton minimum.
Solar cycles 6, 9 and 13 are 148 to 162 months (between 1 and 2 sigma longer than the average. Note that SC#6 is part of the Dalton Minimum.
Solar cycle #4 is the gold standard at 164 months, it is more than 2 sigma longer than the mean. It is the one that started the Dalton minimum. We’ve got a year and a half to go before we make this level!
Just thought I’d let you all know,
Paul
captdallas2 (14:56:29) : The sun is quiet, but there are other factors that are involved in climate. The cool PDO shift is likely more responsible for the current cooling trend than the quiet sun.
Or perhaps the sun stirs the ocean via a spin-orbit coupling of angular momentum conservation:
http://users.beagle.com.au/geoffsharp/wilsonforum2008.pdf
Don’t focus too heavily on the sun or you may miss the real drivers of climate.
And don’t soft focus yourself too much for the same reason…
tallbloke (23:02:35) :
I have on three separate occasions tried to get Dr Svalgaard to have a look and comment on this theory, but have been ignored each time. I don’t think ignoring a theory amounts to “debunking” it.
I never ignore anything [that is one my problems; if I only did, these discussions would wither on the vine], but I have yet to see a plausible physical explanation. Doesn’t have to be correct, just possible, i.e. not violating physical laws or being energetically inadequate.
tallbloke (23:02:35) :
Given the failure of current mainstream solar theory to predict the sun’s behaviour
What failure? One of the best prediction methods we have [based on solid dynamo theory] predicts a very low cycle [‘smallest in a hundred years’]. Such cycles are slow starters, so the Sun is doing just what it should.
“Harold Ambler (18:55:42) : I would be tempted to treat an orbit specialist who worked for 15 years at JPL with some respect.”
I would too Harold.
I am also tempted to respect Anthony Watts and what he has accomplished here with this blog.
I have an idea : let’s respect all of them. Let’s use the difference in each ones views as a spurring to go deeper.
Einstein encouraged his students and friends to ask him questions. Eisenhower improved (a lot) on Montgomery’s D-Day plans. NASA would not have got Apollo 13 back to earth if just one brain was working on the problem (I recommend the movie ‘Apollo 13’ to see what I’m saying). More minds, more creativity, more answers.
My point : I’m not going to throw out Gerry, I’m not going to throw out Leif Svalgaard, I’m not going to throw out David Archibald, I’m not going to throw out Milivoje A. Vukcevic (vukcevic), and I wish Willie Soon, Nir Shaviv, and Piers Corbyn were here.
hareynolds (17:40:24) :
(b) I can’t get ANY traction with this, but I keep trying if this IS a Minimum, shouldn’t it be named the Gore Minimum (or perhaps Gore-Hansen)?
My feeling is that if this indeed a Minimum, and the climate follows the Maunder and Dalton pattern (or, heaven forbid, a colder pattern), future generations REALLY need to be reminded about the hubris of AGW.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As much as I can enjoy the irony of your suggestion, it will go over the over-inflated heads of Gore-Hansen. They do not deserve to be remembered as anything but fools – and naming a grand-minima after them would undermine that objective. It is human nature to forget “why” something is named what it is, and just remember the name.
Besides there are physicists who have done serious work on the subject, who do deserve to have their work recognized. It was my understanding (I may have received faulty intell) the next grand-minima was to be named for Theordor Landscheidt, who back in the ’90’s was predicting sunspots to all but disappear after SC24 until 2030.