AGW: atmospheric physics

[Saigon]

The dudes a BS artist nothing more. I read his crap a few times, he's a charlatan

David C. Tobin

Dr. David C. Tobin received his PhD degree in 1996 at the University of Maryland ? Baltimore Campus (UMBC) where he worked under Professor Larrabee Strow. His Ph.D. research focused on molecular spectroscopy, infrared radiative transfer, and remote sensing. His dissertation work dealt with laboratory and theoretical studies of the infrared spectral line shapes of water vapor and carbon dioxide. For the past eleven years, Dr. Tobin has been a research scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison Space Science and Engineering Center, where he is part of the center’s infrared high spectral resolution remote sensing group led by Dr. Hank Revercomb. He has made exceptional advances in the measurement and semi-empirical representation of the water vapor continuum absorption, including, (a) laboratory measurements of the water vapor continuum absorption in infrared window regions and in the 6 μm vibrational band, (b) theoretical investigation and empirical representation of the near-wing super-Lorentz lineshape behavior, (c) measurement of the far-infrared absorption using ground-based downwelling sky view spectra, and (d) development and validation of the latest water vapor continuum model, MT(Tobin)_CKD, which is now used in state-of-the-art line-by-line radiative transfer models. He is involved with various projects involving infrared molecular spectroscopy and atmospheric radiative transfer, atmospheric water vapor, infrared spectro-radiometer calibration and validation, and infrared remote sensing. Current efforts include Level 1 and 2 product validation as part of the AIRS science and Aura (TES) validation teams, infrared radiance and flux closure studies for the ARM program, investigations of the water vapor continuum, NPP science team efforts including CrIS sensor and algorithm assessments, characterization studies of the Geosynchronous Imaging Fourier Transform Spectrometer (GIFTS) and the Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI), and involvement in the center’s aircraft based interferometer program. In summary, Dr. Tobin's scientific contributions are extraordinary for a young scientist. His work has already had, and continues to have, a most significant impact on the field of atmospheric radiation. These outstanding contributions led the IRC to present Dr. Tobin with the 2008 IRC Young Scientist Award.

International Radiation Commission

 

[SSDD]

No one on this thread has claimed that an object MUST radiate heat to a warmer object - only that it could given certain conditions.

The greenhouse effect claims that CO2 molecules absorb outgoing IR and in turn radiate it in all directions with something like 40 or 50% being radiated back to the surface. They aren't claiming that it only happens during rare, and extremely localized events like temperature inversions where the atmosphere is warmer than the surface of the earth, in which case the atmosphere is radiating to the surface, but it isn't backradiation because the air is warmer than the surface....they are claiming that backradiation is happening everywhere 24/7.

Backradiation may not occur in every scenario with cushions, heaters and frogs, but we know for a fact that it exists in the earth & atmopshere, and you can go and watch it happen yourself if you are sufficiently interested.

Sorry, but you can't. The only way to measure downdwelling radiation at ambient temperatures is to have a device that is cooled to a temperature far below the -20 degree average temperature of the atmosphere.

Here is some hard, experimental evidence that backradiation does not exist.

How to Make and Use the Solar Funnel Cooker

These people have put together a set of plans, and demonstration for a very inexpensive solar cooker for use in third world.

Visit the page and look down towards the bottom at the section titled "How to Use the Solar Funnel as a Refrigerator/Cooler"

university student (Jamie Winterton) and I were the first to demonstrate that the BYU Solar Funnel Cooker can be used - at night - as a refrigerator. Here is how this is done.

The Solar Funnel Cooker is set-up just as you would during sun-light hours, with two exceptions:

1. The funnel is directed at the dark night sky. It should not "see" any buildings or even trees. (The thermal radiation from walls, trees, or even clouds will diminish the cooling effect.).

2. It helps to place 2 (two) bags around the jar instead of just one, with air spaces between the bags and between the inner bag and the jar. HDPE and ordinary polyethylene bags work well, since polyethylene is nearly transparent to infrared radiation, allowing it to escape into the "heat sink" of the dark sky.

During the day, the sun's rays are reflected onto the cooking vessel which becomes hot quickly. At night, heat from the vessel is radiated outward, towards empty space, which is very cold indeed (a "heat sink").

As a result, the cooking vessel now becomes a small refrigerator. We routinely achieve cooling of about 20º F (10º C) below ambient air temperature using this remarkably simple scheme.

In September 1999, we placed two funnels out in the evening, with double-bagged jars inside. One jar was on a block of wood and the other was suspended in the funnel using fishing line. The temperature that evening (in Provo, Utah) was 78º F. Using a Radio Shack indoor/outdoor thermometer, a BYU student (Colter Paulson) measured the temperature inside the funnel and outside in the open air. He found that the temperature of the air inside the funnel dropped quickly by about 15 degrees, as its heat was radiated upwards in the clear sky. That night, the minimum outdoor air temperature measured was 47.5 degrees - but the water in both jars had ICE. I invite others to try this, and please let me know if you get ice at 55 or even 60 degrees outside air temperature (minimum at night). A black PVC container may work even better than a black-painted jar, since PVC is a good infrared radiator - these matters are still being studied.

I would like to see the "Funnel Refrigerator" tried in desert climates, especially where freezing temperatures are rarely reached. It should be possible in this way to cheaply make ice for Hutus in Rwanda and for aborigines in Australia, without using any electricity or other modern "tricks." We are in effect bringing some of the cold of space to a little corner on earth. Please let me know how this works for you.

Now, if backradiation is happening how is it that you can point a solar cooker at a clear sky and cause ice to form when the ambient temperature is more than 15 degrees above freezing? Other sites talk about using this device, pointed at a clear sky during daylight hours and achieving temperatures 8 to 10 degrees below the ambient temperature.

If backradiation were happening, pointing the solar oven at clear sky would produce temperatures slightly warmer than ambient, not cooler. The second law of thermodynamics predicts that the temperature in the well of the oven would cool as it is pointed towards the cold sink of space. It does not predict that radiation coming from the colder atmosphere would cause the well in the oven to become warmer.

Now that is actual experimental evidence that backradiation is not happening. Point a device at clear sky and get cooler temperatures...not warmer as the greenhouse hypothesis claims.

I've posted all of the information on this twice now - I've yet to see you address the science behind it.

No you haven't. That junk science article didn't even address backradiation which is the backbone of the greenhouse effect. It pointed out some situations where energy could tansfer from the atmosphere to the surface of the earth, but those were, as I stated, rare, highly localized temperature inversions where the atmosphere was actually warmer than the surface. In such a situation, you aren't seeing backradiation. In those situations, backradiation would be if the cooler surface of the earth were radiating to the atmosphere.

Neither you, nor anyone else has ever posted evidence of backradiation being measured at ambient temperature because it simlply doesn't exist. It is a myth. It can not be measured at ambient temperature because it can't happen. If you want to measure downdwelling radiation, you need an instrument that is cooled to a temperature far below the -20 degree average of the atmosphere and then you aren't measuring backradiation...you are only measuring radiative flux from a cold atmosphere to an even colder instrument.

 

[SSDD]

I suggest you do a little reading - this article explains how it works, and provides examples you can probably see from your own window.

I have done a lot of reading which is why I can state categorically that you can not show any real world example of backradiation...anywhere...at any time...under any situation. Any example that you might show of radiation transferrring from the atmosphere to the surface is not going to be backradiation, but an unusual example of a temperature inversion.

Some of Earth’s accumulated energy is exported via evapotranspiration (latent and sensible heat loss to atmosphere), clouds form from condensing water vapor, some precipitation occurs and (to make it really obvious) some rain falls on glaciers (snow, ice fields…). The liquid water precipitating out of (falling from) the atmosphere is warmer than our glacier (or snow or ice fields) and by melting same it is undeniably returning some of Earth’s previously exported energy back to Earth – this is a feedback.

It is a feedback, but is not backradiation which is the issue here. The greenhouse effect depends on backradiation and backradiation does not exist.

Here, from the IPCC...a discussion of the greenhouse effect.

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg1/ar4-wg1-faqs.pdf

The Sun powers Earth’s climate, radiating energy at very short wavelengths, predominately in the visible or near-visible (e.g., ultraviolet) part of the spectrum. Roughly one-third of the solar energy that reaches the top of Earth’s atmosphere is reflected directly back to space. The remaining two-thirds is absorbed by the surface and, to a lesser extent, by the atmosphere. To balance the absorbed incoming energy, the Earth must, on average, radiate the same amount of energy back to space. Because the Earth is much colder than the Sun, it radiates at much longer wavelengths, primarily in the infrared part of the spectrum (see Figure 1). Much of this thermal radiation emitted by the land and ocean is absorbed by the atmosphere, including clouds, and reradiated back to Earth. This is called the greenhouse effect.

That is the official climate science description of the greenhouse effect. It isn't some small feedback like lightning striking the surface from the cold atmosphere, or rain on an ice field, it is the atmosphere radiating back more energy from the atmosphere to the surface of the earth where it is reabsorbed than comes in from the sun itself.

Your junk science article doesn't even touch on the idea of backradiation which is a violation of the second law of thermodynamics.

 

[SSDD]

I just posted some good explanations from Dr. Roy Spencer that detail just how you denier cult fools are misinterpreting the 2nd law of thermodynamics. As he said: "thermal conduction involves energy flow in only one direction. But radiation flow involves energy flow in both directions".

So provide a link to one instance of two way energy flow being observed and measured...and if you are going to point out radio, or microwaves, then point out an example where two waves at the same frequency and power were transmitted in two directions at the same time.

If such a thing were possible, communications companies could save a fortune paying engineers to design towers and relays that avoided exactly that.

 

[SSDD]

The simplest direct observation of the greenhouse effect at work is atmospheric backradiation

If that is true, then you should have no problem providing an example of backradiation being observed and measured at ambient temperature. If it is so simple, and observable, then you should be able to provide an example. Lets see it.

This thermal emission can be measured from the surface and also from space. The surface of the Earth actually receives in total more radiation from the atmosphere than it does from the Sun.

Yes, it can be measured from earth...but not at ambient temperature. Your instrument must be cooled to a temperature below the -20 average of the atmosphere and at that point, it isn't backradiation...it is radiation from the warmer atmosphere to the cooler instrument. Backradiation does not exist....it has never been observed...it has never been measured...it has never happened except in thought experiments and computer models.

And no the atmosphere does not receive more radiation from the atmosphere than it does from the sun. The atmosphere is not an energy source.. Refer to the law of conservation of energy.

 

[SSDD]

The dudes a BS artist nothing more. I read his crap a few times, he's a charlatan

David C. Tobin

Dr. David C. Tobin received his PhD degree in 1996 at the University of Maryland ? Baltimore Campus (UMBC) where he worked under Professor Larrabee Strow.

Having a PhD doesn't mean one has a clue. Dr. Roy Spencer, admittedly is a great meteorologist believes that he is measuring backradiation with his $125 hand held infrared thermometer when his own UAH spends hundreds of thousands on instruments that are cooled to temperatures less than -20 degrees in order to measure some slight amount of downward radiation from the atmosphere.

Your junk science article doesn't address backradiation and without backradiation, there is no greenhouse effect.

 

[Saigon]

SSDD -

Having a PhD doesn't mean one has a clue.

It means that he is more qualified to make a statement on the Second Law of Thermodynamics than you are.

So much of your posting comes down to ignoring science - you can hardly be surprised to find people like myself find David Tobin to be a more informed source than you are.

 

[SSDD]

Having a PhD doesn't mean one has a clue.

It means that he is more qualified to make a statement on the Second Law of Thermodynamics than you are.

Not if the claim is that energy can move from cool areas to warm areas in direct contradiction to the second law of thermodynamics.

So much of your posting comes down to ignoring science - you can hardly be surprised to find people like myself find David Tobin to be a more informed source than you are.

Once again, here is the second law:

Second Law of Thermodynamics

It is not possible for heat to flow from a colder body to a warmer body without any work having been done to accomplish this flow. Energy will not flow spontaneously from a low temperature object to a higher temperature object.

Given that statement, who is ignoring scinece if the claim is that energy from the cooler atmosphere can radiate down and be absorbed by the warmer surface of the earth?

And the day you have a better grasp of the science is the day we all better start looking for ballistic umbrellas since pigs will be flying.

I can't help but note that you did not provide a single measurement of backradiation ever taken in any situation at ambient temperature...I can't help but notice that you failed to comment on the solar oven when pointed at clear sky actually cools to a temperature lower than the ambient; an impossibility if backradiation were real...I can't help but notice that you are never able to speak to any questions or challenges but instead, post something that you clearly don't understand and claim that you have provided an adequate rebuttal. Better informed than me...what a laugh.

 

[IlarMeilyr]

It is easy to be an AGW Faither.

Proclaim a devotion to "science" while ignoring the pesky actual laws of science.

Cite a hypothetical "consensus" about the alleged "agreement" of "scientists" (loosely speaking) as to the "settled" status of the so-called human "causation" of global warming ("climate change"), while studiously ignoring that science does not operate on the principles of "majority rules."

Attack anybody who actually uses or cites actual science as being (wait for it) insufficiently grounded in "science."

Proclaim the faith. Demand that "carbon" be taxed. Pretend that humans can either cause climate change or do diddly ******* dog to prevent it.

 

[polarbear]

It is easy to be an AGW Faither.

Proclaim a devotion to "science" while ignoring the pesky actual laws of science.

Cite a hypothetical "consensus" about the alleged "agreement" of "scientists" (loosely speaking) as to the "settled" status of the so-called human "causation" of global warming ("climate change"), while studiously ignoring that science does not operate on the principles of "majority rules."

Attack anybody who actually uses or cites actual science as being (wait for it) insufficiently grounded in "science."

Proclaim the faith. Demand that "carbon" be taxed. Pretend that humans can either cause climate change or do diddly ******* dog to prevent it.

Belief and dis- belief as in non -"believers", "infidels", "atheists" etc are religious concepts.
So is a prophecy. Science makes projections, AFTER it has established a scientific principle.
No Geo-Physicist argues against that, IF the permafrost in northern regions thaws Methane gas will be released.
If that happens then it is clear that Methane ppm in the atmosphere LAGGED temperature . It`s also clear then that temperature was the cause and not the effect.
However when it comes to CO2 the AGW religion has it the other way around and it matters not what Geophysics has found:

( Solar activity observed as magnetic disturbances)



Climate variations and historic events

Top = precipitation
lower section = summer temperature deviations
The epoch labels from left to right are:
"Late Stone age" , Roman empire expansion, followed by a large human migration event, then the Medieval period and optimal climate, followed by the great famine, then the "black death" period, then the 30 year war, then the "Little ice age" which is followed by the " modern migration "

All the above has been presented by a joint Geophysics project which had most of the Geophysics and Physics faculties in German Universities participate and was published in book form.
That`s how SCIENTISTS DO IT

And this is how "Climate scientists" do it:

With dramatic media stunt events ( "demonstrating the effect of climate change")

When Journalists asked IPCC officials during their Kampala presentation in which they cited examples of climate change, such as the mud slides in Uganda how they linked that event to climate change the IPCC expert who responded said:
"There are a number of circumstances that cause mud slides, but climate change can not be ruled out"

Sounds a lot more like a religion than science:
There must be a God because you can`t rule out that there is one.

While science only accepts the cause of an effect theory after you have positive proof that nothing else can account for the effect....which then makes you a "denier" in AGW terms and definitions.

In the not so distant past you had no chance in any country that did not separate church and government, and being a "denier of God" had very detrimental effects on your career.
The same is the case now with AGW which reversed all progress we have made in matters of democratic principles.
The way the AGW faithers in this forum respond to anything which is against their cult-religion is an indication how far they would go if they were in a position of authority.
Like that freak "Numan" who fakes a "higher education" ******* up the french language with words like "devotés"... and ponders by how many billions the world`s population could be lowered with Government enforced abortions in under developed countries....like in the China he admires above all, while despising Western Democracy
Or that Siamese Cat freak who "used to run nuclear reactors" the way Fred Flintstone did it in Fraggle Rock.... and hasn`t got a clue what`s going on in the Navy.
Not to mention "Saigon" the fake journalist from Finland who had to Google who Finland`s current Prime Minister is.

 

[polarbear]

@SSDD
It`s no use. If you show what happens with a solar fridge pointed at the clear sky they revert back to Roy Spencer`s "though experiment" where a colder bar heats up the warmer one in Roy`s vivid imagination.
If you place a colder object next to a warmer one, such as a bunch of ice cubes near a coke can in an icebox, they tell you it wasn`t a fair comparison because the coke can had no heat source.
And when you point out that a transistor which does have a power source gets hotter without a heat sink than with a heat sink, where the cooling fins should heat each other with their own "back radiation" then they tell you it was not a fair comparison because the convection overpowers the "back radiation".
Then if you point out how much more convection there is over wide open earth terrain as compared to a power transistor heat sink in a small box, they recite the 20 year old "Trenberth Energy budget" based on "estimates" which even the IPCC has discarded over 13 years ago...or try tell you that there is no such thing as a power transistor/heat sink arrangements without a cooling fan...just like the Siamese Cat is trying to tell me that no 2 turbine driven generators can run at the same rpm and phase angle while there are tens of thousands perfectly synchronized at any given time on our power grid

 

[mamooth]

It is not possible for heat to flow

Yep, flow. Conduction. That particular way of stating the second law is specifically talking about about heat conduction, not energy radiation.

Your problem seems to be your confusion of heat and energy. The energy goes both ways, but the heat, which comes from a sum of the energies, only goes one way. The second law is a statement of statistics, not of tracking individual bits of energy.

Anyways, given how ignorant you and PolarBear are of the basic physics, why should anyone take you two seriously?

 

[mamooth]

What sort of object do you believe you saw backradiation from with a FLIR? What were you looking at that was colder than the FLIR unit?

You actually think it needed to be colder than the FLIR to be measured? Again, your theory is insanely stupid. Only a gibbering retard could spout something that dumb.

I pointed the FLIR at the sky. The sky was dimly emitting IR. The clouds were emitting IR more strongly. That's backradiation, directly measured.

 

[mamooth]

Or that Siamese Cat freak who "used to run nuclear reactors" the way Fred Flintstone did it in Fraggle Rock.... and hasn`t got a clue what`s going on in the Navy.
Not to mention "Saigon" the fake journalist from Finland who had to Google who Finland`s current Prime Minister is.

Notice the pattern. Whenever someone spanks PolarBear and sends him running home to mama in tears, PolarBear goes psychostalker on them.

It's kind of typical of denialists. Since they suck so hard at every aspect of science, logic, ethics and common sense, cowardly deflections are the only tactic left to them. And no one does cowardly deflections better than PolarBear.

By the way PolarBear, you _still_ haven't told us what computers were running your magical control software in 1960, as you claimed. I understand that your type has great difficulty in locating your balls, but keep searching, and give us the answer when you find them.

 

[SSDD]

It is not possible for heat to flow

Yep, flow. Conduction. That particular way of stating the second law is specifically talking about about heat conduction, not energy radiation.

I suppose it is possible to misunderstand the second law of thermodynamics more profoundly than you apparently do, but I don't quite know how. Conduction? Are you kidding? The second law describes any and all types of energy transfer. The second law is a law of nature, not a law of systems. It certainly covers conduction, but every sort of energy transfer imaginable is subject to the second law of thermodynamics.

For example, the water behind a dam has a great deal of potential energy. The water behind the dam at its base is under more pressure than water at the surface. As the water flows out from the bottom of the dam, doing work, or whatever, it comes out the other side under less pressure and as such the energy has moved from a concentrated state to a less concentrated state. Water doesn't flow both ways in a single outlet and you can't get the water back to a higher energy state without doing some work to make it happen..either by pumping it back into the lake or building another dam or something similar downstream.

The second law governs the use of fuels whether they be gasoline, or carbohydrates and fats in food. The second law states that the energy (highly concentrated in gasoline and food) once processed will move towards a less dense energy state. The energy flow is one way. You can't run your engine backwards and get gas out of the fuel injectors and you can't return the exaust to a useful high energy state without doing some work to make it happen.

Put a marble on an incline and watch it roll down and you see a process governed by the second law. The marble at the top of the incline represents potential energy...let go of it and it rolls down to a lower energy state. It won't roll back up the incline unless some sort of work is done to make it happen.

Hold a rock out at arms length and let go. What do you think the second law of thermodynamics predicts will happen? High energy state held out at arm's length...low energy state laying on the ground and you can't get the rock back to where it was unless you do some work to make it happen.

The second law governs chemical reactions...iron + oxygen = rust. The molecules of the piece of iron are in a higher energy state than the molecules in the rust. Energy was released in the oxydizing process and you can't get back to where you started without having done some work to make it happen.

Pump up a tire and put a hole in it. Again, the second law at work. Pressurized air inside the tire...high energy state...air outside the tire...lower energy state. The flow is one way and you can't get the air back into the tire unless you do some work to make it happen.

Every energy transfer is an example of the second law and in every energy transfer, energy moves from a higher energy state to a lower energy state and it can't go back to the higher energy state unless some work is done to make that happen.

IR in the surface of the earth is at a higher energy state than IR in the atmosphere. The IR disperses in the atmosphere and you simply can't get it to go back to the higher energy state (ie absorbed back into the surface of the earth) without doing work to make it happen.

Your problem seems to be your confusion of heat and energy. The energy goes both ways, but the heat, which comes from a sum of the energies, only goes one way. The second law is a statement of statistics, not of tracking individual bits of energy.

Your problem is that you don't understand the laws of thermodynamics. Energy goes one way....period. You can get energy to go two ways, but you have to do work to make it happen. Whether you are talking about a marble rolling down an incline, air escaping from a tire, burning fuel in your vehicle or in your body, watching an old tractor rust, or speaking of IR radiation moving from the surface of the earth to space...energy moves in one direction unless you do work to make it move in the other direction. Radiation is not an exception.

By the way, absorption and emission is not work.

The second law is a statement of energy transfer. If you beleive energy can move in two directions, give one example of it happening without work having been done to accomplish the task and offer some proof that the energy moved in two directions.

Anyways, given how ignorant you and PolarBear are of the basic physics, why should anyone take you two seriously?

I am afraid that it is you and yours who are ignorant. Second law only about radiation....what a laugh. I suggest that if you are actually interested, that you do some reading. The second law governs every energy transfer everywhere under every condition and it states clearly, and proves every day that if energy is moving, it only moves in one direction...from a high energy state to a low energy state.

If you think otherwise, then show an observed, measured example and I will show you the basis for a perpetual motion machine. We can both become billionaires overnight.

 

[SSDD]

What sort of object do you believe you saw backradiation from with a FLIR? What were you looking at that was colder than the FLIR unit?

You actually think it needed to be colder than the FLIR to be measured? Again, your theory is insanely stupid. Only a gibbering retard could spout something that dumb.

Of course it had to be colder. If it weren't, then you would get no image. Why do you think the FLIR units are cooled?

[I pointed the FLIR at the sky. The sky was dimly emitting IR. The clouds were emitting IR more strongly. That's backradiation, directly measured.

That isn't backradiation if the FLIR unit was colder than the sky you pointed it at and all FLIR units are cooled. It isn't backradiation if the radiation is moving from one area that is warmer to an area that is cooler...the cooled FLIR being cooler than the sky or the clouds.

Of course it is possible that pointing at a clear sky, you were just seeing noise and not radiation at all. A clear sky isn't what a FLIR unit is programmed to process. You didn't see backradiation with a FLIR unit. The fact that you think you did is just more evidence that you really need to put some effort into understanding the material.

Why don't you do yourself a google search for FLIR and backradiation and see how many hits you don't get. If you could measure backradiation with a FLIR unit, do you think NASA would be spending hundreds of thousands of dollars on equiment (which are failing by the way) to try and measure it?

 

[mamooth]

The second law describes any and all types of energy transfer.

On a statistical level, not a photon level. That's your fundamental glaring error.

The second law is a law of nature, not a law of systems.

Completely wrong. The second law is a description of statistics, not a description of photon-level physics.

For example, the water behind a dam ....

... has zilch to do with the second law of thermodynamics. Conservation of energy is not the second law.

The second law governs the use of fuels whether they be gasoline, or carbohydrates and fats in food.

Sounds a lot like Jeremy Rifkin's "entropy" babble, silly New Age pseudoscience.

Put a marble on an incline and watch it roll down and you see a process governed by the second law.

Completely wrong. You see a function governed by gravitational force, which has nothing to do with the second law.

IR in the surface of the earth is at a higher energy state than IR in the atmosphere. The IR disperses in the atmosphere and you simply can't get it to go back to the higher energy state (ie absorbed back into the surface of the earth) without doing work to make it happen.

Since there's no work being done, your argument falls to pieces. The net flow of heat is outwards, even if individual photons come back in, hence the second law is obeyed. The second law doesn't care about the actions of individual photons. The second law only describes how a system behaves statistically on a macro scale.

 

[mamooth]

That isn't backradiation

It amuses me, how you think that backradiation is somehow magically different from plan old long-wave infrared radiation. In your world, instruments that detect longwave IR are inexplicably incapable of sensing backradiation.

 

[mamooth]

.just like the Siamese Cat is trying to tell me that no 2 turbine driven generators can run at the same rpm and phase angle while there are tens of thousands perfectly synchronized at any given time on our power grid

I never said such any such thing, you lying sack of shit.

Why can't you speak about me without lying, you big *****...cat? Oh, that's right, it's because you're such a big pussycat.

 

[SSDD]

On a statistical level, not a photon level. That's your fundamental glaring error.

And yet, the whole of science can't prove what you seem to take on faith. You call it an error but are completely unable to prove it.

Completely wrong. The second law is a description of statistics, not a description of photon-level physics.

Again, you couldn't possibly be more wrong. I would like to see you prove that energy moves from low states to high states.

... has zilch to do with the second law of thermodynamics. Conservation of energy is not the second law.

Profound misunderstanding of the laws of thermodynamics on your part...Here is some basic level physics. Try and learn something.

Entropy - a Further Look

Water falling over a power dam converts gravitational potential energy into kinetic energy to turn a turbine. In turn this kinetic energy is converted into electrical energy. However, some energy is lost as heat is dispersed into the universe – the entropy of the universe increases. It must do so, or the water would not flow over the dam and do useful work.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics (4)

We make our whole technological world run by grabbing as much as we can of the energy flow available from concentrated energy mixtures like oxygen and fuels to run an infinite variety of machines, electrical generators and vehicles. (Our bodies, as we have said, use second-law energy flow from the oxidation of food for the synthesis of essential compounds and for all activity, from biochemical to muscular to mental.) However, when we change energy from one form to another, from energy in a fuel plus O2 to pushing a piston or even water running down from Hoover Dam to the dynamos below, it is impossible for us to get to use all of the energy in the concentrated energy source for the jobs we want it to do. Some always is diverted as the unusable energy due to faster moving molecules (i.e., "heat") to the environment. (That's where our body gets heat to maintain our 98.6º F/37º C.)

Second Law of Thermodynamics: Entropy and Systems - Free Intro to Natural Sciences Video

On a much smaller scale, a reservoir of water held back by a dam contains potential energy, as its location gives it the potential to flow over the dam. In each case, the stored energy, once released, spreads out and does so without any applied effort or force. In other words, the release of potential energy is a spontaneous process. A spontaneous process is simply a process that occurs without the need for additional energy. Another way of putting that is that it happens automatically once you give it a little bit of a kick. As the energy spreads out, some of it is converted into usable energy and gets the work done that we need. The rest of the energy is converted into unusable energy, simply referred to as heat .

Laws of Thermodynamics Basic Significance

One example of increasing entropy is water falling over a dam. When the water is above the dam it has some potential energy due to gravity, which can be used to generate electricity or turn a wheel to perform some useful task. Once the water has fallen to the level below the dam, its total energy is the same - as the fall warms the water increasing its thermal energy - but it no longer has the same capacity to do work. The water has moved from what is referred to as an "available" or "free" energy state (high grade energy) to an "unavailable" or "bound" energy state (low grade energy). This change in the energy state of the water as it falls over the dam is an increase in entropy.

Completely wrong. You see a function governed by gravitational force, which has nothing to do with the second law.

Further deep misunderstanding of the laws of thermodynamics. Hell mamooth, you don't even know what they are about.. Here, have some more...very basic, but apparently that is where you need to be your failure to understand the laws of thermodynamics is so profound.

The second law of thermodynamics - how energy flows from useful to useless.

Energy flows from a higher temperature to a lower temperature (heat flow). Energy flows from a higher pressure to a lower pressure (expansion). Energy flows from a higher voltage potential to a lower voltage potential (electric current). Energy flows from a higher gravitational potential to a lower gravitational potential (falling objects). Marbles and trucks roll downhill. Water flows and falls from higher elevation to a lower elevation (downhill). And last, but not least, chemical reactions proceed from higher concentrations of molecular bond energy to lower bond energies.......So that's one part of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Energy will flow to a more "spread out" or "less concentrated" condition. It stops flowing when there is no longer a difference in concentration levels - when things have reached the great state of equilibrium.

Entropy and Evolution

Other Expressions of the Second Law

With some advanced calculus it is possible to take the mathematical expressions that underlie the description above, and find other equivalent principles that apply to situations other than closed systems. The second law can be seen as a fundamental principle behind why many processes occur in the direction that they do. For example, according to the first law of thermodynamics, a ball on a hill side could either stay where it is and maintain a high potential energy, or it could roll down the hill lowering its potential energy but gaining kinetic energy (as speed and rotation). The thing that tells you that it is the second one of these that will happen is the general form of the second law.

This is very basic stuff mamooth and you don't appear to have even a tenuous grasp of it. Imagine, thinking that a marble rolling down an incline is not an example of energy transfer governed by the second law. You apparently have no idea how pervasive the second law is. In fact, you can't swing a dead cat without invoking the second law of thermodynamics. You need to get a grip of the basics before you attempt to speak on the more advanced stuff...and if you have a firm grip on the basics, you too will know that spontaneous two way net energy flow is not physical and in fact, impossible.

Since there's no work being done, your argument falls to pieces. The net flow of heat is outwards, even if individual photons come back in, hence the second law is obeyed. The second law doesn't care about the actions of individual photons. The second law only describes how a system behaves statistically on a macro scale.

And even more deep misunderstanding of the laws of thermodynamics. Because there is no work being done, there is no backradiation. The IR in the atmosphere is at a lower energy state than the IR stored in the surface of the earth.

And there is no net flow...there is gross flow in one direction. The second law doesn't allow two way energy flow without some work being done to accomplish it.

The second law is a description of the physical world.. Your claims regarding net two way flows of energy are at best, hypothetical and even today remain completely unproven. No example of a spontaneous two way energy flow between a high energy state and a low energy state has ever been observed. In short, two way net energy flow is an ad hoc construct.