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The synthesis

Measure the Sun's actual energy output (Heliophysics) and set it against Earth's outgoing energy (Earth). The gap, and how it tracks the solar cycle, separates Sun-driven change from human-driven warming.

Is Earth warming from the Sun, or from us?

What you can answer

Compare the Sun’s measured output (TSIS-1) with Earth’s net energy budget (CERES) to see which way the imbalance points.
Test how much recent warming follows the ~11-year solar cycle versus a steady greenhouse trend.

What you can NOT answer with these datasets alone

Pin a single year’s temperature on one cause — oceans store heat and the system lags.
Replace a full climate model — this is the energy boundary condition, not the whole simulation.

The cross-division bridge

This question is Earth-anchored, reaching into Heliophysics. The Earth side is CERES EBAF (outgoing/reflected energy at the top of the atmosphere). The Heliophysics side is TSIS-1 aboard the ISS, which measures total and spectral solar irradiance — the actual energy input. Differencing input against output isolates the planet’s energy imbalance and how much of it co-varies with the solar cycle.

Sources

https://science.nasa.gov/ems/ (TSIS-1)
https://ceres.larc.nasa.gov/data/

⚲ How a scientist answers this

Parameters

Earth's top-of-atmosphere energy budget from CERES EBAF (incoming solar, reflected shortwave, outgoing longwave; net imbalance in W·m⁻², ~1° monthly); solar input from TSIS-1 total solar irradiance (W·m⁻²) over the ~11-year cycle. Net imbalance = absorbed solar − outgoing longwave.

Method

Build deseasonalized global-mean monthly series of CERES net TOA imbalance and TSIS-1 TSI, then test whether the imbalance tracks the ~11-year solar cycle (small, oscillating) or a steady accumulating trend; a persistent positive imbalance not in phase with TSI points to a greenhouse rather than solar driver.

Validation

Anchor CERES EBAF against the independent ocean-heat-content energy uptake (the system's true heat sink), and state that ocean lag means no single year's temperature pins to one cause — this is the energy boundary condition, not a full climate model.

In plain EnglishCompare the Sun's measured output with Earth's measured energy imbalance: if the planet keeps gaining heat while sunlight barely changes, the warming is coming from us, not the Sun.

Make it yours → Set the year range and averaging window in the notebook to focus on one solar cycle or the full record.

⌨ Run the core method · no login

The robust trend (Theil–Sen + Mann–Kendall) at the heart of this question — runnable on synthetic data, right here. The full earthaccess code template further down does it on real NASA data (needs an Earthdata login).

editable · runs in your browser

import numpy as np, pymannkendall as mk
from scipy.stats import theilslopes
rng = np.random.default_rng(0)
years = np.arange(2001, 2023)
# real code returns this after area-weighting a data cube; here it's synthetic so it runs.
series = 100 - 0.8*(years - 2001) + rng.normal(0, 12, years.size)   # edit slope/noise & rerun
s, _, lo, hi = theilslopes(series, years); r = mk.original_test(series)
print(f"trend {s:+.2f}/yr   (95% CI {lo:+.2f} .. {hi:+.2f})   Mann-Kendall p={r.p:.3f}")
print(">>>", "significant" if r.h else "no significant trend (an earned null)")

From another NASA division

☉ Heliophysics

TSIS-1 Total & Spectral Solar Irradiance

The Sun's measured energy output from the ISS — the actual top-of-atmosphere input to Earth's climate.

TSIS1_TSIS · full-disk, daily