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Author Topic: The Sun: First spot-free month in a century  (Read 1246 times)

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Offline Splashdown

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The Sun: First spot-free month in a century
« on: September 01, 2008, 06:25:50 PM »
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Sun Makes History: First Spotless Month in a Century
Michael Asher (Blog) - September 1, 2008 8:11 AM


The sun has reached a milestone not seen for nearly 100 years: an entire month has passed without a single visible sunspot being noted.

The event is significant as many climatologists now believe solar magnetic activity – which determines the number of sunspots -- is an influencing factor for climate on earth.

But will the rest of us? In the past 1000 years, three previous such events -- the Dalton, Maunder, and Spörer Minimums, have all led to rapid cooling. One was large enough to be called a "mini ice age". For a society dependent on agriculture, cold is more damaging than heat. The growing season shortens, yields drop, and the occurrence of crop-destroying frosts increases.

Meteorologist Anthony Watts, who runs a climate data auditing site, tells DailyTech the sunspot numbers are another indication the "sun's dynamo" is idling. According to Watts, the effect of sunspots on TSI (total solar irradiance) is negligible, but the reduction in the solar magnetosphere affects cloud formation here on Earth, which in turn modulates climate.


Linky

Wait...THE SUN affects the global climate? And I just bought all those cool swirly light bulbs.  :whatever:
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Offline JohnnyReb

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Re: The Sun: First spot-free month in a century
« Reply #1 on: September 01, 2008, 06:35:46 PM »
...and here Al Gore just had all those extra Carbon Credits printed up. Oh well, I guess he can burn'em to keep warm.
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Offline Wretched Excess

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Re: The Sun: First spot-free month in a century
« Reply #2 on: September 01, 2008, 07:52:59 PM »

AAAAAIIIIIEEEIII!11!!!111!!!!!   GEORGE BUSH BROKE THE SUN !111!11!111!ONEONE!1

maybe The BarackStar! can fix it after he is done fixing the ocean and the planet. :-)
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