Dr. Nicola Scafetta writes:
Anthony, I believe that you may be interested in my last published work.
This paper suggests that climate is characterized by oscillations that are predictable. These oscillations appear to be linked to planetary motion. A climate model capable of reproducing these oscillation would outperform traditional climate models to reconstruct climate oscillations. For example, a statistical comparison is made with the GISS model.
Here’s the abstract at Sciencedirect:
Empirical evidence for a celestial origin of the climate oscillations and its implications
Abstract: We investigate whether or not the decadal and multi-decadal climate oscillations have an astronomical origin. Several global surface temperature records since 1850 and records deduced from the orbits of the planets present very similar power spectra. Eleven frequencies with period between 5 and 100 years closely correspond in the two records. Among them, large climate oscillations with peak-to-trough amplitude of about 0.1 $^oC$ and 0.25 $^oC$, and periods of about 20 and 60 years, respectively, are synchronized to the orbital periods of Jupiter and Saturn. Schwabe and Hale solar cycles are also visible in the temperature records. A 9.1-year cycle is synchronized to the Moon’s orbital cycles. A phenomenological model based on these astronomical cycles can be used to well reconstruct the temperature oscillations since 1850 and to make partial forecasts for the 21$^{st}$ century. It is found that at least 60\% of the global warming observed since 1970 has been induced by the combined effect of the above natural climate oscillations. The partial forecast indicates that climate may stabilize or cool until 2030-2040. Possible physical mechanisms are qualitatively discussed with an emphasis on the phenomenon of collective synchronization of coupled oscillators.
A free preprint copy of the paper can be found here:
http://arxiv.org/abs/1005.4639 (PDF available in right sidebar)
Basil Copeland and I made some similar observations in the past, but we did not examine other planetary orbital periods. Basil also did a follow up guest post on the random walk nature of global temperature.
This paper opens up a lot of issues, like Barycentrism, which I have tried to avoid because they are so contentious. I ask that commenters keep the dialog respectful and on-topic please.
NOTE: Updated at 10PM PST to add Figure 12, plus some changes to the introductory text per the request of Dr. Scafetta. – Anthony
Excellent, added it to the list,
700 Peer-Reviewed Papers Supporting Skepticism of “Man-Made” Global Warming Alarm
Hans Henrik Hansen said on June 4, 2010 at 2:38 pm:
Just think of him as a pioneering out-of-the-box against-the-establishment scientific thinker like Nikola Tesla. In a good way.
To me, this is more suggestive that global mean surface temperature is a cyclostationary stochastic process rather than a true random walk. But the conclusion would be the same. Cyclostationary SPs contain a unit root and therefore ordinary forms of regression analysis should not be used.
SimonH says:
June 4, 2010 at 2:40 pm
Could someone/anyone update me on the current state of play regarding Scafetta’s willingness to share his data/methods? Or was the whole thing just more fiction from RC in the first instance? I’d be delighted to have my concerns allayed in this respect.
I am not trying to answer for Dr. Scafetta but the data he is speaking of IS the JPL Horizons system. If Gavin wants the data, he, as anyone else, can go get all they want. Or, if Gavin has a few years on his hands he can get a very, very good integrator, self written generally proves the most accurate, and integrate the solar system, the sun, planets, and at least the largest five to nine asteroids. Integrate and check your accuracy against known occultations of stars, planets, asteroids on record to whatever accuracy he wishes. Have at it Gavin.
The rest is pure mathematics best I can tell unless Gavin can point a better finger. If I can do it, Gavin can do it, it only takes his time to understand.
Eric Gisin says:
June 4, 2010 at 2:01 pm
I see, astrology predicts climate.
Boy, I can tell you are not a scientist. This has to do with astronomy, not astrology.
@ur momisugly Carsten
I for one accept most of your criticism, and that the paper is as much a statement about our lack of knowledge as much as a theoretical proposal, except that I seem to remember someone (Semi Semerov?) saying that conservation of angular momentum was an implicit assumption of the way the JPL ephemeris is calculated. I’d be interested to find out more about that.
It seems to me that it’s a logical possibility that the energy transfer involved in a spin orbit coupling affecting the sun’s activity might be such a small proportion of the total angular momentum, that it could be hidden within the limits of error.
Just for fun, I’ll keep a gratuitous insult count on this thread.
Eric Gisin – Astrology
Steven Mosher – Numerology
Carsten Arnholm, Norway says:
June 4, 2010 at 3:32 pm
The Sun is also in free fall and feels no forces anyway, as Leif has explained many times.
Leif is wrong. It’s one of his Newtonian thought experiments which fails to take acoount of the fact that the sun is not a rigid point like object.
@ur momisugly steven mosher says: June 4, 2010 at 3:47 pm
“WRT cycles in GCMs. whatever natural cycles a GCM produces are almost always guaranteed to be somewhat out of phase with the observational record. Spinning up a GCM to a equilibrium ( no drift ) state will make reproducing short time scale processes/cycles difficult, if not impossible.”
This is an excuse for the GCMs being worthless.
“4. Because of #3, your best bet is probably to take an ensemble of results that is larger than the few runs that ModelE does.”
Why would the results be different each time? What in “climate physics” is random?
steven mosher says:
June 4, 2010 at 3:47 pm
1. I hope that Dr. Niki is more willing to share his code and data this time around. or will he use the same tactics he has in the past? The last go round we had with him he was as bad or worse than Jones or Mann.
Maybe it’s in the way you ask. Perhaps dissing the man as a “numerologist” in the same post isn’t the best entree to an open exchange of code.
CARSTEN..
“Correlations are just correlations”
Correlations which prove to have predictive power have an underlying cause worth discovering, don’t you think?
There is also another paper just published that works very closely in conjunction with Nicola Scaffetta’s paper. Planetary cycles are responsible for the internal climate modulation forces as well as the Solar output cycles.
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1005/1005.5303.pdf
There is some ground breaking stuff including a study showing how “Spin Orbit Coupling” is very possible through what has been found as missing angular momentum in our solar system.
Nicola’s latest paper will become a cornerstone of our future understanding of the climate system.
The physical mechanisms that would explain this result are
still unknown. Perhaps the four jovian planets modulate solar
activity via gravitational and magnetic forces that cause tidal and
angular momentum stresses on the Sun and its heliosphere. Then,
a varying Sun modulates climate, which amplifies the effects of
the solar input through several feedback mechanisms. This
phenomenon is mostly regulated by Jupiter and Saturn, plus
some important contribution from Neptune and Uranus, which
modulate a bi-secular cycle with their 172 year synodic period.
Scafetta’s very interesting paper is marred by obvious misuse of the signal-analysis term “coherence.” That spectral metric is defined by the square root of the expression (C^2+Q^2 )/P1P2, where C is the co-spectrum, Q is the quadrature-spectrum and the Ps are the power densities of the two signals. Surely a different term for Scafetta’s unorthodox comparison would avoid much confusion.
An interesting paper, an earlier poster did make a pertinent point, it doesn’t point to any physical mechanisms. I’d say its early yet for any definitive statements, but it is indeed interesting. In spite of Mr. Mosher’s snide tone, he raises a good question, “What does this ” model” retrodict for the MWP?” I’d like to see an answer for that, also. And, as we all know, out performing GISS is, well, a starting point. I appreciate Tallbloke’s “spin” on the energy source, I hadn’t thought of that earlier. (Heh, that’s my punny for the day!) At the very least, this is one of many papers that show our climate is basically cyclic and there is a correlation with orbits and astral bodies and if it isn’t part of the causation, then it points to a much more coherent, purposeful universe. Unless one would believe it is a coincidental happenstance. I for one am not a believer in the “order from chaos” school of thought.
Meanwhile Hathaway has once again reviewed his SC24 prediction, now down to 65 SSN.
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/predict.shtml
He is also not scared to predict a Dalton-like minimum, the planetary cycles are showing exactly that. These predictions have been in place for years, it is only now that the other side of solar science is beginning to come on board (they have no choice)
James Sexton says:
June 4, 2010 at 5:28 pm
I’d say its early yet for any definitive statements, but it is indeed interesting. In spite of Mr. Mosher’s snide tone, he raises a good question, “What does this ” model” retrodict for the MWP?” I’d like to see an answer for that, also.
I think there is a distinction between internal climate cycles and solar grand minima. The MWP is a period without grand minima. The planetary cycles also synchronize with this rare event.
James Sexton says:
June 4, 2010 at 5:28 pm
I’d say its early yet for any definitive statements, but it is indeed interesting. In spite of Mr. Mosher’s snide tone, he raises a good question, “What does this ” model” retrodict for the MWP?” I’d like to see an answer for that, also.
I think there is a distinction between internal climate cycles and solar grand minima. The MWP is a period without grand minima. The planetary cycles also synchronize with this rare event.
tallbloke says:
June 4, 2010 at 4:47 pm
Leif is wrong. It’s one of his Newtonian thought experiments which fails to take acoount of the fact that the sun is not a rigid point like object.
How can a point-like object be anything but rigid? If you stretch it, it won’t be point like any longer!
It has seemed to me like a plausible idea that solar system gravitational forces could produce tidal stress in the sun producing variations in the sun’s behavior. Who would think that the moon could produce such a tidal variation in the earth’s oceans without actually having seen the result? The relative position of the sun and moon will also produce differences in the tidal cycles.
What are the arguments against these forces being present for the sun in a way which will affect solar behavior and output in any substantial way?
sky wrote: “Scafetta’s […] obvious misuse of the signal-analysis term “coherence.””
Different fields, same terms, different use. No one field or branch of a field has a monopoly. Hence: Dictionaries have multiple entries for single terms (and dictionaries don’t always keep pace with developments).
Carsten Arnholm, Norway, June 4, 2010 at 3:32 pm, says:
I’m not sure I understand. The Earth is also in free fall; yet the Moon — which is likewise in free fall — causes tides. It would seem obvious to me that the Sun’s plasma would be affected in some way by the gravitational forces of its satellites, no?
Some of the interesting standout points for Nicola’s paper are the multitude of references depicting a quasi-60 year climate cycle including the known PDO cycle that lineup with the solar velocity modulations and LOD plots.
These are concrete observations that can be used for predictive purposes, the physical mechanisms are getting closer by the day.
After 6000 years of Astrology/Astronomy predicting weather over months, years, decades and centuries there are some that think this might have some basis in fact.
We don’t need climate computer models, we have the Farmer’s Almanac. 🙂
I still don’t understand the hang-ups about theories describing tidal forces acting upon a fluid object (barycentrics). It seems perfectly logical to me that the object would enjoy a higher rotation rate and less frictional losses when spinning about its gravitational center when its own center is near tidal center than when being nudged in one direction or another due to tidal forces. It’s intuitively clear as a bell.
I do understand difficulty in translating that to solar output, field strength, or whatever with a well defined theory given such a chaotic input, lag, etc, but when so many make reasonably clear correlations with other celestial objects, I don’t see a major issue. In other words, it’s not a huge stumbling block for me to see correlation, suppose there must causation of some sort, and still be at a loss for root cause. Given enough evidence of correlation, it only means we’re incapable of discerning / measuring the core factors that give rise to causation. I think that’s interesting as hell, even if we can’t ascribe direct links to causation. I don’t have a major problem accepting that we’re not smart enough to understand every link between observation and root cause. More knowledge and theory required to bridge the gap. no problem.
Wow, that was close. I almost wrote a government grant proposal.
Carsten again:
Ahh, but there are correlations and correlations —
Svensmark & Shaviv — solar wind/cosmic ray flux, all periods from months to millions of years
Scafetta — planetary motion, presumably affecting solar activity, 150 years in detail
Hansen & The Team — CO2-driven warming, 25 years at the end of the 20th Century, and the model is wrong even for Venus
Steven Mosher asserts:
The problem is “compared to what?” Even though it has been diddled in unknown ways, HadCRUT (with its American friends) is the only available “global” record spanning long enough to clearly identify low-frequency cycles. There are lots of regional possibilities, and good proxy reconstructions (e.g. Loehle), but inherent uncertainty makes them dicey for clear decade-scale cyclic analysis.
In fact, we won’t really have any reliable data for medium-term analysis until around 2100, when scientists freezing in their offices because of cap-and-tax will have a century of ARGO and satellite data to play with. Until then, Dr. S and everybody else will have to wing it with the best data at hand, however squirrelly it may be.
Eric Gisin says (June 4, 2010 at 2:01 pm): “I see, astrology predicts climate.”
I will keep an open mind but I think you may be right. Kepler did a lot of work trying to correlate weather and astrological phenomena like the positions of the other plants. He finally admitted that he did not find much. He was not a big believer is astrology, but was not above using it to pay the bills. (I read this is a biography of Kepler by Casper many years ago but don’t have it in front of me now.)
I’ve only looked over NS’s paper briefly. It you take any times series and look for cycles and compare with the myriad of astrological cycles you may find some matches. But this is coincidental not causative. Astrologers ofter cite Junk’s ideas about synchronicity. If NS can show his model is predictive there might be more to it. I won’t have time to read it until Sunday. (The section on possible physical cause and the curve fitting in section 5 look fishy, but I’ll see.) As far as I know the journal is credible.