Reasons why I believe the sun is more luminous and why it matters to you

Surely this would have more to do with the make up of the Earths atmosphere, through which we view the Sun.

Have similar observations been made from above the atmosphere ? (though we can't depend upon NASA revealing such)

Perhaps the sun's recent anomalous behaviour is caused by or is reflected by other aspects in the solar system, such as anomalous bubbles. The fact the recent solar minimum created very low solar magnetic field which in turn decreased magnetism in the heliosphere and increased cosmic rays able to reach earth has caused visual / physical variations here caused by ozone variations and an increase in ultra violet light able to reach earth. These variations could have effect on photons and how earth's atmosphere distributes light.

science.nasa.gov...
"In 2009, cosmic ray intensities have increased 19% beyond anything we've seen in the past 50 years," says Richard Mewaldt of Caltech. "The increase is significant, and it could mean we need to re-think how much radiation shielding astronauts take with them on deep-space missions."

Energetic iron nuclei counted by the Cosmic Ray Isotope Spectrometer on NASA's ACE spacecraft reveal that cosmic ray levels have jumped 19% above the previous Space Age high.

"At times of low solar activity, this natural shielding is weakened, and more cosmic rays are able to reach the inner solar system," explains Pesnell.

Mewaldt lists three aspects of the current solar minimum that are combining to create the perfect storm:

1. The sun's magnetic field is weak. "There has been a sharp decline in the sun's interplanetary magnetic field down to 4 nT (nanoTesla) from typical values of 6 to 8 nT," he says. "This record-low interplanetary magnetic field undoubtedly contributes to the record-high cosmic ray fluxes." [data]

2. The solar wind is flagging. "Measurements by the Ulysses spacecraft show that solar wind pressure is at a 50-year low," he continues, "so the magnetic bubble that protects the solar system is not being inflated as much as usual." A smaller bubble gives cosmic rays a shorter-shot into the solar system. Once a cosmic ray enters the solar system, it must "swim upstream" against the solar wind. Solar wind speeds have dropped to very low levels in 2008 and 2009, making it easier than usual for a cosmic ray to proceed. [data]

3. The current sheet is flattening. Imagine the sun wearing a ballerina's skirt as wide as the entire solar system with an electrical current flowing along its wavy folds. It's real, and it's called the "heliospheric current sheet," a vast transition zone where the polarity of the sun's magnetic field changes from plus to minus. The current sheet is important because cosmic rays are guided by its folds. Lately, the current sheet has been flattening itself out, allowing cosmic rays more direct access to the inner solar system.



solarcellcentral.com...
In June of 2011 NASA surprised everyone when they announced that the Voyagers were encountering huge frothy magnetic bubbles at the Heliosphere boundary. See the diagram at the left. (The red and blue wavy lines represent the sun's magnetic waves.) This was totally unexpected. Some of the bubbles are 100 million miles wide. NASA explains: "Because the sun spins, its magnetic field becomes twisted and wrinkled, a bit like a ballerina's skirt. Far, far away from the sun, where the Voyagers are now, the folds of the skirt bunch up. The crowded folds of the skirt reorganize themselves, sometimes explosively, into foamy magnetic bubbles. The actual bubbles appear to be self-contained and substantially disconnected from the broader solar magnetic field." This is all recent news and scientists are still studying this bubble phenomenon. See a 3 minute NASA video on Youtube regarding the Magnetic Bubbles.

news.discovery.com...
After notching up two decades of magnetic data from using this method, the solar researchers have noticed a startling trend. The solar magnetic field strength is decreasing. Rapidly.

science.nasa.gov...
"Fermi is picking up crazy-energetic photons," says Dave Thompson, an astrophysicist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "And it's detecting so many of them we've been able to produce the first all-sky map of the very high energy universe."

“This is what the sky looks like near the very edge of the electromagnetic spectrum, between 10 billion and 100 billion electron volts.”

The light we see with human eyes consists of photons with energies in the range 2 to 3 electron volts. The gamma-rays Fermi detects are billions of times more energetic, from 20 million to more than 300 billion electron volts. These gamma-ray photons are so energetic, they cannot be guided by the mirrors and lenses found in ordinary telescopes. Instead Fermi uses a sensor that is more like a Geiger counter than a telescope. If we could wear Fermi's gamma ray "glasses," we'd witness powerful bullets of energy – individual gamma rays – from cosmic phenomena such as supermassive black holes and hypernova explosions. The sky would be a frenzy of activity.

Before Fermi was launched in June 2008, there were only four known celestial sources of photons in this energy range. "In 3 years Fermi has found almost 500 more,” says Thompson.

What lies within this new realm?

"Mystery, for one thing," says Thompson. "About a third of the new sources can't be clearly linked to any of the known types of objects that produce gamma rays. We have no idea what they are."


www.nature.com...
It sounds like a conspiracy theory: 'cosmic rays' from deep space might be creating clouds in Earth's atmosphere and changing the climate. Yet an experiment at CERN, Europe's high-energy physics laboratory near Geneva, Switzerland, is finding tentative evidence for just that.

The findings, published today in Nature1, are preliminary, but they are stoking a long-running argument over the role of radiation from distant stars in altering the climate.

For a century, scientists have known that charged particles from space constantly bombard Earth. Known as cosmic rays, the particles are mostly protons blasted out of supernovae. As the protons crash through the planet's atmosphere, they can ionize volatile compounds, causing them to condense into airborne droplets, or aerosols. Clouds might then build up around the droplets.

The number of cosmic rays that reach Earth depends on the Sun. When the Sun is emitting lots of radiation, its magnetic field shields the planet from cosmic rays. During periods of low solar activity, more cosmic rays reach Earth.

www.independent.co.uk...
One theory suggests that last winter's cold temperatures were part of a pattern that is set to continue because of a complex interaction between the Sun's magnetic field and the high-altitude jet stream which dominates Britain's weather system. The jet stream normally brings mild, damp westerly winds over Britain during winter but this year it went into "blocking" mode, sweeping back on itself and allowing a bitterly cold north-east wind to blow over the country, bringing ice and snow with it.

Scientists have found a link between blocking changes to the jet stream that result in colder winters and variations in the "activity" of the Sun, as measured by alterations in its magnetic field. This could mean that the UK can expect more cold winters than usual in the coming decade, despite global warming.

OP is 100% correct. I too was told not to look directly at the Sun when I was younger. I remember a solar eclipse one year and was instructed to look ONLY through a hole in a piece of cardboard. But I defied the teacher and look at the Sun anyway and.... with ease!
Now I can't even look in its direction!!!

And nothing for nothing, last night the full Moon was SO incredibly bright that I had to squint even looking at that! Grant it, I was super tired so maybe my eyes were weak but......everything seems so unusual lately

S&F

Originally posted by McGinty
Surely this would have more to do with the make up of the Earths atmosphere, through which we view the Sun.

Have similar observations been made from above the atmosphere ? (though we can't depend upon NASA revealing such)

I said more or less the same thing a few pages back.We see the sun,through our atmosphere,we cant see what it really looks like and we see the sky colored blue,but it really has no color at all,its clear,invisible...

I had an early day today, so I left my home before the sun came up. I took care of my chores and headed back home.

I am usually never heading in that direction when the sun comes up, making my travel path directly into the sun.

I couldn't believe how dang bright the sun was, had to use visor, which is normal, but still had to squint and try to keep the light out of my peripheral*(sp?) vision, due to it's intensity.

I do remember, quite well, being a young boy and having to shied my line of sight from the sun's bright rays. I can't say for certain that the rays were as bright and as uncomfortable as they seem to be now.

Can you remember years ago, heading home from work or from somewhere else and need to put on your sunglasses and lower the sun visor? The light was so bright! In my experience anyway, it seems like it was very close to the same intensity.

I also remember that the intensity of the suns brightness varied from day-to-day and week-to-week. When there is a high pressure front, little to no haze and virtually no clouds in the sky, the Sun's intensity seems to be much more noticeable and uncomfortable in comparison to a day that offers a lot of haze.

Maybe you simply noticed a day when there was little to no weather that would impair the Sun's intensity.

reply to post by esteay812
In the past and up into the 1970's and 1980's,people were not being met with barrages of doom and gloom from every possible angle simultaneously...

people who lived in the not so long ago past,were not being relentlessly assaulted by end of the world thoughts and ideas every day of the week...

and so i wonder if we were having our minds posessed by end times notions and possibilities in the past,like we are now,would we have seen the sun as appearing to become brighter and brighter?

Meaning the more and more instilled with end times fear and panic we are made to feel,the closer we think the end of the world is upon us,the more and more the things we see and hear around us appear to be changing and moving into end of the world directions,like the sun brightening,like those ominous rumbling sounds...

Knowing that ultimately,everything is taking place inside our brains and nowhere else,within our minds,that could be whats actually going on...

I've been debating with myself whether to come back on board to this thread, but since it's died down a bit, and perhaps most people with something to share have already said their bit, maybe it'll be a little bit less time-intensive for me to deal with things. I'm not sure what kind of bump mechanism this site has in place, but I hope it stays less under the radar. I know I did wish for it to gain more visibility but that was much more than I had the time or desire to handle. Might be like an excuse, but that's how I felt. The truth is not meant for everyone in any case. And if I can be a little selfish for a bit, I'd rather only talk to them and embrace them, not the others.

With that, please understand everybody who posted already, positive and negative, I've read your posts. And while I can sincerely say thanks to those who disagreed, there must be a counterweight to every position, mine not excepted. This will seem too entirely egotistical but there has to be an out for those who aren't ready. And you've supplied that to enough credibility to those kinds of folks, so you're work is also needed. And to those that share my outlook, I appreciate everything you said. Wish I could respond to every single one, but I don't want the mods to work overtime in deciding which posts of mine are irrelevant and which add nothing else to that being said. That said, again, I do appreciate your willingness to go on record and tell it is as it were, despite the steep opposition you and I face.

The real reason I'm going ahead and choosing to post again is because while I can't respond to everything (read: volitionally wont, for already mentioned reasons, and others) there are a few recurring themes that crop up from those who disagree and those who agree which I feel the need to respond to.

First, about eye sensitivity as we age. I clearly believe this is an attempt at keeping those in the dark from the truth. Not everyone who has espoused this view of course is doing so with the wrong intentions. But the effect is real, keeping the truth out of the reach of many with a little plausable, perphaps even possible, preconceived notion. Young and old have seen the sun is very bright. while the very young don't have an adequate frame of reference ultimately to judge any difference from, their testimony on the sun's brightness should stand in any case. And for those old to enough to witness a change, if they had problems with every sort of luminosity, I'd expect some comment like the light bulbs in my house are unbelievably bright from when I used to be a kid. To my knowledge, I've never seen this comment. If I'm wrong, please do correct.

Second, about the photospheric (I think that's correct, or I just coined a new nonsensical word lol perhaps photo-luminescent etc) about the blue color of the sun. Since the light receptors in our eyes are very sensitive at any age, there's no doubt in my mind that the bluish tint from the sun is just how our own eyes perceive them, not because I believe that the sun is actually blue in any way. This has always been about an anthropormophic view of how the sun appears to US. Yes indeed, the sun is so bright that it causes the receptors in our eyes to instantly see the negative if you will, if that's scientific in any way. again, this attests to the sun's brightness.

Third is about the atmosphere. There's no doubt our ozone layer is shrinking or completely nonexistent in some parts, as is the rest of our atmosphere if I'm being completely candid. The real question that should be asked is not if it has. It has. The question is what is the cause? Again, I would point to the sun. Sure that's going to change the whole air ballgame, including the magnetosphere of the earth. But please again don't miss it, it's the sun that has started all of, well, everything.

Fourth is the bit about the moon being brighter. Yes it is. That's reflection from the sun, as I know those who mentioned something about the moon already realized and so posted about it. So this is just a reminder of looking at the secondary effects of a brighter sun.

Fifth, for those who believe the Earth and the sun continues on almost the same for countless ages, this simply denies the fossil record of rapid extingishment of life and then it's sudden spontaneous eruption of all kinds of diversified life. The point of this isn't to argue for or against evolution, just catastrophism. It really needs to be more of an understood concept in the minds of everyone today. Not to bring fear, again, but to face the facts.

Well I thought there was one more, but it's escaped me at the moment.

Again I'm glad that so many took an interest in this. I urge you to not lose sight of this. I believe it's the most important thing to understand and come to terms with. While some will say that no facts have been presented thus far, I say that nothing but facts have been. But then again, that's just opinion on things isn't it? lol

I find it hard to stomach that clear personal feelings and experience have to be mediated past a rearguard of zealous posters here. What tripe.

My experience is that of the OP. The Sun is different to the 70, 80s Sun.
It is more intense, it is more luminous, it beats down on you.
That is my experience, don't try to tell me it isn't.

Originally posted by bulldetector
I find it hard to stomach that clear personal feelings and experience have to be mediated past a rearguard of zealous posters here. What tripe.

My experience is that of the OP. The Sun is different to the 70, 80s Sun.
It is more intense, it is more luminous, it beats down on you.
That is my experience, don't try to tell me it isn't.

Ah, thanks, I think perhaps the other point I was going to make was about the cycles of the sun. Out of one side of their mouths they tell us that it's just the cycles of the sun, the reason that it appears brighter. The other side of their mouths they tell us that we can't possibly notice an increase in brightness over the course of our short time lifespans. So which is it? Am I reading their comments wrong?

Plus also point to me a dated time stamp of anywhere on the entire internet where anybody has ever come on record before giving the opinion like mine that the sun looks blue. This isn't to stroke my ego, but now they're simply trying to downplay it like it's almost common knowledge, Sure if common knowledge instantly strikes in a twinkling of an eye like my initial post.

Funny I was thinking about this the other day. Tried looking at the sun and could barley do it for one second. I remember being in elementary and middle school and being able to look out the window and stare at the sun for a while. I don't know if it's because it's brighter I really don't know why it is.

To the OP, I was going around last week telling people the same exact thing. The Sun is Brighter period... The notion of as you get older you become more sensitive is laughable.... I find it extremely interesting that two people can that do not know each other at all, can concieve a thought together. Then come together in the information age we have today....

reply to post by blocula


End times and doom and has nothing to do with the Sun's brightness. Or at least we're not saying that. It's just an astute and personal observation.

Hey, Halloween isn't the same either. My parents never had to check my candy. That doesn't mean we're in end times. Just means we're in different times. (but sure am glad I grew up in the 70's though)

The problem with the OP in this thread is that the evidence you are putting forth about the sun's brightness is anecdotal. Unless you have a scientific way to measure brightness, you are not going to convince anyone who is approaching this from an objective angle. Out of curiosity, I asked my dad, who has blue eyes and has always been somewhat sensitive to the sun, and he said it actually looked a little less bright to him lately. He has been playing a lot of tennis outside in the past few years, so that is possibly one explanation. My mom, on the other hand, did say that it actually looks brighter to her. She used to sunbathe quite often in the past, but not as much recently. To me, it looks the same as it has for the past 30 years, so it is going to take something more compelling than an opinion to convince me.

Look at the BRIGHT SIDE ,you people worry to much. Hey, it is easier to get a tan more faster. Being tan is so much more beautiful, who cares that when you get older that you have alot more wrinkles.

Originally posted by blocula
reply to post by esteay812

 

In the past and up into the 1970's and 1980's,people were not being met with barrages of doom and gloom from every possible angle simultaneously...

people who lived in the not so long ago past,were not being relentlessly assaulted by end of the world thoughts and ideas every day of the week...

and so i wonder if we were having our minds posessed by end times notions and possibilities in the past,like we are now,would we have seen the sun as appearing to become brighter and brighter?

Meaning the more and more instilled with end times fear and panic we are made to feel,the closer we think the end of the world is upon us,the more and more the things we see and hear around us appear to be changing and moving into end of the world directions,like the sun brightening,like those ominous rumbling sounds...

Knowing that ultimately,everything is taking place inside our brains and nowhere else,within our minds,that could be whats actually going on...

edit on 7-4-2012 by blocula because: (no reason given)

That is very true but also somepeople really enjoy "doom and gloom"...well i gues we all have a little of that in us.

The other day i was watching a t.v show and there were two characters on a roof excitedly looking at "falling stars". Today it would be like "OMG, is that right?" It is amazing how people get swayed in different directions.

Originally posted by Genxbeyond
To the OP, I was going around last week telling people the same exact thing. The Sun is Brighter period... The notion of as you get older you become more sensitive is laughable.... I find it extremely interesting that two people can that do not know each other at all, can concieve a thought together. Then come together in the information age we have today....

I think people have become less in tune with nature than they realize. This is not necessarily a bad thing. The sun is very powerful. Look at people who spent their lives on beaches or just in the sun very frequently during the 70s-80s and they have very wrinkly, old skin compared to people who stayed out of the sun more.

The sun hits the earth with an incredible amount of energy / power.

en.wikipedia.org...

"The total solar energy absorbed by Earth's atmosphere, oceans and land masses is approximately 3,850,000 exajoules (EJ) per year.[7] In 2002, this was more energy in one hour than the world used in one year."[emphasis mine]

There are varying reports from various studies, though it appears in general the sun has recently experienced very high activity, followed by very low activity, more than the solar max and minimum averages.

There are also many things happening in the solar system that are either new or weren't known before that could cause variations on the earths atmosphere and therefore our radiated sunlight.

www.futurepundit.com...

The activity of the Sun over the last 11,400 years, i.e., back to the end of the last ice age on Earth, has now for the first time been reconstructed quantitatively by an international group of researchers led by Sami K. Solanki from the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (Katlenburg-Lindau, Germany). The scientists have analyzed the radioactive isotopes in trees that lived thousands of years ago. As the scientists from Germany, Finland, and Switzerland report in the current issue of the science journal "Nature" from October 28, one needs to go back over 8,000 years in order to find a time when the Sun was, on average, as active as in the last 60 years. Based on a statistical study of earlier periods of increased solar activity, the researchers predict that the current level of high solar activity will probably continue only for a few more decades.

The research team had already in 2003 found evidence that the Sun is more active now than in the previous 1000 years. A new data set has allowed them to extend the length of the studied period of time to 11,400 years, so that the whole length of time since the last ice age could be covered. This study showed that the current episode of high solar activity since about the year 1940 is unique within the last 8000 years. This means that the Sun has produced more sunspots, but also more flares and eruptions, which eject huge gas clouds into space, than in the past. The origin and energy source of all these phenomena is the Sun's magnetic field.

This report from 2004 suggests increased brightness, perhaps this trend is increasing, despite the 'regular' or recently not so average cycles.

www.futurepundit.com...

July 18, 2004
Sun Energy Output At Over 1,000 Year Peak
Sami Solanki, Professor at the Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich Switzerland, says the Sun has been burning more brightly over the last 60 years than over the previous 1090 years.

“We have to acknowledge that the Sun is in a changed state. It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago, and this brightening started relatively recently – in the last 100 to 150 years. We expect it to have an impact on global warming,” he told swissinfo.

The sun's brightness hasn't changed much over the last 20 years. But it has been brighter for the last 60 years than it has been at any time in the last 1,150 years.

According to scientists, the Sun’s radiance has changed little during this period. But looking back over 1,150 years, Solanki found the Sun had never been as bright as in the past 60 years.

The team studied sunspot data going back several hundred years. They found that a dearth of sunspots signalled a cold period - which could last up to 50 years - but that over the past century their numbers had increased as the Earth's climate grew steadily warmer. The scientists also compared data from ice samples collected during an expedition to Greenland in 1991. The most recent samples contained the lowest recorded levels of beryllium 10 for more than 1,000 years. Beryllium 10 is a particle created by cosmic rays that decreases in the Earth's atmosphere as the magnetic energy from the Sun increases. Scientists can currently trace beryllium 10 levels back 1,150 years.

reply to post by GreenEyedVixen


The sun is changing yes because it is becoming a 4th dimension sun along with the rest of the solar system. You are correct about the change. Blue is more common with 4th d energy. Comment Holmes has turned into another blue star. Read tolecs work at www.andromedacouncil.com he will fill you in. Yes there is more earth changes coming how can there not be if we are changing.

reply to post by shortsticks
Then theres the most vital possibility of all,to explain the suns apparent brightening,the fact that the sun might be starting to expand into a red giant and if it is,its goodbye to everything we've ever done and aloha to all we know,forever and ever those thing will just be gone and just imagine if humanity had only spent the last hundred years not desigining ever more effective ways to kill eachother off and engineered massive collective efforts and trillions of dollar towards weapons of war and genocide and had instead focused on working together with the same drive and determination,maybe we could have been able to save at least some of humanity,who would have than possibly been able to go to another world and begin again,far away from the unstoppable expanding red giant sun...

Originally posted by blocula
reply to post by shortsticks

 

Then theres the most vital possibility of all,to explain the suns apparent brightening,the fact that the sun might be starting to expand into a red giant and if it is,its goodbye to everything we've ever done and aloha to all we know,forever and ever those thing will just be gone and just imagine if humanity had only spent the last hundred years not desigining ever more effective ways to kill eachother off and engineered massive collective efforts and trillions of dollar towards weapons of war and genocide and had instead focused on working together with the same drive and determination,maybe we could have been able to save at least some of humanity,who would have than possibly been able to go to another world and begin again,far away from the unstoppable expanding red giant sun...

Only if we omit the FACT that you have never seen a "red giant" and neither has anyone else. Dont know if they exist, are possible, ever existed...etc. Could easily say brown dwarf, little giant, blue kachini...oh well, never seen those either.

Originally posted by frenzy4444
reply to post by GreenEyedVixen

 

The sun is changing yes because it is becoming a 4th dimension sun along with the rest of the solar system. You are correct about the change. Blue is more common with 4th d energy. Comment Holmes has turned into another blue star. Read tolecs work at www.andromedacouncil.com he will fill you in. Yes there is more earth changes coming how can there not be if we are changing.

I have read that the sun is actually cube shaped and only appears round to our limited senses because its spinning super fast...Shattering the Cube,by Amitakh Stanford-2004 > www.canng.com...