As a result of comments in this thread at Lavartus Prodeo, I have been Googling Solar Inertial Motion. Discussion on it is not easy to find outside anti-AGW websites.

The application of Solar Interial Motion (SIM) to Climate Change is a work of the Australian scientist, recently deceased, Rhodes Fairbridge

After some poking around, SIM seems like a particular case of the Sunspot explanation for climate change, i.e. that changes in Solar Output explain Global Warming and Cooling.

Here’s Fairbridge in his article The “Solar Jerk”, The King-Hele Cycle,and the Challenge to Climate Science”

“… a planet revolving about the Sun in its “Keplerian” elliptical orbit delivered no energetic jolt to the Sun’s photosphere, such as might explain the episodic growth of sunspots. Read more »

Season’s Gruntings.

As Christmas roars toward us I am reminded of the cheapest box of Christmas Cards I ever purchased. I am a cheapskate and love digging around for specials of say 800 Christmas cards for $1.50 – that would be ideal. So I buy such a box and start happily posting them off, admiring their awful quality and designs only tangentially related to Christmas, when one stopped me in my tracks.

The design was a bunch of animals playing in a playground, sliding down slippery-dips, bouncing on trampolines etc. There was a Walrus, a Penguin, a Bear and maybe a Fish. It was as if a Birthday card for a two-year old had been mislabelled “Merry Christmas”.

Next day the penny dropped. The animals were all the kinds of animals you would find at the North Pole…where Santa lives…so that was the connection to Christmas. It was a generic “things associated with ice” card.

I am looking for this year’s set which I’m told feature Russian Nuclear Powered Submarines surfing through a landscape of anchovies.

Merry Christmas! Read more »