Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
The CERES data has its problems, because the three datasets (incoming solar, outgoing longwave, and reflected shortwave) don’t add up to anything near zero. So the keepers of the keys adjusted them to an artificial imbalance of +0.85 W/m2 (warming). Despite that lack of accuracy, however, the CERES data is very precise and sensitive.
As an example of what that sensitivity can reveal about the climate system, consider Figure 1, which shows the upwelling (outgoing) longwave (LW) and reflected solar shortwave (SW), month by month, for 13 years (N=156). Since these are individual CERES datasets, their trends and values should be valid.
Figure 1. Upwelling longwave (shades of blue) and upwelling reflected shortwave (shades of red) for the globe as well as the two hemispheres separately. Cyclical seasonal variations have been removed.
Now, there are several very curious aspects to this figure. The first and most surprising issue is that the hemispheric values for shortwave, and also the hemispheric values for longwave, are nearly identical from hemisphere to hemisphere. Why should that be so? There is much more ocean in the southern hemisphere, for example. There is solid land at the South Pole rather than ocean. In addition, the underlying surface albedos of the two hemispheres are quite different, by about 4 watts per square metre. Also, the southern hemisphere gets more sunlight than the northern hemisphere, because the earth’s orbit is elliptical.
So given all these differences … why should the longwave and shortwave in the two hemispheres be the same?
The next thing of interest is the stability of the system. The trends in all six of the measurements are so tiny I’ve expressed them in W/m2 per century so that their small size can be appreciated … if the trends continue, in a century they may change by a watt or two. Note that despite the small spread of the measurements, none of the trends are significant.
The next thing of interest is that in addition to the values being similar in both hemispheres, the trends are also quite similar. All of the trends are very slightly negative.
Finally, despite the great difference in the size of the LW and SW signals (240 vs 100 W/m2, Figure 1), the size of the variations in the two signals are quite similar. Here is a boxplot of the three pairwise comparisons—the anomaly variations in global, and northern and southern hemisphere.
Figure 2. Boxplots of the variations in the longwave and reflected shortwave shown in Figure 1, for the globe (left panel), the northern hemisphere (center panel) and the southern hemisphere (right panel).
Since these are boxplots, we know that half of the data lies inside the colored boxes. This means that half of the time, the longwave and the shortwave are within ± one-half watt of the seasonal value. Plus or minus one-half watt half the time, and within a watt and a half for 95% of the time, for a total of 156 months … this to me is amazing stability.
Given the myriad differences between the northern and southern hemispheres, my explanation of this amazing stability is that a) the temperature of the planet is regulated by a variety of threshold-based processes, and b) the set-point of that regulation is controlled by globally consistent values for the physics of wind, water, and cloud formation.
Now, there certainly may be some other explanation for this amazing stability and symmetry of the climate despite the large differences in the geometry and composition of the two hemispheres. That’s my explanation. If you have a better one … bring it on.
Best regards to all,
w.
NOTE ON DATA AND CODE: I’ve turned over a new leaf, and I’ve cleaned up my R computer code. I’ve put all the relevant functions into one file, called “CERES Functions.R”. That file of functions, plus the data, plus the code for this post, are all that are required to duplicate the figures above. I just checked, it’s all turnkey.
DATA: CERES 13 year (220 Mbytes, has all the CERES data in R format.)
FUNCTIONS: CERES Functions.R (Has all the functions used to analyze the data.)
CODE FOR THIS POST: Amazing Stability CERES (Has the code to create the figures and calculations used above.)
I’ll make this short and hopefully sweet.
1 Solar year is 24 hrs x 365.2422 days equals 8,765.813 hrs.
1 Sideral day is 23.93447hrs x 366.2422 days equals 8,765.813hrs.
This is close enough at my pay grade.
Thanks, Konrad. Given the typical temperatures of earth, I thought most IR radiation was in the SWIR band. Additionally, Steve Mosher didn’t actually limit his claim to IR. He claimed that, “The earth radiates to space at a given height called the ERL.” The earth also radiates reflected, visible light, and I know for sure that visible light imagery of the earth’s surface is visible from space.
“ERL” is essentially a mathematical fiction
OK, that’s what I was thinking. It’s strange for him to be making the claim as if the radiation is actually only occurring from that altitude rather than just mathematically assumed to occur from that altitude for certain calculations.
Thanks for the explanation regarding the convection argument. I’ll have to try tackling that issue another time.
Gerald Kelleher says:
January 7, 2014 at 3:27 pm
Rgbatduke wrote
“Do you seriously think that one single person on this list doesn’t understand the connection between axial tilt and the seasons? Wow, dude, you are seriously self-deluded.”
You need a surface rotation to explain the daily day/night cycle so you need another one to explain the 6 month day/6 month darkness polar cycle plus the sea ice that forms at the poles due to that surface rotation.
Gerald, are you saying that you believe the Earth is rotating on a 2nd axis so that first one pole is presented directly to the sun, then the other pole is presented 6 months later? Is this why you linked photos showing one pole of Uranus pointed sunward?
If so, have you considered that this 2nd polar rotation would cause every place on the surface of the Earth to have the noon sun pass directly overhead, that is pass through the Zenith, twice each year?
Have you also considered that such a polar rotation would mean that the the North Star would not be north except briefly twice each year?
Have you also considered that Uranus would not need to have a polar rotation to present its poles to the sun if it had a steady axial tilt near 90 degrees, which it does? That its orbital revolution would then do the job?
SR
P.S. I 2nd Wobble’s queries… Gerard, all you have to do is respond to our questions if you want to get your message out.
SR
When it comes to explaining sea ice growth at the North pole along with the 6 months of daylight followed by 6 months of darkness,the forum becomes silent on the dynamical cause which amounts to a surface rotation caused by the Earth’s orbital motion around the Sun. I was half expecting someone to assert that the Earth rotates so slowly at the poles compared to the Equator that it takes 6 months to travel through night but unfortunately readers either can’t or won’t consider the actual cause which is a separate rotation to daily rotation and a motion that can be seen to a 100% observational certainty.
I have encountered the most hostile opposition to the cause of daily temperature fluctuations within a 24 hour period coincident with the daily surface rotation to the central Sun at any given habitable location so it is hardly surprising that the annual temperature fluctuation at the polar location which requires a second surface rotation to explain (reflective of all points on Earth) is not going to be appreciated even with imaging to demonstrate it.
I won’t ask again how people are going to explain the 6 month period of darkness followed by 6 months of daylight at the poles without acknowledging a surface rotation just as they would normally do for the day/night cycle at lower latitudes.
Anyone doubt that there is a cult out there and that it is not only the opposition which are driven by hopelessly flawed convictions ?.
Tell me Gerald..
Did you ever complete junior high ?
Willis wrote –
“So yes, Gerald, you’ve proven you’ll stuff your nonsense down peoples throats whether they want it or not. You just may not get to do it for much longer on WUWT. I’d take a deep breath and take a break if I were you, or you may find yourself out in the cold.”
You are the guy who ,without a single objection,declares that there are more rotations of the Earth than there are day/night cycles. In normal times there would be no opposition to the explanation for the daily temperature response to daily rotation as temperatures pick up as a location swings back into solar radiation within a 24 hour period but this is no normal era with its 366 1/4 rotations in 365 1/4 days which expands out to 1465 rotations inside 4 orbital circuits of the Earth.
Human nature works a lot differently than you expect and the forum will respond to this information in a way other than the hostility directed towards me. The human body is built around the great daily and orbital cycles of the Earth hence they are the first things people should appreciate but unfortunately they don’t as demonstrated by your disability in the matter of the body’s response to the effects of one rotation in a day.
I told you it is nothing I haven’t heard or seen before apart from the remarkable moderation policy here and that I haven’t seen.
Gerald, will you please explain the cause of daily temperature fluctuations within a 24 hour period? I promise that I will not oppose you, but please keep in mind that I’m not an expert in this field – so simple terms will be best for me.
(Also, I can’t understand your complaints about the opposition and cults unless I first understand what your trying to teach, so a straight forward explanation would be appreciated.)
Wobble
“Are you saying that both a day and a rotation should simply be defined as the time it takes the earth to rotate between apogee’s of the sun? And are you saying that a calendar merely needs to add an extra day every 4 orbits around the sun at the time when Sirius fails to be visible?”
Anyone care to determine the reference for the Earth’s orbital position each year other than the original one where the orbital motion of the Earth puts Sirius just far enough to one side of the Sun to be visible ?.
The Earth follows roughly the same ecliptic path as the other planets so when we see two planets close to each other,a line running parallel with both planets determines not only their orbital path but also ours –
http://wpmedia.o.canada.com/2013/12/smiley-face.jpg
There is a also an apparent motion of the background stars along the same path and Sirius is one of those stars which disappears behind the Sun due to the orbital motion of the planet,the previous animated graphics should suffice to explain this and particularly this one –
All things are worked out from this perspective including how many rotations it takes our planet to return to the same orbital position by literally counting the rotations in proportion to those 4 orbital circuits.
People are foolish,they follow the dictates of the late 17th century crowd who shoved everything into stellar circumpolar motion and destroyed the ability to appreciate the graceful motion of the planets and the apparent motions of the stars in their annual circuit so they could model planetary dynamics using timekeeping averages.So there is a clash of cultures where the most vapid minds are unable to work with 21st century imaging and graphics by lunging at a rotating celestial sphere conclusion –
I doubt if you had read the first line of this response but it does give me a chance to bring up astronomical points that were lost to mathematical modelers centuries ago.
Wobble wrote –
“Gerald, will you please explain the cause of daily temperature fluctuations within a 24 hour period? ”
You probably notice that it gets colder as darkness sets in and not until light and the Sun appear will it start to warm up ,the cause has to do with this motion –
Now,you ask the other guys how they plan to explain the same cause and effect when they aggressively assert that there are more rotations than day/night cycles.
Btw,in dealing with a cult on a pandemic scale there is no room for frustration as the issue is to open the mind to possibilities,opportunities and wider perspectives whereas modeling has confined the human condition to contending with or defending a pre-conceived conclusion. It is probably the closest I will come to a personal insult but when you have to ask what causes the temperatures to go up and down daily then be aware that the mob hostility directed towards me is a normal reaction within a cult setting –
“In all the world,, there is nothing quite so impenetrable as a human mind snapped shut with bliss. No call to reason, no emotional appeal can get through its armor of self-proclaimed joy.” Cult deprogramming website
““In all the world,, there is nothing quite so impenetrable as a human mind snapped shut with bliss. No call to reason, no emotional appeal can get through its armor of self-proclaimed joy.” ”
And you are holding that tightly to your chest. You own it , It is YOU ! 🙂
How are you chewing on that knee , btw?
No hostility.. just hilarity. !
Gerald K,
Labeling others as a ‘cult’ is extremely lame. This is the most wide open science site you will find. It is not inhabited by head-nodding cultists who all agree with each other — as your own comments make clear. Just because someone disagrees with your world view does not make them members of a cult.
You need to at least consider the possibility that you might simply be wrong. Name-calling is just something you can hide behind to avoid that possibility. Maybe everyone else is not wrong, eh?
I’m not sure why you phrased this as a question, but it seems as if you are claiming that “the reference for the Earth’s orbital position each year” should be “the original one where the orbital motion of the Earth puts Sirius just far enough to one side of the Sun to be visible”. Is this correct? Again, please be patient. I’m doing my best to understand.
OK, it also seems as if you’re saying that one should determine the number of rotations it takes the earth to return to the same orbital position by counting the rotations during 4 orbital circuits. Is this correct? From previous comments it seems as if you’re saying that the counted number is 1461. Is this correct? If so, does this mean that you’re saying that the earth doesn’t return to it’s original orbiting position for 1461 days? I’m I understanding you correctly?
OK, it seems as if you’re saying that the cause of daily temperature fluctuations within a 24 hour period are caused by the sun warming the earth up by exposing it to sunlight during part of its rotation and that the earth then cools after it’s no longer exposed to the sunlight? Is this correct?
OK, I will ask the other guys this as soon as I know that I understand you properly. 🙂 Does this sentence mean that you’re saying that it’s impossible for someone to correctly explain the cause and effect of daily temperature fluctuations if they aren’t correctly determining the number of rotations of the earth? Are you saying that someone who asserts that there are more rotations than day/night cycles will be wrong about the cause and effect of daily temperature fluctuations?
Again, please be nice to me. I’m really trying to understand.
dbstealey
Two questions surfaced in this forum over the last 12 hours ,questions that were directed to me –
1 .What causes temperatures to fluctuate daily ?.
2 How many rotations are there in a year ?.
The very fact that those questions are asked in the 21st century other than in a high school setting is a reflection of a dangerous cult that emerged in the late 17th century and is almost pandemic today via the education/indoctrination system,at least in astronomy and terrestrial sciences.
Despair,frustration or exclusion are not issues,a person looking over the historical and technical vista provided by the great planetary cycles and creation is a reward in itself and as distant from this overheated contending or defending a exceptionally ridiculous conclusion using climate as a background.
So,rather than explain what causes the day/night cycle as the cause is taken for granted,the next effect is the cause of the polar day/night cycle and its separate cause along with the formation and disappearance of Arctic sea ice,something dear to readers here.
Willis Eschenbach: “Sorry for the lack of clarity.” Judging by your response, I think it was probably my comment that lacked clarity, but it probably isn’t worth your time to pursue my real problem further, so I won’t attempt further clarification.
I write here only to mention a paper, http://pubman.mpdl.mpg.de/pubman/item/escidoc:1482060:15/component/escidoc:1703066/JCli-26-2013-468.pdf, to which Berényi Péter invited attention over on Judith Curry’s blog. I haven’t read it myself, but it appears to be directed to the shortwave match and longwave mismatch between the hemispheres.
dbstealey wrote –
“Labeling others as a ‘cult’ is extremely lame. This is the most wide open science site you will find. It is not inhabited by head-nodding cultists who all agree with each other — as your own comments make clear.”
The judgement is just and in line with those people who deal with individual cult members experience.I can make an emotional appeal that when people wake up on January 8th they are waking up to another rotation of the planet and the same will happen January 9th and every day after that but the cult member will insist that there are more rotations than there are 24 hour days.
I can present all the references from the creation of the calendar system to the Longitude problem where the 24 hour system works in tandem with the Lat/Long system around the Earth’s rotational characteristics and the cult guys will still insist there are more rotations than 24 hour days.
I can appeal to the flaws created by the rotating celestial sphere system created in the late 17th century using time keeping averages and the calendar system in direct conflict with the 24 hour and Lat/Long system and the cult guys will still insist that there are more rotations than days.
There can be a fine difference between being a cult member and being part of an organized group with a particular ideology needed to maintain a healthy and productive society. Due to the consensus against the 1461 rotations in 1461 days,this group has fallen to the wrong side of that line and all the reactions are merely a disturbance to the narrow mindset common to those who find themselves in rut convictions in either defending or contending with the idea of human control over planetary temperatures.
Widen up the technical and historical perspective and all the fuss vanishes and researchers can start fresh but modeling got this era into trouble and it as sure as can be that the world cannot model its way of this mess we inherited from a different era.
I think a clue to Gerald’s delusions may be found in how he always refers to the “central sun”.
But even so, simple geometry shows that for any object orbiting a central object, the number of “rotations” cannot equal the number of “days”.
Perhaps Gerald should consider the moon. It clearly presents the same face to the Earth at all times, and so if you define a day on the moon by the number of Earth rises, then there are 0 days per month. And yet in the course of one month, it rotates once. Thus it has one more rotation per month than the number of “days”.
I’m having difficulting imagining any frame of reference in which this does not apply, other than a simple model of a stationary Earth, in which case there are 0 rotations anyway on any timescale.
Steveta UK
“But even so, simple geometry shows that for any object orbiting a central object, the number of “rotations” cannot equal the number of “days”.”
This more or less mirrors what the main contributor to that cult states –
Willis wrote –
“In any case, NASA is right, there is one more rotation than there are days (a “day” being one day/night cycle). I guess you must have skipped that day in school.”
So,the response of the website is to recycle the arguments of a person who has just declared a separation between day/night cycles and rotations as though the slate was wiped clean and it was not an issue.
When you can’t predict the number of temperature rises and fall over a 500 day period is response to the same number of rotations then the use of ‘cult’ is justifiable as a cult member is unable to correlate their experience of the effects on their bodies such as how they feel temperature within a 24 hour cycle or day turning to night with their ability to appreciate the cause,in this case one rotation of the planet.
So,instead of looking at individual hostility in this thread,I look at how Willis is back in another thread feeding off the comments of those who know no better or are inclined to the same modeling nonsense. As cults are always self-defensive as opposed to normal organizations which protect themselves to maintain a healthy and productive environment for its citizens,you may see which side of the line this website falls.
Gerald, are you unable to consider the case of the moon, as I outlined above, and tell me where I went wrong, without any reference to anything else whatsoever? Just this one example. What is wrong with it?
Gerald, your fundamental perception of addressing a monolithic website (cult) is erroneous, thus any subsequent thought is as well.
@Steven Mosher: “The earth radiates to space at a given height called the ERL.” I repeat my question: Is it independent of a wavelength? And what exactly is that height? 20km? 47.5km? 200km? If it is simple, you should have no trouble to come up with a number.
Konrad 7:20pm: Good move correcting your narrative that only IR makes it directly to space and not the winds. Try to hold on to that as the internet never forgets.
The winds as you write do in part enable the distribution of the energy in the emission bath to be smooth over time per Willis Fig. 1 and without interfering. I note you do not find fault with the science in the Callendar 1938 paper – only finding fault w/the imprecise words.
BTW, the smooth NH and SH LWIR overlap in Willis’ Fig. 1 also means observations of nature needs you to correct your interpretation that windy days over the ocean majorly affect water emissions b/c there is no difference in emissions NH to SH even though much more water surface in SH. You must have skipped reading the paper I posted for you on that some time ago.
Moderators, why is Gerald Kelleher still allowed to post his inane speculations about astrophysics and astronomy on my thread about climate stability? He has repeatedly broken blog policy with his attempts to derail the thread, and has successfully done so. You are letting him run wild despite blog policy.
HELP! Can someone shut this idiot up, or at least tell him to take it to a relevant thread?
w.