Editing 2930: Google Solar Cycle

{{comic
| number    = 2930
| date      = May 8, 2024
| title     = Google Solar Cycle
| image     = google_solar_cycle_2x.png
| imagesize = 357x293px
| noexpand  = true
| titletext = From Google Trends, it looks like the lag between people Googling cocktail recipes and 'hangover cure' is 14 hours.
}}

==Explanation==
{{w|Solar flare}}s appear on the Sun's surface in different numbers at different times. A {{w|solar cycle}} is the amount of time that elapses between times of maximum (or minimum) solar flare activity. This period is approximately 11 years.

Solar flares can generate interest, and 'news' stories at times of high activity, because they can sometimes cause {{w|aurorae}}, as well as power outages and other similar issues. Hence people will be more aware of them, and search for "solar flares" on Google to learn more about them. This trend somewhat matches the solar cycle since people will be more interested/concerned about solar flares during the times they are abundant and search for them more often. Randall notes that Google has existed for long enough to see [https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=Solar%20Flares&hl=en the trend in searches for "solar flare" over a full solar cycle.]

The title text comments that people usually Google "hangover cure" 14 hours after they search for cocktail recipes. This suggests that people decide they want cocktails, look for ways to make cocktails, make (and presumably drink) the cocktails, wake up with a hangover and look for ways to get rid of the hangover. Google trends [https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=now%207-d&geo=US&q=Cocktail%20recipe,Hangover%20cure&hl=en does indeed] suggest that there is roughly a 14-hour difference in peaks between these searches. However this does not mean (as the title text implies) that the people searching for cocktail recipes are the same people that are searching for hangover cures later. It may represent the (not unreasonable) assumption that people who are exploring the idea of cocktails (for themselves or others) generally start to do so from the early evening onward, whilst those who find themselves freshly under the weather (not ''just'' from cocktail consumption) are likely to be finally provoked to look up a solution from around mid-morning.

One can illustrate the pitfalls of assuming such causation by substituting "chicken nuggets" for "cocktail recipe" which shows a very similar relationship. Chicken nuggets are not known to cause hangovers.{{cn}}

Looked at another way, there is a 10-hour 'lag' from searching for "hangover cure" to searching for "cocktail recipe"; this does not imply that having a hangover is causing people to be interested in drinking cocktails! (Though they may [https://gourmetinthemaking.blogspot.com/2016/02/posh-chicken-nuggets.html lead to chicken nuggets].)

Another very important problem with looking at scales of less than a day is that the Earth has 38 time zones, and people drink cocktails and wake up all the time around the world. Since everyone is searching the same Google, it is impossible to deduce anything on a daily basis by looking at global data. It is possible to see only searches from a particular country, but even then, in the case of the {{w|Time in the United States|US}} there are several hours difference from east to west that may smear out any such direct observations. This also applies to other countries/regions, being potentially at its most extreme {{w|Time in Russia|in Russia}}. This might be moot if the data is preprocessed to 'local' time, although the opposite issue might arise in {{w|Time in China|a case such as Chinese data}} (though any examination of Google Trends for China {{w|Google China#Blockage of Google|may not be fruitful}}).

Sunspot cycle was explained in [[2725: Sunspot Cycle]].

==Transcript==
{{incomplete transcript|Do NOT delete this tag too soon.}}
:[The label of the graph in the top left corner of the image:]
:Google Trends search traffic for "Solar Flare"
:[A graph starting in 2005, peaking in 2013. It rises until 2024 when the graph cuts off. There is an arrow in between the two peaks labeled "11 years".]

:[Caption below the panel:]
:I like that Google has existed almost long enough for us to observe the solar cycle using Google Trends.

{{comic discussion}}

[[Category:Timelines]]
[[Category:Line graphs]]
[[Category:Google Search]]
[[Category:Astronomy]]
[[Category:Food]]
[[Category:Comics to make one feel old]]