From the The Washington Times – By Willie Soon and William M. Briggs
Scientists have been studying solar influences on the climate for more than 5,000 years.
Chinese imperial astronomers kept detailed sunspot records. They noticed that more sunspots meant warmer weather. In 1801, the celebrated astronomer William Herschel (discoverer of the planet Uranus) observed that when there were fewer spots, the price of wheat soared. He surmised that less light and heat from the sun resulted in reduced harvests.
Earlier last month, professor Richard Muller of the University of California-Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST) project announced that in the project’s newly constructed global land temperature record, “no component that matches solar activity” was related to temperature. Instead, Mr. Muller said carbon dioxide controlled temperature.
Could it really be true that solar radiation — which supplies Earth with the energy that drives our climate and which, when it has varied, has caused the climate to shift over the ages — is no longer the principal influence on climate change?
Consider the accompanying chart. It shows some rather surprising relationships between solar radiation and daytime high temperatures taken directly from Berkeley’s BEST project. The remarkable nature of these series is that these tight relationships can be shown to hold from areas as large as the United States.
This new sun-climate relationship picture may be telling us that the way our sun cools and warms the Earth is largely through the penetration of incoming solar radiation in regions with cloudless skies. Recent work by National Center for Atmospheric Research senior scientists Harry van Loon and Gerald Meehl place strong emphasis on this physical point and argue that the use of daytime high temperatures is the most appropriate test of the solar-radiation-surface-temperature connection hypothesis. All previous sun-climate studies have included the complicated nighttime temperature records while the sun is not shining.
Read more: SOON AND BRIGGS: Global-warming fanatics take note – Washington Times
Just look at these two Met Office maps, for max and min temperature anomalies, and see what a difference there is.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/anomacts/2012/14/2012_14_MaxTemp_Anomaly_1981-2010.gif
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/anomacts/2012/14/2012_14_MinTemp_Anomaly_1981-2010.gif
Leif once again appears to be up sh*t creek without a paddle. The evidence continues to build.
Another death blow to his Sun doesn’t do it propaganda is the solid data that refutes any L&P type effect that so many of the skeptics tend to believe in blindly.
http://tinyurl.com/2dg9u22/images/darkness1.png
Poptech says:
I wouldn’t have used BEST data at all as it involved the contributions of those unqualified to contribute aka Mosher and Muller.
Mosher has worthless statistical qualifications – BA’s in both English Literature and Philosophy and a career history that includes bringing MP3 players to market for Creative Labs.
Ad hominem is not scientific reasoning. Your use of it would render you “unqualified to contribute to discussions about scientific practice”, if it were to be similarly applied to you.
If Mosher’s stats are wrong, it is because his stats are wrong, not because his CV doesn’t have particular entries. If his stats are correct, then his stats are correct. “Qualifications” or the asserted lack thereof are not valid scientific concepts.
The graph shows a variation of 1 ° C per 1 W / m ^ 2.
hypersensitivity climate
beng says:
September 7, 2012 at 6:59 am
Thanks. It must seem like an endless struggle….
Science always is. The struggle against pseudo-science and the post-normal science practiced by most people here pushing their politically motivated agenda is ever-lasting. In the end, science will prevail. I just added the Schrijver et al. graph to the my graph: http://www.leif.org/research/Temp-Track-Sun-Not.png It just overlays my plot and Preminger et al.’s plot.
My only question is how did all those anthropogenic green house gasses get all the way to the sun? Pretty amazing.
tallbloke says:
September 7, 2012 at 6:21 am
How can we ‘forget about the climate’, when the two curves compared are ‘Solar total Irradiance’ and temperature data?
I was not commenting on the temperature curve, simply pointing out that the ‘solar radiation’ curve is wrong. Trying to compare two curves when one is wrong only makes sense if you want to mislead people [or are misled yourself]
Soon multiplied recent TSI values with with the GHCN adjustments inherited by the BEST data for all we know…
Apart from this being nonsense you are accusing Soon of circular reasoning, that he used temperature adjustments on the solar curve and you seem to accept that that is reasonable practice, rather than criticizing S&B for it. The solar curve looks much like the old Hoyt & Schatten curve.
Leif your resilience amazes me. With every solar posting here all the back room experts drop in with exactly the same arguments. Most time the amount of abuse you receive is unbelievable.
I tried to post this at TB blog
sergeiMK says:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
September 7, 2012 at 12:53 pm
TB I find it a trifle strange that you know more about solar physics than Leif who has been researching for decades!
It all boils down to a plot of solar radiation made by one person (lean) years ago. Leif says it is wrong and Lean now says it is wrong.
So why do you, Soon etc say it is right. Can you show the proof please.
steveta_uk says:
September 7, 2012 at 1:51 pm
It never made it of course.
So I would like to ask TB, and others, the question I posed. Where are they getting the TSI data from?
Also TB now says the solar heating and cooling is delayed by 10 years by the oceans. If this were the case then TSI should be put through a trailing 10 year average (which will remove some of the cycle peaks. PLUS the plot in the article clearly shows no such 10 year delay!!
Perhaps its a special delay that only appears at millenia+10?!
Rick Lynch says:
September 7, 2012 at 6:25 am
We are in a period of minimal sunspot activity, and yet the earth isn’t cooling. Temperatures have been pretty flat for the last 10 years. So something is keeping us warm despite the lower level of solar radiation. Greenhouse gasses?
This heavy cast iron frying pan burnt my hand when i picked it up, even though the flame was turned off 3 minutes ago. Something was keeping it warm despite the stiching off of the hob. Specific heat capacity?
So the basic hypothesis is that radiation from the sun warms the earth? Whodda thunk?
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 7, 2012 at 7:18 am
Apart from this being nonsense you are accusing Soon of circular reasoning, that he used temperature adjustments on the solar curve and you seem to accept that that is reasonable practice, rather than criticizing S&B for it.
Easy Leif, you were up too early this morning. Get some bread and milk.
The solar curve looks much like the old Hoyt & Schatten curve.
Did they use ACRIM data for that?
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 7, 2012 at 4:31 am
Perhaps look again before you make an even bigger fool of yourself.
_________________________________
Maybe you could take another look too?
I have rescaled the two graphs to match (more or less) in both time and energy scales and put them together.
http://imageshack.us/f/707/leiff.png/
Despite common scales, these curves don’t overlap. And that’s what I’m asking about.
There’s also pretty deep valley between 1950 and 2000 in their graph which is nowhere to be found in either of your three graphs.
So if you are so perfectly sure how they created the curve, maybe you could share a more detailed explanation? Or maybe a reconstruction?
Leif, what is the history; why are the low, early 20th century curves wrong? How were they created?
thanks in advance
Rick Lynch says:
September 7, 2012 at 6:25 am
and have you considered the time lag factors? How long does it take for the earth to heat up and/or cool down? It sure isn’t instant ! In the same way as temps don’t instantly cool as soon as the sun goes down at sunset, a warmed/cooled earth will take time to react to such changes – giving the ‘illusion’ of the currently observed solar effects being insignificant…….and given the heat stored in the oceans, we can probably expect such time lags to be quite large (decades?)……….
“Scientists have been studying solar influences on the climate for more than 5,000 years.”
Ah yes, climatology is the oldest science in the world.
I like Leif`s graph, Sunspot number (traditional view) and Sunspot number (corrected for weighting), everything’s corrected in one direction. Its not the sun stupid.
Leif, please.
This reconstruction can be considered correct? (doubt sincere. Sorry for the bad english)
Observed solar constant reconstructed from satellite observations., Please cite C.Fr\”ohlich, 2000, “Observations of Irradiance Variations, Space Science Rev., 94, pp. 15-24., source,
Steven Mosher says: Sept. 6 at 11:08 pm
…3. If they used the BEST data I think they used, they probably forgot a critical step.
With this statement, Steven Mosher achieves maximum vagueness. Contact the Guinness Book of World Records.
IF (no ElseIF or Else)
I think they used… (well you are intimate with BEST, what dataset do you think it was???? Pray tell. )
probably …. ( p = what?)
a critical step. (Finally, some precision! “a” meaning one! But which critical step?)
Steven, you do your reputation no good with such statements. Be more specific or don’t say anything at all. We can read your written words, not read your mind.
It is getting to the point where “Steven Mosher says” translates to
“You will learn nothing useful in the following comment.
Save yourself and skip to the next posting.”
You mean the biggest source of energy in our solar system has something to do with the temperature?! When will these people learn to think for themselves?
excuse me, i’m getting an error whenever I load up or post in the following thread;
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/09/04/sea-ice-news-volume-3-number-12-has-arctic-sea-ice-started-to-turn-the-corner/
A login po-up keeps appearing
“Enter user name and password for ftp://sidads.colorado.edu”
I know the site, so I went to retrieve NSIDC (NOAA) sea ice data from here;
ftp://sidads.colorado.edu/DATASETS/NOAA/G02135/
and got the same message.
I’ve frequently accessed these sites of late and never had issues. Is there a bug on this page or maybe my computer?
I posted in the sea ice thread, but don’t know if my posts made it owing to the pop-up login appearing there.
From a history/philosophy of science perspective, it probably doesn’t make sense to talk in terms of what “science” was going on 5000 years ago.
With respect to the perennial Leif contra al. spectacle, a recurring motif in the comment sections of any entry on the sun, I don’t want to enter the fray, but notice that Leif at least has a communication problem. I don’t mean that as an ad hominem–it frustrating even just to read the comments because there is no real dialogue and instead just talking across each other.
Reliable sources report that NASA GISS is working on a manned mission to the Sun to prove once and for all that the sun has no effect on climate. When questioned on the possible hazards of solar radiation, GISS scientist’s were quick to point out they had solved the problem. They were going to fly at night.
Leif, could you average three groups of numbers from slide 31 for me?
Group 1: 1700 – 1812
Group 2: 1812 – 1905
Group 3: 1905 – Present
It seems to me that Group 3’s average is higher than Groups 1 and 2.
Steven Mosher says: Sept. 6 at 11:08 pm
…3. If they used the BEST data I think they used, they probably forgot a critical step.
======
The adjustments
Leif Svalgaard says:
“Most commenters here [as usual] suffer from a severe case of confirmation bias.”
That’s what makes the study interesting. From the mouth of babes comes the truth. People who elevate themselves to be experts are usally the most closed minded in their thinking… or should I say suffer confirmation bias (which works both ways?)?
Being a simpleton, I muse over the battle of climate science, as generally speaking we see the notion of CAGW has fallen on its face, leaving the study of long forecasting of earth climate very arguable. A coin has three sides, how many people consider the coin’s edge as a possible outcome?
I suppose calculating any single element of influence earth / sun / climate relationship can predict some degrees of climate change, all others being consant; however, I believe there is too much chaos and science yet to be discovered. The battle is not the obvious (even though there are some folks living in denial).