Clouds and Heating the Earth
Vacuums make for good insulation because there are few collisions between molecules where heat can be transferred by conduction, which is a fast efficient way of transferring energy, and in gases it is primarily done by radiation, which is a slow inefficient means of transferring energy.
The vacuum of the higher atmosphere makes for an effective insulating blanket for the surface of the Earth.
Liquid water is a poor insulation because the loose association between water molecules makes it an ideal medium for the absorption and transfer of heat between molecules by conduction. Fifty degree water will cause hypothermia within an hour because the water conducts heat away from the body, while fifty degree air may feel cool but it takes considerable time for the gas molecules to transfer enough heat from the body, allowing the body to generate more heat.
Adding water droplets, in the form of clouds, does not increase the insulation of the atmosphere. In fact it does the opposite be adding molecules that can more efficiently transfer heat at a faster rate. The idea that water droplets in an atmosphere with a temperature of minus 30 degrees F could be reflecting heat back to the surface of the Earth is as ridiculous as the idea that ‘greenhouse gas’ molecules are reflecting heat back to the surface of the Earth.
The reason cloudy nights are warmer than clear nights is because the water droplets in the clouds are conducting heat from the hotter molecules in the atmosphere to the surface of the Earth. Meteorologist who report that it is reflection is the cause are just looking for any plausible excuse rather than looking for the cause.
Temperature is not an accurate indication of heat in a gas. When heated a gas expands resulting in fewer molecules transferring heat to the thermometer. The state of water, gas, liquid or solid is a result of the balance of the attractive force between molecules and the kinetic energy of the molecules. In ice the attractive force is greater than the kinetic energy, in a gas the kinetic energy is greater than the attraction between the water molecules, while in liquid water the two forces are close to equal.
The fact that clouds are formed from liquid water droplets is a clear indication that the minus thirty degree temperature of the atmosphere is not an accurate measurement of the kinetic energy (heat) of the molecules in the atmosphere. The state of the water molecules show that the correct temperature reading for the atmosphere should be between thirty two and two hundred twelve degrees F.
There is no temperature in space between the sun and the Earth even though the energy being radiated by the sun is greater than the energy from the sun striking the Earth. The one atom per cubic centimeter in space will not register a temperature but we know that the energy is there. The confusion between temperature and heat causes some people to believe that this energy from the sun is low in the upper atmosphere and increases in the lower atmosphere. Looking at the composition of the atmosphere shows this is totally wrong.
Molecules form when the attractive force between atoms is greater than the kinetic energy of the atoms. This is similar to the state of water. In the upper atmosphere there are no gas molecules because the energy of the atoms will not allow molecules to form, just as high kinetic energy will not allow gas molecules to form liquid water. The elemental atoms of the upper atmosphere show that the energy in the upper atmosphere is greater than the energy of the lower atmosphere. Cooling of molecules towards absolute zero does not cause the molecules to split into atoms.
The stratification of the atmosphere clearly shows that the higher the matter is in the atmosphere the greater its energy. Since objects radiate energy not temperature it should be obvious that the surface of the Earth is not losing energy into the atmosphere but absorbing energy from the atmosphere. Neither clouds nor ‘greenhouse gases’ can change the basic laws of thermodynamics and make energy (heat) flow from a cooler object to a hotter object.
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Terry
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The last sentence of the article needs correction/editing. The location of the words “hotter” and “cooler” should be reversed.
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jerry krause
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Hi Terry,
I make mistakes like the one to which you point, but the fact is you have editted it for yourself.
Do you consider that Herb’s first paragraph needs editing? Is conduction really “a fast efficient way of transferring energy” and radiation “a slow inefficient means of transferring energy.”
If you go to (https://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/uscrn/products/hourly02/2018/CRNH0203-2018-NV_Mercury_3_SSW.txt) you will find the following data for for the hour previous to 1pm on 6/22/2018 at Mercury NV: “53136 20180622 2100 20180622 1300 2.622 -116.02 36.62 37.4 37.5 38.0 36.9 0.0 953 0 967 0 931 0 C 56.1 0 58.0 0 54.5 0 2 0 0.024 0.041 0.034 0.048 0.050 48.6 37.2 33.6 31.7 31.2:” 37.5, 38.0, and 36.9 are the average Celsius temperature, the maximum temperature, and the minimum temperature for the previous hour. 48.6 is the temperature of the soil at a depth of 5cm for the previous hour. And the ave, max, min temperatures of the surface during the previous hour were 56.1, 58.0, and 54.5.
I ask: If conduction is so fast and efficient how are air temperatures so much lower than the soil temperature at 5cm depth? To say nothing about the greater difference between the air temperatures only about 1.5m above the surface and the measured surface temperatures. Now the numbers 953 , 967, and 931 (W/m^2) are the ave, max, min solar radiation measured during the previous hour. I ask: Is the radiation being emitted by the soil surface at an average temperature of 56.1C likely balancing the solar radiation being absorbed by the soil surface during the previous hour?
I next turn to the data just before sunrise at 4am “53136 20180622 1200 20180622 0400 2.622 -116.02 36.62 26.7 25.3 27.0 22.9 0.0 0 0 0 0 0 0 C 21.0 0 22.0 0 20.2 0 5 0 0.017 0.041 0.035 0.049 0.050 28.1 33.0 34.3 32.3 31.6” Now the average air temperature of the previous hour is 25.3C and the surface temperature is 21.0C while the soil temperature at 5cm depth is 28.1. How is the surface temperature lower than either the air temperature above it and the soil temperature below it if conduction is so fast and efficient and the transfer of energy by radiation so slow and inefficient?
Have a good day, Jerry
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Terry
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Hi Jerry,
I may be wrong but I believe the time 1300, or as you indicate 1 pm, is actually being expressed in Zulu time format which for that location is -7 hours or 6am local time. That may account for the lower subsurface temperature as the sun is just commencing warming the soil. Just a thought, as I say, I may be wrong but all my weather reports from government sources in Canada are usually expressed in a Zulu time format. Have a good day yourself.
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jerry krause
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Hi Tim and Herb,
There are two times given for each hourly data set. The second is the local time and as I reread what I wrote I do not find any error It seems you are referring to the lower subsoil temperature of 28.1 at 4am local time (which is clearly stated) relative to that of 48.6 at 1pm local time (which is also clearly stated).
I now see that I confused things terribly by not considering two consecutive days whose diurnal temperature oscillations were nearly identical. For the latter is the only way the cooling portion of the diurnal temperature oscillation can be observed. So, I now have gone to the data set for 6/23/2018 and find that the subsoil temperature at 5cm depth at 4am (local time) was 27.8C, even a bit cooler than 28.1C.
So I can now correctly make the point which I did not previously make. Which was to ask: How was the total matter (air and soil), whose temperatures decreased significantly from 12am (the hour before 1pm) of the 22nd to 4am of the 23rd, cooled? My answer is only by the continuous emission from the surface during this 16hr period even though the matter was absorbing solar radiation for 7hrs of this 16hr period.
So thank you for alerting me of my problem which allowed me to respond to Herb’s comment which he had not yet submitted.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hi again Jerry,
The energy an object absorbs is a function of its area while the heat it contains is a function of volume. The Earth is being heated by the sun during the day. Most of the heat is being absorbed in the atmosphere while some makes to the surface of the Earth. (A satellite orbiting has its surface heated to 250 F while the same satellite on the surface is heated to 50 F. The energy difference is contained in the atmosphere.) At night the atmosphere transfers heat into space and to the cooler surface of the Earth. The surface is no longer receiving heat from the sun but it is still transfering heat into the Earth. (You need to dig deeper into the Earth before temperature begins to rise from geothermal heat.) The first day of summer is rarely the hottest day of the year even though it receives the most sun light. The volume of the Earth is continuing to absorb energy eventually reaching its peak in July or August. The same is true when the surface of the Earth is cooling during winter. The first day of winter is not the coldest.
It is the atmosphere that is the primary means of transferring energy to the surface and into space just as the atmosphere of Venus is the primary means of heat transfer on that planet
Have a good day,
Herb.
Terry
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Hi Jerry,
I checked the website and they are in fact reporting times in UTC or Zulu and not local. The location offset is -8 hours to arrive at local time, my apologies I thought Nevada was -7 hours. So the 4am data is actually 8pm local and the 1 pm data is actually 5 am local.
As a pilot, I am used to seeing these types of weather reports and they are always in UTC, never local times.
This is a reinforcement for all of us to verify the basic data we use to advance our questions/opinions.
Now that you have the correct time, the temperature data makes sense and once again reinforces Herb’s position.
jerry krause
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Hi Terry,
I again made too common mistake and wrote Tim instead of Terry. And you admitted to a mistake. Which as you noted humans like us are mistake prone.
I write this because you wrote: “and once again reinforces Herb’s position.” I am curious why you wrote this? More specifically II am curious what you consider Herb’s position is? I am curious about whatever I wrote (referred to) that reinforced whatever Herb had written?
I am not trying to be critical because I must admit to be clueless as to your possible answers to my questions. I ask them so I might learn to read and/or write more clearly. For you certainly do not seem to understand what I consider I had plainly written, whether it be right or wrong.
Have a good day, Jerry
jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
This is in reference to your comment of 10/10/2018 at 10:30pm and to your article and to your other comments.
The publisher of Galileo’s book–Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences–in their preface to the reader wrote: “intuitive knowledge keeps pace with accurate definition.”
You wrote: “A satellite orbiting has its surface heated to 250 F”. Here, you have not accurately defined the system to which you have referred. If the satellite had a reflective surface I doubt if its surface temperature would reach 250F. And if the satellite rotated rapidly as it revolved about the earth I doubt if its surface temperature would reach 250F. And only if it had a near polar orbit would it be continuously illuminated by the sun. And it it orbited in a plane defined by the sun and earth, it would be totally in the earth shadow for a half of its orbital period. So, given these various possible cases, I strongly doubt that the entire surface of the satellite could ever have a temperature of 250F.
Have a good day, Jerry
jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
Relative to my comment of 10/11/20218 3:46am, I reasoned wrongly: “And only if it had a near polar orbit would it be continuously illuminated by the sun.” So before anyone else corrects my mistake, I want to correct it. For as the earth revolved about the sun, the plane of the polar orbit would not continuously ‘face’ the sun as I had assumed. Instead the plane would become edge-wise to the sun and the satellite, in orbiting about the earth, would for two different periods pass through the shadow cast by the earth.
Have a good day, Jerry
Heb Rose
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Hi Jerry,
The reason I say conduction’s a fast and efficient way of transferring heat is because when molecules collide their energy equalize. Radiation is slow and inefficient because both objects are absorbing and radiating heat. As the energy approaches equilibrium the rate of transfer from the hotter object to the cooler object slows. Radiation is also dependent on the distance between the objects where objects will equalize at different temperatures depending on the distance. If you put two equal objects at different distances from a heat source they will both reach equilibrium where they radiate as much heat as they absorb but this equilibrium will at different temperatures or energy levels. I do not know if the two objects reach equilibrium in the same amount of time.
The problem with comparing temperature of soil and atmosphere is that the number of molecules radiating heat are different. If you compared water with atmosphere there a million times as many molecules transferring heat in the water than threes in the atmosphere. A similar situation rises with a solid where more molecules are transferring heat from the soil than from the air.
Have good day,
Herb
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Terry
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Hi again Jerry,
I gave up trying to get my tractor out of the ditch, so I will respond more fully.
Your second example of 4am(GMT) is actually 9 pm local time and the subsurface temperature is indicating warmer than the surface temperature. The sun has just set and the surface temperature is rapid decline but the subsurface will cool more slowly.
I think you have inadvertently supplied the observational data which proves Herb’s article correct regarding the efficiency of energy transfer by conduction vis a vis radiation.
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John O'Sullivan
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Thanks Terry, now fixed. Jerry, hopefully Herb will soon address your comment.
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Herb Rose
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Hi Terry,
I realized that after I sent it. The revised sentence was, Neither clouds of greenhouse gases can violate the laws of thermodynamics and interfere with the flow of heat from a hotter objects to cooler objects. The molecules higher in the atmosphere, whether water droplets or gases, have more energy (heat) than molecules lower in the atmosphere because they are in equilibrium with the energy of the sun.
Have a good day,
Herb
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Nick Schroeder
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By reflecting 30% of the ISR the atmosphere cools the earth. O.K. makes it less hot.
Just like the insulated walls of a house the thermal resistance of the atmosphere creates a temperature difference per Q = U A dT with the inside/surface warmer than the outside/ToA.
Yes, it’s that simple.
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jerry krause
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Hi Nick,
In email conversations you have questioned the measurements by the NOAA SURFRAD project (https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/surfrad/surf_check.php) of the upwelling IR radiation emitted from the earth’s surface for various reasons. And you have questioned the measurements of the surface temperatures measured by NOAA USCRN project referred to in my previous reply to Terry.
The sites of these two projects are only a few miles, at most, apart even if the names of their locations are different. The upwelling IR measured 6/22/2018 at 12am and 1pm are 710 and 722 W/m^2. The upwelling IR radiation calculated by using the S-B radiation law and the average surface temperature of 56C (732K) and an assumed emissivity of 1 is 749 W/m^2. These two measured (or calculated) are not identical but they seem to be reasonable estimates of the actual emission from the surface.
Now if we subtract the average value (727 W/m^2) of these 3 values from the average downwelling solar radiation measured (953 W/m^2) at the USCRN site we find that 226 W/m^2 must be reflected from the surface (not absorbed by the surface). So the albedo of the surface is about 0.24. Which seems to be a reasonable estimate for a dry, light colored, desert surface.
So I ask: What of these measurements and calculations should we not accept as being reasonably valid?
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hello again,
All objects above absolute zero radiate energy and all objects absorb energy. This makes it difficult to tell if an object is reflecting or radiating energy. If you paint a wall red the red wavelength of light will be reflected to give it its color, but the color of a red piece of glass is from the glass absorbing light and emitting light in the red wave length. (You can make red glass by dissolving gold into molten glass.) Water is transparent and absorbs light but the shape of water droplets make clouds appear white as the light is absorbed and refracted at different angles. Etched or frosted glass appears white not because it is reflecting light but because it is emitting light. A rainbow is a result of water droplets absorbing light and reflecting different wavelengths.
When cooking in the oven the oven will heat the outside of the food and then this heat is conducted to the center. When you remove the food from the oven the surface begins to cool but inside the food heat is still being transfer to the cooler center. This is true for the Earth where the sun is heating the surface (atmosphere) and then that heat is transferred to the surface of the Earth which then transfers it into the Earth. The temperature of the oven does not give an accurate reading of the kinetic energy of the air transferring the heat. The gas molecules are heated by flames or heating elements to have a high kinetic energy but because there are fewer of them transferring the heat the temperature reads low. It takes a lot longer to cook something in a 212 degree oven than in boiling water even though the kinetic energy of the molecules in the oven is greater than the kinetic energy of the molecules in the water. Think of the Earth as a roast in an oven.
As to the satellites orbiting the Earth. The satellites are all insulated and have means of transferring heat because the the surface facing the sun is 250 F while the shade side is -250 F. (This is the same as the surface of the moon.) Satellites need air conditioning to dispose of the internal heat generated because they have to be well insulated from the external temperature swings.
Have a good day,
Herb
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jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
I will dissect your statements presented as ‘fact’. The first: “All objects above absolute zero radiate energy.” This statement appears to be true based upon the observations that led to the formulation of the S-B radiation law except what is an object? Are the atoms and/or the molecules of a gas objects? I believe the observations that led to the formulation of the S-B radiation law were about the radiation being emitted from the surface of either solid or liquid matter.
Don’t we assume that the oxygen and nitrogen molecules of the atmosphere cannot radiate (emit) energy because of their temperature? Yet, these individual molecules of the atmosphere have kinetic energy because they have mass and have various speeds of motion.
I find I haven’t shared with you a quote from The Feynman Lectures on Physics. : “If, in some cataclysm, all of scientific knowledge were to be destroyed, and only one sentence passed on to the next generations of creatures, what statement would contain the most information in the fewest words? I believe it is the atomic hypothesis (or whatever you wish to call it) that all things are made of atoms—little particles that move around in perpetual motion, attracting each other when they are a little distance apart, but repelling upon being squeezed into one another. In that one sentence, you will see, there is an enormous amount of information about the world, if just a little imagination and thinking are applied.”
One thing that seems to have been learned by a little imagination and thinking about gaseous matter is that temperature is a state function and is a measure of the average kinetic energy of these tiny gas particles (atoms and/or molecules) whose motions are perpetual above absolute zero temperature. Liquid or solid particles can never qualify as being the tiny particles of atoms or molecules. This because we must accept that a
liquid or solid particle is composed of many atoms and/or molecules.
I have great difficulty in translating this rapid motion of gaseous atoms and/or molecules (diffuse matter) at the varying observed temperatures of the earth’s atmosphere to the motions of the atoms and molecules in a liquid or solid (condensed matter) particles (tiny or huge). But I have to accept, on the basis of the accepted kinetic theory of matter, that if a gas (a diffuse collection of many atoms and/or molecules), a liquid, a solid, have the same temperature, the average kinetic energy of the atoms and/or molecules which compose each of these three forms of matter are the same.
Now I consider I am demonstrating that accurate definition requires many words. Which must be the reason that Galileo and Newton wrote books instead of fifteen page articles.
Einstein is said to have stated: “Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.” Herb, I believe you and many others by writing few words are trying to make things simpler than is possible. I have just written a page about the 7 words which you first wrote. I do not claim that my many more words have accurately defined the topic to which you referred with your 7 words; but I very much doubt that your 7 words do as you in the same sentence move on to a second (different) topic.
As i composed the preceding I had continued: “Now a fact is that as an instructor of chemistry I did not really grasp, at that time, the significance of a simple experiment I had my students do in laboratory.” But I have decide that already this comment is longer than most might decide to read.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
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Hi again Jerry,
I enjoy our communications because it helps clarify things for me.
I disagree with the contention that the kinetic energy of molecules in solids, liquid, and gases are the same if they have the same temperature and will attempt to explain why.
A thermometer (I will use a mercury one as an example) measures the temperature of a medium. The thermometer consists of a bulb of mercury attached to a glass column with a tube in it. The bulb is submersed in the medium to absorb kinetic energy which then causes the mercury to expand up the tube. The amount of energy transferred to the mercury is a function of the area of the bulb while the amount of expansion is a function of the volume of mercury. As the mercury expands the area of the mercury in the tube increases increasing the area radiating heat from the thermometer. When the amount of heat radiated by the thermometer equals the amount of kinetic energy being transferred to the bulb the temperature is established. You can change the calibration of the thermometer by changing the volume of mercury absorbing heat or the diameter of the tube radiating heat. The thermometer is recording the total heat being transferred to it.
I have three identical chambers with thermometers installed. In the first chamber I put one molecule with a velocity of V. The molecule ricochets around the chamber bouncing off the walls and occasional striking the thermometer. How often it strike the thermometer is a function of its velocity and the energy it transfers to the thermometer is a function of V^2 (1/2mV^2).
In the second chamber I again placeone identical molecule with a velocity of 2V. This molecule will strike the thermometer twice as often as the molecule in the first chamber and will deliver 4 times the energy ((2V)^2). In the second chamber the thermometer will receive 8 times the energy of the thermometer in the first chamber.
In the third chamber I place 8 identical molecules with velocity of V. A molecule in this chamber will strike the thermometer 8 times as often as the molecule in the first chamber and each time a molecule strikes the thermometer it will transfer energy equal to the molecules in the first chamber. The total energy transferred to the thermometer will be equal the energy transferred in the second chamber.
If the thermometer measured the average energy of the molecules striking it, the temperature would be the same in the first and third chambers. I believe the temperature of the third chamber will be the same as the second chamber because the thermometer just records how much energy it is receiving and not how many molecules are transferring the energy.
Have a good day,
Herb
jerry krause
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Hi Herb,
Do you accept how much fundamental physical science Aristotle and his fellow philosophers got wrong by doing what you seem to be doing? Do you accept that Galileo had to lie to save his life as he by observations attempted to correct Aristotle’s contention that the earth did not move? That is the serious consequence of ignoring that the knowledge of science is based solely upon observations and not upon what you reason.
But you have just given me an excuse to share what I considered too long for my previous comment.
Now a fact is that as an instructor of chemistry I did not really grasp the significance of a simple experiment I had my students do in laboratory. Which at this time would be no-no because of the many hazards involved. However, when I entered my first university chemistry course it was suggested that l learn to work with glass tubing because it was a thing that chemists routinely do. So I taught my students to work with glass tubing. And somewhere, I do not remember where, I read about making a glass gas thermometer. To do this one merely had to break off a 30cm, or so, section of capillary tube, heat and ‘melt’ (using a Bunsen burner) one end of the tube so the end of the capillary was sealed off. Then student was to hold the open end of the tube to heat as much of the remainder of tube as possible without burning the student’s fingers. Then, holding the heated end of the tube with a laboratory towel, immerse the open tube end into a bottle of mercury and wait until a 2-3mm plug of mercury was drawn into the capillary as the tube cooled.
But this was not yet a thermometer, it had to be calibrated. So a large beaker of boiling water was provided so the tube could be immersed in it up to the bottom of the mercury plug and the student was to wait until the plug stopped moving (temperature equilibrium). Then the student was to quickly mark the ‘bottom’ end of the plug on the tube with a marker. Next the student was to do the same with a large beaker of ice water, again wait until the plug stopped moving (temperature equilibrium), and again mark the bottom end of the plug.
Next the student was to measure the distance between each mark and the closed end of the capillary. The student was then to take a piece of graph paper and label the vertical axis (distance) with a linear scale from, say 0 to 350, and label the horizon axis (temperature) with a linear scale from -300 to 150. Of course, the students knew that water boiled at 100 and had measured the distance at this temperature and knew that ice (water) melted at 0 So they plotted these two points on the graph paper. Next students were drew a straight line through the two points so they could determine the temperature at which the distance became 0 (zero). Hence, by the simple experiment, plotting two points determined by assigning a temperature to the boiling water and a temperature of the ice water, and a drawing the line through the two points had determined the temperature of absolute zero according to their measurements of distance (length of the air column in the capillary tube at the two temperatures). Of course, the value of the temperature of absolute zero was not precisely negative 273 because this was a relatively crude, but very informative experiment. But I know I did not set up the experiment by simply asking: How do we know that absolute zero is -273C as we are told it is?
Have a good day, Jerry
Charles Higley
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“The reason cloudy nights are warmer than clear nights is because the water droplets in the clouds are conducting heat from the hotter molecules in the atmosphere to the surface of the Earth. ”
The cause of cloudy nights being warmer than clear night is the temperature gradient. On a clear night, at 283 K (10 deg C) at the surface, it is radiating IR outward to space at zero —3 K, depending on how you look at it—space has no temperature, being a vacuum, but it does have a background radiation of ~3 K. Now, on a cloudy night, the temperature gardiat is mu ch less, being 243 K (-30 K in the text above) and 283 K at the surface.
So, clear night has a 283 deg gradient and the cloudy night a 40 deg gradient.
If you stand outside on a freezing cold clear night, say 0 deg C (273 K), you will feel the chill because your temperature gradient is your 310 K body and 0 K of space, but you will have a gradient of only 310 versus 273 if you put up an umbrella or stand under a tree. The umbrella has the gradient against space but it is constantly gaining energy from the atmosphere by conduction.
BTW, rain is the delivery or colder mass back to the surface after the latent heat of water condensation is lost to the upper troposphere. Roughly 85% of the planet’s energy budget is transferred away from the surface by conduction/convection, with radiation being the much lesser route.
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Herb Rose
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Hi Charles,
The problem I have with your argument is that objects do not radiate temperature but kinetic energy or heat and they are not the same thing. Temperature is how we measure heat and it is determined by the total heat delivered to the measuring device which is a function of both the kinetic energy of the molecules striking it and the number of molecules striking it.How can there be liquid water in clouds if the temperature is -30 F? Temperature is not a good indicator of the kinetic energy of a gas.
If you look at the data on the temperature of the atmosphere at different altitudes you will see that the temperature decreases in the first 5000 ft but then increases until the altitude of 50000 ft. This does not indicate that the surface of the Earth is radiating heat into space. The density of the atmosphere starts at 1.1 gram per cubic meter at sea level then decreases with altitude, so the number of molecules transferring heat to the thermometer decreases with altitude.If you divide the absolute temperature at altitudes by the grams of molecules transferring kinetic energy to the thermometer it will produce an exponential curve where the kinetic energy increases with altitude. The higher in altitude a molecules is the longer (greater radius of the sphere and transparent atmosphere) it is exposed to the energy of the sun and the greater the intensity of the energy of the sun striking the molecule.In order for the surface of the Earth to cool this blanket of molecules covering it (equal to 33 ft of water) must cool first and to do this it must radiate the energy absorbs during the day into space and to the cooler molecules lower in the atmosphere.
In a reply to Jerry (above) I used a thought experiment to show why I didn’t believe the kinetic energy of molecules in a solid, liquid, or gas with the same temperature were the same. He did not accept the experiment because it diid not conform to the expert opinions but I believe it is correct
Have a good day,
Herb.
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James McGinn
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Herb:
Liquid water is a poor insulation because the loose association between water molecules makes it an ideal medium for the absorption and transfer of heat between molecules by conduction.
JMcG:
Yes. Well stated. To be more precise the “loose association between water molecules” that underlies water’s high heat capacity (as well as many other anomalous features of H2O) that is associated with liquid water (and only liquid water [not gaseous water or ice]) is a consequence of the (comprehensively) inverse relationship between the H2O molecules polarity, which is the force underlying its hydrogen bonds (see Note below) and the fact that hydrogen bonds neutralize this polar force as a result of incidental symmetry, as explained in my video entitled Pauling’s Omission:
Pauling’s Omission: The Original Sin of the Natural Sciences
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIQSubWJeNg
(Note: It is important to realize that it is not fully accurate to state that it is “looseness” that allows for the conserved movement that is associated with liquid H2O’s high heat capacity. Instead, it is the inverse relationship between proximity and polarity taking place on the nano scale [closer = weaker; farther = stronger]. This is not to say that it would not appear to be loose. It will. But it is not accurate to say that the resulting conservation of energy is a result of the looseness. It is more accurate to say that the resulting conservation of energy is a result of the fact that the polar force re-emerges [increases] with distance between H2O molecules. It is extremely important to understand this distinction.)
This heretofore unknown aspect of H2O is the reason it has such a high heat capacity which itself is the basis of the observed greenhouse effect. The really funny thing is that not only does the operational nature of the so called “greenhouse gas effect” have nothing in common with the operational nature of a greenhouse but the chemical that is producing this effect, liquid H2O, isn’t a gas.
Herb:
Adding water droplets, in the form of clouds, does not increase the insulation of the atmosphere. In fact it does the opposite by adding molecules that can more efficiently transfer heat at a faster rate.
JMcG:
Yes. And it does this in a matter that is completely consistent with the laws of thermodynamics (hotter to cooler, etc.). The huge misconception (as you elude to so comprehensively here) is that temperature is proportional or even a proxy for heat capacity. This is plainly mistaken (as you are pointing out here).
Herb:
The reason cloudy nights are warmer than clear nights is because the water droplets in the clouds are conducting heat from the hotter molecules in the atmosphere to the surface of the Earth.
JMcG:
True, but keep in mind, this is radiation, not conduction.
Herb:
Meteorologist who report that reflection is the cause are just looking for any plausible excuse rather than looking for the cause.
JMcG:
Right. When it comes to the physics of the atmosphere, meteorology is a set of allegories barely more scientific than fairy tales. Climatology adopted its propaganda tactics from meteorology. Global warming is only the most obvious form of this propaganda. There is a lot more pseudoscience concealed within meteorology’s convection model of storms. Most people–including most AGW skeptics–are far too gullible to even notice it.
James McGinn / Solving Tornadoes
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