Our Sun continuously converts hydrogen into helium and with this process it provides the essentials for life processes. In doing this it controls “our climate,provides light, raises tides, and drives the food chain” (Schaefer 34). Our Sunalso has influenced many beliefs now and in the past. History has documented Sun worshipping religions while many current societies use solar calendars(Schaefer 34). Because the Sun is so influential, imperfections of the Sun, such assunspots will continue to impact life on Earth. The discovery of sunspots iscorrelated with the invention of the telescope in 1608, although there are earlierrecordings of sunspot like activity from China (Schaefer 35). Galileo was one ofthe astronomers who decided to publish his findings and use sunspots in one ofhis theories of Chief World Systems (Schaefer 35-6). Today many patterns including real estate sales to fluctuations in theclimate have been attributed to the cycle of sunspots. These fluctuations may bean explanation of the decline of Sun worship in India due the increased sunspotactivity during the time of the Medieval Maximum. Throughtout history thesefluctuations have been omens (e.g. a slave revolutionists incited a riot when heinterpreted the site of a large black area on the Sun as the black taking over thewhite) (Schaefer 38). There are also modern examples of solar fluctuationsaffecting the Earth like the delayed launch of the Hubble Telescope (Schaefer38) and the disruptions in electrical and radio technology during solar flares dueto increased activity of sunspots at the last solar maximum in 1989.Sunspots are the most apparent features on the Sun’s surface orphotosphere. Anyone could use a filter such as a welder’s helmet to observegroups of sunspots. A sunspot consists of two regions, the umbra and thepenumbra. The temperature of the umbra can be as low as 4,000 K and thepenumbra that surrounds the umbra has a te...
