When I was a kid, summer was June, July and August – the months we were out of school – but we’re often told that the official start of summer is June 21st.  What’s the deal?

Simply, there are two different methods defining the seasons.

In temperate and subpolar regions, four seasons based on the Gregorian calendar are generally recognized. The dates for the seasons depend on whether one is talking about meteorological  seasons or astronomical seasons as well as where on Earth one is.

Meteorological seasons

In 1780, an early meteorological organization, the Societas Meteorologica Palatina, defined seasons as groupings of three whole months as identified by the Gregorian calendar. This definition has been used in meteorology ever since.

Astronomical seasons

In the astronomical timing of temperate seasons, summer and winter begin at the solstices,^{1, 2} while spring and fall begin at the equinoxes.³ 

Length of seasons

The meteorological seasons are well balanced in length.  In the northern hemisphere, spring and summer are 92 days each, autumn is 91 days, and winter is 90 days, except on leap years when it is 91.

Astronomical seasons, on the other hand, are not as exact because of the elliptical nature of the Earth’s orbit.  Again for the northern hemisphere, spring is currently 92.75 days, summer is 93.65 days, autumn is 89.85 days and winter is 88.99 days.

The timing of the equinoxes and solstices are not fixed to the calendar, shifting six hours later each year, accumulating one full day every four years, when they are reset with the addition of an extra day on leap years.

‘Tis the season! – stay cool!

Endnotes

1. either the shortest day of the year (winter solstice) or the longest day of the year (summer solstice) – Collins English Dictionary (accessed May 25, 2019)
2. Either of the two times in the year, the summer solstice and the winter solstice, when the sun reaches its highest or lowest point in the sky at noon, marked by the longest and shortest days. – Oxford Living Dictionaries (accessed May 25, 2019)
3. either of the two times each year (as about March 21 and September 23) when the sun crosses the equator and day and night are everywhere on earth of approximately equal length – Merriam-Webster (accessed May 25, 2019)

Approaching what is called solar minimum, the Sun’s average number of sun spots is dropping towards zero, with 54% of the days so far in 2019 spot free.

Sunspot numbers are visible evidence of overall solar activity. Some think that lower sunspot numbers over the last decade are indicative of the beginning of an extended period of lower solar activity and, potentially, a cooling of the Earth.

On average, there is an eleven year solar cycle where the Sun goes from a quiet mode, with almost no sunspots for extended periods, to an active mode, where multiple spots – some huge – rage on the surface of the Sun. Since tracking began in 1755, there have been 24 solar cycles, with the current cycle – cycle 24 – coming to a close as the number of spotless days rises. 

“Solar maximum and solar minimum refer respectively to periods of maximum and minimum sunspot counts. Cycles span from one minimum to the next.”¹

Over time, cycle length and solar activity have varied significantly.  Sunspot cycles have ranged from as little as 8 years to over 14.  Solar activity is currently dropping from an exceptionally high level that began in about 1940.  The last period of similar magnitude was 9,000 years ago during the Boreal age.²

While it’s been proposed, thought and suggested that variations in solar activity affect climate, the current “scientific consensus” is that solar variation is but a minor driver for global climate change, “since the measured magnitude of recent solar variation is much smaller than the forcing due to greenhouse gases.”³ Some scientists think that an extended dip in solar activity during a period named the Maunder Minimum, which lasted from around 1645 to about 1715, intensified the Little Ice Age, a cool period that began in about 1300 and ended around 1850.⁴ As well, a lower rate of warming from 1998 to 2012 compared to the previous two to three decades has been attributed, in part, to reduced solar activity – “relatively weak solar activity made a small contribution to slowing surface warming in the early part of the new century.”⁵

While some studies suggest that solar activity will continue to weaken for an extended period and may produce cooling that could partially offset “disastrous effects of human-induced global warming,” other studies indicate that solar activity may be stronger during the next solar cycle.⁶

American and international scientists on NOAA’s Solar Cycle Prediction Panel (SCPP) say that the decline in solar activity amplitude, seen from cycles 21 through 24, is ending, with no extended Maunder-type minimum expected.  The panel expects “Solar Cycle 25 will be very similar to Cycle 24: another fairly weak cycle.” Cycle 24 is declining to its end, with minimum expected within months. “Solar Cycle 25 may have a slow start, but is anticipated to peak with solar maximum occurring between 2023 and 2026” with an amplitude range of 95 to 130, “well below the average number of sunspots.” An official Sunspot Number prediction curve for Cycle 25 will be released later this year.⁷

The official prediction curve may likely be similar in format to the 2007 projection for Cycle 24, below.⁸

Nearing cycle minimum, Cycle 24’s progression curve, below, shows that the cycle’s smoothed curve double peaks were below both the high and low prediction curves.

Solar activity is now the lowest it has been in a century while the period from 1950 to 1995 “had the highest solar activity in perhaps 1000 years.” If the  SCPP’s forecast of a Cycle 25 similar to Cycle 24 is wrong, how low might future solar activity get?   “There are already suggestions that solar activity is moving towards a grand minimum along the lines of the Maunder Minimum, or perhaps a less severe one, like the Dalton Minimum (see Figure 2). Grand minima are by no means rare; they have likely occurred 7–9 times over the Holocene period (see, for example,Figure 7). It is therefore interesting to consider if the Sun is currently moving into a new grand minimum or just a period of low solar activity, and to think about the consequences for the Earth’s climate.”⁹

I’ve looked at sunspot status quite often over the duration of Cycle 24, usually at the beginning of each month when the when the sunspot number progression is updated, and have seen a number of different predictions of future climate impacts of changes in solar activity.  One hypothesis predicts a sustained and significant cooling that will lower global temperature in the 2020s to that which prevailed in the 1980s. Another suggests that solar activity will fall 60% in 2030 to ‘mini ice age’ levels.

There have been a lot of articles recently speculating about the potential for global cooling – as well as others rejecting the possibility.

My personal thoughts on the matter is that these are all forecasts and hypotheses.  We’ll likely not know for sure until whatever is going to happen is shown by empirical data to be already in progress.

1. Solar cycle definition – Wikipedia (accessed May 21, 2019)
2. Cycle history, “Sunspot numbers over the past 11,400 years have been reconstructed using Carbon-14-based dendroclimatology.” – Wikipedia (accessed May 22, 2019)
3. Climate, IPCC consensus on climate change – Wikipedia (accessed May 22, 2019)
4. No Global Cooling Miracle: Sun’s Activity Lull Will Stop Soon, Study Suggests – Space.com, December 7, 2018 (accessed May 22, 2019)
5. Did global warming stop in 1998? – NOAA’s Climate.gov, September 4, 2018 (accessed May 22, 2019)
6. Mini ice age ruled out – India Science Wire, December 7, 2018 (accessed May 23, 2019)
7. Solar experts predict the Sun’s activity in Solar Cycle 25 to be below average, similar to Solar Cycle 24 – National Weather Service, April 5, 2019 (accessed May 24, 2019)
8. NOAA Predicts Solar Cycle 24 – SpaceWeather.com, May 8, 2009 (accessed May 24, 2019)
9. Force Majeure, The Sun’s Role in Climate Change – Heinrik Svensmark, ©2019 The Global Warming Policy Foundation, pdf (accessed May 24, 2019)

The “Money Bags Calendar” – not so special after all!

A meme that has been circulating – forever it seems – on the internet in various forms, proclaims that this December is special because it has “five Saturdays, five Sundays, and five Mondays,” a phenomenon that occurs only once every 823 years. The meme also connects it to riches that “will surprise you,” but only if the message is shared or sent to “all your friends.”

It turns out though that this December isn’t so special after all.  The supposedly  “fortuitous” pattern described happens every time December ends on a Monday. Unfortunately, this is a share left over from a previous year, likely 2018.  December 2019, ending on a Tuesday, only has 4 Saturdays, but it does have 5 Tuesdays to go with the 5 Sundays and Mondays.

The next time that December has five Saturdays, five Sundays, and five Mondays will be in 2029, just a mere 11 years after that last time, hardly an unusual phenomenon.  On average, December ends on a Monday about every 11 years.  Throwing leap years into the mix produces a pattern of 11-6-5-6. That is, when December ends on Monday, that event occurs again eleven years later, then six years after that, then five years later, and finally, another six years lapses, whereupon the cycle repeats.

Not so special after all.

Mrs. M. Stevens Wagner, half length., facing slightly right, arms and chest covered with tattoos.¹

Maud Stevens Wagner was America’s first known professional female tattoo artist, and the world’s most tattooed woman of the time.

Like many interesting characters in the early 20th century, Maud Stevens and August “Gus” Wagner ran off to join the circus. Maud, originally an aerialist and contortionist, met Gus at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. At the time, Gus was heralded as the world’s most tattooed man. The two began dating, and Gus began teaching Maud the art of the hand poke tattoo.²

Eventually the couple married and had a daughter, who later also became a tattoo artist. After they left the circus, the Wagners traveled around the United States.  They worked both as tattoo artists and tattooed attractions in vaudeville houses.  They are credited with bringing tattoo artistry inland away from coastal cities and towns.³

1. Los Angeles, Cal.: The Plaza Gallery, ©.1907, Library of Congress image, Prints and Photographs Division; Record pages for this image: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2002724032/ and http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2006687059/ (accessed July 2012 and May 18, 2019)
2. The Graves of Maud and Gus Wagner, Atlas Obscura (accessed May 18, 2019)
3. Maud Wagner, Wikipedia

The photo was originally posted on Exit78 on July 21, 2012. Additional information was added May 18, 2019 and the post was republished.

The militia of the United States is more than just the National Guard.

Long before the Revolution, American colonies required militia service of most males “between sixteen and sixty, excepting clergy, college students, slaves, and, often, free blacks.”¹ During the war for independence, this militia system provided a broad resource of men, the number of militiamen who served far outnumbering those in the Continental Army, though the Continentals “were the backbone of the struggle almost from the beginning.”

In 1777, the Articles of Confederation forbade, “any body of forces be kept up, by any State, in time of peace,” but required that, “every State shall always keep up a well-regulated and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutered.”²

After the war, public sentiment strongly opposed standing armies, seen as the hallmark of a tyrannical government.  Despite the unpredictability and unreliability of Revolutionary War militias, the common view was that adequate defense of country and laws could be secured through the Militia – civilians primarily, soldiers on occasion.  Writings, debates, and history from that period demonstrate the significance attributed to the term Militia. “These show plainly enough that the Militia comprised all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense… And, further, that ordinarily when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.”³

Ratified June 21, 1788, the US Constitution assigned Congress military related powers,

• To raise and support Armies…;
• To provide and maintain a Navy;
• To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
• To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.⁴

“Unlike armies and navies, which Congress is given the power to create, the militia is assumed by Article I already to be in existence.” This is consistent with the concept of the militia as a pool consisting of all able-bodied men, from which Congress has the power to organize units into an effective fighting force. “Although the militia consists of all able-bodied men, the federally organized militia may consist of a subset of them.”⁵

In a 1792 Militia Act, Congress codified the extent of the militia: “That each and every free able-bodied white male citizen of the respective States, resident therein, who is or shall be of age of eighteen years, and under the age of forty-five years (except as is herein after excepted) shall severally and respectively be enrolled in the militia…” and required that each citizen enrolled “within six months thereafter, provide himself with a good musket or firelock, a sufficient bayonet and belt, two spare flints, and a knapsack, a pouch, with a box therein, to contain not less than twenty four cartridges, suited to the bore of his musket or firelock, each cartridge to contain a proper quantity of powder and ball; or with a good rifle, knapsack, shot-pouch, and powder-horn, twenty balls suited to the bore of his rifle, and a quarter of a pound of powder…”⁶

Earlier acts were superseded by the Militia Act of 1903, which provided: “That the militia shall consist of every able-bodied male citizen of the respective States, Territories,and the District of Columbia, and every able-bodied male of foreign birth who has declared his intention to become a citizen, who is more than eighteen and less than forty-five years of age, and shall be divided into two classes – the organized militia, to be known as the National Guard of the State, Territory, or District of Columbia, or by such other designations as may be given them by the laws of the respective States or Territories, and the remainder to be known as the Reserve Militia.”⁷

Current law:

§246. Militia: composition and classes⁸

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.

(b) The classes of the militia are—

(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and

(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

Disclaimer: This article is intended to clarify the meaning of the word Militia as used in the US Constitution, including its use in the Second Amendment.  It is intended to be neutral on the topics of gun rights and gun control.

Sources and links:

1. A Common American Soldier, The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation (accessed  May 15, 2019)
2. Article VI, Articles of Confederation, Library of Congress pdf (accessed May 16, 2019)
3. U.S. v. Miller, 307 U.S. 174 (1939), Supreme Court, Library of Congress pdf (accessed  May 15, 2019)
4. US Constitution, Article I, Section 8, clause 12, 13, 15 (accessed  May 16, 2019)
5. District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), Supreme Court pdf (accessed May 16, 2019
6. An ACT more effectually to provide for the National Defence, by establishing an Uniform Militia throughout the United States., Militia Act of 1792, passed May 8, 1792, Constitution Society, (accessed May 16, 2019)
7. An Act To promote the efficiency of the militia, and for other purposes, Militia Act of 1903, Approved, January 21, 1903, Library of Congress pdf, (accessed May 16, 2019)
8. US Code, Title 10. Armed Forces, Subtitle A. General Military Law, Part I. Organization and General Military Powers, Chapter 12. The Militia, Cornell Law School, Legal Information Institute (accessed May16, 2019.

Royalty free images by Mike¹ – No. 74 of over 600 images

Plants in Hollow Tree, Shenandoah National Park, Virginia, May 13, 2009

Image shared as public domain on Pixabay and Flickr as “Plants in Hollow Tree.”

1. Only images specifically identified as such are public domain or creative commons on our pages. All other images are copyright protected, creative commons or used under the provisions of fair use.

Royalty free images by Mike¹ – No. 73 of over 600 images

Credit Island Bridge, Credit Island, Davenport Iowa, September 25, 2012

Image shared as public domain on Pixabay and Flickr as “Credit Island Bridge.”

1. Only images specifically identified as such are public domain or creative commons on our pages. All other images are copyright protected, creative commons or used under the provisions of fair use.

Royalty free images by Mike¹ – No. 72 of over 600 images

Old Gym in Hot Springs, Fordyce Bathhouse, Hot Springs National Park, Arkansas, August 19, 2012

Image shared as public domain on Pixabay and Flickr as “Old Gym in Hot Springs.”

1. Only images specifically identified as such are public domain or creative commons on our pages. All other images are copyright protected, creative commons or used under the provisions of fair use.

Royalty free images by Mike¹ – No. 71 of over 600 images

Butterfly on Purple Coneflower, West-Central Arkansas, June 25, 2011

Image shared as public domain on Pixabay and Flickr as “Butterfly on Purple Coneflower.”

1. Only images specifically identified as such are public domain or creative commons on our pages. All other images are copyright protected, creative commons or used under the provisions of fair use.