We noticed this daft report in ScienceDaily (May 12, 2009)
Changes In The Sun Are Not Causing Global Warming, New Study Shows, and were glad to come across comments by Doug L Hoffman....such is the wonder of Google....H/T ClimateDepot.Com
Two computer modelers from CMU have written a program to simulate the interaction of cosmic rays with Earth's atmosphere. Because the model failed to predict significant increases in cloud cover, global warming activists are claiming the theory linking cosmic rays to climate change has been discredited. Climate models have failed to accurately predict the current downward trend in temperatures and now we are asked to accept a model as proof of how the Universe works. In truth, the paper cited is nothing more than a study of a computer program, and has nothing to do with the physical reality of how Earth's climate functions.
Appearing in Science under the title, “Study Challenges Cosmic Ray–Climate Link,” a review of the paper by Jeffrey Pierce and Peter Adams of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was used as an excuse to cast doubt on the theory that cosmic ray levels affect the creation of clouds in Earth's atmosphere. This theory was first proposed in 1997 by physicists Henrik Svensmark and Eigil Friis-Christensen of the Technical University of Denmark in Copenhagen.
Article continues below this advert:
They reported that Earth's cloud cover seemed to vary in step with galactic cosmic rays—high-energy charged particles from outer space—striking Earth's atmosphere. The more cosmic rays, the more cloud cover, the more cloud cover the fewer warming rays from the sun reaching Earth's surface to affect the climate.
One of the reasons that the cosmic ray theory is so intriguing is that, to a significant extent, the sun's activity regulates the volume of particles impacting Earth, thus providing a mechanism for variation in the sun to affect earthly climate in ways other than irradiance (direct solar radiation). If Svensmark and Friis-Christensen's theory is correct, changes in solar activity are responsible for a large portion of climate variation, greatly diminishing the importance of greenhouse gases like CO2. This assault on climate change orthodoxy, combined with the fact that Svensmark and Friis-Christensen are not members of the climate change fraternity, have singled them out for attack by global warming true believers.
A study disproving the cosmic ray theory is perfectly plausible and an acceptable part of the way science works. When I first saw the title of the report in Science I was immediately excited. What cunningly conceived experiment had been devised to prove or, even harder, disprove the impact of cosmic rays on cloud formation? What finely reasoned logic allowed the researchers to separate the effects of cosmic rays from other influences and make this claim? After all, Svensmark and Nigel Marsh had shown the statistical correlation between galactic cosmic rays (GCR) and cloud cover in a
study of satellite data published in the Journal of Geophysical Research – Atmospheres, in 2001. In it they stated, “The results presented here lend further support to the idea that at interannual timescales, solar variability has influenced low cloud [cover].”
Please click the link to theresilientearth.com to read FULL report by Doug L Hoffman
Tweet Article
Post to Facebook
Print Article