Category Archives: Sun

NASA Discovers New Sun-Earth Connection

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Very interesting new findings from Science@NASA (also involving the Goddard Space Flight Center):

Spring is aurora season. For reasons not fully understood by scientists, the weeks around the vernal equinox are prone to Northern Lights. [...] This is a bit of a puzzle. Auroras are caused by solar activity, but the Sun doesn’t know what season it is on Earth [...]

Such outbursts are called auroral substorms and they have long puzzled space physicists. [...]

NASA’s THEMIS mission–a fleet of five spacecraft launched in Feb. 2007 to study the substorm phenomenon [...] may have found the substorm power supply–and a springtime connection:

“The satellites have detected magnetic ‘ropes’ connecting Earth’s upper atmosphere directly to the Sun,” says Dave Sibeck, project scientist for the mission at the Goddard Space Flight Center. “We believe that solar wind particles flow in along these ropes, providing energy for geomagnetic storms and auroras.”

It turns out that rope-like magnetic connections between Sun and Earth are favored in springtime. It’s a matter of geometry: As Earth goes around in its orbit, Earth’s tilted magnetic poles make different angles with respect to the Sun, tipping back and forth with a one-year cadence. Around the time of the equinox, Earth’s magnetic field is best oriented for “connecting-up” with the Sun. [...]

Geomagnetic disturbances are almost twice as likely in spring and fall vs. winter and summer, according to 75 years of historical records [...]

Climate Debate (4): Laypeople vs AGW Clergy

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(fourth and likely final entry in my series of exchanges “On Climate Debate and Debate Climate” with a person genuinely convinced AGW is a settled argument)

This is a list of previous blogs on the topic:

On Climate Debate and Debate Climate (1)

Consensus, Actions and the Sun (2)

The Church of AGW (3)

(again on plausible mechanisms causally linking solar *wind* and terrestrial weather)

I have already specified I don’t particularly subscribe to the “it’s the solar wind” hypothesis. But heaven forbid we discover effects before knowing the “plausible mechanisms” about them.

For a speculation on a direct path for an effect, look at figure 7 (page 5) in the Ørsted satellite results paper (“The Ørsted Satellite Project“, by Peter Stauning, Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI), 22.1.2008/PSt-DMI), to see the areas where high-energy radiation is capable to penetrate lower in the atmosphere, to around 700km.

It’s still quite a way to the troposphere, of course.

(on why I do not believe in qualified climatologists)

Because I am free to make out my own opinion.

Boy have some people a problem with that or what? Even if 95% of people agree with AGW, they’re still trying to stamp out the remaining 5%…

(on “lay opinion” vs. “qualified scientists’ opinion”)

In non-scientific matters (such as public health policymaking: the stuff also called “action“…), a “lay opinion” is no better or worse than a “qualified scientist’s”.

It’s called “democracy“.

That’s why people can choose between different economic policies, for example, voting this or that candidate: otherwise it’d all be done behind close doors by a bunch of Professors in Economics.

In scientific matters, any given “lay opinion” is expected to be generally less authoritative than any given “qualified scientist”‘s. Obviously it depends on the “qualification”. A geologist’s take on climate is not necessarily any more or less informed than a biologist’s.

In any case: what about the opinion of John Christy, a very qualified scientist, and of others like him, members of the IPCC that do not subscribe to the AGW panic?

What’s wrong with them, or with the IPCC that still gives them credit?

(on my alleged arguing that “lay people” can challenge scientists because science was wrong in the past)

That would be a mistaken mixing up of my arguments.

I have said that lay people can challenge any scientific opinion, and the scientists should not be afraid of accepting the challenge.

This also because a “lay person”, say, in climatology, could very well be an “authority”, say, in systems engineering. And there are obvious similarities between modeling the “climate system” and modeling other kinds of complex system, either natural or man-made.

This applies also to software, as climate models are ultimately bunches of computer codes. Etc etc.

The IPCC itself has recognized this point, and is not limited to climatologists.

Anyway: everybody’s contribution to a topic should always be welcome, and especially so if it potentially has far-fetching policy and lifestyle consequences.

The point about helicobacter and cholesterol is different.

It is about the vast majority of scientists still being capable of being wrong. Other scientists found a way to make progress: but they would not have been able to do so, had they subscribed to the “follow the consensus” strategy.

Now…if anybody keeps refusing to acknowledge the very existence of at least two IPCC Lead Authors, it is not my problem.

Climate Debate (3): The Church of AGW

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(third entry in my series of exchanges “On Climate Debate and Debate Climate” with a person genuinely convinced AGW is a settled argument. Part 2 is here):

(about the IPCC conclusions, and the supposed scientific consensus on AGW)

Clearly you haven’t spent any time reading the IPCC reports rather than just their conclusions. You’ll be surprised at your findings (like the thousands of data the IPCC themselves report as “not compatible” with warming).

And you have not said a word about scientific papers like those on Geophys Res Lett, and the fact that scientists of all sorts hold all kinds of opinions about AGW, even up high in the IPCC.

They are not all convinced a catastrophe is upon us.

LET ME REPEAT THIS CLEARLY: There are peer-reviewed articles by esteemed scientists holding important academic posts, published in renowned scientific journals, advancing doubts about the mechanisms, effects, and urgency of AGW and CO2 emissions, and they are often published ALONGSIDE pro-AGW papers, by esteemed scientists etc etc “on your side” that evidently consider those journals serious enough to warrant their appearance in their Resumes.

Also, if you bother to actually read the original articles, you will see that some foretell the end of the world, others talk of major disruptions, others still say AGW is a nuisance that can be dealt with. And that, among the people convinced AGW may force us the way of the Dodo.

Please decide: either you follow the scientists, or you don’t. AGW is not a “settled issue” in scientific terms, otherwise what is Geophys Res Lett publishing, and what is John Christy doing at the top echelons of the IPCC?

You may argue that AGW is a “settled issue” in public health terms: perhaps, but then it’s a policy matter. It’s not science. CO2 reduction vs. harm-reduction, it’s a policy discussion. The opinions of scientific bodies are only a part of the whole issue (we’re blessed not to live in technocratic societies).

Even economists get called in to talk about this: and that is perhaps the biggest trouble 8-)
In any case do consider that argumenting “ad authoritatem” has been discounted since the times of Galileo. When we followed the 99.999% of scientists about stomach ulcers, we were in trouble.

(about the way solar wind may interact with the weather)

As for the solar wind, there are people that have made hypotheses about the way it may interact (Svensmark and others). I do not “believe” in their findings and am just waiting to know more. I have just remarked that if it’s not the solar wind, surely there must be something else in the Sun that affects the weather: and if there isn’t, that’ll be a major discovery on its own.

(about belief in AGW)

It’s you “believing” in things and treating them religiously (hence your vehemency: as a matter of fact, I am not trying to disprove your assertions when based on standard physics. I am not “vehement” at all, in this discussion).

You even keep repeating the word “believe” like if there were an AGW Church. If people were asked to believe in science, SciAm would close down and become a news agency.

I do not “believe” in the IPCC, in the AGU, in the Hadley Centre, in 2,500 scientists and experts, in Svensmark, in Lindzen, in Crichton, in yourself, in SciAm, in American Scientist, in any skeptic or AGW believer. I take everybody’s remarks as a step forward in the discussion and in the understanding of this or any other issue.

From that, I extract, polish, and sometimes destroy my own opinion.

I am not arguing that “lay people” can “challenge scientific opinion”. It is a given. A scientist that cannot defend his argument (for example, on the pages of SciAm) is clearly in trouble.