Another anemic solar cycle 23 sunspeck, could 19th century astronomers have seen it?
From Spaceweather.com
SUNSPOT 1016: A ring-shaped sunspot numbered 1016 has emerged near the sun’s equator. Its magnetic polarity identifies it as a member of old Solar Cycle 23. Until these old cycle sunspots go away, the next solar cycle will remain in abeyance.
Nice to see a bit of balance on Discovery Channel’s Daily Planet show yesterday. They presented a piece on the quiet Sun and possible correlation to global cooling. Especially given that the shows presenter, Jay Ingram, is an AGW fan and seems to mention it on most shows. He even mentioned “skeptics” of global warming during the Sunspot piece.
Leif Svalgaard (22:37:52)
Thank you Dr. Svalgaard for a most enthralling exposition.Agreed. The number of times people ask “would this spot been seen xxx years ago” gets old after a while. There are some smart people doing this (counting SSN’s).
Leif Svalgaard (00:40:29) :
carlbrannen (00:20:06) :
After that, I’d be interested in what the Fourier transform of the sunspot cycles look like.
It looks like this:
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-Power-Spectrum-SSN-1700-2008.png
Leif,
So this was done with annual data? Do you have a reason for using annual data rather than monthly data? Just curious.
Where’s the “Gleissberg” cycle in this analysis? I don’t see it, do you?
What’s the critical power factor for 0.05 significance, if you know?
Thanks.
Basil
Kath,
If we send complaints to Daily Planet, we may get balance. I do so. There is a contact link on their web site. He must have looked at the Danish National Space Center web site or Willie Soon’s statements. It really ticks me off that Soon is heard and Sallie Baliunas is not. That’s another issue. They work together! In any case, this is the first acknowledgement by Jay Ingram that there may be two sides to the story.
vukcevic (04:14:39) : your [] should be and with the “i ” inside
I meant “”
“Francis T. Manns (08:55:58) :
If we send complaints to Daily Planet, we may get balance. I do so. There is a contact link on their web site.”
Thanks Francis, I will do so.
Leif 06:46:48
Excellent and thanks. Now, are we observing clouds carefully enough and measuring the input of haze from Asia’s burning and other sources to distinguish these two contributors to albedo?
============================================
“Future generations will be puzzled with our intense divination of [sunspots] for our use in solar predictions ”
Well divined and appropriately struck. Choreography by the augurers themselves from obvious self-interest.
“I think it’s about time we all stand up and put an end to this eco-fascism before it destroys all of our liberties.”
Is the eco-fascism the real worry or only a ceremonial sidearm, like Patton’s pearlhandled revolvers? The wielders of power have simply instigated a world conflict to whip up fervor among the masses, Gaia’s patriots. Useful idiots.
It’s past time.
Carsten: My apologies. I goof up my terms a lot. Local transit time would be better. It would be better to try and observe theses “Faint Fuzzy” umbraless SSN’s near local noontime to put atmospheric extinction at the minimum.
I am at 43N and I have to observe between 1 hour before to 1 hour after solar transit in the sky. Even that doesn’t work any more. If I had adaptive optics hooked up, maybe.
The first thing out of people’s mouths after learing of Deep Solar Minimum is “How does that affect global warming”. Laymen & Politician alike. Warming is intuitively associated with the Sun.
Solar inactivity is associated with cooling.
You don’t even have to say it.
Therefore, Deep Solar Minimum puts AGW on the defensive….at the basic Human instinct level.
Basil (08:53:53) :
So this was done with annual data? Do you have a reason for using annual data rather than monthly data?
Just that the record is longer.
Here is the monthly FFT [raw and smoothed – exercise for student: which is which?]:
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-SSN-Monthly-1755-2007.png
Doesn’t make any difference.
Where’s the “Gleissberg” cycle in this analysis? I don’t see it, do you?
There is a lot of power out in the 50-120 year range. That is the Gleissberg cycle. But it is not a real ‘cycle’ just a ‘tendency’ [spots were low 1700s, 1800s, 1900s, and 2000s].
What’s the critical power factor for 0.05 significance, if you know?
I tend not to pay attention to this as the series does not conform to the assumptions behind that measure. A better criterium is to do the FFT on the first half and the second half of the data and see what difference it makes:
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-SSN-two-halves.png
Judge for yourself.
Adolfo Giurfa (09:19:56) :
I meant “”
this is hard to get right. To make an < sign use ampersand, the two letters lt, and a semicolon. For > use gt as the two letters.
kim (09:36:03) :
Now, are we observing clouds
People are trying. We shall see. Eventually they will get it right.
Leif Svalgaard (08:12:45) :
vukcevic (04:14:39) :
[“This may be, in Dr. Svalgaard’s words, entirely baseless and unfounded speculation, but falling Polar Field strength as measured at Wilcox SO.
Yes, such extrapolation is indeed baseless. Why not extrapolate the first two cycles on the left? Or extend the extrapolation another cycle to the right.”]
No problem sir.
http://www.geocities.com/vukcevicu/LP-project1.gif
Extrapolation to the left:
As you know Wilcox SO data starts in 1976, so prior data are from Mnt. Wilson Observatory which is available since 1967.
One should necessarily assume that reduction in the intensity is absolutely linear and that it should have started from an excessively high level. Amplitude envelope is most likely another longer term cycle, which may take us back to SC13 and further back (cyclically) to Dalton and Maunder, and forward to New Dalton in the late 2020s.
Extrapolation to the right:
No data beyond 2009, so if you forgive me taking the liberty to follow course of my (Vukcevic) formula.
I suspect aforementioned cyclical envelope will take off in the late 2020s, and solar activity will accordingly intensify.
But of course, this is not science, it is just peace of NAÏVE ART !
It is all in the eyes of the beholder!
pyromancer, if cycle 24 were acting like a normal active cycle, and a cycle 23 spot showed up just like it did this week, that would be normal. There would be no sudden discussion of this weird occurrence. Old spots do that. Overlap is normal. This spot is normal. We make the mistake of saying something is abnormal about cycle 23 just because cycle 23 spots show up every now and then. What is interesting is the lack of a ramp for Cycle 24. The rather arbitrary Minimum measurement happens more because of the ramp of the next cycle, not the old one. Cycle 23 is acting quite normal.
Basil (08:53:53) :
“Leif,
Where’s the “Gleissberg” cycle in this analysis? I don’t see it, do you? ”
The FFT Spectrum analysis chart is an important reference. Thanks Dr. Svalgaard.
I do not see “Gleissberg” cycle either.
But I do see the second most powerful cycle (after 11 year one) with period of approx 107 years, with its half period of 53.5 years. This concurs in an excellent manner with another product of NAÏVE ART of mine.
http://www.geocities.com/vukcevicu/SSNanomaly1.gif
This clearly identifys all known mayor anomalies of recorded SSNs.
Trigonometric transformation dictates fundamental period of 107 = (118+96)/2
Leif 22:37:52
What does the earth’s weakening magnetic field together with the reduced solar wind portend bedsides the increased GCRs? Have you been analyzing the newly discovered breaches in the earth’s magnetosphere by the THEMIS spacecraft?
The FFT Spectrum analysis chart
http://www.leif.org/research/FFT-Power-Spectrum-SSN-1700-2008.png
vukcevic (10:13:52) :
But of course, this is not science, it is just peace of NAÏVE ART
Perhaps there is [another] blog for that
It is all in the eyes of the beholder!
A famous American ball player, Yogi Berra (known for his marvelous sayings) has this to say about that:
“If I hadn’t believed it, I wouldn’t have seen it”.
vukcevic (10:33:59) :
“I do not see “Gleissberg” cycle either.”
The ~108 year period is the Gleissberg ‘cycle’
Pamela Gray (10:15:25) :
Cycle 23 is acting quite normal.
Absolutely, and so is cycle 24 [for a small cycle].
vukcevic (10:13:52) : and further back (cyclically) to Dalton and Maunder
We are waiting for it 🙂
Dj asks
“Global temperatures continue to run well above average and the sun remains quite. How much longer before we are willing to admit that this is entirely consistent with the enhanced greenhouse effect?”
Well firs off what the heck is “average” mean in this context? Are you only counting periods of widespread famine? Or how about have you ever heard of thermal inertia? did you really think the change would be instant? Perhaps you think temperature should have declined 800 years ago in response to this months quiet sun? Kinda like the claim that CO2 drives temperature in the historic record?
That’s my answer then, using the AGW standard the cooling of the little ice age was caused byn the weak sunspot cycle 24. Perfect and that answer has all the scientific rigor of the AGW theory.
vukcevic (10:13:52) :
Why not extrapolate the first two cycles on the left?
I meant take the two cycles to the left and extrapolate those to the right.
No problem sir.
http://www.geocities.com/vukcevicu/LP-project1.gif
Extrapolation to the left:
As you know Wilcox SO data starts in 1976, so prior data are from Mnt. Wilson Observatory which is available since 1967.
The MWO data for the first cycle are not any higher that the WSO data for the second cycle, so the extrapolated line should not go up on the right, if the goal is for it to match the data.
As I said, there is no base for your linear extrapolation.
vukcevic (10:13:52) :
“Why not extrapolate the first two cycles on the left?”
I meant take the two cycles to the left and extrapolate those to the right.
No problem sir.
http://www.geocities.com/vukcevicu/LP-project1.gif
Extrapolation to the left:
As you know Wilcox SO data starts in 1976, so prior data are from Mnt. Wilson Observatory which is available since 1967.
The MWO data for the first cycle are not any higher that the WSO data for the second cycle, so the extrapolated line should not go up on the right, if the goal is for it to match the data.
As I said, there is no base for your linear extrapolation.
Robert Bateman (09:45:19) :
Carsten: My apologies. I goof up my terms a lot. Local transit time would be better. It would be better to try and observe theses “Faint Fuzzy” umbraless SSN’s near local noontime to put atmospheric extinction at the minimum.
No worries. Yes that makes sense, at your latitude it the difference between transit is and zenith passage is small. Local noontime should indeed be local, disregarding summertime, adjusted for longitude etc. Local transit time works for all latitudes and longitudes.
I am at 43N and I have to observe between 1 hour before to 1 hour after solar transit in the sky. Even that doesn’t work any more. If I had adaptive optics hooked up, maybe.
One year ago I captured an SC24 spot
http://arnholm.org/astro/sun/sc24/sc24_spot_20080504_1010ut.jpg
http://arnholm.org/astro/sun/sc24/sun_20080503.jpg
Now the sun is high enough to try again, but I wonder if I will ever get the chance to see another one big enough….
Pamela Gray and Leif Svalgaard, thanks and I understand from you that Cycle 23 is “acting normally” and we are waiting and waiting on #24. My question is has the small variance in TSI declined in some small significant way such that there has been less heat/energy/irradiance for earth climate systems to use. As I look at Leif’s TSI Reconstruction Chart, it seems that total TSI might have declined since 1992.5. I feel certain this issue has been studied many times, but are there articles examining the tiny changes in TSI over time and the time lag of any consequences? I realize that this is only variable among many, but it seems like an essential one in any gathering of influences on climate. We focus so much on sunspots —