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Yet Another Big Solar Flare
philthedrill writes "CNN is reporting that the sun has fired another large solar flare towards Earth. This one could arrive as early as Thursday (Oct. 30th) afternoon. (insert end-of-the-world statement here)."
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It's a pity that more people don't get to view these phenomena, because of modern light pollution. How many people are losing awe-inspiring sights, such as this and the milky-way?
((lambda x ((x))) (lambda x ((x))))
From the article:
Space weather forecasters say this spate of strong solar flares is not consistent with normal solar behavior. The sun, which follows an 11-year activity cycle, has been quieting down since the last peak in 2000.
Although we humans have been looking at the sun since before we climbed out of the trees (and our moms have been telling us not to even longer), it's almost silly to say that any observation of our local star is "not consistent with normal solar behavior." Just how many of those 11-year cycles have been recorded?
If the ancient Chinese were using pinhole solar viewers to count sunspots for the past 5000 years, that would be one thing. But as has been posted in every Slashdot story on the subject, we have maybe 200 years of scientific data (of varying quality) out of the sun's five billion year history. Even W's pollsters would tell you that sample size is too small.
Stressed? Me? Of course not. Stress is what a rubber band feels before it breaks, silly.
When I read this line, "I have not seen anything like it in my entire career as a solar physicist. The probability of this happening is so low that it is a statistical anomaly.", I cringed. Either a) This guy thinks his model is great & really believes that this is a 1/1,000,000,000 event, or b) he knows that this indicates a whole in his model, but the reporter ripped the quote out of context to make the story more sensational.
A little statistics primer is in order. In order to quote odds on anything, a statistician needs a model, generally based on existing data. When there is an event that's off the charts, it will usually indicate to the scientist (or engineer) that there is a deficiency in their model (or their process is out of control, for manufacturing types). If I were a solas scientist, this event would indicate to me that the model is not adequate for predicting this sort of thing. Which makes sense, since we probably only have 40 years worth of data; you expect to be thrown a curve-ball every now and then.
So I doubt it really is a statistical anomanly; maybe these solar-flare pairs occur every 50 years or so & that's why we haven't seen it before. But either the reporter needs to better explain the meaning of the quote, or the quotee needs to take a basic course on the limits of statistical probability.
I do however think a very very limited number of people could survive in deep mineshafts. Bring down a small nuclear generator, some source of oxygen, lights, canned foods and enough plants and seeds to be able to start some sort of food production, and I think a few people could survive for a number of years.
The main problems I see is that they have no way presumably of making the machinery necessary to keep things in good repair and to replace broken equipment. So without a lot of foresight, I dont' think those people would have more than a few years. Although it does make one wonder if some small secret govt. group has thought of and prepared for this contingency. Who really knows?
I also think the social chaos on the surface would kill off most everyone before a day or two are up.
The sending of this message pretty much inconveniences everyone involved.
While that probably is true, that doesn't mean that he has any freaking clue what is going on inside the sun. Bad analogy: A moron is more developed than an idiot, but neither one has much of a clue.
Maybe we should get a craft with solar sail up and waiting asap, for next event? :)