@ubtastic1 -- But you won't be able to alter it anyway...
...So you may as well laugh now.
>:-)
Earth may be headed into a mini Ice Age within a decade
What may be the science story of the century is breaking this evening, as heavyweight US solar physicists announce that the Sun appears to be headed into a lengthy spell of low activity, which could mean that the Earth – far from facing a global warming problem – is actually headed into a mini Ice Age. Average magnetic field …
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 21:41 GMT brainwrong
11 year cycle
"The Sun normally follows an 11-year cycle of activity"
How do we know that? What we (OK, I) do know is that it has done that very recently (on solar system timescales), and that it has done other things in the past.
I would imagine that the interior on the Sun, as a dynamic system, is in general chaotic. It may flip chaotically between several different behaviors in much the same way as the lorenz attractor flips between tracing out 2 different unstable cycles.
In short, anything may happen, but is very unlikely to lead to the destruction of any significant proportion of the solar system. I hope you find these words soothing.
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 21:42 GMT Michael Mokrysz
Troll?
Not to say that I have no trust in the Reg, but I do find it a bit dubious that something so supposedly thought through seems to have nothing online except months/years old speculation. I can't help but wondering if this is really just a well-written (and actually possibly true) experiment.
Mine's the coat with 'sceptic' stamped on it...
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 21:42 GMT ChilliKwok
People of the world - Do not fear....
Our great leaders have consulted the all-wise IPCC activist-scientists. They have decreed that the great yellow fusion reactor in the sky has absolutely no effect on climate. No. None at all.
They have decreed that the climate is entirely controlled by the bubbles from your fizzy drink.
Do not fear. Our solar panels and windmills will keep us warm while our great leaders agree a new tax on the Sun to limit temperature drop to 2oC.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:55 GMT nyelvmark
Re: I'm confused...
You're confused because you think that "scientist" is a title awarded to people by some indisputable authority. That's not the case. The word means whatever you want it to mean. There is no indisputable authority. Somebody who began studying physics yesterday is a scientist by one definition.
'Appeal to authority' is well-understood to be a rational fallacy. I know, because Einstein said so.
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Thursday 16th June 2011 11:58 GMT Anonymous Coward
title
Since you seem to have missed it, I was parodying the denialist commentards that usually turn up in these articles.
Now before we all start getting hysterical about whether or not we are actually heading into a Maunder Minimum (which the original press release did not confirm), or whether this "could have major implications for the Earth's climate" (more liberal editorialising from Mr Page), here's a little update from the original source:
"We are NOT predicting a mini-ice age. We are predicting the behavior of the solar cycle. In my opinion, it is a huge leap from that to an abrupt global cooling, since the connections between solar activity and climate are still very poorly understood. My understanding is that current calculations suggest only a 0.3 degree C decrease from a Maunder-like minimum, too small for an ice age. It is unfortunate that the global warming/cooling studies have become so politically polarizing."
http://www.nso.edu/press/SolarActivityDrop.html
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:55 GMT Anonymous Coward
Ah yes, just what I was saying about false dilemmas.
>"as clearly mankinds affects on earth is far greater than that small yellow dot in the sky"
See, that's nonsense. It doesn't have to be larger, it just has to be a) enough to tip the balance and b) under our control. You appear to have swallowed someone's biased description of what the debate is actually about, but it's a lot more subtle than anything that can be disproven by your simple-minded either-or logic.
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 23:12 GMT Grommet
Balanced Views?
I know this is a red top and usually amusing but really?
For a slightly more balanced view... http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/06/14/6857473-solar-forecast-hints-at-a-big-chill
Personally I can accept that the climate is changing (it always has). I "guess" mankind must be having some effect on that.
But I basically think it is a bad idea to piss in the stream you are drinking from. so all reasonable efforts to stop any kind of pollution are welcome if only we could leave out the political nonsense.
Are we going to get warmer? Are we going to get colder? I don't really care to be honest. What does bug me is articles such as this jumping on bandwagons and taking a single fact and running with it to come to an overall conclusion.
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 23:13 GMT Bluenose
New stories of the day
I am waiting to hear that Friends of the Earth are claiming victory in their long standing battle with the Sun to stop using nuclear power as it is enviromentally unfriendly and means that we will have to live with the Sun sitting around for hundreds of thousands of year while we wait for the radiation to dissipated.
and headline number 2
Greenpeace blames human activity for the slow down in sun spot activity due to all the crap we keep launching into space which invariably finds its way in to the Sun due to space tides that take the bits of plastic from six packs of NASA oxygen cylinders and lets them wander across the solar system trapping and killing thousands of aliens which is why they never get to Earth.
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Tuesday 14th June 2011 23:14 GMT Anonymous Coward
0.1% cooling
The difference of energy coming from the sun between the peak and trough of a solar cycle is about 0.1%
How can such a small change cause an ice age?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Solar-cycle-data.png
Also - all previous ice ages took 10's of thousands of years to cool down. What if the CO2 warming is strong enough to offset this cooling?
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:54 GMT Goat Jam
0.1% cooling
"How can such a small change cause an ice age?"
Even were I to believe your 0.1% assertion, if Sun activity is not the driver for Ice Ages, what do you think is? A precipitous drop in fairy farts?
"all previous ice ages took 10's of thousands of years to cool down"
Did you know that the Vikings once settled in Greenland growing crops and cattle? Until a cooler period came along and wiped them out? No, it didn't take 10's of thousands of years for them to disappear, it happened in 10's of years or less.
Climate does change. This is not disputed.
The idea that mankind can have a significant effect on that, either positively or negatively, is what's in dispute.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 10:21 GMT Some Beggar
@Goat Jam
The settling and later abandonment of Greenland had nothing to do with climate change. The name "green" was given by Erik the Red to encourage settlement - it was as inhospitable then as it is today. They sailed out, built some farms and churches, struggled for a while, then the trade routes fizzled out and they all went home again. It was a failed frontier enterprise and nothing more.
Read a history book.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 15:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
Greenland
It was five centuries of settlement from the time of Eirīkr Þōrvaldsson through to the final disappearance of the colonies. Even now it is not certain what happened, only that the colonies were abandoned some time in the late 15th Century. it is still uncertain whether they starved to death, were killed in conflicts with the Inuit or whether they returned to Iceland (although the Icelandic records do not mention the return of the Greenlanders).
Greenland in the Norse period was very slightly more appealing than it is now (i.e. not very) and supported a borderline pasture economy which the Vikings brought from Scandinavia. You grew grass, raised animals, produced milk and ate the animals. But it was very, very marginal. Even in the good years the climate was never good enough to grow arable crops, so all grains had to be imported from their other colonies.
As the climate deteriorated, the Norse stuck to their pasture farming which become ever more unsustainable. They never adapted their lifestyle to one better suited to Greenland, so the colonies gradually dwindled until they failed entirely.
Much the same happened in Iceland, but there, conditions were just good enough that pasture farming could be maintained throughout the Middle Ages, but it was a wretchedly poor place right up until the middle of the 20th Century.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 10:21 GMT Gary Heard
@0.1% cooling
TSI (Total Solar Irradiance) may only vary by that amount, but extreme Ultraviolet varies by almost 20% trough to peak, the Solar wind also varies by about 15%, as evidenced by the increase in galactic cosmic rays during the trough, increased cosmic rays are thought to increase the planets albedo, stopping the heat even reaching the surface and leading to a cooling due to Black Body radiation
So TSI in the visible spectrum is not the only output to consider
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 12:29 GMT Anonymous Coward
Title
> The difference of energy coming from the sun between the peak and trough of a solar cycle is about 0.1%
Doubling CO2 only change the composition of the atmosphere by 0.03% yet it has an impact.
Re: Some Begger
Retreating glaciers in Greenland are uncovering biomass that is carbon dated to dates ranging from 400 to 1200 AD.
The Eric the Red story is a fallacy. It is an impossibility for the Vikings to have set up successful and long term settlements and keep them supplied via sea routes. Therefore the settlements must have been able to sustain themselves with home grown crops and herding animals (abundant evidence for this exists). This is something they could not do today therefore Greenland was more hospitable when the Vikings were there.
Read a more modern history book.
Re: Are you saying that 30 billion tonnes of CO2 per year is not a significant amount
It all depends upon scale. 30 billion tonnes amounts to about 0.2 parts per million of the atmosphere which isn't a great deal. Or to put it another way. If you have a million dollars then it amounts to adding an extra 20cents.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 15:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
Bzzzt!
@Anonymous Coward
'The Eric the Red story is a fallacy. It is an impossibility for the Vikings to have set up successful and long term settlements and keep them supplied via sea routes. Therefore the settlements must have been able to sustain themselves with home grown crops and herding animals (abundant evidence for this exists). This is something they could not do today therefore Greenland was more hospitable when the Vikings were there.'
The Norse economy was pasture based. Animals grazed in the wild in the summer whilst hay was grown and fed to them indoors in the winter. You see the same in Iceland - and Greenland today.
All other staples (with the exception of fish) were imported. The Greenland records show this was increasingly infrequent as time went by with many of the Greenland Norse not knowing what simple things like bread were.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 07:21 GMT solaries
The Day After Tomorrow Anyone
Even Al Gore mention this in his documentary A Inconvenient Truth and Art Bell and Whitney Streibler in their book whose title I have forgotten mention this possibility towards the end of the last ice age there came a return of severe weather called the Younger Drayas so a increase in carbon dioxide may bring on a new ice age isn't something to laugh at the movie The Day After Tomorrow might be closer to the truth than the movie maker thought so only the future will tell which story is true.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 13:21 GMT Adrian Challinor
Oh great
Having had the IPCC make up the science as they go along, now we have policy based on a Holywood movie. We deserve to be doomed.
For the record: as a scientist and a Fellow of the Royal Astronimical Society, I don't accept the MMGW arguement. I do think that the great nuclear reactor in the skies is responsible for a lot more than is currently thought (though that does seem to be changing).
What I do believe is that pushing CO2 in bulk (or any gas of any sort) in to the atmospher is Not a Good Thing (c). If its Not a Good Thing, then we should take steps to stop it. These steps do not include panic by a munch of muppets who stand to make a lot of money selling bulbs that don't light and putting a wind farm on every hill.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 07:21 GMT h4rm0ny
Would this really make a difference?
I've been attacked for being a "denier" before now. But would this make a difference if AGW were correct? If it led to an 11-year cold period, we'd still have wanted to take measures for the long-term climactic issues of CO2 et al. when we come out of that (relatively short) period.
In either case though, whether you believe in significant AGW or not, the answer is nuclear power. It would be just what we need to get us through mini ice-ages and it's also what we'd need to reduce CO2 and reduce AGW. Unfortunately our short-sighted government and some last-generation environmentalists seem to want us to ignore nuclear power and spend our money on wind-farms.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 10:10 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: ..but can we build it next to your house?
Well I rent, but if other people are daft enough to fear the plant, I'll take advantage of the nice low house prices and move near to it. Does that count?
And if it's a choice between living next to a nice modern reactor or a coal -powered powerstation, I know which I would choose!
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:56 GMT Anonymous Coward
False dilemma is false.
It's not an either/or; it's perfectly possible that both a) human activity is warming the Earth and b) solar activity is about to start leading to cooling of the Earth, both at the same time.
This is one of the most egregious fallacies perpetrated by the AGW-deniers: the supposition that if anything else affects Earth's climate apart from human beings, that somehow proves that we don't.
As has been pointed out elsethread, if *both* are true, then we would be making a terrible mistake in assuming that the problem wouldn't come back after a few decades' respite.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 10:13 GMT h4rm0ny
Re: False dilemma is false
Whilst I agree with the logic in your final paragraph (if X then Y) and made the same point myself above, I find it ironic that you should accuse "deniers" (more properly called skeptics, thank you), of using the argument that if anything else affects Earth's climate other than man, then man doesn't matter. The inverse argument seems to be more commonly used by AGW proponents, of saying that the other factors don't matter, man made factors are the significant ones. Skeptics are the ones pointing out the often very significant degree to which other factors affect the climate whilst some AGW arguments seem to depend on attempting to normalize these away as much as possible.
I honestly don't think we can draw any definite conclusions as to AGW at present and the certainty of some AGW proponents, which reaches moral certitude at times, is kind of disturbing to me.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 11:35 GMT Anonymous Coward
Title
The man made factors are the ones we can potentially do something about. At the very least we could be much more effecient with our energy, which has the benefit of eeking out the finite resources of the planet so that we can continue to bicker, fight, exploit, steal, rape and murder for longer.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 15:18 GMT Anonymous Coward
Re: Re: False dilemma is false
>"I find it ironic that you should accuse "deniers" (more properly called skeptics, thank you), of using the argument that if anything else affects Earth's climate other than man, then man doesn't matter"
I was using the term "deniers" specifically to denote those whose opposition is based on irrational factors like political preference or wishful or illogical thinking, specifically in order not to lump them together with genuine skeptics. Skeptics have an open mind; Deniers, on the other hand, have already reached a conclusion.
(As indeed have pro-warming zealots, but I've never heard them propose the argument that since humans affect the Earth, the Sun cannot possibly do so to any significant extent; whereas I have heard the reverse argument propsed by anti-warming zealots many times. You claim to have done so, but I can't help but wonder if you have misunderstood the argument that has been made by some who think warming is happening: that the human contribution is most significant because other contributions are basically cyclical and balance out, but the human contribution is only increasing in one direction, unlike those other factors)
I'm skeptical myself, but lean toward the opinion that there is currently a preponderance of evidence suggesting strongly that human activity could make significant differences to atmospheric system, but that a lot remains to be determined before conclusions can be reached. My apologies in advance if zealots of any kind find that too reasonable for them!
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:59 GMT lglethal
Ok just to be pedantic...
Solar Minimum is actually the most dangerous time for astronauts to be outside of the Earths protective magnetic field. Not because of Solar Flares, which youre right are most dangerous at Solar Maximum, but because of Galactic Cosmic Rays. At Solar Minimum the Suns protective magentic field stops less GCR's from entering the Solar System and so there is an increase in the background radiation of these highly energetic particles.
Whilst a direct hit from a Solar Flare could potentially kill an astronaut in space, the chances of this are incredibly low (and can be designed for by having a small enclosed space which is highly protected and which the astronauts can hide in for the couple of hours or days that the Solar Flare takes place.
However, an increase in background CGR radiation is extremely harmful because it is almost impossible to design to stop CGR's effectively (being of such huge amounts of energy), and over the course of a long space journey their radiation effect will be far more noticable and hugely increase the risk of cancers and other long term radiation exposure diseases...
So Solar Minimum is bad for space travel... Very bad...
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 08:59 GMT Anonymous Coward
Not related
IANAS (I am not a scientist) but....
I don't know about the Bell & Streibler book, but the sudden freeze that Al Gore & the Day after Tomorrow were proposing was caused by the melting of the ice caps (due to higher temperatures) reducing the salinity of the sea water at the poles.
A large reduction in salinity could theoretically effect the North Atlantic Gyre which is what prevents the UK from having a similar climate to that of Siberia.
If this potential Solar Minimum has enough of an effect to counter greenhouse gas driven global warming the NAG should not be threatened & will to some extent counter the lower temperatures for NW Europe .
Please try to understand Solar Activity has no relation to greenhouse gasses although both can have an effect on global temperatures.
The graph shows that solar activity has been declining since around 2000, yet global temperatures have continued to rise.
Global Warming is a long term effect (unless some of the proposed feedback mechanisms do actually kick in) . Hopefully this unexpected Solar Minimum will be something that only lasts a short period. Let's accept the 70 years they suggest for now. That gives us 70 years during which will mitigate to some degree the effects of global warming.
We might also expect the cooling effects of this minimum to be much less than that of the Maunder Minimum due to the increased levels of greenhouse gas in our atmosphere compared to then.
This doesn't suggest we can forget about greenhouse gas controls for 70 years because even if this minimum does stall global temperature rise, the effect when the sun does get its mojo back will be a much faster and harder to adapt to rise in temperature.
There's not much we can do about the sun I'm afraid but Global Warming and a lot of other problems are really just a product of the elephant in the room that no-one wants to discuss.
Population.
Global population has doubled since I was born 44 years ago, and whilst there is some evidence to suggest that birth rates taper off and even reduce once a local population reaches a certain level of developed comfort there are still billions of people well below this threshold.
Consider the current strain on fish stocks, viable arable land, mineral, energy, carbon and fresh water resources and then double or triple it in the next 40 years.
I think we're going to be well in the shit long before we have to worry about the end of a 70 year solar minimum or the worst effects of global warming.
These just apply extra pressure to the real problem of unchecked, cancerous human population growth.
I'll get my coat, or maybe my shorts er... or maybe buy all the tinned goods and weapons I can fit in my house and build a bunker.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 10:34 GMT Anonymous Coward
Humans are "cancer"? Wow...
Malthus was wrong, and every Malthusian ever since has been wrong too - demographics didn't play ball, and our productivity increased. Even the UN predicts population will begin to fall fairly soon, by 2030.
And energy from renewables, nuclear, etc is already providing people with far more resources, and more efficient use of resources
You want to believe the world is ending because you're basically a miserable sod who has always wanted to hole up in a bunker. Here's a tip: it really won't help you get a girlfriend.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 11:39 GMT Anonymous Coward
Begin to fall really?
The UN does not predict population will fall by 2030 (unless we do it to ourselves of course). They do predict the RATE OF GROWTH will fall as I alluded to in my post.
"And energy from renewables, nuclear, etc is already providing people with far more resources, and more efficient use of resources"
As far as I know energy from renewables (or nuclear) doesn't provide any new resources (such as uranium, lithium, fossil fuels, fresh water etc... They don't replenish fish stocks or increase arable land. Maybe you are confusing 'resources' with iPads and flat screen TVs?
Perhaps you can explain how they create new resources without resorting to baseless personal attacks?
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 09:00 GMT John Savard
Good News
This is good news. It will save us from disaster while we get our act together.
Global warming is a real problem, but there's a saner solution than relying on solar power and wind farms. It's called nuclear power. As long as that's off the table, though, it's not surprising that the economic costs of addressing global warming are so daunting that people would prefer to deny the problem.
Both of the other choices are very bad choices.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 09:01 GMT Adam Nealis
Maunder Minima and LIAs
A definition of The Little Ice Age (TLIA).
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/little-ice-age-lia/
Be careful. The sun spot stuff as covered is fine. Mr Page brought in the implications of a possible Ice Age, not the solar scientists. As an Orlowski acolyte, perhaps he couldn't help himself. But don't let that detract from the solar sunspot part which is interesting in its own right.
The link between a Maunder Minimum and TLIA only works if you select a narrow enough definition of TLIA.
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Wednesday 15th June 2011 09:01 GMT Nick Gisburne
This may be a good thing
70 years of ice age may buy us the time we need. In the 70 or so years it takes the planet to go in and out of a mini ice age, fossil fuels will be severely depleted (not least by us having to use far more energy to keep warm), and in addition to that perhaps China's thorium reactor projects will have taught us all that this is the way forward - when we do come out at the other end we won't then be so reliant on CO2-making solutions. Meanwhile I'll be holding off on investing in solar panels for a while.
This topic is closed for new posts.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
