The Chilling Stars: A New Theory of Climate Change

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For many years it has been known that periods of global cooling are associated with with reduced solar activity. In the 1970s, Jack Eddy of the High Altitude Observatory in Colorado named the correlation between the lack of sunspots and the consequent decline in earth's temperature the "Maunder Minimum" and showed that similar sequences of global warming and cooling were also associated with increasing and decreasing solar activity. Until recently, however, no one has been able to provide a mechanism explaining why this correlation exists. Henrik Svensmark, however, has done just that in his published work and with the help of science writer Nigel Calder has provided a very readable explanation of how solar activity affects climate change. This book has profound implications for policy debates in this country and deserves a wide audience.Svensmark's theory is that cosmic rays which originate from collapsing stars (novas) are the primary cause of cloud formation, in particular the formation of low level clouds, those 3,000 meters above the ground and lower. Muons, basically very dense electrons, which are among the few cosmic particles to survive the solar winds and contact with the earth's atmosphere to sufficiently interact with with atoms near the surface, liberate electrons in the atomosphere which in turn join with molecules that form stable clusters. These clusters attract a small amount of sulpheric acid and then water molecules to ultimately generate water droplets, the basis of cloud cover. But how exactly does cloud cover affect climate? Most climate models simply see clouds as a byproduct of climate changes, but as Svensmark and Calder demonstrate, clouds themselves are the predominant factor in global cooling. Although they trap heat between the clouds and earth's surface, they also reflect radiant energy from the sun back into space. The net effect of low lying clouds is therefore a cooling one. And, as it happens, all periods of global cooling have coincided with increasing cosmic rays and cloud cover.The implications of this theory are quite startling. For one thing, it almost completely elimates increases and decreases of carbon dioxide and other so called green house gasses (GHG) from the equation of climate change, a matter of some concern to those who use fears of anthropomorphic global warming to advance their political agendas. Indeed, when Svensmark first proposed his theory in the mid 1990s, it was called "dangerous" because, if correct, it would undermine the vast public funding currently available to the many scientists who feed off of global warming fears. Unfortunately for them, Svensmark's theories have since been experimentally vindicated, something that cannot be said for the "models" that GHG advocates use to prop up their increasingly discredited arguments. Indeed, Svensmark's "chilling stars" are able to explain all the data that other climate change models note. For example, since 1900 the solar magnetic field has almost doubled, resulting in a dramatic decline in the amount of cosmic rays reaching the earth's surface. There has been a consequent temperature increase (.6 degrees celsius) and an 8.6% decrease in cloud cover. This results in "a warming of 1.4 watts per square meter."(p. 80) But this figure is crucially important because it is precisely the same figure that advocates of the man made global warming hypothesis say is the result of increases in greenhouse gases. What this means is that natural variation almost entirely explains all observed temperature increases this century, and this model, unlike the GHG model, is experimentally vindicated.But what really sets Svensmark and his colleagues apart from the man made global warming advocates is that this model, while also explaining the observed rise in temperature, also explains the data that the other models ignore, and in some cases irresponsibly cover up. For example, it is well known that Antarctica is not experiencing global warming. This is part of a long term climate trend in which Antarctica has for thousands of years experienced cooling while the rest of the world warms, and warming as the rest of the world cools. It is part of the troubling evidence that skeptics of man made global warming routinely bring to the table and which popular films like Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" conveniently ignore. Advocates of GHG as the primary mover of climate change typically try to brush off this anomaly by explaining that they need "more data." But Svensmark explains it easily. The Antarctic ice cap is the one place on earth that is so reflective that it actually loses more radiant energy on cloudless days than on cloudy ones. So, while cloud cover cools the rest of the planet, it warms Antarctica, and as the rest of the planet warms with a decrease in cloud cover, Antarctica cools.Similarly, Svensmark's work explains the cooling trend the world experienced from the 1940s to the mid 1970s. This period also saw one of the greatest outputs of GHG in history and man made global warming theorists have a great deal of trouble dismissing it. Indeed, for a long time they ignored it but following the pulbication of Michael Crighton's novel 'State of Fear' this anomaly became common knowledge among the literate public. This period also coincides with a slight reduction in solar activity and a slight increase in cosmic ray induced cooling. In terms of the history of global climate, this cooling was not very dramatic, but it was sufficient by 1975 to lead many popular publications to speculate on the coming of a new ice age. Interestingly enough, the solution to "global cooling" political activists sought in the 1970s also involved a reduction in fossil fuel usage, so one might reasonably be skeptical now of their claims to solve global warming by the same technique.The value of Svensmark and Calder's book, however, extends far beyond the current debates on global climate change and what, if anything, we as a society should do about it. They note that periods of warming and cooling have had a tremendous impact on human history, including the development of agriculture, and on the whole development of life on earth. Indeed, their research suggests ways to narrow the search for life in other parts of our galaxy. The final chapter of the book describes the myriad of research projects that will open up to investigators once this new (but already well tested) paradigm of climate change is adopted.But the promise of new research, even the promise of a better model, is hardly sufficient to insure the adoption of Svensmark's "Chilling Stars" as a new paradigm for research in the modern era. Historically, as Thomas Kuhn has demonstrated, "science" advances by using a paradigm, a carefully constructed set of theories. These paradigms guide research until a point at which there are too many unexplainable gaps in the theory for the paradigm to continue to be useful. At this point, a new paradigm replaces it. Usually the process by which one paradigm replaces another is fraught with argument, debate, and in some cases dramatic confrontations among advocates of competing ideas. This is how science operates and it generally works quite well. Svensmark's work has been subjected to just this sort of rigorous testing for the last decade and has shown itself to be remarkably versatile. However, late 20th and 21st century science is altogether different than science in earlier periods of human history. Scientists used to be motivated by religious considerations (a desire to better understand creation) or humanitarian motives (curing diseases like polio) or simply curiosity. Such motivations are still common among many scientists. But increasingly, political advocacy coupled with the public funding of science has led to a new motivation for science: the advancement of a political agenda. In such an environment, it may not matter that the work of Svensmark and his colleagues better explains climate, the development of life on the planet, and even better predicts the future. The political usefulness of their studies does not, at present anyway, coincide with that of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and so it is quite possible that their work simply will not get the attention it deserves. This signals a dramatic, and perhaps fundamental, change in the way science operates. Will the future see a continued commitment to experimental research and the free publication of diverse views, or will the modern scientists win out, stiffling open debate and corrupting data to advance their agendas. The case of Michael Mann and his famous "hockey stick" graph is instructive in this regard. Mann, an advocate of the man made global warming hypothesis, knew that the medieval warming period and the little ice age of the last millenia contradicted the GHG theory. So he simply revised history by creating a chart that that showed a stable climate for a thousand years followed by a dramatic increase in the 20th century. He also hid his raw data and algorithms from public and scientific scrutiny for almost a decade, an act that would have immediately disqualified his work from serious consideration among the previous generation of scientists. But in the "Brave New World" of science, his graph graced numerous IPCC publications. Calder rightly calls Mann's work "Orwellian" and dismisses it in favor of finding a theory that accurately explains, rather than explains away, actual climate changes in earth's history. But one cannot help but wonder if Orwell's vision was correct. Time, and in particular, the reception of this spectacular book, will tell. Be sure to get the book yourself and enjoy the read.

Henrik Svensmark's theory is that high-energy cosmic rays originating in the destruction of stars in other parts of our galaxy substantially explain the changes in the world's temperature throughout its history. Ice ages and hot periods, as well as shorter lived warming and cooling events (like the Mediaeval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age) are explained by the combination of our solar system's proximity to areas in the galaxy where cosmic activity is highest and the cycle of our Sun's magnetic activity (and thus its ability to protect us from those rays). How? Such cosmic rays - charged sub-atomic particles - stimulate the creation of low-level clouds, and those clouds cool the Earth by reflecting heat back into space. Svensmark does not duck the issue - he states that this effect explains most warming and cooling, leaving only a secondary role for changes in CO2, however caused. Such warming that has occurred over the last century was caused by unusually high magnetic activity of the Sun keeping cosmic radiation away, meaning fewer clouds and a warming world.This book is written by Svensmark and Nigel Calder, a scientific journalist. It is highly readable and the science well explained. The book is made easier by the fact that the argument is explained in the overview at the start, and each chapter is preceded by a short summary. One quibble is that although there are chapter references at the back, it is not possible to identify the origin of all the bold assertions Svensmark and Calder make.Svensmark has had his scientific critics; many are catalogued by name. Many, such as Bert Bolin, a Swedish professor of meteorology and member of the IPCC, abused his developing theory because it was "naive and dangerous" - it did not comply with the developing consensus that global warming is man made through the agency of CO2, and that to deny this was to encourage further complacency by self indulgent politicians and ordinary folk. Such attempts to stifle research do not reflect well on the scientists involved. The book gives the impression that he has won over many outright critics and many other scientists who similarly sought explanations for global temperature changes in extra-terrestrial sources but who posited different mechanisms.Certainly, if you are inclined to wonder, there is ample evidence that Svensmark is working with many scientific colleagues - he is no lone crank - and even where he is not actively working with others his theories have found supporting evidence from other work in other fields - including work that was being undertaken without any obvious connection to climate change research. Although primarily a theoretical physicist, he conducted experiments in the basement of his Danish National Research Centre, apparently demonstrating the cloud forming effectiveness of muons, or high-energy electrons. It seems to me that he and his colleagues have made their case well, quite the contrary to the impression given by Inge Brede Johannessen below. Nor, Mr Listen, is there anything remotely polemic about it! In 2010 an experiment at CERN may provide further evidence of the physics of the basic process. But for the global warming consensus this experiment, originally devised by another scientist and blocked, the book suggest, by physicists unwilling to expose themselves to the criticism of the global warming consensus, might have taken place five years ago.If your mind is open to the questions (a) is the planet warming? And, if so, (b) why? and (c) how much? then this is a book for you. The science is not that difficult to understand, though if you are a layman like me then you have I think to be modest enough to admit that you probably couldn't identify any scientific howlers in the book, let alone in the Svensmark and colleagues' scientific papers listed in the back. As I write the world's great and good have jetted off to Bali to discuss climate change "mitigation", and most of that mitigation will involve restricting CO2 emission. As others such as Bjorn Lomborg have pointed out, the cost of such a restriction may be the loss of much of the economic growth, and the alleviation of poverty, that would otherwise happen. It is always worth considering whether we have identified the right enemy - or even whether there is an enemy at all. Besides, we all know about ice ages: have you ever wondered what actually caused them?

"The chilling stars" is a fascinating journey through the earths climate history.Starting point is the presently politicized issue of so-called man-made global warming. Physicist Henrik Svensmark finds himself suddenly isolated and being labeled "dangerous" when doing nothing more than what scientists normally do: proposing and testing hypotheses about natural phenomena. Unfortunately, he steps into the already "charted territory" of climate modellers who claim monopoly for predicting global temperatures.In an attempt to proove that there is more to climate than just an evil CO2-releasing mankind Svensmark has to dig deeper and deeper into evidence from many sciences:- Archeology: ancient shoes from the Schnidejoch (is the present day warming really unique?)- Astrophysics: why does the sunspot cycle give such a good correlation?- particle physics: isn't the atmosphere a giant fog-chamber?- oceanography: why antarctic weather is more isolated than arctic- cosmology: our journey through the spiral arms of our galaxy- atmospheric chemistry: how do clouds nucleate?- geo-chemistry: trace elements tell about former supernovae- historical & physical geology: glaciations in Australia !- biology: what drives evolution? How productive is a cold earth?- ...In the end Svensmarks theory yields a synoptical view of todays climate data and also makes a proposal for a more universal view on paleoclimate throughout the earths history. Many new questions arise, so that the last chapter is devoted for drafting out an agenda of a whole new field: cosmoclimatology.The book is written partially as a pop-science book, partially as a biography of the hero describing his struggling from conference to conference among narrow-minded colleagues.If You think that CO2 is everything You need to know about climate, please read this book. By the way, this book does NOT say that there is no influence from CO2. Rather, today its influence is systematically overestimated. Also, as it is put in chapter 1: "among the many generations to observe drastic climate changes, ours may be the first that was frightened by a warming."

This is a fascinating well written book about a third major theory of climate change. So far there were two dominant theories.The first one is global warming due to increase in CO2 concentration resulting from industrialization. This theory is well presented in  The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth . For an apocalyptic version read  An Inconvenient Truth: The Planetary Emergency of Global Warming and What We Can Do About It .The second theory of climate change is that the main drivers are: 1) decadal oscillations in ocean temperatures, and 2) solar irradiation. This theory is well presented by Joseph D'Aleo's paper "US Temperature and Climate Factors since 1895."Svensmark developed a third theory. Climate change is due to galactic cosmic rays emitted from distant exploding stars that trigger the formation of low clouds. Cosmic rays generate muons (elementary particles) that trigger the seeding of clouds by forming cloud condensation nuclei, on which water droplets form. Those low clouds have an umbrella cooling effect over our climate. The Sun has a fluctuating magnetic shield that partly protects against such rays. When the Sun is active and its magnetic shield is strong, the flow of cosmic rays is reduced, the low cloud cover diminishes and temperatures rise.Svensmark duplicated this natural process in a lab experiment called Sky. The CERN in Geneva is engaged in replicating this experiment on a large scale. Fifty top scientists from different disciplines from 17 countries are involved. Thus, outside the politicized IPCC the scientific community takes Svensmark theory seriously.The influx of cosmic rays depend on:1) The state of the Sun. When it is active it has more dark sunspots;2) Where we are in the Galaxy. During our galactic orbiting, we get closer to areas with large concentration of exploding stars with more cosmic rays. Then, our climate goes into a "icehouse" mode. As we move away from such zones, we enter into a "hothouse" mode. During the past 500 million years, we have experienced four switches from hothouse to icehouse mode. The actual cycle of the Earth's climate from hothouse to icehouse periods as captured by geological records fit perfectly with the cosmic rays cycle. Nir Shaviv, a scientist from Israel, estimated that the cosmic-ray flux from our galactic journey are ten times larger than the variations due to solar activity; and3) The Sun's vertical motion as it rises and plunges like a dolphin above or below through the flat horizontal disc of the Galaxy where the cosmic rays are most intense locally. This movement is four times more frequent than the ones mentioned above from icehouse to hothouse.It is the cosmic rays of intermediate energy that affect the variation in low cloud formation and resulting climate change. A graph on page 77 shows a close match between variation in cosmic rays and variation in low level clouds. Low clouds account for 60% of the cloud cooling effect. Overall, clouds cut the warming effect of the incoming sunshine by 8%. If clouds did not exist the planet would be 10 degrees Celsius warmer.This theory has a lot of explanatory power. On page 25, Svensmark shares a remarkable graph that discloses the history of our climate for the past 12,000 years. For each period, the graph shows the state of the Sun, the resulting strength of cosmic rays, and the resulting climate (following the exact causal link as described at end of third paragraph). Svensmark theory appears robust as it is supported by the convergent findings from many different sciences including physics, paleontology, geology, biology and astronomy.This theory can explain a lot of things that CO2 can't. For instance, temperature trends in Antarctica are opposite vs the rest of the World. This is because Antarctica with its ice cover is the brightest spot on Earth. It reflects more solar heat than anywhere else. There, low clouds do retain relatively more solar heat than the Antarctica's surface. And, the clouds emanate some of this heat downward. This is contrary to all other Earth's surfaces. Antarctica sea-ice increased by 8% between 1978 and 2005 contrary to CO2 global warming expectation. The Antarctica anomaly is well predicted by Svensmark theory. Also, the Earth warmed from 1900 to 1945. Then, it cooled in the 60s and 70s only to warm up again in the 80s and later. CO2 concentration can't explain this up and down pattern at all. Svensmark theory can, as each cycle was matched by a corresponding change in intensity of the Sun and cosmic rays. As mentioned earlier, this theory explains the four shifts from hothouse to icehouse over the past 500 million years. Meanwhile, CO2 concentration can only vaguely explain two of them.Shaviv from his analysis of long term records, figured that in the past a doubling in CO2 concentration would result in only a 0.5 to 1 degree Celsius increase in temperature. This is far lower than the IPCC estimate range of 1.5 to 4.5 degrees Celsius.Shaviv did extensive long term studies and found out that the long period of 1 to 2 billion years before the present during which no glaciations are none to have occurred, coincides with a paucity in the past star formation rate and resulting cosmic rays.Predicting global temperature is challenging. Using Svensmark theory, it would entail predicting the Sun magnetic shield intensity which is not reliable yet. Svensmark adds that predicting global temperatures using any framework (including CO2 global warming) is highly unreliable so far.Svensmark advocates scientists get away from dogmatic narrow scientific specializations and embrace multi-discipline research framework. He states that we defined scientific borders (let's say between biology and chemistry) without regards to how nature works. He advocates the birth of a new science called cosmoclimatology defined as "a new field of research investigates extraterrestrial events that affect the terrestrial climate, on all time scales from fractions of a second to billions of years..." This would be a multi-disciplinary science including chemistry, astronomy, geology and other life sciences. The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on EarthAn Inconvenient Truth: The Planetary Emergency of Global Warming and What We Can Do About It