Guest post by David Archibald
George Orwell said,” He who controls the present, controls the past. He who controls the past, controls the future.” Some amongst us have used that as an instruction manual and have attempted to create confusion about the sunspot number record. We can sidestep all that by using the F10.7 flux which can’t be fiddled with and adjusted. The F10.7 instrument record goes back to 1948:
It has been previously derived that the break-over between sea level rising and falling is a sunspot number of 40: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/03/quantifying-sea-level-fall/ A sunspot number of 40 equates to a F10.7 flux of 100.
WUWT recently alerted us to the existence of Usoskin’s 2010 paper on solar activity during the Holocene, available here: A History of Solar Activity over Millennia
Usoskin’s paper contains a lot of useful information that allows us to backtest the relationship between solar activity and sea level. For example, consider that if the average sunspot number over the Holocene had been above or below 40 over the Holocene, then sea level would have risen or fallen over the Holocene according to my theory. His Figure 18 provides the answer:
Figure 18 shows that the average sunspot number over the Holocene was very near 40. We can also tie sea level events over the Holocene to the detail in Usoskin’s Figure 17:
The figure above is the last six thousand years of sunspot number. It is evident the average sunspot number was higher prior to 0 BC and lower since. Sea level therefore should have been higher prior to 0 BC and lower since. That is confirmed by a 2007 paper on Holocene sea level variability: http://www-public.jcu.edu.au/public/groups/everyone/documents/journal_article/jcuprd_054910.pdf
From the abstract,”the Holocene sea-level highstand of +1.0 – 1.5 m was reached ~ 7000 cal yr BP and fell to its present position after 2000 yr BP.” Low sunspot periods from Usoskin’s Figure 17 are evident in the sea level record. Further from that abstract,”During this ~ 5000 year period of high sea level, growth hiatuses in oyster beds and tubeworms and lower elevations of microatolls are interpreted to represent short-lived oscillations in sea-level of up to 1 m during two intervals, beginning c.4800 and 3000 cal yr BP. The rates of sea-level rise and fall (1-2 mm yr) during these centennial scale oscillations are comparable with current rates of sea-level rise.” On Usoskin’s Figure 17, the 4,800 BP date corresponds to the low sunspot period at 2,800 BC and the 3,000 BP date corresponds to the low sunspot period at 800 BC.
The Usoskin paper contains another instructive figure, his Figure 13 of an example of a reconstruction of the heliospheric magnetic field at Earth orbit for the last 600 years:
The benign period of the second half of the 20th Century is associated with a far more active Sun. The cold periods are associated with a heliospheric magnetic field of under 2 nT. How does that compare with the modern instrument record? The following figure shows that the recent range of the magnetic field equates to that of the first half of the 20th Century:
Now back to the F10.7 flux and sea level. Based on the length of Solar Cycle 24 derived from Altrock’s green corona emissions diagram and Livingston and Penn’s prediction of peak Solar Cycle 25 sunspot amplitude of 7, we can predict the general form of the F10.7 flux to 2040:
I have come to the conclusion that a F10.7 Flux of 100 is the breakover between heating and cooling on Earth. It explains most things to me. My best guess on that at this point is January 2015, following which, two decades of cooling will ensue.
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Leif,
By the way, thanks for your earlier answer, and indeed all answers.
L.S:
The first few surges serve to cancel out the old flux, the rest to build the new polarity which [I think] determines the size of the next cycle. We have just seen that the very first surge of cycle 24 in the North has already cancelled out the old flux [granted that there wasn’t much to begin with]. If several more surges follow [as they usually do], the North polar fields might build to considerable strength [with SC25 then becoming strong, contrary to expectation]. The South seems to be a year or so behind. If mid-cycle is when the poles reverse it can’t be far away…
Remember, you heard it first here, Last Edit: Feb 23, 2011, 9:03pm by lsvalgaard followed by laughing face.
OK then, ‘laughing face’ got you out of that one.
I’m cherry picking in the emperor’s garden, always a dangerous business.
To be fair, there were at least 5-6 ‘low SC25’ prediction since then.
Peace among friends.
In reply to Leif Svalgaard.
“Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 9:19 am
William says:
September 15, 2012 at 9:00 am
I fully support the assertion that sea level will fall if the sunspot cycle falls below 40. Based on observations both solar and earth based, however, it appears the solar magnetic cycle has been interrupted which is significantly different than a slow down in the solar magnetic cycle.
Explain what you mean by the magic word ‘interrupted’.”
No sunspots, abrupt very large CME. The sun will be unstable, if I understand what happened before and the same event occurs again (i.e. This is not a Maunder minimum.)
As noted above in my comment, there will be a significant increase in volcanic activity, increase number of earthquakes, large earthquakes, large drop in sea level, and there will be a gradual but significant planetary cooling before the solar magnetic cycle restarts, if I understand the mechanism and what happened before and the same event occurs again. The long term abrupt cooling is caused by the solar magnetic cycle restart which causes a geomagnetic excursion. (There are burn marks on the surface of the planet that correlate in time with the timing of the Younger Dryas abrupt cooling event and there is a geomagnetic excursion that also correlates in time with the Younger Dryas.)
I am waiting for observations (both solar and earth based) which are unequivocally viewed by all specialists as anomalous and will not comment further until there are. I am working away at clarifying the mechanism and have made progress. It appears it is fundamental to galaxy formation, galaxy morphology, and galaxy evolution.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 10:52 am
“…and that does not show any trend over the past almost two centuries:”
Looks to me like it might, if the low frequencies are stripped out. What happens if you feed this series through a low pass filter with a very low bandwidth?
I do not know who this belongs to – it’s just a random link I saved some years ago. The blue line is observed temperate anomaly, and the green line is said to be the “integrated sunspot”. An integral, of course, is a first order low pass filter with infinite time constant.
It stands to reason that the effect of solar heating should be cumulative, with a thermal time constant which could be quite long, given the immensity of the system. Just as a pot of water on the stove on low heat will take a long time to reach steady state temperature, imagine the time it would take for a pot big enough to hold the world’s oceans.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 12:39 pm
“The Sun may have shown less activity, but somebody forgot the tell the Earth that, as temperatures since 1995 have increased.”
There is always a lag. With a very long time constant, the lag can be quite long.
Tim Walker said, “For your definitive statement about the sun to be true, then the Maunder Minimum must not have been caused or affected by the sun in anyway or else the sun does have some kind of effect on glaciations.”
Leif Svalgaard said, “For your information, a glaciation [or ice age] is something completely different from what happened 400 years ago. The last glaciation ended some 15,000 years ago, and the next is 50,000 years in the future.”
Glaciation for your information is The process, condition, or result of being covered by glaciers. During the Maunder Minimum glaciers grew in Europe and most other parts of the world that have been thoroughly checked. Therefore there was glaciation happening during the Maunder Minimum. It did not get to the extent of ice sheets covering large portions of the northern continents, but it was glaciation. I presume you are thinking in only the situation where glaciation has happened to the point of ice sheets covering large portions of the northern continents, you did clarify your use of glaciation by [or ice age] otherwise you might not of been so pedantic sounding. I say pedantic sounding as apposed to pedantic, because the use of pedantic also implies being correct..
I appreciate your agreeing with me about your definitive statement not being correct.
Leif said, “Glaciations have nothing to do with the Sun.”
Tim said, “When I see definitive statements about theories, I expect to see those statements proven wrong at least to some degree in the future.”
Leif said, “All theories are eventually [to a degree] proven wrong. The issue is whether they are good enough for now.”
That is why making definitive statements about theories puts the speaker in a bad light. They come across as just argumentative instead of as entering into a discussion
Thanks for the chat, Leif..
OT – There are nice comments about Leif over at http://www.skepticalscience.com/do-we-know-when-the-arctic-will-be-sea-ice-free.html
Archi: “Figure 18 shows that the average sunspot number over the Holocene was very near 40. ”
It does? Could you explain how you read 40 off that graph? Mean, median, mode what are we talking about here. If you mean the middle of the fitted parabola: a) Why?; b) is 32 “very nearly ” 40?
It’s not at all clear what you are reading off this graph.
c) Whatever the average for the Holocene is , how does this relate to the zero in sea level rise? On that time scale temps have been falling for the last 10,000 years. That would imply falling sea levels
You seems ot be working on the erroneous assumption that temperatures have been oscillating around this “average” value for the entire Holocene period and that it thus is the neutral point for sea level rise.
I would also suggest that basing climate analysis on one parameter is unlikely to be useful , whether it be sun spots or CO2.
Bart: >> There is always a lag. With a very long time constant, the lag can be quite long.
could you expand on what you mean?
Increase in temp is increase in energy. In what cicumstances do you see a lag in the increase in energy once the driver is removed?
Leif,
You replied to the question: “So anyway Leif, where’s your money on temperatures over the next 20 ++ years ?” …
“None of the above, but colder, but not because of the sun.”
If not because of the sun, what then ?
HenryP says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:06 pm
Are you sure -you want to quible again? With me?
I’m trying to educate you, but you seem to be learning-resistant.
vukcevic says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:22 pm
by lsvalgaard followed by laughing face.
OK then, ‘laughing face’ got you out of that one.
But puts you in a very poor light, doesn’t
William says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:29 pm
“Explain what you mean by the magic word ‘interrupted’.”
No sunspots, abrupt very large CME.
This has never been observed
Bart says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:30 pm
Leif Svalgaard says:
Looks to me like it might, if the low frequencies are stripped out. What happens if you feed this series through a low pass filter with a very low bandwidth?
How low? A century per data point? or a solar cycle?
It stands to reason that the effect of solar heating should be cumulative, with a thermal time constant which could be quite long, given the immensity of the system.
None of the solar enthusiasts incorporate a ‘quite long thermal time constant’. What do you think it is? 10 years, 100 years? 1000 years? 10,000 years? …
Bart says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:31 pm
There is always a lag. With a very long time constant, the lag can be quite long.
Tell that to HenryP
Tim Walker says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:32 pm
Glaciation for your information is The process, condition, or result of being covered by glaciers.
“Glaciation’ has a very precise meaning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacial_period
“A glacial period (or alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate within an ice age. The last glacial period ended about 15,000 years ago”
I appreciate your agreeing with me about your definitive statement not being correct.
In spite of your appreciation, my statement stands.
That is why making definitive statements about theories puts the speaker in a bad light.
Not when they are true
They come across as just argumentative instead of as entering into a discussion
Your education is not a discussion.
OK Bart, I just found your preceding comment about the integral being infinite period low pass filter. and Leif’s “less activity”. Less is still some , so continued increase or reduceing increase is sitll possible.
Leif Svalgaard-
you say “First of all, this is not NASA’s prediction, but David Hathaway’s own private prediction…”
I think that may be a surprise to the global news media and every magazine that quotes these solar cycle predictions from the NASA website-
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/predict.shtml
The web page indicates the update was authored by Hathaway.
I don’t see anywhere on the webpage that indicates this is David Hathaway’s ‘private’ prediction.
It is presented as the official prediction of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 12:39 pm
“The Sun may have shown less activity, but somebody forgot the tell the Earth that, as temperatures since 1995 have increased.”
If rate of change of temp (aka global warming) and rate of rise of sea levels have fallen drastically since 1995 , somebody forgot to tell Leif.
http://i46.tinypic.com/2myp2rk.png
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:08 pm
But puts you in a very poor light, doesn’t
Indeed it doesn’t , not as yet, so far so good
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SSN.htm
If you follow my example and do one off, you will not need updates.
Riding a rollercoaster prediction got Hathaway into a bit of a mess. 🙂
Leif Svalgaard posted this,
Tim Walker says:
September 15, 2012 at 1:32 pm
Glaciation for your information is The process, condition, or result of being covered by glaciers.
“Glaciation’ has a very precise meaning: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacial_period
“A glacial period (or alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate within an ice age. The last glacial period ended about 15,000 years ago”
I appreciate your agreeing with me about your definitive statement not being correct.
In spite of your appreciation, my statement stands.
That is why making definitive statements about theories puts the speaker in a bad light.
Not when they are true
They come across as just argumentative instead of as entering into a discussion
Your education is not a discussion.
Your problem sir is that you posted not the precise meaning of glaciation, but of GLACIAL PERIOD. Your condescension gathered around your obvious error is very bad sir. I sir looked up the meaning of glaciation and used it in my post, sir. You sir did not use a PRECISE meaning of glaciation or even a meaning of glaciation. You, sir, used the wikipedia definition of GLACIAL PERIOD. This gives me serious doubts about what else you are sharing here. As I have sadly found out in recent times, science is occupied by many with larger egos than desires for truth and knowledge. Good day sir. I will from hence forth take all you have to say with a very large grain of salt.
[I’m not condescending to think I could teach you anything. It sounds as if you just might know it all. SARC]
ANONY MOUSE
sept 15 9:38am
I truly resent people who are funnier than me.
Eugene WR Gallun
Ric Werme says:
OT – There are nice comments about Leif over at
I propose some slogans
Save the Leif
No Leif for oil
Leif’s Day
I guess without the presence of Dr Leif. My misconceptions were permanently crystallized,
Thanks Dr Leif.
Anthony: The best blog in the solar system.
I would like Leif or anybody to explain why the next glaciation could be 50,000 years into the future?
Our flat topped holocene would then be 61,000+ years young. Bit different than all the other interglacials in the 100,000 year cycle.
Leif Svalgaard says:
September 15, 2012 at 12:26 pm
The last glaciation ended some 15,000 years ago, and the next is 50,000 years in the future.
Of the last six interglacial episodes, five lasted for 1/2 of a precessional cycle (12,500 years) and the sixth, for unknown reasons lasted for a full precessional cycle (25,000) years).
Upon what information are you claiming the current interglacial will last for two full precessional cycles?
Wading through these comments, I am beginning to think there may be a danger that sunspot versus sea level may be another “correlation equals causation” error similar to temperature versus CO2.
I need to keep an eye on two or three local tide gauges for the purpose of checking habitable floor and trench invert levels against height datum and HAT (highest astronomical tide). No variations apparent other than a cyclical variation of +/- 2mm/year.
Reasonable fit to JCU paper 2008: “Mid-late Holocene sea-level variability in eastern Australia” referenced above. I am also aware of Mörner’s paper: “The great sea-level humbug”.
Staggering mismatch with the projections in the Australian Baseline Sea Level Monitoring Project.
Sea level is another area where “corrections” are rampant and observations are replaced by modelling.
If they are tweaking here, they are probably tweaking everywhere.
AnonyMoose says:
September 15, 2012 at 9:38 am
0 BC? So the seas stopped rising when Jesus appeared, and again when Obama appeared. 🙂
————————-
I’m going back to my old training ….. something about causation and …….now what was that?
Leif Svalgaard-
you say “…he is settling on our prediction issued back in 2004”
Thanks for the link to your paper. Do you still stand by your prediction of cycle 24 maximum occurring in 2011?
Dr Burns says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:07 pm
If not because of the sun, what then ?
Any sufficiently complicated system has internal variations.
chris y says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:20 pm
It is presented as the official prediction of NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.
Nowhere does it say that. NASA subscribes to the official prediction here:
http://www.swpc.noaa.gov/SolarCycle/SC24/index.html
“April 25, 2008 The official NOAA, NASA, and ISES Solar Cycle 24 prediction was released by the Solar Cycle 24 Prediction Panel on April 25, 2007″
P.S. I am on that prediction panel.
P. Solar says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:22 pm
If rate of change of temp (aka global warming) and rate of rise of sea levels have fallen drastically since 1995
Except they haven’t
vukcevic says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:29 pm
“But puts you in a very poor light, doesn’t it”
Indeed it doesn’t , not as yet, so far so good
The poor light comes from misrepresenting a tongue-in-cheek statement by me, as my ‘opinion’ [we got you on record …]
This is very poor style
Tim Walker says:
September 15, 2012 at 2:33 pm
Your problem sir is that you posted not the precise meaning of glaciation, but of GLACIAL PERIOD.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glacial_period : “A glacial period (or alternatively glacial or glaciation)”
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/glaciation.html
http://www.nationalatlas.gov/articles/geology/a_glacial.html
You confuse the term ‘glaciation’ with ‘glacier’. Glaciers expand and shrink all the time. Geologists call it a glaciation when glaciers expand and move on a continental scale. This happens rarely [every tens to hundreds of thousands of years] controlled by changes in the orbital elements of the Earth [caused predominantly by Jupiter] and seems to be contingent of particular arrangements of the continents and ocean currents. In the past 500 miliion years there have been a handful of periods where glaciations happened. We call those ‘ice ages’ [each ‘age’ consisting of many ‘glaciations’]. And they are not caused by variations of activity of the sun.
Neville. says:
September 15, 2012 at 3:17 pm
I would like Leif or anybody to explain why the next glaciation could be 50,000 years into the future?
Because the slide into a new glaciation happens at ‘glacial’ speed [i.e. slowly]. There are more than one cycle: 21k, 41k, 100k years aprox.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitch_cycles
jjfox says:
September 15, 2012 at 3:42 pm
Upon what information are you claiming the current interglacial will last for two full precessional cycles?
“More recent work by Berger and Loutre suggests that the current warm climate may last another 50,000 years”
Berger A, Loutre MF (2002). “Climate: An exceptionally long interglacial ahead?”. Science 297 (5585): 1287–8.
http://i46.tinypic.com/atkt3l.png
This compares satellite sea level records and the tide gauge data against which they are supposedly calibrated. Tide gauge data from knmi Klimate explorer only goes to 2002 but there’s enough overlap to tell the story.
Apparently the water was piling up in the middle of the oceans at a rate of 3mm/yr from 1995 until 2005. Then apparently they were full and it stopped piling up. In the mean time there was a minimal increase in global sea levels measured at the coastal tide gauges. Well under 1mm/yr even at the peak in 1995.
The tide gauge data is 12 data per year and the GMSL is 33 / year , so the processing accounts for this as seen in the legends. GMSL is Colorado’s data current release sl_ns_global is the SAME dataset as reported April 2011.
The closer you look the worse it gets … again. What a scam.