Solar, Terrestrial, & Lunisolar Components of Rate of Change of Length of Day

Thank you for this, Paul.
Have you had a chance to review “Solar Minima, Earth’s rotation and Little Ice Ages in the past and in the future The North Atlantic–European case”?
I think you will find it quite interesting if you have not.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VF0-4Y7P4NS-2&_user=10&_coverDate=07%2F31%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=gateway&_origin=gateway&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_searchStrId=1713037503&_rerunOrigin=google&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=591a5ac3b099dd4c0ac2ff0f9ec45a36&searchtype=a
Email me at sharkhearted@gmail.com and I will send you a copy.
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA

Wow, I read the whole thing. The graphics look good, but what is with the techno speak, I need a “Solar, Terrestrial, & Lunisolar Components of Rate of Change of Length of Day” for DUMMIES post.

Very interesting work and glad to see Leroux’s work in good place!

I know that the length of day varies with wind and changing ocean currents and it is getting longer due to the moon, I also know that the variation in length of day is very small(fractions of a second).Do these very small changes alter the temperature of the earth?Some claim that the Sun alters wind patterns such as the jet stream if it does then it is obvious that it will have some correlation with the length of day.How do you fit solar cycles so precisely to the length of day ?(the lod measurements must have error bars).

I have a few questions for anyone who is willing to answer (to see if people are absorbing the message):
1) How would you crudely go about isolating the semi-annual + annual wave using nothing but simple (boxcar) averaging?

Leif Svalgaard, wrote [of Le Mouël, Blanter, Shnirman, & Courtillot (2010)], “Second, the data is heavily smoothed [4-year sliding window which reduces the number of degrees of freedom enormously and makes the data points very dependent on each other].”
As I’ve explained in a recent WUWT thread, I don’t think they chose their extent with proper cognizance of the properties of the time series. They did, however, get “close enough” to optimal to harness the pattern.
I’ve varied the wavelet extent parameter and found that there’s a fairly wide range around the optimum that will capture the pattern. Base on intuition, this is in absolutely no way surprising.

Thanks Paul,
Well and concisely put together, trying to make progress into the mechanics behind the drivers of climate, would be harder with out a good understanding of these basic Solar, Terrestrial, & Lunisolar harmonic interactions, and their further application to the longer periods of climate periodicities of oscillations.
You do the world a service in helping others to gain a good understanding of how the rest of the interplanetary harmonic interactions, that drive the decadal and longer period cycles, and to extend the thinking to the similarly inter-modulated Inner planet, solar, and moon harmonic period.
As opposed to the longer period cycles of synod conjunction of the outer planets, which jointly swings the sun and the inner planetary system, around the SSB which beats the two long period set together, the inner planets at a rate of once every 17.95 Years and the outer planets periodicity of ~179.5 years.

Leif Svalgaard wrote [of Le Mouël, Blanter, Shnirman, & Courtillot (2010)], “Third, the cosmic ray data compared with are not correct. They seem to have been manipulated to improve the fit, as previously pointed out.”
NO manipulations have been performed on the cosmic ray data presented here:
Vaughan, P.L. (2010). Semi-annual solar-terrestrial power.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/23/confirmation-of-solar-forcing-of-the-semi-annual-variation-of-length-of-day/
Direct links to the CR graphs:
1) http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/vaughn_lod_fig1a.png
2) http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/vaughn_lod_fig1b.png

Multimoment multiscale spatiotemporal integration reveals nonrandom harmonic pattern-summary discontinuities, exposing the comedy tragically advocated by deceitful &/or naive theoreticians who are in part constrained by a dominant culture that clings seemingly religiously to maladaptive traditions such as unjustifiable assumptions of randomness, independence, uniformity, linearity, etc. that are routinely misapplied (for example to conveniently render abstract conceptions mathematically tractable).

Paul, I am fascinated by your work but I can never understand it well enough to reach the point where I can begin to cross-check it, except to note that it looks as if there really are significant harmonic resonance patterns. If you want to avoid “corrupt science” taking it over, it would help if you made your work accessible to ordinary intelligent generalists (like Willis E). I think if you did this, your dark desire to rant against scientists would actually mostly evaporate.
Focus on straightforward communication – please!

Richard Holle says:
April 10, 2011 at 11:29 pm
the inner planets at a rate of once every 17.95 Years and the outer planets periodicity of ~179.5 years.
Not technically correct, Jose when looking at the data only went back several hundred years. The 4 outer planets never really come back to the same position, but they roughly come back to a similar position on average about every 172 years, or the rough synodic period of Uranus & Neptune.

Carla says:
April 11, 2011 at 5:37 am
Carla, the queen of left field 🙂
Asteroids are numerous but have no real effect on planetary systems in this current age other than posing potential threats to life. The 4 outer planets only, have the clout to make solar system changes on big scales in my way of thinking, but leaving the door open re the inner planets on solar cycle length.
On the magnetic front, I see no evidence of any planetary magnetic feedback. The Tsunami like solar wind obliterates all.

While the above article provides much detail I have been unable to discern what amount of time is denoted by the verticle scale of the graphs.
Is the +/- 1 a second, a dimensionless number or a nanosecond?
While it may be possible to torture numerological correlations from the LOD data and the quasi-periodic SOI or other observations – zonal high wind etc – that corellation only has any possibility of indicating a causal relationship rather than a coincidental one if the physical processes can be defined that operate.
If, as I suspect, the energy in Joules of these variations is several orders of magnitude smaller than the solar varation around the 11 year cycle or the extra downwelling energy measured from the extra CO2 then it is ridiculous to ascribe causation to something that has no chance of influencing the processes because its energy signiture is way below the level of many other influences.
So what change in energy received at the surface do the graphs indicate ?

Lucy Skywalker suggests, “[…] it would help if you made your work accessible to ordinary intelligent generalists […]”
Solid conceptual understanding of the effect of integration across harmonics is something folks will have to develop independently. Then it’s dead simple (and the results can be reproduced in mere minutes).
The target audience of these communications may not be the one you prefer, but I sincerely appreciate your interest in the topic.
Best Regards.

2 more questions (slightly more advanced):
3) Did Le Mouël, Blanter, Shnirman, & Courtillot (2010) make the most sensible choice of window width (1 month) when isolating the semi-annual to annual timescale derivative series?
Hint: …or did they just come “close enough” somehow?
4) Are the optimal kernel widths determined by maximal correlation (with CR) or by dominant temporal modes of the mean & variance (of LOD’)?

Re: izen
The vertical scales are normalized to optimize visualization. As a contribution to this multidisciplinary discussion, I explore data, leaving physics to physicists & other qualified parties. A limiting factor in quantitative musings about physical mechanisms is insufficient human knowledge of clouds (and hence insolation [not to be confused with irradiance]]). Producing yet more estimates based on untenable assumptions is not the answer. That the atmosphere experiences thermal as well as gravitational tides is accepted. Given the public’s growing awareness of the spatiotemporal cloud/circulation issue, assumptions such as uniformity are now a deal-breaking problem for advocates of oversimplified models. The data have spoken. Are the physical modelers listening? Or do they remain caught in the deep grooves of their abstract imaginations?
Best Regards.

Carla says:
April 11, 2011 at 5:37 am
Geoff Sharp says:
April 11, 2011 at 1:38 am
~
Question for Geoff, bit off the topic here or not..
The Earth has a roid, asteroid that is orbiting in its zone.
They are saying that this roid has a “horseshoe” type orbit. Now how can that be, Geoff? Check out the orbit of this thing Geoff.
Astronomers Find Newly Discovered Asteroid is Earth’s Companion
http://www.arm.ac.uk/press/2011/aac_horseshoe_orbit.html
————————————————————————————————————-;
The asteroid has a circular orbit around the Sun but at a different speed than the Earth so the motion appears to be like a horse shoe orbit when viewed from Earth. Even the planets at times appear to have retrograde orbits when viewed from the Earth.

A little history on some of these concepts might be of interest. I worked for several years (in the 1970s) at a “polar motion” observatory in Mizusawa Japan (International Latitude Observatory – ILO). The ILO at Mizusawa for many years had been using optical methods to determine the Chandler period (an approximate 14 month cycle of the earth’s pole through about 8 to 12 meter circles). The Chandler phenomenon (1891) was discovered over 100 years ago and from just a few years before 1900 a small group of world wide observatories located in the northern hemisphere spread in longitude along latitude 39 deg N began observing latitude shift of zenith stars. The observed shift (in latitude) appeared as an approximate sine wave of about 14 months long. My support was to use satellite based geodesy methods to obtain the same information in spite of cloudy bad weather conditions which limited optical data quantity and quality. This network grew to a multi-station, multi-nation system with the Paris observatory eventually becoming the headquarters of the International Earth Rotation Service – IERS. Just to let you understand that earth rotation variation has a time component and a spatial component.
I wonder if we might be able to tie some of the pole spatial movement effects to other physical elements – especially climate effects (and polar tides)? It is well known that one the drivers of the pole speed and position is the atmosphere (as well as ocean currents, magma, gravity, extra-terrestrial effects, etc.)
Bernie

The replies have covered a lot of ground and raised a lot of questions, too much to cover fully on WUWT. Nor does Paul say all.
Background.
The work is Paul Vaughan’s where I was using the effect of years of technical work and experience to produce numbers and models for him. There is cross discipline involved. I only understand part of what he is doing.
In this case Paul emailed out of the blue with an xls containing data attached and more or less what could I do with it. I recognised the data as daily LoD first difference, hence first data point 2nd Jan 1962 but that is all I know, nor have I checked which version of LoD nor how exactly Paul produced it.
Since then a few emails and attachments have bounced between us as we drove to whatever Paul wanted and found mutually compatible file formats.
First I knew about what Paul was up to other than he was going to published something was seeing the WUWT post.
Tools used.
Over some years I have developed unique software intended for use on climatic kind of data. Some of this goes back to a novel development for commercial usage during the 1980s. Some think I am nuts to write this in C; there are several very solid reasons.
The key to the result is a selective non discrete Fourier Transform created by data matching discrete input data (qualifications there are critical). This outputs the parameters for matched Fourier terms and a spreadsheet model of the matched data. (it doesn’t have to be Fourier but this is usually best and is used here)
A spreadsheet row comprises an inverse transform, simply the sum of computed terms for that index value, in this case a decimal date. It is literally simple.
Column meaning: –
index sum-of-terms+offset term1 term2 term3 .. termx
Multiple rows with say a one month index increment, plot sum column against index column and you have a computed monthly time series. The spreadsheet maths engine is doing the result computation from the parameters and formula. The software derived the parameters and wrote out two rows of the formula, copy and paste extends this as the user wants. Conceptually simple.
Why a fancy way of doing a Fourier Transform?
There are finite limits on the capability of a DFT (discrete fourier transform) which is the only kind that can be done on discrete data (regularly sampled in time). The time increment defines the width of each output value, called bin as in garbage bin, where a transform outputs a long row of them, one for each frequency it is capable of showing. This means the numbers are approximate, only is within that bin which has a finite width. Accurate phase is very hard to compute.
The values can to some extent be improved by interpolation and other trickery but this only goes so far.
A further problem is the need to Window the input data, a large subject.
Very roughly I am subtracting the contents of a bin from the input data and fine tuning the frequency, phase and amplitude for zero error. Those are the answer. the limits of binning are to a degree sidestepped: the bins have zero width, just that there not very many of them. (useful results in practice tend to 3 to 30 bin range)
It is also possible to put more than one item in a single bin and this spins off into ambiguity and validity, where the human brain is necessary.
In this case the presence of doublets (two very closely spaced (eg. 0.25%) frequencies) and more makes the problem interesting. When computed this turns out to mean 18.6 years… get the idea?
Put simply, it works.
In this case the input data has chronometric causes (orbitals) and therefore the model will be predictive (not been confirmed).

Here is an extended version of the PDF PV mentioned, on WP servers.
Might help as a starting point.
http://daedalearth.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/comment-on-pv3-a.pdf

George E. Smith says on April 11, 2011 at 10:58 am

“”””” netdr2 says:
April 11, 2011 at 7:45 am
The LOD also should vary due to sea level rise. [It is like the figure skater that pulls her arms in to spin faster.]
Axel Moerner claims that the effect of rising sea levels on LOD limits the sea level rise to 1.1 MM per year or 1 cigarette length per century.
Is he right ? “””””
Well hardly.
Sea level rises because water flows down hill. so that means that a water mass that was previously rotating at a larger radius about earth axis, has now moved down to a lower orbit; namely sea level. So the global moment of inertia must go down, not up, with sea level rise. If there is any LOD change, it would be a shortening.

Isn’t one of the components of sea-level rise due to thermal expansion of the water?
Secondly, most of the ice that will melt and contribute to sea-level rise is currently closer to the spin axis than it would be if it were uniformly distributed across the surface of the planet… so, I am not sure it would lead to a shortening of the LOD but I am willing to be persuaded otherwise.

Leif Svalgaard says:
April 11, 2011 at 8:06 am
Geoff Sharp says:
April 11, 2011 at 6:21 am
On the magnetic front, I see no evidence of any planetary magnetic feedback. The Tsunami like solar wind obliterates all.
Something we can agree on.
~
I was going to mention Geoff, that you were sounding a bit like Dr. S.
Not the point. The “Princess” in left field, is suggestingt that the closer your dipole is to the energy source ‘within’ your system, the more influence the solar electra magno reconnection regime, well have upon it. Saturn’s dipole looks undecided..like maybe he’s the queen in left field, with a by directional dipole depending on ISMF forces present in Saturn’s orbital field of ref..or somethin like that. Ah yep that would change Saturns LOD. lol..
But seriously .. how would you slow down ionospheric plasmas moving across field lines? I have read that the ionosphere is coupled to the solar wind IMF. And the ionosphere is coupled to this rotating electro dynamo. The ionosphere is suggested to be directly coupled with the polar vortex and may vary it by strong variations of ionospheric winds. Seems lately we have seen a stalling of regional weather systems moving across the N. Hem, causing an unusually shaped jetstream. . kinda like its being forced back down. . lost connection?

“”””” Richard Sharpe says:
April 11, 2011 at 11:18 am
George E. Smith says on April 11, 2011 at 10:58 am
“”””” netdr2 says:
April 11, 2011 at 7:45 am
The LOD also should vary due to sea level rise. [It is like the figure skater that pulls her arms in to spin faster.]
Axel Moerner claims that the effect of rising sea levels on LOD limits the sea level rise to 1.1 MM per year or 1 cigarette length per century.
Is he right ? “””””
Well hardly.
Sea level rises because water flows down hill. so that means that a water mass that was previously rotating at a larger radius about earth axis, has now moved down to a lower orbit; namely sea level. So the global moment of inertia must go down, not up, with sea level rise. If there is any LOD change, it would be a shortening.
Isn’t one of the components of sea-level rise due to thermal expansion of the water?
Secondly, most of the ice that will melt and contribute to sea-level rise is currently closer to the spin axis than it would be if it were uniformly distributed across the surface of the planet… so, I am not sure it would lead to a shortening of the LOD but I am willing to be persuaded otherwise. “””””
Tut tut Richard; I know you are sharper than that. You are contemplating that the melt water unaided, by human hand can actually run uphill to a higher potential energy location.
Is not the (mean) surface a gravitational equipotential surface. As far as the earth is concerned it is gravitationally flat. Yes it does have some rather large periodic bumps in it caused by tides and weather; but over the course of a thirty year climate period, it is quite flat.

The LOD varies during the year as the earth speeds up and slows down in its orbit round the Sun but its rotation period is not affected by its solar orbit.I think that graphs are showing the apparent LOD during the year not just the actual rotation of the Earth.

I always knew the global economy was run by Lunatics! Every 9 years (approx) there is a collapse in the world’s domestic land markets (corresponding to the Lunar Apse Cycle = 8.85 years) and every 18 years there is a huge collapse into economic depression as the commercial, agricultural and (again) domestic land markets die more or less together (which corresponds to the Lunar Nodal Cycle= 18.6 years).
In 1801, Herschel announced he had spotted a correlation between sunspots and wheat prices. Now we have a correlation between economic cycles and rates of change in Length of Day Lunar cycles (sunspots involved too!—gosh, they do get around!)
🙂
It’s all driven by sunspots and the moon!

“”””” Richard Sharpe says:
April 11, 2011 at 1:45 pm
George says:
Tut tut Richard; I know you are sharper than that. You are contemplating that the melt water unaided, by human hand can actually run uphill to a higher potential energy location.
No. Simply that the earth is approximately a shere rotating on its axis. “””””
Well of course the earth is not a rotating sphere; it is an oblate spheroid, that is flatter at the poles. I’m sure this flattening is largely a direct result of the earth rotating on its axis. If the earth wqas not rotating on its axis at 1000 mph at the equator it would not be oblate it would be more speherical. The earth’s shape is such that on average it is not uphill in any direction. There is no reason for ocean water to run north and south to the poles becaue the altitude there is lower. Gravitationally, the poles are not any lower than the equator, and there is no gravitation reason for water to run from the equator tyo the poles. Well it does on the surface of course; but then it returns towards the bottom depths, so that there is no net flow. The ocean surface at the equator is as far downhill as it can possibly get on the long term averaged earth. So melting of ice on land, or precipitation from the atmosphere can only decrease the moment of inertia, so the rotation speeds up as land ice melts, and runs down to sea level. It doesn’t matter whether it is Antarctic polar ice, or tropical ice from Mt Kilimajaro, it will go down hill locally, and the zero datum is the same everywhere due to the earth not being a rigid body, on geological time scales.

Thanks to all who have contributed to the discussion.
Best Regards,
Paul Vaughan.

Its always a little disappointing if you ask a question that gets no answer. You suspect the question was ‘wrong’ or irrelevant in some way…
But it is FAR more frustrating when you ask a question and you get an reply that appears to avoid giving a meaningful answer.
@-Paul Vaughan says:
April 11, 2011 at 8:10 am
“The vertical scales are normalized to optimize visualization. As a contribution to this multidisciplinary discussion, I explore data, leaving physics to physicists & other qualified parties.”
I had asked what time-period was represented by the vertical scale on the graphs and what amount of energy variation this implied. This on the basis that as in politics its follow the money, in science its follow the energy.
This reply clearly does nothing to answer the question – very disappointing.
Perhaps somebody else can answer what amount of time all these curves actually represent ?

“But it is FAR more frustrating when you ask a question and you get an reply that appears to avoid giving a meaningful answer.”
Agreed.
“Normalising” to a non-dimensional scale does not in any way change the graph , hence it in no way “optimize visualization”. What it does do is make interpretation of the data impossible. Labelling an axis [-1:1] is meaningless , it may as well have no scale or label.
I have no time at all for graphs without meaningful quantities on the axes.
The changes in LOD are probably something like microseconds per year , which makes the idea that it affects climate laughable. I expect such a presentation to tell me that not hide it.
The fact that you did not get a clear reply to a simple question and the false “optimisation” argument says a lot about the author’s objectivity and openness.
He should probably apply some of his vitriolic criticism of mainstream science to his own efforts.

Leif Svalgaard says:

In physics we deal in dimensions [units], not grain. Temperature is just another way of expressing the Wattage per unit area.
Both TSI and average temperature can be determined at any given time and two time series can be formed, so both vary in time [one as the fourth power of the other].

Where I studies physics temperature was measured in kelvin which is in no way “just another way of expressing” watt/metre*2 . I don’t know what you are trying to say here but the way you said it is clearly wrong.
Equally TSI may be simplistically said to be related to T*4 of the sun. But where the “average temperature” in question is that of the earth your comment is “as wrong as can be”.
As a supposed correction to ferd berple’s comment that is a surprisingly messy effort from someone of your level of competence.

oops, that should have read:
Isn’t that exactly fred’s point? That what is being done with climate weather station data is combining a whole lot of very unequal data sets.
So it looks like your comment is says that compiling a global average is not the kind of thing real scientists would do (only economists). Despite declaring fred’s comment “nonsense” you appear to endorse what he is saying.

The agenda dances,
and personal stances,
of all become clear,
reading down to here,
nice to see all present,
have their own mindset.

Regarding P. Solar’s comments about smoothing & Leif Svalgaard’s comments about degrees of freedom:
Have either of you noticed that LOD’ is clearly not a random time series? Suggestion: Do a color-contoured time-integrated autocorrelation plot for some insight. Clearer awareness of the effect of integration across harmonics is needed (rather than reliance on rote memorization of procedures advocated by some for dealing with less well-structured time series).

P. Solar charged, “vitriolic criticism”
On the contrary, I have volunteered an objective assessment.

P. Solar, what is at issue is not what some abstractly-idealized time-filter does, but rather what the Earth does.

Re: Richard Holle
“…Workin’ on a mystery,
Goin’ wherever it leads…” – Tom Petty

Leif
What comes in must go out
No, that’s what heat capacity is about. Some of what comes in can remain in the ocean for centuries. On a very long time scale on avarage what comes in must go out, but not on a decadal scale.

Leif
No need to complicate this. ΔT=q/C says T is determined by J. TSI is J/s and has to be integrated to become J, very simple.
The GCR-LOD link is not a A causing B, it’s a case of C causing both A and B. The planets accelerate both the Sun and the Earth, changing the rotation of both. Probably the same with sun-climate link.

Dr. Svalgaard you are a man of immense patience it seems. Hope some of this sinks in around here so that there is less noise and more real science.

“”””” A G Foster says:
April 11, 2011 at 8:54 pm
Lots of confusion around here. One poster confuses LOD=sunrise to sunset with sidereal LOD, equals one spin of the earth relative to a star. I’m surprised at George Smith, but I will try to enlighten him. When polar ice melts the earth changes shape: mass (ice) which was concentrated at the poles, with a short arm of inertia, is spread evenly around the ocean surface, averaging something like 63 degrees latitude. If the the mantel were totally elastic nothing would happen, but it isn’t. It is part elastic, part plastic, so there is an instantaneous change of shape (more oblate) followed by slow inelastic recovery (back to round, or oblate spheroid). The earth has been speeding up in recent years due to Glacial Isostatic Adjustment from a combination of the Last Glacial Maximum and the Little Ice Age. “””””
I’ll have to think on that.
We are constantly told that when all the Greenland ice slips off into the ocean and melts that the Greenland land will rebound.
Presumably a similar thing happens if the Antarctic ice melts, and if the weight of all that ice stops pushing on Antarctica, so it rises, surely the equatorial radius of the earth will diminish.
If the ice caps are currently melting as we are assured by the NSIDC is happening, then your scenario would be happening, so the earth should be slowing down; yet you say it is speeding up.
It’s not clear to me you’ve made your case; but as I said, I will think on it.
Should not the earth be slowing down due to the recession of the moon, and the transfer of angular momentum from earth to moon ?

Re: izen
You appear to be under the impression that some relations are controversial to the mainstream when in fact they are well accepted by the mainstream. See for example the literature links I listed above. Here’s another:
Zhou, Y.H.; Zheng, D.W.; & Liao, X.H. (2001). Wavelet analysis of interannual LOD, AAM, and ENSO: 1997-98 El Nino and 1998-99 La Nina signals. Journal of Geodesy 75, 164-168.
http://202.127.29.4/yhzhou/ZhouYH_2001JG_LOD_ENSO_wavelet.pdf
I appreciate your interest in these phenomena. Thanks sincerely for your contributions to the discussion.

lgl, Leif is correct that I might have some issues with your conceptions of heat storage & lags. However, I’ve miles of data exploration to go before I will be anywhere near a point where I can appropriately articulate my suspicions about multidecadal variations.

George E. Smith says:
April 12, 2011 at 3:49 pm
“”””” A G Foster says:
April 11, 2011 at 8:54 pm
..The earth has been speeding up in recent years due to Glacial Isostatic Adjustment from a combination of the Last Glacial Maximum and the Little Ice Age..
~
The melting of the ice and perma frost over that period has also helped to increase the Earth’s surface electric potential. Ice is not a good conductor..
~
Leif Svalgaard says:
April 11, 2011 at 1:38 pm
..closer your dipole is to the energy source ‘within’ your system, the more influence the solar electra magno reconnection regime, well have upon it.
The sun does influence the planets magnetically, but not the other way around. The planets and the interstellar medium do not influence the Sun via magnetic forces..
~
The Interstellar Magnetic Field shapes the heliosphere. That in itself is an influence upon it. The primary reconnection zone at the nose of the heliosphere is very simular to the reconnecton process we experience daily several times a time here at Earth. They think one of the differences in the reconnection processes is that the the sun is capable of more multiple reconnection regions. The primary being at the nose in the direction of solar orbit. Maybe that unravelling knot at the edge of the bubble was just a diminishing reconnection site.

Leif, every time I find a new comment from you there are a dozen more misunderstandings to address. Looking at millions of things won’t help if you’ve got your fundamentals wrong. As I’ve indicated, you’re using a different definition of extent than the one to which I was introduced by the post-secondary education system (at both undergraduate & graduate level in different departments at different universities). You also appear in comments you address to Tim Channon to misunderstand that his synthesizer has isolated the 11 year pattern. It has not, but the more important misunderstanding is on the definition of extent. Looking at “the superposition of millions” isn’t necessarily going to improve your vision if you & your colleagues have overlooked something fundamental.

So now Le Mouel et al. would be a good choice. A few comments back it was not:
Third, the cosmic ray data compared with are not correct. They seem to have been manipulated to improve the fit
Regardless, it’s just absurd that basic physics should stop functioning beyond 11 years periods. And my own graphs of long-term changes do show that Temp~Integral of TSI http://virakkraft.com/TSI-integral-temp.png

“”””” Carla says:
April 13, 2011 at 5:40 am
George E. Smith says:
April 12, 2011 at 3:49 pm “””””
Not sure just what it was I said, that you are referring to Carla. I found nothing following the above that was anything that I said.

Leif
Ok ΔT=q/C is not true and J=J/s
Try explaining your pseudo-science to guys working in the field and publishing. These for instance: http://www.wri.org/publication/content/7684 How many publications do you have on the oceans thermal inertia? But of course you know this too better than the specialists anyway.

A G Foster wrote, “[…] Richard Gross […] I understand he is now working on the ice problem.”
Excellent news. Thanks for sharing.

izen wrote,
“I had got things COMPLETELY inverted as to what you might be claiming here.
For some reason I had infered that there was some claim that the variation in day length had some causal influence on SOI, ENSO and Zonal winds. […] thought you were claiming a causal path from LOD to climate, rather than the other way round.”
I get that reaction a lot and I find the reaction itself quite interesting.
The sign of the phase relationship between interannual SOI & interannual LOD is not static as many seem to think. SOI is just a part of AAM (a big part, but certainly not the only part). In studying interannual phase relations of various climate indices, the interesting thing is the nonrandom distribution of phase differences. There is a preference for co-phasing or anti-phasing (with switching). Loosely speaking, this is something like the eddies on opposite sides of a global jet swirling in opposite directions (…and then the position of the jet moves).
I haven’t presented related results here, but they are a much bigger topic than the current post. There is coherence with the rate of change of solar variables. The ‘messy’ aspect of the 11 year envelope we’ve been discussing relates to these changes. I’ve audited many claims about cycles since November 2007 and pursued many curiosities arising along the way; most of them run into dead ends of one form or another, but the ones I describe in this comment keep getting cleaner as I look more carefully (an activity for which I no longer have much time, unfortunately).
Thank you sincerely for your thoughtful comments.

George
Right, in an ‘ideal’ setting it will be precisely one quarter of a cycle. In real world there are losses so it will always be a little less than 1/4. Temp will peak when the net energy transfer goes below average and not when the solar input goes below average.

Leif, you seem to be using the word extent the way many people use the word global (i.e. to refer to the whole series).
Here’s what I wrote above:
“Extent is a term which concisely encompasses the properties of spatiotemporal summary windows.”
There are bodies of literature, books, courses, etc. on the variation of pattern measures with variations in the properties of spatiotemporal summary windows.
Your choice to label people pursuing such legitimate work as a “cult” was in poor taste.
Let’s get this nonsense over with.
While I don’t have time to write an essay or short course for you, I can ask a pointed question to diagnose your deficiency. (If you were not so defiant & intransigent [“learning resistant” as you would say] – and if I had more time – I might be more patient, but under the circumstances I need to be practical…)
…So let me ask:
1) If you average pressure over some region of the world – and then you move the spatial window to another region while making it a different shape & size, will you necessarily get the same summary?
2) If you do a wavelet analysis with Morlet 2pi and then do the same analysis with Morlet 10pi, will you necessarily get the same summaries?
These are just 2 off-the-cuff examples with the answer “no”.
Elaborating succinctly is challenging (but maybe we are identifying here an important challenge for educators …discussion generally goes on for hours when profs introduce these concepts to newcomers)
In landscape ecology, a problem field researchers were having was that they were getting COMPLETELY different results depending on what summary windows they used (Simpson’s Paradox). This is no trivial matter warranting rude labeling of serious researchers – doing legitimate & IMPORTANT research – as a “cult” [Leif Svalgaard’s term].
Depending on the nature of the spatiotemporal heterogeneity, there can be abrupt scale breaks as one adjusts windowing parameters. Many researchers have never taken time to think about this carefully, in part perhaps because formal education on the subject remains in its infancy, still working its way in from the periphery on the mainstream radar.
I suggest taking some time to run systematic investigations, paying attention to how scale-dependent (window scale, to clarify) integration over harmonics (using a variety of kernels) affects summaries.
For those playing around with GIS (Geographic Information Systems), systematically investigate how changes of summary window sizes & shapes change pattern summary. (This exercise should give some idea of the importance of the main point raised by Schwing, Jiang, & Mendelssohn (2003).)

A G Foster says:
April 12, 2011 at 10:55 am
I always have a hard time navigating the IERS site, but here’s an easy reference for the tinkering novice–the latest LOD (up to 3900 days) with or without tidal variations (best to remove them for annual variations–not for stat analysis)
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Great – I’ll take a look. Thanks for posting the URL.

Tim Channon wrote, “[…] I assume no-one is interested in an elephant.”
–
“Even on a cloudy day,
I keep my eyes fixed on the sun.” – Cage the Elephant.

I think that the observed length of day is more real than the lod measured by radio telescopes using distant quasars,the fact that the Earths orbit is elliptical and that the Earth is inclined to the rotation gives us real changes here on Earth(just because something is more accurate does not mean more relevant).Why the precise rotation of the Earth varies I could speculate though not in the complicated statistical way used here.I think that statistical speculation is replacing real science in climate science ,because it is impossible to to experimentally test any theory apparently, then everything is judged on how clever your computer models are.

Leif
“So is TSI” exactly, and J/s will tell how fast temperature is increasing. What you are saying is you can find the temperature of the water in a kettle just by looking at the wattage input. You are right only after equilibrium is reached and in the case of the ocean that is centuries, for a small imbalance. I don’t have more time for this nonsense, all this plotting you know 🙂

Leif
And it is not the atmosphere that radiates into space, but the opaque surface
It’s both.