People send me things. Today it is a curious graph of the number of supernovae (dying stars) discovered versus the HadCRUT temperature data since 1960. There’s a good correlation. So at first glance you might conclude two things, 1) GCR’s, which are known to be the result of supernovae thanks to data gathered by the Chandra Space Telescope, are indeed influencing Earth’s temperature or 2) Earth’s AGW is killing stars, and aliens are correct to be concerned about Earth and may need to wipe us out to protect the Universe.
Our contributor at an observatory sheds more light on the subject. He writes:
Hi Anthony,
I am a senior research fellow at ICRAR (International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research) in Perth, Australia. I was studying the sample of supernovae (SNe) discovered in the last 50 years (source: Harvard-Smithsonian CfA List of SNe), and I discovered that the number of SNe discovered per year correlates pretty well with the temperature anomaly. I produced a plot, placed at the URL below. Clearly the temperature anomaly has a better correlation with the observed number of dead stars than with dead polar bears, tree rings, CO2 or number of pirates. This is proof that global warming is causing more stars to explode. It’s worse than we thought. We are killing the universe. We need more funding.
Best Regards–Rob
Dr Rob Soria
International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research
This person is all legit, he’s real and at ICRAR. The data appear so well correlated, it would seem to be a cinch to use this to apply for a research grant, no matter which premise you want to prove. The possibilities are tantalizing. But, let’s analyse the data first.
The first thing I asked for is the data source for Supernovae (I know where to get HadCRUT data), which he provided here:
http://www.cbat.eps.harvard.edu/lists/Supernovae.html
Sure enough, his work was replicable.
I spotted a couple of curious things though. Why the logarithmic graph on the right Y axis, and why only use data back to 1960, that favorite cutoff date for “hide the decline”?
Well there’s data, and then there’s data reporting bias. While it would be easy to conclude on this sample that there’s something worth further (funded) study, especially given the recent first results of the CERN CLOUD experiment, there’s a bit of a rub in the data. That rub has to do with the recent explosion of amateur astronomy and technology.
You see, around 1980 or so, affordable CCD detectors started to become available to the amateur astronomer, and in the decades that followed up to the present sensitivity increased 10x thanks to Peltier cooled CCD chips and other improvements in CCD imaging technology. Costs came down and you can now buy a good CCD detector for under $2000, often less than the cost of a good telescope.
So as a result, the number of detectors trained on the sky blossomed, and the number of supernovae detected by amateur astronomers soared. Hence the need for the logarithmic axis in the graph above. As for the cutoff date of 1960, well, um, the correlation doesn’t hold well before that. Thus, the decision was made to truncate the data prior to 1960. We figure if it was good enough for the hockey stick (which has been recently vindicated again) then it is good enough to do here to write a grant proposal.
Neither Rob nor I plan to write that proposal, but if any WUWT readers succeed in getting funded, I’ll happily publish a notice here.
So the moral of this story is: you can find short correlations in many things, such as correlating El Niño and Civil Wars, and truncating data is OK to make your point for the grant application and study, because you’ll be vindicated later if the study becomes popular and/or included in the IPCC AR5.
It also underscores the issue of reporting bias, which I’ve talked about again and again relating to the issue of bogus severe weather and AGW correlations, which simply don’t exist. They are a byproduct of improved radar systems, storm chasers, improved communications, and global 24/7 news gathering.
Caveat: For anyone reading with the composition of a neutron star, this essay is satirical, but with a real lesson: correlation is not causation.
j fisk says:
August 25, 2011 at 12:19 pm
I note that as of today (UK) that the GCSE results have continued their year on year rise do I sense a correlation between intelligence and global warming?
That means that my son (who passed all of his GCSE’s) who we are very proud of must forfeit the £150 I promised him if he achieved a 100% pass. Instead I will give this money to Al Gore (in fact I will give Uncle Al a bit more because Adam(my son) wants to be an airline pilot)also he currently is having flying lessons. We all know that paying more in taxes reduces carbon emissions as does lining the pockets of charlatans. So my conscience is now clear, except for the fact that these charlatans say that carbon emissions are still rising, the science IS settled and the world is getting warmer. So I will just give the money to Adam as promised.
Isn’t life confusing?
This Theory is wrong. 🙂
Given a constant lightspeed, we now are seeing SN explosion of stars that exploded many millions of years ago in galaxies other than the Milky Way.
Consequently, if a relation exists, is that SN exploded millions years ago (and millions of light years away) are now producing here some GW, not viceversa.
Sorry, no more funding. Hihihihihihi
M.
dr.bill says:
August 25, 2011 at 8:45 pm
Reed Coray, August 25, 2011 at 7:37 pm :
Consider a supernova that takes place (say) 700 light-years from Earth, and produces GCR’s that travel directly to Earth a speed of 0.995c. That gives a relativistic gamma-factor of 10.0. Thus the distance travelled, as “seen” by the GCR’s is only 70 light-years, and because they are travelling at almost the speed of light, it just takes them a touch over 70 years to get here. Light emitted at the same time won’t arrive for another 630 years.
Thank you for responding to my comment. I appreciate the opportunity to engage in technical discussions that this blog provides.
When I was in school (many many years ago), I told myself that there were two subjects where intuition should never be used: probability and special relativity. You may be correct, but I still disagree. I believe you are mixing “inertial reference frames”; and that if you analyze the problem in either (a) an inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the earth or (b) an inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the GCRs, the conclusion will be that the light will collide with the earth before the GCRs collide the earth.
When you say “Consider a supernova that takes place (say) 700 light-years from Earth”, I assume the distance of 700 light-years is in the inertial reference frame of the earth in which the earth is at rest. In that reference frame GCRs and light are simultaneously emitted from a point 700 light-years distant from the earth. In that reference frame light traveling at the speed c will take 700 years to reach the earth. Because the GCRs are traveling at 0.995c, it will take the GCRs slightly more than 700 years to reach the earth. Thus, in the inertial reference frame in which the earth is at rest, the light arrives at the earth before the GCRs.
In the inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the GCRs, the GCRs are stationary *by definition( and the earth is traveling towards the GCR at a speed of 0.995c. At the time of light emission the distance between the GCRs and the earth is approximately 70 light years. However, in the inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the GCRs, light still travels towards the rapidly approaching earth at speed c. As such, in the GCR-at-rest inertial reference frame, the light will arrive at the earth before the earth crashes into the GCRs–i.e., the light arrives at the earth before the earth collides with the GCRs.
Thus, in both inertial reference frames, the light and the earth come together (occupy a common spatial point) before the GCRs and the earth come together.
In my immediately preceding post, I fat-fingered the expression “*by definition(” that should have been “(by definition)”. Sorry for the error.
>Light emitted at the same time won’t arrive for another 630 years
The light is traveling at 1.0c which means it has a gamma of infinity, which means that from the photon’s point of view, the supernova and the Earth are at the same location and the photon immediately arrives at Earth. In other words the interval x^2-c^2t^2 is zero; it is a light-like event.
None of this matter to an Earth-based observer. They have to wait 700+ years for either light or cosmic rays to arrive.
You guys are all missing the obvious lag shift. Stars dying lags HADCRUT by about 10 years by my eye. Clearly means that it IS global warming killing stars and not the other way around!
At last someone has dared to speak the truth to power. The FACTS show a clear correlation with the number of capital letters. Were the aliens trying to get Rumsfeld before he got them? This is a known unknown. I think it’s all due to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict – if you were Mr Spock would you want mad Zionists taking over your planet? And covering it up … what do you mean, evidence? The lack of evidence PROVES a coverup!!! I expect to be silenced at any mom
Reed Coray, August 26, 2011 at 10:54 am :
Hi Again Reed,
Please don’t take this as disrespect, but you appear to be the exact complement to many of my students. All that stuff you’ve gone through, and correctly, are the “complications” that they often have trouble with. However, these are just small complications to the main effect, which you appear to be overlooking. Essentially, I think you’re paying too much attention to the fairly small (in relative terms, no pun intended) lateral or orbital kinds of motion that take place on either end while the light or GCR’s are in transit. These local movements are at much smaller speeds than the main effect, and cause only small variations in the outcome. So let’s take it closer to home so that relative movements during the transit time aren’t such a distraction.
Example 2:
The closest star to Earth is Proxima Centauri, which is 4.24 light-years away from us. With that kind of “longitudinal” distance, it really doesn’t matter if it or Earth might be moving around a bit in our local areas. Those motions are very slow in comparison to the speed of light or anything close to it. We don’t really move very far compared to 4 light-years. Now let “someone” on Proxima Centauri send something, anything, as long as it has mass, towards us at 0.995c, and at the same time send an electromagnetic signal. They’re smart enough to send each of them in the right direction(s) so that when they get to our neck of the woods, Earth is in the right place(s) to intercept them.
As in my earlier example, the gamma-factor is 10.0, so the distance (for the travelling mass) gets contracted to 0.424 light-years, which they can cover in about 5.06 months (0.995×0.424×12). The EM signal sent at the beginning, of course still take 4.24 years or 50.9 months, since it can only travel one light-year per year, so it arrives about 46 months later than the material object.
Example 3:
If Proxima Centauri is still too far away for your liking, the exact same thing happens right here on our own planet with unstable particles called muons that are created during collision events in our upper atmosphere. These strike the surface (ground or sea level) in large numbers all the time, travelling thousands of meters downward when they “should” only be able to travel hundreds, given their very short lifetime. They manage this, not by going faster than light, but by moving fast enough that the thousands of meters get contracted down to hundreds, which they then have enough lifetime to cover, even if they’re only moving at 0.9c or something. We’re talking times in the microsecond range here, so issues of lateral motion don’t really have any consequences (nor do they to any great extent in the other examples).
Hope some of that helps.
/dr.bill
Damn! Sorry about the bold. Missed the closing tag.
/dr.bill
The 5.06 should also be 5.11 months (divide by 0.995, not multiply).
Time to go have that Scotch! 🙂
/dr.bill
dr.bill says:
August 26, 2011 at 1:57 pm
Example 2:
The closest star to Earth is Proxima Centauri, which is 4.24 light-years away from us. With that kind of “longitudinal” distance, it really doesn’t matter if it or Earth might be moving around a bit in our local areas. Those motions are very slow in comparison to the speed of light or anything close to it. We don’t really move very far compared to 4 light-years. Now let “someone” on Proxima Centauri send something, anything, as long as it has mass, towards us at 0.995c, and at the same time send an electromagnetic signal. They’re smart enough to send each of them in the right direction(s) so that when they get to our neck of the woods, Earth is in the right place(s) to intercept them.
As in my earlier example, the gamma-factor is 10.0, so the distance (for the travelling mass) gets contracted to 0.424 light-years, which they can cover in about 5.06 months (0.995×0.424×12). The EM signal sent at the beginning, of course still take 4.24 years or 50.9 months, since it can only travel one light-year per year, so it arrives about 46 months later than the material object..
First, no disrepect taken. And I hope you feel the same way about my comments. First, I am glad you too treat the earth’s motion about the son as being an insignificant effect. I only mentioned it because it has relevance to the fact that a coordinate system at rest with respect to the earth is not an inertial reference frame. For this discussion, let’s treat the earth as being stationary in an inertial reference frame.
Second, In your 2nd example, I’m going to assume (a) that Proxima Centauri and the earth are at rest in “a common” inertial reference frame and (b) in that inertial reference frame the distance between the earth and Proxima Centauri is exactly 4.24 light-years. In that reference frame it will take light 4.24 years to travel from Proxima Centauri to the earth. In that reference frame, a particle traveling at 0.995c that leaves Proxima Centauri in the direction of the earth will take 4.24/0.995 (which is approximately 4.261 years) to reach the earth. If in that reference frame the light and the particle leave Proxima Centauri at the same time, the light will arrive at the earth approximately 0,021 years before the particle arrives at the eart–i.e., the light arrives at the earth before the particle.
In an inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the particle, when the particle leaves Proxima Centauri (a) the distance from Proxima Centauri to the earth is approximately 0.42347 light-years, (b) the earth is approaching the GCR at speed 0.995c, and (c) the GCR is stationary. In that reference frame light will be traveling at speed c. If the light leaves Proxima Centauri at the instant the distance (in that frame) between Proxima Centauri is 0.42347 light years, in that frame it will take the light 0.42347/(1.995) years to reach the earth. The numerator is the distance between Proxima Centauri and the earth at the time of light emission from Proxima Centauri. The denominator is the “closing speed” (in the inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the particle) between the earth and the light that left Proxima Centauri. Thus, in the inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the particle, it will take 0.212266 years for the light to reach the earth and 0.42347/1 = 0.42347 years for the earth to arrive at the particle. It’s true that in the inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the particle, the travel time is less than 4.24 years, but in both reference frames the light and the earth come together before the particle and the earth come together.
The next level of analysis would be for either (or both of us) to (a) set of two inertial reference frames where one frame is at rest with respect to the earth and Proxima Centauri and the other reference frame is moving along the line that joins Proxima Centauri and the earth at the speed 0.995c, (b) define time zero in both frames to be the time light and the particle traveling at 0.995c leaves Proxima Centauri, (c) at time zero locate the origins of both inertial reference frames at Proxima Centauri, (d) compute in the reference frame at rest with respect to the earth (i) the event parameters (position/time of light particle emission from Proxima Centauri, (ii) the event parameters of light arrival at the earth, and (iii) the event parameters of particle arrival at the earth, and (e) use the Lorentz transformation to compute these three event parameters in the reference frame at rest with respect to the particle. I bet that when you perform these calculations you will find that in the reference frame at rest with respect to the particle, the time of light arrival at the earth will be less than the time of particle arrival at the earth–i.e., in the reference frame with respect to the particle, both event times will be less than 4.24 years, but the light arrival time iwll be less than the particle arrival time.
In your third example, I agree that if the “decay time” of a particle in an inertial reference frame at rest with respect to the particle is “Tatrest” and the decay time in an inertial reference frame in motion with respect to the particle is “Tinmotion”, then “Tinmotion” > “Tatrest”. But this observation doesn’t affect the event parameters for a particle and light traveling between two locations.
Again, thanks for the discussion,
Reed Coray
Pardon me, I can’t get a handle on html mark up. I’ll have that scotch with you. In my preceding post, all text before the paragraph that starts with: “First, no disrespect taken……” should have been in italics as that text was what you said not what I said.
Second correction. I said it will take 0.212266 years for the light to reach the earth and 0.42347/1 = 0.42347 years for the earth to arrive at the particle. That should have been: “It will take 0.212266 years for the light to reach the earth and 0.42347/0.995 = 0.42556 years for the earth to arrive at the particle.
The intentional humor in this article is a nice counterpoint to the unintentional humor coming out of the CAGW industry.
In case anyone hasn’t mentioned it, the conclusion is obvious.
God is very angry with us for global warming, and every time He gets mad, he blows something up.
The Galaxy is screaming. In a few short years the nights will be starless. In fact, during times of increased precipitation some areas of the Earth already regularly experience star-free nights. This is predicted to follow the normal exponential growth curve of all climate related science based non-denier science from scientists who do real science.
Oh, this fits finely with the idea from Paul Krugman, that an Alien invasion will save the economy ( just google “Krugman aliens” or see http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/08/24/coalmines-and-aliens/ for the story). We can both save the economy AND the stars…
Perhaps we really are killing the stars. There could be a quantum mechanics observer effect at work here. When global temperatures are lower there is more cloud (or perhaps the other way round) – anyway with more cloud, less people see the stars. Observing of the stars might resolve quantum dualities or cause separated entangled particle states to coalesce to a single state, and this could somehow nucleate or trigger supernova explosions.
So how were there supernovas before there were any people to observe them?
To paraphrase, I think there is a correlation between clear scientific reasoning using validated, peer reviewed empirical climate data and a huge reduction in the imminent threat of Global Warming in this millenium!!!!! Methinks…….
there is a changing in the “energetic void” superfluid and superconductive space?