Solar Cycle 24 Has Started

radioweather writes "Solar physicists have been waiting for the appearance of a reversed-polarity sunspot to signal the start of the next solar cycle. As of Friday, that wait is over. A magnetically reversed, high-latitude sunspot emerged on the surface of the sun. Just a few months ago, an 'All Quiet Alert' had been issued for the sun. This reversed-polarity sunspot marks the beginning of the sun's return back to Solar Maximum. Solar Cycle 24 has been the subject of much speculation due to competing forecasts on whether it will be a highly active or a quiet low cycle. If it is a low cycle, it may very well be a test of validity for some CO2 based global warming theories. Only time will tell."

Comments

Re:Impossible

[Frozen Void]

Reversed Polarity is just change from + to - or south to north. Nothing magical about it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_cycle
The physical basis of the solar cycle was elucidated in the early twentieth century by George Ellery Hale and collaborators, who in 1908 showed that sunspots were strongly magnetized (this was the first detection of magnetic fields outside the Earth), and in 1919 went on to show that the magnetic polarity of sunspot pairs:

        * is always the same in a given solar hemisphere throughout a given sunspot cycle;
        * is opposite across hemispheres throughout a cycle;
        * reverses itself in both hemispheres from one sunspot cycle to the next.

Re:discredit global warming theories? no way

[Mathiasdm]

Actually, 'climate change' is preferred instead of 'global warming' since it's very much possible that, while the average worldwide temperature is expected to increase, the temperature could decrease in some locations (Example: Gulf stream slowing down causing Europe to become colder)