Posted on 06/14/2011 8:12:17 PM PDT by goodnesswins
WASHINGTON (AFP) – For years, scientists have been predicting the Sun would by around 2012 move into solar maximum, a period of intense flares and sunspot activity, but lately a curious calm has suggested quite the opposite. According to three studies released in the United States on Tuesday, experts believe the familiar sunspot cycle may be shutting down and heading toward a pattern of inactivity unseen since the 17th century. The signs include a missing jet stream, fading spots, and slower activity near the poles, said experts from the National Solar Observatory and Air Force Research Laboratory. "This is highly unusual and unexpected," said Frank Hill, associate director of the NSO's Solar Synoptic Network, as the findings of the three studies were presented at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society's Solar Physics Division .. "But the fact that three completely different views of the Sun point in the same direction is a powerful indicator that the sunspot cycle may be going into hibernation."
A study in the March 2010 issue of Geophysical Research Letters explored what effect an extended solar minimum might have, and found no more than a 0.3 Celsius dip by 2100 compared to normal solar fluctuations. "A new Maunder-type solar activity minimum cannot offset the global warming caused by human greenhouse gas emissions," wrote authors Georg Feulner and Stefan Rahmstorf, noting that forecasts by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have found a range of 3.7 Celsius to 4.5 Celsius rise by this century's end compared to the latter half of the 20th century. "Moreover, any offset of global warming due to a grand minimum of solar activity would be merely a temporary effect, since the distinct solar minima during the last millennium typically lasted for only several decades or a century at most."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
You can find some interesting reading at this site. I don't agree with his every theory but with the possibility of significant global cooling or even the start of a new ice age, I agree.
Thanks for that explanation....
be careful...which “hordes” would those be? I LIVE in the North, and right now I WOULD LIKE TO MOVE SOUTH!
Last column based on 1st qtr of 2011 only
YIKES...but that is ONLY 38 years....be interesting to know over 100 years....I fear a Yellowstone Blow...that’s what I fear...
Heh. I live in a cold climate, was being silly, and was scaring southerners (lived in the south in the past). ;-)
Yes it will. Colder into the 2020s, not getting warmer until after 2035. That’s my prediction. The minimum will be at least two solar cycles long (24 - 26).
Note: this topic is from 6/14/11. Thanks goodnesswins.Bear necessity ping.
Note: this topic is from 6/14/11. Thanks goodnesswins.
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They do not know what they do not know.
Actually, what was being predicted 50 years ago when I took an astronomy course, was that in the next few years one of the periodic sun cycles, the 88 year one, would have us seeing drought conditions like the dust bowl/depression years. Incidentally, have you seen the Phoenix dust blows?
The thing about natural cycles is they’re actually artificial, because they’re constructed to try to make something which is essentially random into something basically predictable and repeating; IOW, they’re not cycles anyway. :’)
The philosopher Hume asked the question to the effect, is it more likely that nature sometimes runs out of its course, or that human testimony is fallible?
It was meant as a rhetorical question, but the actual answer is, what we regard as the course of nature *is* human testimony.
There was a news report tonight suggesting we might be in for a major cosmic flare which would crisp our electronics and satellites. Does anyone know how fast a flare goes from sun to earth. A friend said we should turn of our electronics, and possibly even throw the main circuit breaker for the house. Any opinions/knowledge? They also spoke of something called the Carrington Event in the 1850s which fried American and European telegraph systems.
Thanks, this was a very interesting article. I am a little confused however. If he saw the flare at 11:20 am in Sept. and the outburst of auroras was at dawn the next day. Let’s say 5:20 am (anyone know what time dawn was in his area on that date?), then that would indicate a lapse of around 18 hours. Plenty of time to warn people to unplug electronics, and perhaps even throw the house main switch. But then the article goes on to say that astronauts doing a space walk would only have a few minutes to get back into their capsule for safety. Are there different kinds of energy traveling at different speeds?
Thanks gleeaikin.
Being a part time herpetologist makes me wonder just what it is I’m missing.
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