Talk:Solar cycle

One page to rule them all

Material on climate-related stuff is uncomfortably split / duplicated between here and solar variation and Solar_constant#Variation. I'd like to move the climate stuff to SV, mostly William M. Connolley (talk) 21:14, 4 November 2011 (UTC)

Disagree. The Solar Variation page is a much broader topic. This article is discretely about the solar cycle and the effects of the solar cycle. The section on terrestrial climate in the solar cycle pages appropriate exists here to cover the terrestrial climate impacts. Agree that there is quite a bit of overlap but the solar cycle merits its own page and the terrestrial climate impacts of the solar cycles should also be kept here. Also deeply concerned at the elements that might be dropped out in the transition.174.49.84.214 (talk) 17:20, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I thought you'd stormed off in a huff? If you want to talk (or rather, if you want to be listened to), you'll need to be polite William M. Connolley (talk) 17:28, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

The solar cycle is linked to the terrestrial climate. SV impacts on climate are very broad and very long term. Removing terrestrial climate from here will give the impression that the solar cycle has no impact on the terrestrial climate - which is a gross omission. Logically, the section should stay and some elements brought in from SV to supplement. I'm ok with showing divergence in the recent term and attributing that divergence as evidence of global warming (and linking to that section) but object to this becoming an AGW section or to it being erased entirely. Much very good sciene going on in this field that should not be marginalized.174.49.84.214 (talk) 17:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

From looking at the solar constant page and other pages' edit history, it appears that William M. Connolley came through about a year ago and dumpted a ton of ProAGW content into each of the discrete pages. Now he purports to want to clean up the mess that he created by folding all the topics under one. I disagree with his approach. We should:

1. Solar Constant: Remove his ProAGW 23,000 bytes of ProAGW content that William M. Connolley added to the Variation section from the Solar Constant Article and be discrete about Solar Constant labeling it an old deprecated theory and point the reader to solar variation. Variation does not make sense in the Solar Constant Page other than to say that the theory has been replaced with Solar Variation
2. Solar Variation: We should clean up the ProAGW stuff out of the Solar Variation Page because solar variation is too broad a topic for any AGW stuff which is short term, Maybe link a relevant small section from there to Solar Cycle which are already linked via a main
3. Solar Cycle: We might want to bring some ProAGW stuff from the Solar Variation page to the solar cycle under the banner of a special AGW section section and link the reader to either the main climate change page or the global warming page.

Overall, I'm agast at how these pages have been masacred and mangled and how no editors have risen to resist this gross invasion. Connolley create this monster and now he rides on a horse painted white purporting to want to clean this up.174.49.84.214 (talk) 21:43, 8 November 2011 (UTC)

Terrestrial Climate

William M. Connolley simply deleted the short term terrestrial impacts because he felt like doing so and didn't incorporate into solar variation. This is about short term impacts to the climate due to the solar cycle and correctly this content belongs here not in the longer term solar variation page. It has been restored by me. William M. Connolley, please discuss before defacing through deletion. The solar variation climate content is largely out of place, very poorly written, poorly organized, and just dumped there by William M. Connolley from Solar Constant. William M. Connolley is not the decider. We all decide on Wikipedia. The citations are correct and are strong. Please do not delete this section without substantial discussion. 174.49.84.214 (talk) 17:32, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

It does seem to make more sense to put the material about temperature variation correlated with the solar cycle into this article, and climate variation correlated with longer term solar variation into the solar variation article (which is now listed as "see main"). In fact, the current version of the article is exactly opposite- the short-term correlation of temperature with solar cycle was removed, but a discussion of the long term variation was left in.

I do find it disconcerting that a large block of text was simply deleted and not put into the solar variation article. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 19:03, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

--OK, I added back a little bit of overview material and a reference to a paper on temperature variation correlated with the 11-year solar cycle; and cut down the discussion of the longer-term variation slightly. As rewritten, it is still a lot shorter than the original material that was deleted, but I think it is now much more directly relevant to the solar cycle article. The rest of the deleted material I moved to the solar variation article. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 19:51, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Thank you Geoffrey.landis. My faith is partially restored in the community. I like where your writeup is going and agree there is a place for short term terrestrial climate impacts caused by solar cycles in this page.174.49.84.214 (talk) 20:32, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

There were thirteen(13) very solid citations in a well crafted section on the short term impacts of the solar cycle on the terrestrial climate that William M. Connolley and his climate Cabal removed from this page today. In its place now stands a watered down ProAGW section with 5 dated and much weaker citations - some dated and misatributed and any attempt to correct the citations is reverted. This is global warming revisionism in a page about physics - why? What has been done here today is deplorable. This is why serious people don't contribute and why authorship is down.174.49.84.214 (talk) 01:08, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

This is the section that William M. Connolley excised from Terrestrial Climate. He and his cabal resisted and reverted any attempt to change and they never came to the talk section here to discuss. They just did what they wanted and walked away with their chains and baseball bats like thugs. Yes, its that sad that they weren't willing to collaborate on what it should look like.

Data collected from older U.S. and European spacecraft previously showed that the solar luminosity is about 0.07 percent brighter in years of solar maximum, at peak sunspot activity, than during solar minimum, when spots were rare. This radiative forcing correlates with a variation of ±0.1°K in measured global temperature. Variations of this magnitude are too small to have contributed appreciably to the accelerated global warming observed since the mid-1970s.

On the other hand, an analysis of data from NASA's Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment challenged the idea that decreasing solar activity cools the Earth, and vice versa. Solar activity seems to work the opposite way around: less visible light reaches the Earth's surface during the Solar maxima than during the minima. This is caused by redistribution of the Solar energy during the maxima from the visible light, which actually heats the surface and the troposphere, to the ultraviolet light, which is absorbed high above the ground in the stratosphere. The research also found that the Sun may have caused as much warming as carbon dioxide over the period of the declining solar cycle from 2004 to 2007.

Recent research suggests that there may also be regional climate impacts due to the solar cycle. Measurements from the Spectral Irradiance Monitor on NASA's Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment show that solar UV output is more variable over the course of the solar cycle than scientists had previously thought. Climate models taking this information into account suggest these changes may result in, for example, colder winters in the US and southern Europe and warmer winters in Canada and northern Europe during solar minima.

Recent research at CERN's CLOUD facility examines links between cosmic rays and cloud condensation nuclei. Dr. Jasper Kirby, an experimental particle physicist currently with CERN and a team leader at CLOUD said, "At the moment, it [the experiment] actually says nothing about a possible cosmic-ray effect on clouds and climate, but it's a very important first step." During periods of high solar activity (during a solar maxima), the Sun's magnetic field shields the planet from cosmic rays. During periods of low solar activity (during solar minima), more cosmic rays reach Earth, potentially creating ultra-small aerosol particles which are precursors to cloud condensation nuclei.

More broadly, links have been found between solar cycles, global climate and events like El Nino, and a study indicates that heat caused by El Nino has a temporal correlation with civil wars. In other research, Daniel J. Hancock and Douglas N. Yarger found "statistically significant relationships between the double [~21 year] sunspot cycle and the 'January thaw' phenomenon along the East Coast and between the double sunspot cycle and 'drought' (June temperature and precipitation) in the Midwest."

One well-documented correlation between solar activity and climate change is the Maunder minimum, which occurred at the same time as the Little Ice Age period during which cold weather prevailed in Europe. Research had suggested that a new 90-year Maunder minimum would result in a reduction of global average temperatures of about 0.3°C, which would not be enough to offset the ongoing and forecasted average global temperature increase due to global warming.

I though I had pretty pretty much all the useful content from [this version] into either this article or to the solar variation article. It's true that the section here is now very short (3 sentences), but it does direct the reader to the solar variation article both at the beginning and at the end. 04:14, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

nothing from this content has been incorporated into solar variation. William M. Connolley merely excised it from here and dumped it into the talk section. In the process he added a very weak stubb here forcing people like you to come in and do a bunch of editng. We went from 13 citatations to now 5. Further, what is in solar variation that William M. Connolley dumped there from Solar Constant is largely a proagw rant extremely poorly written filled with misquotes and misatributions but no editor from anywhere challenges him on it. This section here merits a substantial section on the effects of short term solar cycles on the climate. I appreciate what you've done. At least it's not a blatant proAGW stubb anymore but still Wikicrimes have been committed here.174.49.84.214 (talk) 13:36, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I like the Haig based intro btw. It is balanced and she's substantial. In the Climate variation ProAGW section her words are misatributed though.174.49.84.214 (talk) 13:44, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree, the climate material in Solar variation is bit more of a data dump than a clearly-written essay. It could use some rewriting to improve the clarity and eliminate some infelicitous language, and right now it rather jumps from paper to paper in some cases without clear chronological order. But I'm not sure I have time to think out a logical organization right now-- I may just add it to my "when I get time" list.

Optimally it should be neither pro- nor anti- AGW, but instead a source of background information that the advocates on both sides can refer to in order to ground their arguments against what has already been done. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 14:19, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I completely agree and I like your approach and I thank you for your balanced perspective. Further, I would prefer this little AGW war to not creep into every article on Wikipedia (that's a large part of my frustration here) We don't need to caveat every sentence with an AGW component - it really makes Wikipedia come off as biased. New satellites and new research is shedding light and growing our knowledge base on solar cycles and that research merits unfettered representation. I say let the facts be the facts and let others go fight their wars (and let the best theory win in the end). We have plenty of great articles that tackle climate change. I say point them to those where it makes sense and let those experts have their arguments. Again, thank you much for helping to keep this balanced.174.49.84.214 (talk) 15:08, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

LOSU

If you've found a more recent reference that has changed the LOSU (level of scientific understanding) on a finding, it is your responsibility to also update the reference link not just change the LOSU in the text and leave the old citation. Please be professional and don't just undo somebody's edit based on the reference there without doing the cleanup. I checked the reference and the chart still says Very Low. Please update the reference and update the entry and make a note. And if possible, make an entry in the talk like I just did. BTW, TAR is scattered throughout multiple articles on here and LOSU is wrong on those as well, would you help KimDabbleStein? 174.49.84.214 (talk) 19:55, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I gave the reference - and if you had bothered to read the ref to the section in the AR4 that is already given in the paragraph - you'd have found the same. I'm sorry - but i don't find the talk-page here constructive, with all the personal attacks and other insinuations flying around. So i'm avoiding it. You've broken WP:3RR - so i suggest that you self-revert. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 20:04, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I did follow the links in the reference. The links take me to a chart with a VL LOSU. There are other links and none of them take me to your reference. The reference link should go directly to the citation for a L LOSU otherwise the researcher will be confused. I'm happy to accept the change, but we have to clean up the references to TAR and we have to not point the user to the entire AR4 working paper.174.49.84.214 (talk) 20:11, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Here, i've cut out the relevant column and bolded the low:

Solar irradiance

B

3

Low

Measurements over last 25 years; proxy indicators of solar activity Relationship between proxy data and total solar irradiance; indirect ozone effects Range from available reconstructions of solar irradiance and their qualitative assessment

Here btw. is the text from AR4 that is cited in the section - which says the same thing:

The estimates of long-term solar irradiance changes used in the TAR (e.g., Hoyt and Schatten, 1993; Lean et al., 1995) have been revised downwards, based on new studies indicating that bright solar faculae likely contributed a smaller irradiance increase since the Maunder Minimum than was originally suggested by the range of brightness in Sun-like stars (Hall and Lockwood, 2004; M. Wang et al., 2005). However, empirical results since the TAR have strengthened the evidence for solar forcing of climate change by identifying detectable tropospheric changes associated with solar variability, including during the solar cycle (Section 9.2; van Loon and Shea, 2000; Douglass and Clader, 2002; Gleisner and Thejll, 2003; Haigh, 2003; Stott et al., 2003; White et al., 2003; Coughlin and Tung, 2004; Labitzke, 2004; Crooks and Gray, 2005). The most likely mechanism is considered to be some combination of direct forcing by changes in total solar irradiance, and indirect effects of ultraviolet (UV) radiation on the stratosphere. Least certain, and under ongoing debate as discussed in the TAR, are indirect effects induced by galactic cosmic rays (e.g., Marsh and Svensmark, 2000a,b; Kristjánsson et al., 2002; Sun and Bradley, 2002).

The thing with very low certainty is cosmic rays - which isn't a factor in the text that we quote. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:06, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Insisting on using "very low" because it was like that in 2001 is quite unreasonable; edit warring to breaking 3RR to force your wording in is unacceptable William M. Connolley (talk) 21:56, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

The statement "but the level of understanding of solar impacts is very low" isn't referenced, and isn't (as far as I can see) in the AR4. Since that sentence starts with "The current scientific consensus is..." I don't think we should be relying on a 2001 document. So I think the entire statement should just go William M. Connolley (talk) 22:01, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

UPDATE THE REFERENCE!! That's my point! Look at your reference 26. It clearly shows us a graphic indicating that the LOSU is VERY LOW. Remove that reference and include your good reference.174.49.84.214 (talk) 22:11, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Do please read WP:POINT. Disrupting Wikipedia (by edit-warring) to make a point is not acceptable. Update the reference yourself, instead of editwarring is the correct thing to do. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:17, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

You should definitely keep the LOSU statement otherwise the reader will think you're dealing in absolutes, which we are not. The reader deserves to know the LOSU.174.49.84.214 (talk) 22:13, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

This isn't LazyPedia or MyOpinionPedia, this is Wikipedia --- you have to update the citations and you have to make full citations and you can't point the reader to a book as a reference. And your readers are not necessarily experts so we have to be clear. Clean it up that's all I'm saying with this one174.49.84.214 (talk) 22:18, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm sorry - but WP:POINT stands. And you've admitted in both text here, and in your edit-comments that you deliberately reverted to a wrong version. If you want this small point cited, then you can insert a ^{[citation needed]} or put in the citation. Editwarring to preserve something that is wrong, to make a point - simply isn't in the cards. And i suggest that you find a more civil tone, since you've been well beyond what is acceptable on wikipedia several times. (see WP:NPA for a good overview). --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:25, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Full protectionUnprotected

This page has been fully protected for a period of a month. A fully protected page can be edited only by administrators. The protection may be extended in case the edit warring continues once the block is lifted. The protection may also be reduced if talk page discussions seem conducive to the same. Modifications to a fully protected page can be proposed on this talk page. Administrators can make changes to the protected article reflecting consensus. Placing the {{editprotected}} template on the talk page will draw the attention of administrators for implementing uncontroversial changes. Editors are advised to discuss all relevant issues before requesting modifications. In case issues have been sorted out, a request for unprotection can be given at this forum. Please contact me directly for any administrative support. Wifione ^Message 22:39, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Which quite frankly doesn't make sense, since both editors are blocked now. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:57, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

There has been an unusually high amount of editing and reverts on this page recently, and, from the history logs, it looks like it was kicked off following my edits of 30 January. However, it's worth noting that all of the controversy has been on a single subsection of the article, 3.7.3 Terrestrial climate, which comprises an extremely small part of the overall article. It seems a bit overkill to edit-protect the full article, when only a very small portion is controversial. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 19:33, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Geoffrey Landis. I along with William M. Connolley were the offenders and I personally apologize to the serious people on here trying to make changes to the article. The Terrestrial Climate is the only section that should remain locked and I do think it should be locked. Further it would be good if we could actually collaborate on the talk page. That's what started all of this. Some contributors plain refused to come and talk about their changes and collaborate and of course warring brought the heavy hand down. Let's take the time now to fix Terrestrial impacts here. I'll start up the section in a clean start and let's edit it and we can promote the finished product after the lock expires. The rest of the article should probably be unlocked. Also, the Solar Variation climate change section should probably also be locked as the war will likely go there next. 174.49.84.214 (talk) 13:34, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

• Single section edits can come up only from the toolserver, not through admin actions. So request not accepted. I see discussions getting on. In good faith, I'm unprotecting the article. I'm watching the page. As this page has already undergone a recent protection cycle, please take care to stop at 2RR than reach even the third revert. Blocks will be made if another edit war erupts. Thanks. Wifione ^Message 05:31, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

"very low" => "low"

Can we please get consensus for inserting the following citation after "low" and removing "very":

Forster, P., V. Ramaswamy, P. Artaxo, T. Berntsen, R. Betts, D.W. Fahey, J. Haywood, J. Lean, D.C. Lowe, G. Myhre, J. Nganga, R. Prinn, G. Raga, M. Schulz and R. Van Dorland (2007) "2.9.1 Uncertainties in Radiative Forcing" in IPCC AR4 WG1 2007 Chapter 2: Changes in Atmospheric Constituents and Radiative Forcing ISBN 978-0-521-88009-1 http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/wg1/en/ch2s2-9-1.html#table-2-11 

The relevant column from the table is clear (my bolding):

Solar irradiance

B

3

Low

Measurements over last 25 years; proxy indicators of solar activity Relationship between proxy data and total solar irradiance; indirect ozone effects Range from available reconstructions of solar irradiance and their qualitative assessment

So there really shouldn't be any objections? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 22:51, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

Thanks. That looks like the ref I failed to find in my comments above William M. Connolley (talk) 11:18, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

I'm going to ask for this being put into the article with the edit-protect template - so if there are any objections, i'd like to hear them. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:15, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

There are no objections from here on this change. I'm glad we are updating the article with the latest information and updating the citation 174.49.84.214 (talk) 13:28, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Again, someone went in and updated the LOSU to "low" but did not update the reference citation from above. The article is incorrect. If you want it to be low, you need to update the citation. This is just lazy work from contributors. 174.49.84.214 (talk) 15:19, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Yes! Now it's right! Thank you William M. Connolley! 174.49.84.214 (talk) 16:39, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

As a gesture of goodwill, I will go to SV and make the change that's needed in that page so that it also reads "low" not "very low" and I'll update the citation. 174.49.84.214 (talk) 16:41, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Scope of the article

• The solar cycle, or the solar magnetic activity cycle, is a periodic change in the amount of irradiation from the Sun that is experienced on Earth.

Hey, is this about what the sun does (up there), or how it affects us (down here)? I'd like to have a more general article, which talks about natural variations on the Sun. Once we understand the Sun (i.e., have read about what happens with it up there), we can turn our attention to what it sends out: to other planets as well as the big blue marble.

This will also help clarify any disputes over whether solar variability affects terrestrial climate. By the way, is the general scientific usage of "solar variation" really limited to changes in solar radiation? If so, is there a term for changes in the solar wind, or better yet, a term which encompasses both meanings?

Not for nothing, but if the page is going to be locked for more than a few hours, we may as well talk about terminology. I just created a List of articles related to the Sun. Check out the redirects. --Uncle Ed (talk) 23:33, 1 February 2012 (UTC)

The most visible feature of the solar cycle is sunspots. The variation in the amount of solar radiation ("TSI"- total solar irradiance") is actually quite small. So I'd say that it is misleading-- in fact, incorrect-- to say that the solar cycle is "a periodic change in the amount of irradiation from the Sun". And, while it's true that it is "experienced on Earth," it's also experienced everywhere in the solar system, not just Earth. Mostly, it's "experienced" on the surface of the sun. So, yes: this introductory sentence is not accurate; it confuses a small portion of the solar cycle with the whole thing. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 18:24, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Okay, so let's change it. If TSI varies by a small amount, let's say what that amount is. Is it so small that historically it's been called "the solar constant"?

The article already has a section 3.2 Solar irradiance that goes into detail about this. The answer is, intensity varies by about one part in a thousand.

If sunspot variations correlate with (or cause?) changes in the solar wind, then maybe that should be mentioned, too. --Uncle Ed (talk) 18:38, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Sunspot variations definitely don't cause the solar wind. I think that the discussion of solar wind must refer to coronal mass ejections. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 23:51, 2 February 2012 (UTC)

Right, sorry if I was unclear, but at times of high sunspot activity the solar wind pushes out a magnetic field that tends to shield the Earth from the cosmic rays that rain down from the universe beyond. [1]

• Solar wind, according to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center, consists of magnetized plasma flares and in some cases is linked to sunspots. [2]

When they say "plasma flares" are they referring to coronal mass ejections? And when they say "linked to" do they mean "linked causally", as in A causes B or as in C causes both A and B? --Uncle Ed (talk) 05:16, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

Terrestrial Climate

I would nominate that Geoffrey Landis to write or take a heavy hand to this section. He's a PHD Physicist from NASA and is versed on the latest. He has the knowledge and is very balanced with respect to AGW and NonAGW factors. 174.49.84.214 (talk) 13:47, 3 February 2012 (UTC)

I appreciate the vote of confidence! I do have to point out that my time availability is somewhat limited, though, so I'm probably not the best person to do a rewrite. Geoffrey.landis (talk) 19:13, 4 February 2012 (UTC)