The fact that there’s a scientific workshop discussing the solar-climate relationship at all, especially when doomsayers like Hansen say there’s no solar connection, should tell you something.
I got a chuckle out of the final slide in Dr. Judith Lean’s presentation. First the workshop program:
The 2nd Nagoya Workshop on the Relationship between Solar Activity and Climate Changes
16-17 January, 2012 | Noyori Conference Hall, Nagoya University (Nagoya, Japan)
Session I: Opening and Keynote Talk (Chair: Kanya KUSANO)
- Judith LEAN (Naval Research Laboratory, USA)
Session II: Solar & Heliospheric Activity (Chair: Kanya KUSANO)
- Leif SVALGAARD (Stanford Univ., USA)
- Munetoshi TOKUMARU (Nagoya Univ., Japan)
- Ayumi ASAI (Kyoto Univ., Japan)
Session III: Cosmic Ray and its Influence (Chair: Kimiaki MASUDA)
- Martin BODKER ENGHOFF & Henrik SVENSMARK (National Space Institute, Denmark)
- Hiroko MIYAHARA (Univ. of Tokyo, Japan)
- Shigeo TOMITA (Univ. of Tsukuba, Japan)
==============================================================
Here’s the Judith Lean presentation: Variations in Solar Irradiance and Climate. WUWT is prominently referenced on slide #23.
But the final slide is what really caught my attention, because I was surprised to see what is in the upper right corner:
I asked Dr. Svalgaard via email:
With the end slide, saying “It’s the sun stupid” I wonder how well she was received?
He replied:
She’s an authority on this and was well received.
Well allrighty then.
Footnote: While I can’t be sure if someone said it before me, or if Dr. Lean got the phrase from me (I did reference her 2000 solar irradiance graph) the phrase “It’s the Sun, stupid” first appeared on WUWT on April 6th, 2007:
If only the Sun could be as colorful as Dr. Lean’s presentation!!
It is difficult to grasp all the meanings one might have gotten having actually heard the presentation. For example, one slide – mostly black with an orange title has the paper of Lean and Rind, GRL, 2008 indicated. Below that ref. in the lower left is a 2-bullet-point “fundamental puzzles” statement, one of which says that (in essence) to claim 70% of global warming on the Sun requires that “Earth’s climate be insensitive to well-measured increases in greenhouse gases at the same time that it is excessively sensitive to poorly known solar brightness changes.”
Well, the WUWT post just 2-before this one suggests the first part of the above quote is true. Also, the second part seems to imply one ought to question the 70% claim and to (a) look at other factors, and (b) keep studying the sun.
Maybe there is a better source than a slide but without more information there isn’t much to get excited about.
It should be:
“It’s the MAGNETIC sun stupid”
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Spc.htm
as far as global temperatures are concerned.
Graph shows very little response to the sun at 11 year cycle. However at 22 year the response suddenly shoots up.
Why is that?
Sun changes its magnetic polarity with Hale cycle (22 years), so for 11 years the sun and the Earth have same magnetic polarity, and for following 11 the opposite, creating the sun-Earth link as a 22 year cycle one.
Yeah, um guys…I think she has the last slide in there to make fun of it. Here’s what she actually has to say about the sun and global warming:
“But we’ve done a great deal of modeling, and the Sun doesn’t explain the global warming that’s occurred over the last century. We think changes in irradiance account for about 10 percent global warming at most. Of course, there are also longer cycles that may have an impact on climate, but our understanding of them is limited.”
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/Interviews/lean_20100525.php
Dr. Leif Svalgaard says: – JJ says:
It was at least in part (about 71%) that she was ridiculing the notion that it is the sun, and pretty much saying that the people who think so are stupid.
That is my take too, albeit a bit less emphatic. Both Lean and I believe the sun has an influence, but that it is small, cf. her slide 11.
Now I’m confused. Dr. Lean’s final slide shows a clear correlation between sunspot activity that implies causation. Next to that is a graphic “It’s The Sun Stupid”. Yet Dr.s Lean & Svalgaard believe the sun has an influence, but that it is small? The download of Dr. Lean’s presentation is locked up for the moment.
Dr. Svalgaard, could you please clarify this for us? What is your (& Dr. Lean’s) take on the correlation/causation between sunspot activity and the Earth’s temperature?
Correction to previous post:
Dr. Lean’s final slide shows a clear correlation between the Earth’s temperature and sunspot activity that implies causation.
I note that Dr Svensmark was a presenter at the conference, Long-term Evolution of the Global Solar Wind Structure. I recall that Dr Svalgaard is skeptical about Dr Svensmark’s theory. I am very interested in and hope that Dr Svalgaard will comment upon Svensmark’s presentation.
As Leif points out, Judith was not suggesting that solar accounts for much of modern warming (e.g. 1970-present) given that TSI has not noticeably increased during that period.
Judith Lean has argued in the past that TSI may have driven some of the 1900-1940 warming, something that was echoed in past IPCC reports. More recently there has been a bit of a vigorous debate about the magnitude of TSI changes during that period, with Judith on the side of larger TSI changes and others (say, Lief) on the side of smaller ones. I’m not sure if that debate has had much resolution in the past few years; perhaps Lief could comment on it.
Louis Hooffstetter says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:40 am
Dr. Svalgaard, could you please clarify this for us? What is your (& Dr. Lean’s) take on the correlation/causation between sunspot activity and the Earth’s temperature?
Her last slide was not intended to show her own research or opinion, but simply to show that there is interest ‘out there’ in the Danger zone, but also that there is conflict and poor science, i.e. the same person [West] claiming 69% solar and 70% man-made.
There is definitely a causation between solar output and temperature. The solar cycle produces a temperature cycle of the order of 0.1C. On the longer term, the sun does not vary enough to be important, e.g. solar activity is now what it was around 1900, but the climate is not. This does not deter people to believe otherwise especially if it fits their personal [or cult-induced herd-] bias and agenda. My own presentation at the very same meeting was intended to show that the Modern Grand Maximum that some take as indication of a solar cause of recent warming probably didn’t happen, i.e. that the Sun had not been markedly different than during times of the 18th and 19th centuries. What happened during the Maunder Minimum is less clear and is an active area of research, cf. my last slide.
Mr Vukcevic, I am always most fascinated with your stuff, you demonstrate a clearer thought process than most. Kudos, sir!
You guys need to learn to distinguish between a person’s talk, and the images that they use to dress it up. It isnt the pictures she shows that are important, it is what she says about those pictures, as she points and giggles.
On a related note, I think the current practice of submitting these powerpoint slide shows – without the associated commentary – in lieu of text is very sloppy and unscientific practice. It used to be, when you presented a paper at a conference, you were required to provide the paper itself or the text of your talk, which would be included in the proceedings. Increasingly, all you get are these freaking slide shows. These can be useful if they present data, but (as demonstrated here) they are next to useless without the verbage.
paddylol says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:45 am
I am very interested in and hope that Dr Svalgaard will comment upon Svensmark’s presentation.
Unfortunately Henrik couldn’t make it to the workshop [poor health was the official excuse], so a collaborator [Enghoff] talked instead about some correlation between Forbush decreases and clouds, but with such a small number of cases that it was not convincing. Other scientists looking at this have found no effects, so the opinions are divided.
I have posted a second article on Dr. Habibullo Abdussamatov, Dr. Sc.
Head of Space Research Laboratory of the Pulkovo Observatory,
Head of the Russian/Ukrainian Joint Project Astrometria:
“Bicentennial Decrease of the Total Solar Irradiance Leads to Unbalanced Thermal Budget of the Earth and the Little Ice Age”.
“From early 90s we observe bicentennial decrease in both the TSI and the portion of its energy absorbed by the Earth.
The Earth as a planet will henceforward have negative balance in the energy budget which will result in the temperature drop in approximately 2014.
Due to increase of albedo and decrease of the greenhouse gases atmospheric concentration the absorbed portion of solar energy and the influence of the greenhouse effect will additionally decline.
The influence of the consecutive chain of feedback effects which can lead to additional drop of temperature will surpass the influence of the TSI decrease.
The onset of the deep bicentennial minimum of TSI is expected in 2042±11, that of the 19th Little Ice Age in the past 7500 years – in 2055±11.”
Dr. Abdussamatov is able to very precisely measure TSI from his solar telescope permanently mounted on the ISS.
Dr. Svensmark has experimentally corroborated his theory about the Sun’s magnetic influence.
Yes, I think it is the Sun!
http://www.oarval.org/ClimateChangeBW.htm
M.A.Vukcevic says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:35 am
It should be:
“It’s the MAGNETIC sun stupid”
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Spc.htm
as far as global temperatures are concerned.
Graph shows very little response to the sun at 11 year cycle. However at 22 year the response suddenly shoots up.
Why is that?
Sun changes its magnetic polarity with Hale cycle (22 years), so for 11 years the sun and the Earth have same magnetic polarity, and for following 11 the opposite, creating the sun-Earth link as a 22 year cycle one.
~
Didn’t Dr. S. explain to us a few times that when the north solar pole is positive, we see more reconnection events at earth, Vuks.
Dr. David McComas, recently explained the current magnetic pressure surrounding the heliosphere in this way..”like a beach ball being squeezed when someone sits on it.”
Well gee I say to myself, sounds like the current polar configuration of the sun. Stonger source surface field than polar fields. The system is being squashed more in the southern heliosphere than in the northern heliosphere from what I can see..
IBEX spacecraft measures ‘alien’ particles from outside solar system
January 31, 2012
http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-01-ibex-spacecraft-alien-particles-solar.html
..IBEX data reveal that interstellar neutrals enter the heliosphere at a speed of about 52,000 mph, roughly, 7,000 mph slower than inferred from Ulysses observations, and that they enter from a somewhat different direction.
Magnetic forces play a major role in the interactions of the charged particles at the heliosphere’s boundaries. As the overall particle speeds drop, however, the magnetic forces play an even more dominant role. “With this lower speed, the external magnetic forces cause the heliosphere to become more squished and misshapen,” says McComas. “Rather than being shaped like a bullet moving through the air, the heliosphere becomes flattened, more like a beach ball being squeezed when someone sits on it.”
Based on the older Ulysses data, researchers had theorized that the heliosphere was leaving the local galactic cloud and transitioning into a new region of space. However, while the boundary is very close, IBEX results show the heliosphere remains fully in the local cloud, at least for the moment..
And Vuks..you know how they report on those unexplained shifts in some neutral atom data, well may have shifted again..Gee to think the reconnection region to interstellar space shape shifts and moves..
Zeke Hausfather says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:50 am
More recently there has been a bit of a vigorous debate about the magnitude of TSI changes during that period, with Judith on the side of larger TSI changes and others (say, Leif) on the side of smaller ones. I’m not sure if that debate has had much resolution in the past few years; perhaps Leif could comment on it.
Judith herself were with time advocating a smaller and smaller variation [although not as extreme as I], but the debate is not over. Partly [I think] because there is a strong feeling that in order to explain ‘global warming’ people need the sun to vary [sort of circular argument]. My last slide [before the abstract] mentions a workshop to discuss the problem.
JJ says:
February 8, 2012 at 12:02 pm
On a related note, I think the current practice of submitting these powerpoint slide shows – without the associated commentary – in lieu of text is very sloppy and unscientific practice.
My own presentation shows that it is possible to add enough explanatory text so people can follow the presentation. In [weak] defense of Lean, I’ll point out that the presentation was not for a general audience, but for scientists actively studying the topic and thus already familiar with a lot of the background.
How about getting some ‘It’s the sun, Stupid!’ t-shirts made?
“Earth’s climate be insensitive to well-measured increases in greenhouse gases at the same time that it is excessively sensitive to poorly known solar brightness changes.”
There is no direct scientific evidence for the IPCC claimed GHG sensitivity, and the solar brightness changes is largely a strawman argument, as few people think changes in total solar irradiance drive climate change.
As for as much as “70 percent” due to human intervention. That covers a lot of ground in addition to GHGs.
I am always amazed at how people who really have no evidence for their theory can contemptously dismiss the effect of the Sun. Even a one tenth of one percent of the solar constant is a similar “radiative forcing” as the amount claimed by the AGW crowd – Kiehl & Trenberth altered their “budget” to show a 0.9 W/sq m imbalance.
It is arrogance to dismiss any effect of the Sun in the contemptous manner the proponents of the theory display.
However time will tell – if the Sun continues in a state of reduced activity for a significant period lots of reputations will either be made or destroyed.
My tip – look for many proponents facing a career crisis.
It’s your money!
http://www.zazzle.com/its_the_sun_tshirt-235117679919995426
Carla says:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
February 8, 2012 at 12:13 pm
M.A.Vukcevic says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:35 am
It should be:
“It’s the MAGNETIC sun stupid”
~
So if we follow this out one step further and let’s say that the current Interstellar Magnetic Field is positive, would that squish more in the southern heliosphere then? Or is all an orbital mechanical thing or both?
In her last slide shown above, Lean is clearly referring to an interview to Bruce West who was asked to comment the results of our papers. For example:
Nicola Scafetta, and Bruce J. West, “Phenomenological reconstructions of the solar signature in the NH surface temperature records since 1600.” J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S03, doi:10.1029/2007JD008437 (2007).
http://www.fel.duke.edu/~scafetta/pdf/2007JD008437.pdf
where it is clearly proven that solar activity could count between 40% and 70% of the warming since 1850 according to whether PMOD or ACRIM total solar irradiance are used.
Indeed, our results contradict Lean’s estimate of a small secular solar effect on climate in Lean and Rind (2008). However, the reason why Lean gets a smaller contribution is because she uses her TSI proxy model that would agree with PMOD TSI composite and, more importantly, she uses a purely linear model to determine the secular solar impact on climate, which has nothing to do with physics because a purely linear regression model assumes that the heat capacity of the climate system does not have a relaxation time response.
A detailed rebuttal of Lean linear regression model argument is not only present in my papers, but it is explicitly presented in my later paper:
N. Scafetta, “Empirical analysis of the solar contribution to global mean air surface temperature change,” Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics 71 1916–1923 (2009), doi:10.1016/j.jastp.2009.07.007
http://www.fel.duke.edu/~scafetta/pdf/ATP2998.pdf
Lean essentially appears to move away from her previous claims and she is moving to acknowledge our empirical results.
Unfortunately, Leif does not read with fairness my papers, nor he undestands the issue.
Other papers of mine can be downloaded fro my web-site where there are also figure updates with my latest models
http://www.fel.duke.edu/~scafetta/
so IF it IS the sun (stupid) does that give Gates et all permission now to go ahead with geoengineering to save us from the stupid sun and destroy our planet? You say they cannot tax the sun, but are you so certain. Exactly who will be paying the bill for the geoengineering?
ANd the cold weather the planet is experiencing (this winter) is it the stupid sun has now gone asleep? the solar maximum has ended earlier than expected? And if we had in place geoengineering (in space) how damn cold would we really be……..
Leif Svalgaard says:
February 8, 2012 at 11:57 am
Well, there you have it. When added up, I get 139% warming. No wonder things are getting so “hot” out there even though temperatures throughout the world are falling.
It’s the stupid, son.
One of the main problems with the current models, as used by Lean and others is that they use the same (or similar +/- 10%) sensitivity for all types of forcings. Thus 1 W/m2 change by CO2 has the same effect as 1 W/m2 change of solar input. But there are huge differences in effect: While CO2 has its main effect in the lower troposphere, IR enters the oceans only for the upper fraction of a mm, partly re-emitted, partly converted in evaporation energy and partly absorbed down. Solar has a lot of effects: UV (+/- 10% over a solar cycle) is absorbed in the lower stratosphere, heating it up and pushing the jet stream position polewards, including changes in cloud and rain patterns, NAO, AO,… In the troposphere, it changes cloud cover and in the seas, sunlight penetrates to lower depths, heating the ocean surface layer.
Even a test of the HadCM3 model with enhanced solar (and volcanic) forcing indicates a larger sensitivity for solar, be it within the constraints of the model (like a fixed influence of aerosols):
http://climate.envsci.rutgers.edu/pdf/StottEtAl.pdf
There may be hope, as the next round of models will include the variation of the sun’s output over its spectrum, not only as TSI. But even so, the one sensitivity for all can’t be right.
Andres Valencia says:
February 8, 2012 at 12:08 pm
“Bicentennial Decrease of the Total Solar Irradiance Leads to Unbalanced Thermal Budget of the Earth and the Little Ice Age”.
Unfortunately, the purported decrease is due to calibration errors [uncompensated sensor degradation] and didn’t happen on the sun, cf. slide 31 of http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce/news/2011ScienceMeeting/docs/presentations/1g_Schmutz_SORCE_13.9.11.pdf
From slide 33:
“Observed data do not support a measureable TSI trend between the minima in 1996 and 2008 !”