Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
There are a number of lovely folks in this world who know how to use a shovel, but who have never sharpened a shovel. I’m not one of them. I like to keep my tools sharp and to understand their oddities. So I periodically think up and run new tests of some of the tools that I use.
Now, a while ago I invented a variant of Fourier analysis, that I called the “Slow Fourier Transform”. I found out later I wasn’t the first person to invent it—Tamino pointed out that it was first invented thirty years ago, and that it is actually called the “Date-Compensated Discrete Fourier Transform”, or DCDFT (Ferraz-Mello, S. 1981, Astron. J., 86, 619). Figure 1 below shows an example of the DCDFT method in use, a periodogram of the cycles in the sunspots:
Figure 1. Periodogram, annual sunspots. The horizontal axis shows length of possible cycles from one to 100 years, and the vertical axis shows the strength of those cycles.
Now, in Figure 1 we can see the familiar 11-year sunspot cycle in the data, along with somewhat weaker sunspot cycles of 10 and 12 years. It also APPEARS that we can see the claimed ~90-year “Gleissberg Cycle”.
However, a deeper examination of the sunspot data shows that the “Gleissberg Cycle” only exists in the first half of the data, and even there it only exists for a couple of cycles. Figure 2 shows a Complete Ensemble Empirical Mode Decomposition of the same sunspot data. The upper graph in Figure 2 shows the underlying empirical modes, and the lower graph shows their frequency:
Figure 2. CEEMD, annual average sunspot numbers. UPPER GRAPH: Panel 1 shows the raw sunspot data. Panels C1 through C7 show the seven empirical modes, in order of increasing period. The final panel shows the residual. If you add the bottom eight panels together, you get the raw data shown in the first panel. LOWER GRAPH: Periodograms of the empirical modes. These show the nature of the individual
The ~90-year purported “Gleissberg cycle” is shown in empirical mode C6. In the lower graph in Figure 2, we can see that after the 11-year cycles, C6 has the second-strongest cycle in the data … but in the upper graph, we can see that whatever signal exists, it is actually fairly short-lived, dying out after only a couple of cycles.
And that means that my periodogram shown in Figure 1 was misleading me—the peak at around 90 years was not actually significant. It only lasts a couple of cycles.
So I wanted to sharpen my periodogram tool so it would indicate which cycles are statistically significant. In the past I’ve tested my method by looking at periodograms of square waves, and of individual sine waves, combinations of sine waves and the like.
This time I thought “What I want to test next is something totally featureless, something like my imagination of the Cosmic Background Radiation. That would help me distinguish random noise from significant cycles.
Well, of course I don’t have the CBR to test my periodograms with, so here was my plan for generating some random noise.
I generated a series of sine waves at all periods from one year to thousands of years. They all had the same amplitude. Next, I randomized their phases, meaning that they all started at random points in their cycle. I figured, nothing could be more generic and bland than the sum of a bunch of sine waves of equal strength of all possible periods. Then I added them all together, and plotted the result.
Now, I’m not sure what I expected to find. Something like a hum, something kind of soothing. Or perhaps like on the ocean, when you have small wind-ripples on top of a chop on top of a swell with a bigger swell underneath that. Harmony of the spheres kind of thing is what I thought I’d get, complex but smooth like some mathematical BeeGee’s harmony… however, this was not the case at all. Figure 3 below shows a sample of one of the many different results I’ve generated by adding together thousands of sine waves of identical amplitude covering all the periods
Figure 3. Ten examples of what you get when you add together thousands of sine waves evenly blanketing an entire range of frequencies.
These results were surprising to me for several reasons. The first is their irregular, jagged, spiky nature. I’d figured that because these are the sum of smooth sine waves, the result would be at least smoothish as well … but not so at all.
The next surprise to me was the steepness of the trends. Look at Series 4 at the lower left of Figure 3. Note the size and speed of the rise in the signal. Or check out Series 3. There is a very steep drop in the middle of the record.
The next thing I hadn’t foreseen is the fractal, self-similar nature of the signal. Because it is composed of similar sine waves at all (or at least a wide range) of time scales, the variations at shorter time scales are very similar to variations at larger scales.
I was also not expecting the clear long-term cycles and trends shown in the various random realizations. Regarding the cycles, I had expected that the various sine waves would cancel each other out more than they did, particularly at longer periods.
And regarding the trends, I had thought that because none of the underlying sine waves contained a trend, then as a result the sum of them wouldn’t have much of a trend either. I was wrong on both counts. The signals contain both clear cycles and clear trends.
Another unexpected oddity, although it made sense after I thought about it, is that like a variety of natural climate datasets, these signals all have very high Hurst exponents. The Hurst exponent measures what has been described as the “long-term persistence” of a dataset. Since all of these signals are the sum of unchanging sine waves which assuredly have long-term persistence, it makes perfect sense that these signals also have a high Hurst exponent.
Upon contemplation, I also note that these series are totally deterministic, but with a very long repeat time. For example, the repeat time of all possible periods from 2 to 100 is 6.972038e+40 cycles.
The strangest part of all of this is that the signals look quite lifelike. By that, I mean that they look like a variety of climate-related records.Any one of them could be the El Nino Index, or the temperature of the stratosphere, or any of a number of other datasets.
So after I generated my random datasets composed solely of unvarying sine waves, I used my periodogram function to see what the apparent frequencies of the waves were. Here is a sample of a few of them:
Figure 4. Periodograms covering waves from one to 3200 cycles, in a dataset of length 12,800.
Now, at the left end of each of the graphs in Figure 4 we can see that the periodograms are accurate, showing all cycles as being the same small size. This is true up to about 100 cycles, or about 1/30 of the length of the dataset. But as we get further and further to the right, where we are looking at longer and longer cycles, we can see that we get larger and larger random peaks in the periodogram. These can be as large as forty or fifty percent of the total peak-to-peak range of the raw signal.
In order to gain a better understanding of what’s going on, I plotted all of the periodograms. Then I calculated the mean and the range of the errors, and developed an equation for how much we can expect in the way of random cycles. Figure 5 shows that result.
Figure 5. Periodograms of 100 datasets formed by adding together unvarying sine waves covering all periods up to the length of the dataset, in this case 12,800. Dotted line indicates the level below which we find 95% of the random data.
I also looked at the same situation at various dataset lengths, down to about 200 data points. Here, for example, is the situation regarding a random dataset of length 316, the same length as the annual sunspot record.
Figure 6. Periodograms of 100 datasets formed by adding together unvarying sine waves covering all periods up to the length of the dataset, in this case 316. Dotted line indicates the level below which we find 95% of the random data.
Now, this has allowed me to develop a simple empirical expression for the 95% confidence limit. As you can see, the error increases with increasing length of the period in question.
And this is the precise sharpening of the tool that I was looking for. Let me start by revisiting the first figure above, the periodogram of the sunspots, and I’ll use the same error measure of the amplitude of 95% of the random cycles:
Figure 7. As in Figure 1, but with the addition of the line showing the extent of 95% of the random errors as described above.
As you can see, this distinguishes the valid signal at 11 years from the two-cycle fluctuation at 88 years. If you compare this to Figure 6, you can see that a cycle at 88 years needs to be quite large in order to be statistically significant.
Now, I mentioned above that the random datasets generated by this method look very similar to natural datasets. As evidence of this, Series 7 in Figure 3 above is not a random dataset like the others. Series 7 is actually the detrended record of the historical variations in ∆14C, which I discussed in my previous post … compare that actual observational record to say Series 2. There’s not a lot of difference.
And this brings me to the reason for this post. I’ll start by quoting from my previous post linked just above, which discussed the results of a gentleman posting as “Javier”, who in turn used the results of Cliverd et al. If you have not read that post, please do so, as it is central to these findings. In that previous post I’d said:
Let me recapitulate the bidding. To get from the inverted 14C record shown in Figure 3 to the record used by Clilverd et al, they have
- thrown away three-quarters of the data,
- removed a purported linear trend of unknown origin from the remainder,
- subtracted a 7000-year cycle of unknown origin , and
- ASSERTED that the remainder represents solar variations with an underlying 2,300 year period …
The series shown as “Series 7” above is the result of the first two of those steps. As you can see, there is claimed to be a 7000-year signal that they say is “possibly caused by changes in the carbon system itself”. However, there is no reason to believe that this is anything other than a random variation, particularly since it does not appear in the three-quarters of the data that they’ve thrown away … but let’s set that aside for the moment and look at the result of subtracting the purported 7,000-year cycle from the ∆14C data. Here is the periodogram of that result:
Figure 8. Periodogram of the ∆14C data after removal of a linear trend of unknown origin and a 7,000 year cycle of unknown origin.
Note that this seems to indicate a cycle of about 960 years, and another at about 2200 years … but are they statistically significant?
In the comments to my post, Javier replied and said that I was wrong, that there indeed is a ~2400-year cycle in the ∆14C data. I pointed out to him that a CEEMD (Complete Ensemble Empirical Mode Decomposition) shows that in fact what exists is several cycles of about 2100 years in length, and then sort of a cycle of 2700 years length, and then another short cycle. This result is seen in the empirical mode C9 below:
Figure 9. CEEMD of the ∆14C data after removal of the linear trend and a 7,000 year cycle. Panel 1 shows the raw ∆14C data. Panels C1 through C9 show the nine empirical modes, in order of increasing period. The final panel shows the residual. If you add the bottom eleven panels together, you recover the raw data shown in the first panel.
In empirical mode C9 above you can see the situation I described, with short cycles at the start and end and a long cycle in the middle.
Mode C8 is also interesting, as it has a clear regular ~1000-year cycle at the beginning. Strangely, it tapers off over the period of record to, well, almost nothing. Again, I see this as evidence that this is simply a random fluctuation rather than a true underlying cycle.
In my discussion with Javier, I held that in neither case are we seeing any kind of true underlying cyclicity. And my thanks to Javier for his spirited defense, as it was this question that has led me to sharpen my periodogram tool.
And to complete the circle, Figure 10 below shows what my newly honed periodogram tool says about the ∆14C data:
Figure 10. As in Figure 8, periodogram of the ∆14C data after removal of a linear trend of unknown origin and a 7,000 year cycle of unknown origin, but this time with the addition of the line showing the limit of 95% of the cycles created by the addition of sine waves.
I note that neither the ~ 1,000-year nor the 2,400-year cycles exceed the range of 95% of the random data. It also bears out the CEEMD analysis, in that the ~1000 year period shows more complete cycles, and more regular cycles, than the 2400 year period. As a result, it is closer to significance than the ~2400 year cycle.
Conclusions? Well, my conclusion is that while it is possible that the ~ 88-year “Gleissberg cycle” in the sunspots, and the ~1,000-year cycle and the ~ 2400-year cycle in the ∆14C data may be real, solid, and persistent, I find no support for those claims in the data that we have at hand. The CEEMD analysis shows that none of these signals are either regular or sustained … and this conclusion is supported by my analysis of the random data. The fluctuations that we are seeing are not distinguishable from random fluctuations.
Anyhow, that’s what I got when I sharpened my shovel … comments, questions, and refutations welcome.
My best to everyone, and my thanks again to Javier,
w.
As Always: I, like most folks, can defend my own words and claims. However, nobody can defend themselves against a misunderstanding of their own words. So to prevent misunderstanding, please quote the exact words that you disagree with. That way we can all be clear regarding the exact nature of your objection.
In Addition: If you think I’m using the wrong method or the wrong dataset, please link to or explain the right method or the right dataset. Simply claiming that I am doing something the wrong way does not advance the discussion unless you can show us the right way.
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Peter Sable November 4, 2016 at 9:10 pm Edit
You’ll never regret it. Free, cross-platform, with interactive running of any line or even part of a line. Get the RStudio editor (also free), it features shortcuts and function completion and variable insertion and the like.
Tau is indeed long, about 600 years. Not sure why that is. I assume it’s because of the high autocorrelation of the series (lag-1 autocorrelation is 0.9902). The FORTRAN program has a readme file that says:
So tau is not calculated directly, they use something I never heard of called the “time-domain algorithm of Mudelsee”.
Anyhow, that’s what I know.
w.
for those of you interested in the Gleissberg, note this report
http://virtualacademia.com/pdf/cli267_293.pdf
especially Tables II and III
The most important is the information that the magnetic field of the sun varies in very long cycles.
“We found magnetic wave components appearing in pairs, originating in two different layers in the Sun’s interior. They both have a frequency of approximately 11 years, although this frequency is slightly different, and they are offset in time. Over the cycle, the waves fluctuate between the northern and southern hemispheres of the Sun. Combining both waves together and comparing to real data for the current solar cycle, we found that our predictions showed an accuracy of 97%,” said Zharkova.
Zharkova and her colleagues derived their model using a technique called ‘principal component analysis’ of the magnetic field observations from the Wilcox Solar Observatory in California. They examined three solar cycles-worth of magnetic field activity, covering the period from 1976-2008. In addition, they compared their predictions to average sunspot numbers, another strong marker of solar activity. All the predictions and observations were closely matched.
Looking ahead to the next solar cycles, the model predicts that the pair of waves become increasingly offset during Cycle 25, which peaks in 2022. During Cycle 26, which covers the decade from 2030-2040, the two waves will become exactly out of synch and this will cause a significant reduction in solar activity.
“In cycle 26, the two waves exactly mirror each other – peaking at the same time but in opposite hemispheres of the Sun. Their interaction will be disruptive, or they will nearly cancel each other. We predict that this will lead to the properties of a ‘Maunder minimum’,” said Zharkova. “Effectively, when the waves are approximately in phase, they can show strong interaction, or resonance, and we have strong solar activity. When they are out of phase, we have solar minimums. When there is full phase separation, we have the conditions last seen during the Maunder minimum, 370 years ago.”
https://www.ras.org.uk/news-and-press/2680-irregular-heartbeat-of-the-sun-driven-by-double-dynamo
And I think the planetary magneto’s have to be added to HenryP’s position, particularly some of the poles are opposite polarity, so there will be all sorts of field lines, and connections between multiple partners, and don’t forget mercury a big iron core, I think you can see it’s effect in the ssn during the 1906-1912 cycle.
Hi ren,
I’ve got a dollar that says solar cycle 24 drags on till 2021.
III. THE ~ 2300 YR PERIOD
” . . . the strongest feature in the ∆14C record is the long period of ~ 2300 yr. ”
…….Damon and Sonnett, 1991. Solar and terrestrial components of the atmospheric
…….14C variation spectrum. The Sun in Time. The Univ. of Ariz. Press, 360-388.
Notice that (Damon and Sonnett, 1991) makes reference to the ‘long period’ (~2300 yrs)
of the Hallstatt cycle. There is a long period (2313 yrs) and a short period (2208 yrs) of the
Hallstatt cycle. The 2402 year Charvatova (or Bray) cycle is not the Hallstatt cycle.
The long period (2313.6 yrs) Hallstatt is derived from the great alignment cycle (4627.2 yrs)
of the four gas giants. The significance of the great alignment isn’t the alignment itself
but the fact that all the planet positions repeat themselves in a 4627 year cycle. When
proxy data revealed there was no connection between climate and planet position,
researchers began to look elsewhere. The long period is based solely on alignment and
it takes more than alignment to generate force, it takes the acceleration of a massive sun.
The short period (2208 yrs) Hallstatt bares the same name because it delivers where
the long period failed. The short period (2208 yrs) reflects a repeating pattern of solar
activity rather than planetary position. It is my suspicion that (D & S, 1991) was expecting
to find a ~2300 year pattern and that lead them to believe they had found it. Since 1991,
it seems that every researcher with a cycle between 1470 to 2700 years has found a
perfect fit with the C14 proxy data. And . . all of these cycles somehow acquired the honorary
title of ‘Hallstatt cycle’. This is extremely unfortunate because this data rightfully belongs
to the short period (2208 yrs) Hallstatt cycle.
But there are researchers who did get it right and these were mostly solar scientists
like G.A.M. Dreschhoff:
…….Dreschhoff, 2007. Paleo-Astrophysical data in relation to temporal characteristics
…….of the solar magnetic field. Proceedings of the 30th International Cosmic Ray
…….Conference vol. 1, 541-544.
slightly off topic, although still in realm of sharpening your measuring tools for interpreting data….
when looking at the raw rainfall data from year to year at a particular weather station: it looks pretty chaotic, does it not?
I don’t think that is because weather as such is so chaotic. I think it our measuring procedure. If we look at only when station, then in one year some recurring major storm could have just missed the station where we were measuring. Hence, I thought of this and I decided to group the data into the known solar cycles.
Here is what happened;
fyi
1 Hale-Nicholson=2 successive Schwabe = 1/4 Gleissberg=1/10 De Vries Suess
perhaps this idea might also work for some of you working on the longer cycles?
sorry, typo there,
If we look at only when station
should read
If we look at only one station
Willis, here is a graph comparing cycle amplitude from 10Be, 14C and the cosmic ray modulation function “phi” from McKracken, et al., 2013, “A phenomenological study of the cosmic ray variations over the past 9400 years” Solar Physics:
All three show the Hallstatt cycle clearly and in the same place. Support from three independent methods is very strong evidence for a cycle of about this length.
Here is the 14C power spectrum used by Dr. Nicola Scafetta. The 99% significance level is shown in light blue. He uses a different statistic than you used. This error is the “error of measurement” error. It is probably more appropriate since measurement error is the big problem here. If we assume no measurement error in computing the statistics we can be misled. Scafetta’s methodology is appropriate here.
The cycle is there.
Andy, when I saw your first figure I worried that 2300 was too short compared with 9400 to give a significant result. But then your second figure, assuming it is correct, blows that concern away! I would also note that the Gleissberg spike at 80something years exceeds the 99% bound by a greater extent than does the 208 year spike. Not all of the 19 spikes breaking the 99 percentile are going to be valid, since 19 times 1% is 19% and that is not considered statistically significant. But the 3 largest look to be very significant. Unless God is toying with us, of course…
Rich.
Andy May November 6, 2016 at 5:48 am Edit
First, they do NOT show any confidence intervals. Claims without associated uncertainty are MEANINGLESS.
Next, I fear it’s paywalled, so I can’t say what they’ve done. However, they claim to find the same cycles in the Greenland and Antarctic data, which is highly improbable, as those two records diverge everywhere. They are also measuring something called the “cosmic ray modulation function”, which from the sound of it hardly qualifies as an observational dataset.
Next, they claim that “Fifteen significant periodicities between 40 and 2320 years are observed in the 10Be and 14C records”. That’s hogwash, only believable if you think anything you can see is “significant”.
Next, they are not analyzing three datasets, since one of them is a “cosmic ray modulation function” invented by one of the authors.
What on earth is the “error of measurment” error when it is at home? And why is Scafetta not giving the confidence interval? And I’m sorry, but the idea that the error runs horizontally between 1000 and 2400 years is a joke.
You say that “measurement error is the big problem here” … say what? Lack of significance is the big problem here … along with Scafetta’s continuing refusal to supply data and code to back up his claims. Perhaps claims with no data and no code impress you. Perhaps you don’t care that he refuses to show his work. Perhaps you are willing to gloss over the fact that his confidence levels are not confidence levels …
But those of us who still believe in “Nullius in verba” are clear that he is not a scientist of any kind.
In closing, I have no access to either the study or the data. If you want to send me two linke, one to the study and the other link to the data, as I said I’m happy to take look at it.
But since all you’ve offered are zero links, just three “periodograms” of some kind with no indication of significance, I’m sorry, Andy, but you’re not gaining any credibility with me. I CANNOT analyze your study without a link to an available copy the study and a link to the data.
Funny how every time I make this request, people send me everything and anything EXCEPT for what I requested … makes me wonder if they really do believe in what they claim. If they did, I reckon they’d jump at the chance to show me up. But instead, Andy, just like you, they want to waffle and puff and send me their opinions and their claims about some unavailable study and post up vague uncited graphs, but only very rarely do they send the two links to the study and the data.
Curious, that …
w.
Andy,
Notice that in Scafetta’s latest paper on the Hallstatt cycle, he uses the
J.C. Houtermans bristlecone pine 14C proxy. Houtermans 1971 study
was also used by (Damon & Sonett, 1991) to support their conclusions.
This 1971 data goes all the way back to ~11000 BC and just happens
to exhibit the best fit for the ~2313 year alignment cycle.
Houtermans, JC (ms) 1971 Geophysical interpretation of bristlecone pine
. . radiocarbon measurements using a method of Fourier analysis of unequally
. . spaced data. PhD thesis, University of Bern, Switzerland.
But . . in order to get this best fit for the 2313 year alignment cycle researchers
have to ignore the first and the largest peak, which occurs at ~10500 BC. If
we include the first peak and project forward to the latest (1870 AD) we
find that we now have five cycles of ~2474 years each. Conclusion is . . .
there are a number of cycles that fit but none perfectly.
The point I am trying to make is that attempting to find a good curve fit is not
the right approach when the data exhibits this much variability. This should be
an exercise that matches the correct physical mechanism with the correct period
(2200 or 2300) and weighs the actual influence of these physical mechanisms.
This boils down to a choice between . . ‘alignment’ the 2313 year long-period Hallstatt . .
. . . . OR . . . . ‘acceleration (eccentricity)’ the 2208 year short-period Hallstatt.
please visit Weathercycles.wordpress
” Earths climate linked to Jupiter/Saturn . . ”
Equ’s 1 – 3, . . separate alignment from eccentricity to show
that it is the eccentricity (acceleration) of a massive sun that
generates force in our solar system and not alignment.
This is the approach that takes the least assumptions and includes the most data. It is also independently confirmed by the existence of a ~ 2500 year climate cycle, while there is no 2200-2300 yr climate cycle.
Whether the ~ 2400 yr cycle can be tied to a planetary orbital cycle or not is at the moment highly speculative. One should never try to fit the data into a model.
@Javier
it seems to me that even with the Gleissberg, there were exceptions to the rule – if I have to believe the SSN record.
here I show my own results for the planets’ movement
http://oi64.tinypic.com/5yxjyu.jpg
which I believe to be correct – following my own results and at least 6 or 7 other parameters.
Assuming the relationship is causal, i.e. that the planets movement influence the solar activity
then, in the case of Gleissberg, it seems that for some or other reason it is possible that we could miss the [electrical] switch that puts the sun in the right motion. Perhaps the balance of weight is just not right. What happens then – i.e. if we don’t make the switch – is an extended maximum for another 22 years [ e.g. medeviel warm period] added to the 43 years of warming or an extended minimum [e.g. LIA] that would be 22 years of cooling added to the 43 years cooling.
Luckily it seems to me that we did make the relevant switch in 2014….
This tread is becoming a poster child for how good science is driven out in favor of the bad by those unequipped to understand the former. Instead of learning the analytic basics of white and red noise power spectra (see, e.g., http://www.atmos.washington.edu/~breth/classes/AM582/lect/lect8-notes.pdf and http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/1520-0469(1963)020%3C0182:OTPSON%3E2.0.CO%3B2)
a quaint construction of the sum of random-phase sinusoids equi-spaced in period is posited as the fundamental reference series for judging the spectral significance of observational data. This, of course, is in keeping with the misconception of putative advantages of a “slow Fourier transform.” Never mind that this analytic kluge has no serious mathematical foundation and doesn’t even reproduce the total signal variance upon integration, as specified by the Parseval Theorem. We are simply supposed to accept this as a benchmark–despite the total arbitrariness of its construction. Only rank novices should be that naïve!
Agreed. Coming to a subject ignoring everything that has been done on it for decades and claiming that his shovel is the ultimate tool providing a definitive answer should not be met with applause but contempt. But there is an anti-science movement and they are going to need people that reinterpret everything that has been done. They should reflect that this approach takes them nowhere.
1sky1 November 7, 2016 at 5:50 pm
Javier November 8, 2016 at 5:19 am
The reason I politely request that people QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS THEY OBJECT TO is exactly this—to try to prevent unpleasant folks like yourselves from lying about what I said.
I NEVER said that my constructions is “posited as a fundamental reference series for judging the spectra l significance”, 1sk1, that is a bald-faced lie. Instead, I described some actual experiments I’d done, and used them to make a CORRECT prediction about the lack of significance of the Hallstatt cycle, a crime for which you seem to think I should be punished.
Nor did I say that my tool is the “ultimate tool providing a definitiive answer”, Javier, that is also a bald-faced lie.
In fact, what I said was:
Since what I actually did say was that I’d use “redfit” IN PREFERENCE TO the model I developed, you’re both full of BS up to your eyeballs and trying to lie your way out of a corner.
Next, I am not “ignoring everything that has been done on [solar cycles] for decades’. Instead, I am QUESTIONING some things that have been BELIEVED about solar cycles for decades … it’s called “skepticism”, you two might profitably apply it to your established beliefs. You do remember “Nullius in verba”, don’t you? Its supposed to apply to all scientists, but it appears that only some of us actually take it seriously.
Finally, if you want to squash my ideas like a bug, I’ve asked above that if you (or anyone) thinks the Hallstatt cycle is real, that you decide which paper has the strongest evidence for that and send me two links, one to an accessible copy of the study and one to the data used in the study. With that in hand, we can actually discuss the underlying science and you can prove I’m wrong … and without those two links, we can’t say a damn thing about the study.
However, instead of doing that, instead of discussing the science you claim is there, you’ve both decided to ignore a polite request to specify what you object to, and you have gone straight to throwing mud at the wall and hoping it will stick … can’t say I’m surprised, it’s the common response of alarmists to having their fundamental beliefs questioned.
So if you’d like to discuss the studies underlying the Hallstatt cycle instead of telling unpleasant lies and continuing to make uncited, unreferenced claims, well, we’ll know that has happened because you’ll send me the two links to the study that you think does the most to support the Hallstatt cycle.
w.
Willis
the basic skeptic position is [which is correct] = there is no AGW unless you can prove it is there.
My truth: everything I have measured points to all global warming/cooling being cyclical.\
which side are you on?
let me know.
HenryP November 8, 2016 at 10:35 am
Mmmm … no, that’s not true at all. AGW could easily exist without anyone being able to prove it exists.
Mmmm … no. While there are indeed cycles of a host of lengths in a host of measurable variables, the problem is that they appear and disappear without warning. This makes them USELESS for doing any kind of prediction.
For example: above, in empirical mode C9 you can see the so-called “Hallstatt cycle”. It has two short cycles around 2050 years in length, a long cycle of about 2700 years, and then a final short cycle of about 2100 years.
Finally, something can have both cyclical and secular (long-term) variations.
Neither side. The question is too poorly phrased to answer. Is a signal composed of two short cycles, one much, much longer cycle, and a final short cycle reasonably described as”cyclical”? I suppose so, but there’s no steady cycle as we understand a cycle like the day-night cycle or even the sunspot cycle.
w.
No, thanks. I already did that once and you made a joke of a graph with the data. I don’t care about your ideas. You are as entitled to be wrong as anybody, and you don’t need my help for that. The Bray (Hallstatt) cycle has been studied for five decades by dozens of scientists that have dedicated years to its study. That you dedicate a couple of hours to it and decide that it doesn’t exist means nothing.
Regarding wrongful attribution I should remind you that you are the first that without quoting anything that I have written you have wrongfully attributed several things to me in a couple of your latest posts, so you shouldn’t get so touchy about it. Something about the mote and the beam.
Best regards.
Stop shoveling your Clintonian casuistry, Willis. I was not writing about what you SAID, but about what you DID, wittingly or not. There can be no question in Figures 1 and 7 that your quaintly constructed series–which emulates a bandlimited version of a red noise–was posited as the fundamental reference, without any justification of its particularly high persistence. Nor can the outputs of your “slow Fourier transform” be termed “periodograms,” in any standard sense of measure-preserving DFT decomposition of variance
equi-spaced in frequency.
Merely acknowledging a preference for REDFIT, after a reader pointed you to that program, scarcely remedies your mangling of signal analysis basics in the original post and your uncritical acceptance of red noise as a proper reference model for sunspot cycles, ENSO variations, or ice-core isotope data, amongst the series you mentioned. None of them show the properties of red noise of any persistence in their properly estimated power spectra. (In fact, NINO3.4 shows declining, rather than rising, power density as frequency approaches zero.)
If you want to obtain serious grounding in analysis of geophysical signals, which (aside from astronomically driven periodic variables) are usually Gaussian random signals with widely different spectral characteristics, I would recommend starting with, say, Yaglom’s monograph “An Introduction to the Theory of Stationary Random Functions,” available as a Dover reprint. It will broaden your conceptual horizons as to what is significant in data series.
To sharpen my intended meaning, please read: “None of them show EXCLUSIVELY the properties of red noise…”
1sky1, please define “good science,” since your apparent definition seems to be skewed by confirmation bias. The sole criterion of “good” science that I am aware of is productivity. That is, does it produce something useful, such as new understanding. In fact, discussions like this do produce new perceptions and new understanding of many aspects of the issues among those who actually follow the thread. Whether Willis is right or wrong, the discussion he has generated is highly useful. And, since he is far more explicit and forthcoming about his data and methods, arguably the discussion is immensely superior to one where the basic conclusion is supported by what renders down to “I’m an expert. Trust me.” There are a large number of individuals who try to follow the “climate debate” but find that large portions of it are closed to examination by deliberate barriers that prevent replication work. Those “barriers” are not solely imposed by adherents to one view. You might also recall that every single one of us started out as a “rank novice.” Assuming a superior attitude is far from demonstrating one is no longer naive. Indeed, in the field one is more likely to trip over obstacles that others, paying better attention, will avoid.
In a nutshell, good science is the production of reproducible evidence that acknowledges prior work and withstands scrutiny by the most well-founded, widely accepted analytic methods. It is not the skewed view provided by primitive, ad hoc methods tinkered up without regard for mathematical logic or scientific rigor. Superficial impressions of “confirmation bias” that are based upon how little “forthcoming” an argument may be, without regard for the quality of the scientific content, are what lead scientific laymen astray. That’s precisely what the elaborate dog and pony shows of carnival barkers bank on.
so?
on average, C14 investigation, going back to thousands of years, the Gleissberg is 87.8 years/
I find it [currently] at 86.5 years.
so there must be some irregularity- like I explained to Javier just now-
but the exception to the rule proves the rule?
perhaps you have listened to too many skeptics, so you became somewhat skeptical of the sceptics and decided to become the devils’ advocate…..
just an observation
I still admire you for your thunderstorm paper.
best
henry
but the exception to the rule proves the rule?
Properly rendered that phrase means that an exception invalidates the rule. The rule is bunk. Scepticism is a state of mind and is a useful tool regardless of outlook. It is frequently necessary to be sceptical of sceptics. In their intense desire to diminish or eliminate the anomalous, they not infrequently are a source of confusion. For instance, read Einstein’s response to Karl Popper, who speculated that quantum uncertainty was simply due to the coarseness of the mensuration instruments. Einstein went into great detail to explain to the “sceptical” Popper, that no, the problem was not in the tools but in the very mathematics. And Einstein relished the results of quantum theory no more than Popper. But being a scientist rather than a philosopher, he was capable of using his eyes and differentiating a hawk from a handsaw, even if he really, really wanted it to be a handsaw.
Javier November 9, 2016 at 4:31 pm
And your claim is that scientists are never wrong? I suppose that on that basis you accept all the lies of the alarmists without question, because climate has been “studied for five decades by dozens of scientists”?
I have not decided that the Hallstatt cycle doesn’t exist, that’s your fantasy. That’s why I ask people to QUOTE THE EXACT WORDS THEY OBJECT TO. I said nothing of the sort, you’re just making it up. Instead, I’ve pointed out that while it may exist, it is NOT supported by the ∆14C data. My exact words were:
So, I’ve asked why it is that you believe in the Hallstatt cycle.
But instead of replying, like far too many people who make overarching claims, you refuse to allow your ideas to be put to the test. You won’t tell us what evidences convinces you that the Hallstat cycle is real.
Yet another person who won’t put their money where their mouth is …
Like others, you suggest that I take another look at the existing studies. I’ve been down that road before. I find a study and show that it contains fatal errors … and the person I’m talking to simply says something like “Yes, but that’s just some bogus study, not the real solid study, that one means nothing”.
What I finally realized after a few times down that path was that the only chance I have to convince someone is if they have the albondigas to be willing to identify the study that they think is the strongest—otherwise they can just blow my work off as being about the wrong study. But if I can falsify the study they think is the strongest, then they MAY (or may not) reconsider their opinion.
So that was when I started asking people for two links, one to the study and one to the data, for the work that they thought was the solidest.
However, surprise surprise, most people are like you, Javier. They’re all full of grandiose claims until someone invites them to put their ideas to the test … then, like you, suddenly they come up with a fistful of reasons to turn and run for the door.
Ah, well. By the manner in which you defended your position earlier, I’d thought you were actually interested in finding out the truth, and that you might actually educate us about the scientific underpinnings of the Hallstatt cycle … like I said, it is your chance to squash me like a bug and prove me wrong.
Choice is yours …
w.
Willis,
No. They are wrong all the time as everybody else including you. My claim is that you have not proven them wrong on this issue with your little statistics game under your own set of rules.
There’s a climatic ~ 2400 yr cycle and there is a solar activity ~ 2400 year cycle. The solar activity ~ 2400 year cycle is supported by a variety of solar data including ∆14C and ∆10Be data.
The answer is too long for a comment and requires quite a few figures to lay down the evidence. It is the accumulation of evidence coming from different techniques and approaches what is convincing in Science, not the single magisterial article approach that you are so fond of. A forthcoming article by Andy May with my help will explain to you and others the evidence about the ~ 2400 yr Bray Solar Cycle. As long as you read it, of course.
Except that that’s not me. I always have scientific arguments based on published empirical evidence to defend my beliefs. Otherwise they wouldn’t be my beliefs. You will be shown the evidence. Whether it convinces you or not is a different matter, but frankly I don’t care much. It is convincing to me and my standards are pretty high. The IPCC doesn’t convince me, Svensmark’s Cosmic Rays-Cloud hypothesis doesn’t convince me, the planetary solar cycles don’t convince me, the baricenter hypothesis doesn’t convince me, Milankovitch theory doesn’t convince me, the 100 kyr glacial cycle doesn’t convince me, you don’t convince me. I am not an easy person to convince and I don’t have any skin in this climate thing. I am in just for the challenge and to have fun trying to find the truth, whatever it is. I don’t care if it is CO2 or not, it is the same to me. I just care about the answer.
Best regards.
Javier November 10, 2016 at 2:37 pm
QUOTE THE WORDS YOU DISAGREE WITH!!
I’ve pointed out that while it may exist, it is NOT supported by the ∆14C data.
There’s a climatic ~ 2400 yr cycle and there is a solar activity ~ 2400 year cycle. The solar activity ~ 2400 year cycle is supported by a variety of solar data including ∆14C and ∆10Be data.
So, I’ve asked why it is that you believe in the Hallstatt cycle. But instead of replying, like far too many people who make overarching claims, you refuse to allow your ideas to be put to the test. You won’t tell us what evidences convinces you that the Hallstat cycle is real.
The answer is too long for a comment and requires quite a few figures to lay down the evidence. It is the accumulation of evidence coming from different techniques and approaches what is convincing in Science, not the single magisterial article approach that you are so fond of. A forthcoming article by Andy May with my help will explain to you and others the evidence about the ~ 2400 yr Bray Solar Cycle. As long as you read it, of course.
However, surprise surprise, most people are like you, Javier. They’re all full of grandiose claims until someone invites them to put their ideas to the test … then, like you, suddenly they come up with a fistful of reasons to turn and run for the door.
Except that that’s not me. I always have scientific arguments based on published empirical evidence to defend my beliefs. Otherwise they wouldn’t be my beliefs. You will be shown the evidence. Whether it convinces you or not is a different matter, but frankly I don’t care much. It is convincing to me and my standards are pretty high. The IPCC doesn’t convince me, Svensmark’s Cosmic Rays-Cloud hypothesis doesn’t convince me, the planetary solar cycles don’t convince me, the baricenter hypothesis doesn’t convince me, Milankovitch theory doesn’t convince me, the 100 kyr glacial cycle doesn’t convince me, you don’t convince me. I am not an easy person to convince and I don’t have any skin in this climate thing. I am in just for the challenge and to have fun trying to find the truth, whatever it is. I don’t care if it is CO2 or not, it is the same to me. I just care about the answer.
Best regards.
Javier November 10, 2016 at 2:37 pm
Dang it, QUOTE MY WORDS!!! I have NEVER said that I have “proven [the scientists] wrong on this issue”, that’s your own fantasy straw man you’ve stood up to knock down … not me.
Is there some part of “not statistically significant” that is unclear to you? The redfit analysis shows that the ~ 2400 year cycle is NOT STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT, which is what I said.
Like I said, whenever I ask for two simple links to the study you think is best, all of a sudden you have 56 reasons why you think it is wrong, wrong, wrong to ACTUALLY LOOK AT THE EVIDENCE. jI don’t require that it be a “single magisterial article” as you claim, I just want the study that you think is best … still waiting …
Say what? I asked for the study you think is the most convincing, the evidence that makes you believe. You claim it’s “published empirical evidence”, so why are you so scared of identifying it?
The world wonders …
If your standards were high, you’d admit that the 2400-year cycle in the ∆14C records is not statistically significant …
If you actually cared about the answer, you’d squash me like a bug by merely posting two links to some solid study with good statistics that shows that the 2400-year cycle exists. It speaks volumes that instead of doing that simple thing, you waffle about how it’s all so very complex, claim that you have “published evidence” that you refuse to identify, and encourage me to wait until some vague tomorrow … as far as I’m concerned you’re still running for the door, unwilling to put your ideas to the test.
w.
If they say that the ∆14C data supports the existence of the ~ 2400 yr cycle, and you say that you have proved that it doesn’t, I don’t see any fantasy there, but a straightforward conclusion.
That’s how you have set up your rules, but that is not how science works. There is no best study, but several lines of evidence, each one of them supporting the existence of the solar ~ 2400 year cycle.
This figure using Wavelet analysis of a solar sunspot reconstruction from filtered 14C data (Usoskin, 2007) shows three of those lines of evidence. Source Usoskin, 2013. http://www.livingreviews.org/lrsp-2013-1
http://i.imgur.com/6dxbaLA.png
On the right you have the global wavelet spectra panels that show the known peak that you say is not significant. Other authors dissent.
Then on the upper panel you have the reconstruction showing the solar grand minima in blue. The distribution of solar grand minima has also been shown to follow a ~ 2400 year periodicity. This is another line of evidence. Solar grand minima tend to occur at the lows of the ~ 2400 year cycle.
Then on the lower panel you can see that the ~ 208 yr signal is modulated by a ~ 2400 year periodicity in phase with the ~ 2400 year cycle. The ~ 208 signal is strong close to the ~ 2400 yr cycle lows and inexistent close to the highs. This has been known for many years and is discussed in several articles. It is the third line of evidence.
In the following figure you can see a probability density function showing how strongly grand solar minima (A) tend to occur at the lows of the ~ 2400 yr solar cycle.
http://i.imgur.com/3nFrfYq.png
This is from Usoskin, I. G., et al. “Solar activity during the Holocene: the Hallstatt cycle and its consequence for grand minima and maxima.” Astronomy & Astrophysics 587 (2016): A150.
http://arxiv.org/pdf/1602.02483
And in the next figure you can see how the modulation of the ~ 208 signal allows to identify the lows of the ~ 2400 yr cycle even during the last glacial maximum, when the data has too much environmental deviation to be directly comparable to Holocene.
http://i.imgur.com/niNSwIr.png
This is from: Adolphi, F., et al. “Persistent link between solar activity and Greenland climate during the Last Glacial Maximum.” Nature Geoscience 7.9 (2014): 662-666.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Anders_Svensson3/publication/267105475_Persistent_link_between_solar_activity_and_Greenland_climate_during_the_Last_Glacial_Maximum/links/5450ac820cf24e8f7374dd2f.pdf
Notice that Adolphi et al., are not studying the ~ 2400 yr cycle. They are not looking for it. They don’t even mention it. Yet the cycle is clearly evident in their analysis of the data.
You see, I don’t care what you believe. Like religion, that’s a personal thing. The existence of the ~ 2400 yr cycle doesn’t depend on what you believe. The evidence is published and available. If you want to follow your personal path to conviction that goes through your own analysis of the data, that’s up to you. If it leads you astray it is your problem, also. And it is a very likely outcome as you refuse to read what others have done.
Best regards.
Javier November 11, 2016 at 3:45 am
Are you truly that stupid or are you just running scared? QUOTE MY WORDS, YOU UNPLEASANT PERSON, YOU ARE FLAT OUT LYING ABOUT WHAT I SAID!! I never said I “proved that it doesn’t”, that’s all you.
I didn’ t ask for the “best study”. I asked for the study that you think is the strongest. That’s how the world works.
I clearly asked for TWO links, one to the study and one to the data. I CANNOT analyze a study without the data. You seem impressed by words and pretty pictures. I am impressed by data, facts, observations. This is just you trying to do an end run around a request for the data upon which you’ve built your scientific claims … why are you resisting this so hard?
I clearly asked for TWO links, one to the study and one to the data. This is just you trying to pretend that you didn’t understand the request.
I clearly asked for TWO links, one to the study and one to the data. This is just you trying to fool people into thinking that you are answering. You are not. You are waving your hands and hoping people don’t notice.
I clearly asked for TWO links, one to the study and one to the data. This is just you trying to drown me in work.
Oh, that’s good. I would say that you’ve now repeated every pathetic excuse I’ve ever heard for being unwilling to put your evidence to the test, and now you’re running for the door again.
I truly believed you when you said you were a scientist, Javier, but now I see that that claim is just as bogus as your alias … I knew I should just ignore a man who is unwilling to sign his own words.
But heck, since you’ve proven to us all that you are unwilling to have your beliefs tested, why don’t you just run along to that magical place where the motto is “Omnis in verba” instead of “Nullius in Verba” … here, we TEST OUR BELIEFS.
w.
I think you should try to control your temper, it is so hot that you might cause global warming. You should not react that way to other people’s opinions.
My opinion about which study is the strongest is irrelevant. I really doubt the world works that way.
You have access to the same information that I do. As these are not my articles I don’t feel the need to satisfy your wants. I don’t see how that diminishes in any way their scientific value.
What I don’t understand is why my defense of the ~ 2400 year solar cycle should depend on me getting you two links. Sounds pretty unreasonable.
I don’t care what you believe, I don’t care what you do. I am not asking you to do anything. In this matter you have your arguments and I have mine.
It is not my evidence as I have not conducted any research on this subject, and I am not going anywhere.
I don’t care that you believed me first, and I don’t care that you don’t believe me now. The reality is what it is independently of your beliefs, and that is also the case for the ~ 2400 yr solar cycle. That we believe or not in it is irrelevant. The evidence shows that it exists. I am not here to prove to your satisfaction that I am a scientist, and I am not here to demonstrate you that the ~ 2400 yr cycle is real. The evidence is published. If it matters to you you can find out. If you are satisfied with the negative answer that you got with your little exercise with the ∆14C data that is really up to you.
Best regards.
Really guys
nobody cares abt ur 2400 cycle
as it is not relevant for many years to come.
The Gleissberg is relevant though
Count back 86.5 years and where are we?
1930.
Only 2 years from the big dust bowl drought….
ok
you don’t believe me
count back another 86.5 years and where are we
http://www.buffalofieldcampaign.org/habitat/documents2/Woodhouse.pdf
In passing, Javier, let me note that of the three graphs you put up, not one of them indicates the uncertainty … since that is what this discussion is about, whether the uncertainty is small enough to allow us to say the purported cycle is real, I find this a serious omission.
Also, if we are to believe the first graph by Usoskin et all, in about the year 8800 BP, there were what appear to be statistically significant cycles (shown as being as significant as the 2400 year cycle) at EVERY PERIOD FROM 500 TO 3000 YEARS … sorry, amigo, but that dog won’t hunt.
The second graph shows that “Grand Minima” (defined as extremes in the ∆14C record) occur around the times of the “2400 year cycle” defined by … you guessed it … extremes in the ∆14C record. In other words, because they’ve defined both the “2400 year cycle” and the “Grand Minima” on the basis of the variations in the ∆14C record, yes, they will occur around the same times. This is what passes for science in your world?
Next, you claim a regular “2400 year cycle” in the third graph with extremes every 2400 years. But if you look at the text in the second graph, you’ll find that they agree with me—there is no regular 2400 year cycle. Instead there are 2000-2100 year cycles and one cycle of about 2800 years … from their data:
Time between Peaks: 1880, 2840, 2320 years
Time between Troughs: 2070, 2630, 2130 years
As I said before, there are a few very short cycles and one very long cycle … that doesn’t add up to a cycle in the middle.
Next, I’m not buying Adolphi’s panel “d” in the third graph at all. At this point I’ve looked at thousands and thousands and thousands of graphs of natural data, and I’ve NEVER seen anything as regular as what he is showing, in any natural dataset. Doesn’t happen.
Next, if (as Adolphi claims) there is such a clearly visible ~200 year cycle in solar activity … why does it not show up in the ∆14C data under discussion? Take a look at Figure 8—there is NOTHING in there at around 200 year period, not a hint or a whisper of a cycle. What does that tell you?
Finally, you are a man who has publicly staked his claim that it is not cherry picking to throw away the ∆14Cdata before about 11,000 BP. But your third chart above STARTS around that time and then goes back from there to 22,000 BP … you’ve woven a tangled web, and now you are caught in it. You can’t claim that the data before 11000 BP is invalid, and then cite it to support your claim. (Well, actually, you can do that, and you did do it, and as a result, you’ve just proven that you are indeed picking them cherries … throw data out when it doesn’t agree with your theories, bring it back in when it does …)
Javier, you seem like a really smart guy, with good skeptical critical thinking skills, and a huge blind spot—you’re not applying your skepticism to your own beliefs. You don’t seem to understand how many previous solar studies were seriously and fundamentally flawed. Look at your first graph. Do you truly think that in 8800 BP there were significant cycles at every period from 500 to 3000 years? Really? Doesn’t that make you suspicious of the graph?
And do you really believe in the regular-like-clockwork ~200-year cycle in the third graph, when there is no sign of it in your own ∆14C data?
My suggestion, offered in friendship, is to suspend belief. Suspend belief in cycles of all kinds. Come into it as though everything about the field was in flux. And then go back and use your fine skeptical mind to examine the previous studies. You are swallowing them whole. DON’T TRUST, VERIFY!
Remember that something like HALF of all peer reviewed studies are shown to be false in the long run. If we take a conservative estimate and say that a third of them are wrong, what are the odds that we are buying BS if we believe two studies without seriously investigating them?
Two studies, each with a 1/3 chance of being wrong. The odds of at least one of them being wrong is 5/9, more than half … nullius in verba. These days the reality of solar claims is that you have to examine each and every one.
And that does NOT mean seeing how many people believe in them. Lots of folks believe in the Gleissberg cycle, but I can’t find it. Doesn’t mean it’s not there, but I’ve not seen the evidence. Look at Figure 8, the claimed “Gleissberg Cycle” absolutely does not show up in the ∆14C data, nor does the “DeVries” 208-year cycle … doesn’t that make you in the least curious about your own beliefs?
The problem from my perspective is that we have a lot of fine, sharp scientists out there who mistakenly think that they are statisticians … for example, they see a peak on a fourier periodogram and they assume it has to mean something. That was the interesting part to me of my random data, that equal-amplitude data with random phases adds up to lots of real-appearing, large, but totally spurious peaks in a periodogram.
This lack of statistical knowledge is a huge problem in climate science, because climate science is an oddball—climate is defined as the average of weather over some sufficiently long period. This means that the subject of study is AVERAGES rather than observations. And to complicate matters, the study of averages of non-normal auto-correlated datasets which are common in climate science is a rather obscure corner of statistics, with very different rules. You can’t just plug it into Excel and expect to get the right answer.
And these scientists, who usually know a whole lot about their field of study but are charmingly innocent of knowledge of non-normal statistics, have written hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of papers containing totally unsupported claims. Claims of significant differences that aren’t. Claims of causes that don’t, and effects that aren’t. Claims of cycles that come and go. Claims of records that don’t exceed. Claims of hundredths of a degree of accuracy. The field is fraught with bad math.
And as a result of the problem being so widespread, you have to get out your favorite shovel, sharpen it, and start doing the digging yourself. You can’t just take the studies as being correct, only a fool does that in 2016. Peer review is pathetically weak, and you sure as hell can’t trust that the authors know what they’re doing, including me. Do your own spade work, you might just be surprised by what you turn up.
Best regards,
w.
Willis says
the claimed “Gleissberg Cycle” absolutely does not show up in the ∆14C data,
Henry says
but \I already told you
it is there in the data
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/simsee/biblioteca/CICLO_SOLAR_PeristykhDamon03-Gleissbergin14C.pdf
the result of 87.8 compared to my 86.5 seems due to some [regular?] anomaly
Willis says
at Figure 8, the claimed “Gleissberg Cycle” absolutely does not show up in the ∆14C data,
Henry says
seems to me it does
http://iie.fing.edu.uy/simsee/biblioteca/CICLO_SOLAR_PeristykhDamon03-Gleissbergin14C.pdf
87.8 years seems just a bit off from the [current] 86.5 years but could be due to some continuous anomaly….
HenryP November 11, 2016 at 2:17 pm
Willis says
seems to me your link is busted … a perfect metaphor for your argument?
w.
wonder who did that?
not the first time that this has happened with some info that I referred to…
anyway, it is still here:
http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2003JGRA..108.1003P
the last sentence of the abstract is the usual bs, especially since I have been telling you that you can easily collect your own T max/ Tmin /ozone/ solar data to show that the Gleissberg cycle exists and that the exact half cycle [of the sine wave] can always be approximated with a normal quadratic.
Hmm you should know how to read a 2D wavelet. Possible cycles are signals that extend on the X axis or that show a regular repeating pattern on the X axis. If it extends on the Y axis it means nothing.
There is no a priori reason why solar grand minima should cluster at certain times. There is no a priori reason why those clusters should follow a semi-regular distribution.
Data is band-passed 180-230 yr as it indicates.
It seems to be picked in the decomposition mode C6 of your figure 9. It shows clear signals of the modulation by the longer 2400 yr cycle.
Nope. Everything I have said can be supported in the literature. Changes in sea level made solar activity reconstruction from ∆14C data prior to 12,000 BP unreliable. Tree ring reconstructions of ∆14C data end at about 14,000 BP. Previous to that they use speleothems and corals, that have a much lower resolution and much higher error. 10Be has a precipitation dependent path of deposition and precipitation was very different during the glacial period. It is not clear that the climatological contamination is adequately eliminated in solar activity reconstructions from the last glacial period. It is not cherry picking. If you want a reliable reconstruction of solar activity you have to stop at 12,000 BP. You already know this because I have old you many times, yet you keep ignoring it to accuse me of cherry picking.
Thank you for your advice. I have no opinion on the Gleissberg cycle. I do not know if it is real or not. The solar activity data is difficult to evaluate, otherwise there would not be any discussion. There is a difficult period between 6000 BP and 9000 BP. The low in the ~ 2400 yr cycle at 7700 BP was quite inconspicuous while the 8200 BP low that belongs to the ~ 1000 yr cycle was very strong and perhaps climatically enhanced. This makes most mathematical analyses stutter at that time and create a fake long and short period. The ~ 1000 year cycle is nearly absent during almost half of the Holocene. The ~ 208 yr cycle only appears at the lows of the ~ 2800 yr cycle. Very complex, but not very different to what the 11-yr cycle shows. Not amenable to simplistic approaches like yours, specially using raw data instead of estimated solar activity data.
Going to Berillium data for the 50-20 kyr BP period of the last glacial confirms that the ~ 208 yr cycle is absolutely real despite appearing and disappearing every 2400 yr. See for example Wagner et al., 2001
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2000GL006116/epdf
Going to the Miocene shows that climatic cycles of the same periods existed prior to the Quaternary Ice Age. These are some of the more robust climatic features in the planet. The ostracods in a lake during the Miocene show ~ 205, ~ 1000, and ~ 2400 year cycles.
http://i.imgur.com/6BkbKnz.png
Kern, A. K., et al. “Strong evidence for the influence of solar cycles on a Late Miocene lake system revealed by biotic and abiotic proxies.” Palaeogeography, palaeoclimatology, palaeoecology 329 (2012): 124-136.
http://www.academia.edu/download/30184792/kern-et-al-2012a.pdf
Best regards.
Javier November 11, 2016 at 10:12 am Edit
I, on the other hand, think you should stop telling lies about what I said. In an unsuccessful effort to curb your lying tongue, I have asked you repeatedly to stop doing it and instead to quote the words you disagree with.
Despite that repeated entreaty, the lies have kept pouring from your lips, falsely claiming that I said this and that I said that.
You, sir, are not only a liar. You are an inveterate liar who has refused to stop lying despite repeated requests.
I thought I explained why I ask for the links … hang on … yes, I did. Here it is again. If you have questions, please ask.
Was that somehow unclear?
Not having the data turns their scientific value to zero. Without the data that they purport to analyze, they are just an advertisement for the author’s claims.
It depends on you providing EVIDENCE to support your beliefs. It’s called “science”.
So you are unwilling to produce the evidence … fine, no problem.
By “evidence” I mean whatever it is that has convinced you that the 2400-year cycle is real.
Yes, and all I’m doing is asking you to actually PRODUCE THAT CLAIMED EVIDENCE, which you have consistently refused to do.
You claim that there is evidence. But you refuse to produce the evidence. I’ve made a simple request, for links to that evidence. If you had it, it would be five minutes work to produce it.
I use that request for a couple of reasons. The first is to find studies that people think are strong, so I can learn from them. The next is to find out why someone believes something, so that we can see if their belief is solidly based or built on sand.
And the third to see if someone really is a scientist or not, to see whether they are willing to have their ideas put to the test or not. You’ve made your point. You’re not. Not only that, you are willing to lie about what I’ve said to try to defend your refusal to examine the basis of your own ideas. And that’s no fun at all.
I’m done with you. You are welcome to your belief in every cycle that comes on down the road … I’ll pass.
w.
I haven’t told any lie and you know it. Calling me a liar a hundred times will not change that. You are diminishing yourself with such attitude.
So you say, but as everything you say it is your opinion, and not a particularly valuable one. This is the way science is conducted, and it has been a very successful and fruitful approach. If you want to reproduce a work you should be able to do it, and if you are not able to do it, you could denounce it to the journal or write your own article.
Your approach to science is amateurish and doesn’t produce anything of value. Your request for two links to anybody that disagrees with you is good for effect and argumentation, but it is not a scientific argument. When provided you do what you want with them, so what’s the point? I already fell for that line once.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/04/27/steinhilber-2009/
Your shameful post on the two links that I provided in that occasion demonstrates that it is only a posture on your part when you don’t have scientific arguments.
I have already provided lots of evidence that you feel free to ignore. You think you are the arbiter of what constitutes or not evidence in science and you are not even a scientist. How arrogant.
I have already done that, and the rest of the evidence is published. I can provide references if you need help with that.
You can start with the three references provided above. See if you can learn anything from that.
Best regards.
@ur momisugly Willis
I am not sure that link worked either
I copied and pasted the relevant info
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Title:
Persistence of the Gleissberg 88-year solar cycle over the last ˜12,000 years: Evidence from cosmogenic isotopes
Authors:
Peristykh, Alexei N.; Damon, Paul E.
Affiliation:
AA(Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona USA; Laboratory of Nuclear Space Physics, Division of Plasma Physics, Atomic Physics, and Astrophysics, A. F. Ioffe Physico-Technical Institute, St. Petersburg, Russia.), AB(Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona USA)
Publication:
Journal of Geophysical Research (Space Physics), Volume 108, Issue A1, pp. SSH 1-1, CiteID 1003, DOI 10.1029/2002JA009390 (JGRA Homepage)
Publication Date:
01/2003
Origin:
AGU; WILEY
Keywords:
Global Change: Solar variability, Solar Physics, Astrophysics, and Astronomy: Solar activity cycle (2162), and Astronomy: Solar and stellar variability, Interplanetary Physics: Cosmic rays, stellar variability, solar dynamo, Gleissberg cycle, cosmic rays, cosmogenic isotopes, global change
Abstract Copyright:
Copyright 2003 by the American Geophysical Union.
DOI:
10.1029/2002JA009390
Bibliographic Code:
2003JGRA..108.1003P
Abstract
Among other longer-than-22-year periods in Fourier spectra of various solar-terrestrial records, the 88-year cycle is unique, because it can be directly linked to the cyclic activity of sunspot formation. Variations of amplitude as well as of period of the Schwabe 11-year cycle of sunspot activity have actually been known for a long time and a ca. 80-year cycle was detected in those variations. Manifestations of such secular periodic processes were reported in a broad variety of solar, solar-terrestrial, and terrestrial climatic phenomena. Confirmation of the existence of the Gleissberg cycle in long solar-terrestrial records as well as the question of its stability is of great significance for solar dynamo theories. For that perspective, we examined the longest detailed cosmogenic isotope record—INTCAL98 calibration record of atmospheric 14C abundance. The most detailed precisely dated part of the record extends back to ˜11,854 years B.P. During this whole period, the Gleissberg cycle in 14C concentration has a period of 87.8 years and an average amplitude of ˜1‰ (in Δ14C units). Spectral analysis indicates in frequency domain by sidebands of the combination tones at periods of ≈91.5 ± 0.1 and ≈84.6 ± 0.1 years that the amplitude of the Gleissberg cycle appears to be modulated by other long-term quasiperiodic process of timescale ˜2000 years. This is confirmed directly in time domain by bandpass filtering and time-frequency analysis of the record. Also, there is additional evidence in the frequency domain for the modulation of the Gleissberg cycle by other millennial scale processes. Attempts have been made to explain 20th century global warming exclusively by the component of irradiance variation associated with the Gleissberg cycle. These attempts fail, because they require unacceptably great solar forcing and are incompatible with the paleoclimatic records.
Thanks, Henry. I was able to track it down. Unlike Javier, they clearly state what they think the best evidence is for the Gleissberg cycle, viz:
Really? Crappy auroral records from the freakin’ Dark Ages provide the most decisive evidence for Gleissberg? I have a rule of thumb, which is that the further back in time that someone has to go to find support for their theory, the less likely it is to be true …
Next, unlike most folks, I’ve actually looked at the aurora data … not pretty. Oh, the recent data is pretty enough. Pick your station in the north, you’ll see something between zero and one or two hundred days with auroral observations per year, which is about one or two thousand per decade. However, the number of observations is highly latitude-dependent. In the UK in 1990, for example, at 53°N latitude there were zero days with observations of aurora. But in the same year, at 63°N, there were 130 days with aurora.
The early data, on the other hand, shows auroral counts PER DECADE. The average number of aurorae observed per decade is FIVE ± one.
Five days with auroral observations per decade, a time interval during which many locations around the world show over a thousand days of observations? Really? This is the best you got?
Turning to the numbers, the “Gleissberg Cycle” is evident in that very poor auroral dataset … but only in the later part. The earlier part doesn’t show the cycle.
As a result, the “redfit” algorithm shows that the cycle barely comes to the p<0.05 level … but given the meaningless nature of the underlying dataset, we simply cannot depend on that at all.
I gotta say, Henry, given that this is supposed to be “most decisive evidence for the Gleissberg periodicity” as your link claims, color me totally unimpressed. There’s no way you can depend on a few observations per decade, the uncertainty on that dataset is strictly floor to ceiling.
w.
Willis
I am baffled as to how you get to aurora? Maybe you should just read the comment just above your comment to me.
It says
“For that perspective, we examined the longest detailed cosmogenic isotope record—INTCAL98 calibration record of atmospheric 14C abundance. The most detailed precisely dated part of the record extends back to ˜11,854 years B.P. During this whole period, the Gleissberg cycle in 14C concentration has a period of 87.8 years and an average amplitude of ˜1‰ (in Δ14C units’ end quote
Like I said, that has to do with d14C. According to my own results, which include various different parameters, other than dC14, they are not out by that far; I get it at 86.5 years, for the past two cycles. As I also figured, due to the reported correlation with the position of the planets, – if that correlation is causal of solar activity on the sun – :
that there maybe certain times when the switch where the GB reaches the top or bottom of the sine wave, does not go…. i.e. no dead end stop. Dynamo does not change direction to turn things around. You can imagine that when that happens you get a little ice age or a medeviel warm period. So far, everything looks fine. We made the switch in 2014. There is a bit of [global] cooling now and if you count back 86.5 years we are in 1930. That is the decade when the dust bowl drought started.
seems logical [to me] that in a global cooling period you will have less rain [and more warmth] at the higher latitudes and more rain and more clouds around the equator. The extra clouds around the equator will enhance the global cooling effect for reasons you know well. I agree with you that Svensmark is [probably] wrong but his theory has some element of truth i.e. more clouds around the equator for whatever reason, amplify the cooling effect.
I have been able to figure out that the whole Gleissberg really has to do with changes in the ozone, peroxide, and N-oxides concentration TOA> e.g. ozone started increasing from 1995 and it also follows same sine wave. On its turn that affects the UV coming through the atmosphere.
go south young man, go south.
HenryP November 13, 2016 at 1:27 am
Thanks, Henry. I got to aurora because the authors of the article you cited said:
Since they obviously thought that the aurora data was more decisive than the ∆14C evidence, I looked at that.
Regarding your quote above, it says:
First, anyone who thinks that they can measure a cycle in such noisy data to the nearest tenth of a year does not understand what he can and cannot do with a Fourier analysis. It’s nowhere near accurate enough to provide that kind of accuracy.
Next, the authors don’t make even the simplest test as to whether the apparent cycle is real. This would be to divide the data into two halves, an early and a late half, and then see if the cycle persists over both periods.
Next, the overall swing in the ∆14C data is on the order of 600‰. And if we take the recent data as they have done, and then remove a linear trend of unknown origin with an amplitude of 200‰, and then remove a ~ 7000-year cycle of unknown origin with an amplitude of 30‰, we are told (by Javier) that there remains a 2400 year cycle of about 10‰ …
And after all of those swings of ten and thirty and two hundred and six hundred per mil, the authors take great pride in pointing out a claimed swing of one measly per mil … this would mean, of course, that the claimed Gleissberg cycle would be only a tenth the size of the claimed Hallstatt cycle. But of course, this is NOT what the Gleissberg cycle folks say.
More to the point, the authors do not even attempt to show that this claimed cycle is statistically significant. In fact, statistical significance is given very short shrift in their entire study.
A cycle of 1‰??? Get real, that’s less than the error in the ∆14C data itself, lost in the noise.
w.
Willis, as I said, me, I don’t really rely on d14C but mostly on dT, the derivative taken from a global sample of at least 50 weather stations over different periods of time, averaged.
I thought the figures on 14C looked convincing to everyone but now I am not so sure.
must say that my finding is that the Gleissberg is a sine wave of wavelength 86.5 years i.e. it is always 43 years of warming followed by 43 years of cooling, unless there is an anomaly, which may happen, every now and then, at set periods, depending on certain factors.
Basically, within a normal lifespan of a person, i.e. 86 years, I believe the delta T average [=extra or less energy coming into earth] is usually more or less zero.
Hence, since we know that warming is followed by greening [of earth] and that cooling is followed by more snow and ice and less greening, it would make more sense to me if they actually picked up a 43+/- 2 year periodicity somewhere in the ‘greening” records? Just asking.
btw
after reading the whole report,
must say that your choice of the quote from the report seems a bit selective. On the aurora issue [10], if you had read the 1st sentence, they were referring to studies done by Gleissberg & others, many years ago, that gave some ‘major’ substance [to them] of there being an “80” year cycle, the aurora issue thought to be important.
In the case of Gleissberg and other German investigators: I know that there are records of heights of lakes [Germany/Switzerland] that corresponded with the ’80’ year cycle, and logically – for them – they looked at the sun for answers as to what was happening on earth.
In this regard, I think I already referred you to tables II and III of the report from Youssef
Henry, you asked about the Gleissberg cycle. I pointed out that they say the Gleissberg cycle has an amplitude of one measly per mil (‰), viz:
I have been able to replicate their findings. To replicate them, I,
• took the ∆14C data (inverted), and
• removed their claimed linear trend of unknown origin lasting 11,000 years, and
• removed their claimed 7000-year regular cycle of unknown origin, and
• removed their claimed 2400-year “Hallstatt” cycle.
Then I calculated the best-fit sine wave with a period of 87.8 years. In confirmation of their quoted result, it has a peak-to-peak amplitude of 1.2 per mil (‰). Here is the result:
You can barely see it, but the red line is actually a little teeny sine wave with a period of ~88 years.
I’m sorry, but at that point it doesn’t matter what kind of special statistical analysis you use. That size of a cycle is meaningless even if it were to be statistically significant. It is way down in the noise.
Consider. The width of the 95% CI of the underlying ∆14C data is given by the original authors. At the most recent end the 95%CI is about 3.5‰ wide. As you might expect, as we go earlier it gets larger. The average 95%CI over the period in question is 7.3‰.
And this means that their claimed signal is everywhere smaller than the 95%CI of the underlying data … which renders their claim of significance moot.
Best regards to you,
w.
To show the relative sizes of the ∆14C signal, the error in the signal, and the claimed Gleissberg cycle, here is a closeup of the ∆14C signal with the accompanying 95% confidence interval (95%CI), along with the result we’d get if we subtract out the purported 87.8-year Gleissberg cycle. As I stated above, the variations from their claimed signal are lost in the noise …
As I said above:
w.
impressive. convincing. not in the sense that GB does not exist but in the sense that, as you suggest, dC14 is perhaps not a good indicator of GB. I never knew that. Perhaps on larger time scales there are much bigger factors affecting green growth. I don’t know. However, as I said, the GB is there. The speed of warming in K/annum against time has a sinewave with a wavelength of 86.5 years. According to my rough estimate [ I cannot even remember anymore how to integrate the area under the sine wave – must look that up…..] I think it affects global T by about +0.4 or +0.5K during warming and ca. -0.5K during cooling, On average over the 86 years: ca. zero K. Every 43 years you are back to the same point – on the straight – if you know what I mean. Every quadrant of the wave is equal to one Hale-Nicholson cycle.
I guess that the difference caused by the GB would really not be enough to show up as a difference in dC14?