I note in your post that you provide two different numbers:
“The average period for those cycles was 33 months with a standard deviation of +/- 5 months.”
Then later you say 38 months with a sd of +- 5. That makes a huge difference, given the current lag of 49 months.
If the correct number s 33 and the distribution of the lags is normal, then we are beyond 3 standard deviations—the probability of that happening randomly is less than 1%. OTOH if the number is 38, we are at about 2 standard deviations. The probability of that happening randomly is about 5%.
Does anyone know where to get the raw numbers from which these values were computed. The distribution of the numbers is just as important as the standard deviation and mean and I need the raw data to make any decisions about the distribution.
Having gone back, I see what you’re saying.
The value of “38 months” was based on the quote I cited that said that 33 +- 5 was “average” (please not that I used “If” in that post on at least one occasion). So “38” was only meant to indicate the long side of 33 +- 5 and not “38 +- 5”.
So at the time of posting (6 months ago), we were, as you say, beyond 3 standard deviations. Now we would be around 55 months instead of 49 (beyond 4 SD).
Post #400 briefly picked up on something along these lines: how the variation in the length in solar cycles correlates to warming and cooling.
I’ve looked a bit at the link AFPhys had provided (and which I reposted in #400) in hopes of finding clarification on solar cycle length; but, it suffers a bit from poor form ... as most people are really benefited if writers use more description as well as employ the old “tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell them, tell them what you just told them” routine. Still, some data is there (in that link) as well as pointers to where more raw data should be.