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Stop teaching unproven “Science” to students.
I am concerned that students of science at all levels of schooling are being taught that something
which amounts to nothing more than an unproven hypothesis is fact - which of course an unproven
hypothesis can never be !
I am talking about this nonsense taught to students about how trace gases in our atmosphere cause
the Earth to be hotter than it would otherwise be.
All of our atmosphere has mass and all gases absorb "heat" mostly through contact with the Earth's
surfaces - less than a couple of percent directly absorb infra-red radiation yet all change in
temperature every day in response to the "heat" absorbed by the surfaces irradiated by the Sun.
At http://www.atmos.washington.edu/2002Q4/211/notes_greenhouse.html - a University in the
USA we have the following diagrams presented.
How this can be taught as "science" is beyond me.
In the Earth "assuming no atmosphere" we have them teaching that the solar radiation is "spread"
out over the whole of Earth's surfaces to indicate the "heating" power and thus calculate the Earth's
temperature as minus 18 degrees C or ~255 K. This may well represent an approximation of the
Earth's radiation to space but it in no way resembles the actual heating power of the incident solar
radiation !
Evidence from the Moon disproves this absurd notion. Lunar temperatures during the day reach far
higher temperatures than Earth's surfaces do but the crucial factor is that the Moon cools from
these high temperatures at a rate of less than 1 degree C or 1 K per Earth hour.
Given what we know about temperature variations on Earth it is simply impossible to claim the
Earth's surfaces could cool to minus 18 degrees C in 12 Earth hours.
This claim of a 225 K "no atmosphere" temperature is simplistic incorrect nonsense and proven false
by the lunar orbiter observations !
But the second diagram is even more absurd because it explicitly claims the atmospheric radiation
has equal heating power to the incident solar radiation.
To make this claim is absurd beyond belief - not only is it trivial to prove false by using the solar
radiation to start fires but it defies the fundamental rules of thermodynamics !
I quote - http://web.mit.edu/16.unified/www/FALL/thermodynamics/notes/node37.html
The Clausius statement:"No process is possible whose sole result is the transfer of heat from a cooler to a hotter body."
The atmospheric radiation shown emanates from an object at a lower temperature and thus defies
the laws of thermodynamics.
Every explanation of how atmospheric radiation increases the surface temperature involves the
transfer of "heat" from cold to hot.
This concept was unequivocally shown to be false experimentally hundreds of years ago by a
scientist named Pictet.
Yet today's students are taught this transfer of heat from cold to hot is "settled science".
You no doubt will choose to reject these arguments as ill-informed but if there were conclusive
evidence of the radiation from a cooler atmosphere causing additional heating at the Earth's
surfaces where is the experimental evidence ?
Of course the atmosphere has mass and anything which has mass can absorb "heat" from something
which is warmer.
However, gases have a low radiating power and do not emit continuous spectra - unlike solids.
It is impossible to claim that less than a few percent of the atmosphere which emit line spectra can
even replace the electromagnetic radiation emitted as a continuous spectra from a hotter object let
alone cause an increase in temperature.
Even a cursory examination of Planck curves substantiates the nonsense of the claim of atmospheric
back radiation heating.
But as I said "Of course the atmosphere has mass and anything which has mass can absorb "heat"
from something which is warmer."
Professor Wood said it plainly more than a century ago as a summary of his experiments on
greenhouse heating through so called "radiation trapping" :"The solar rays penetrate the atmosphere, warm the ground which in turn warms the atmosphere by
contact and by convection currents. The heat received is thus stored up in the atmosphere, remaining
there on account of the very low radiating power of a gas. It seems to me very doubtful if the
atmosphere is warmed to any great extent by absorbing the radiation from the ground, even under
the most favourable conditions."
To believe otherwise in faced with experimental evidence and the classical thermodynamics of the
genius scientists who solved the mysteries of radiationis simply fanciful.
Again - I quote - http://web.mit.edu/16.unified/www/FALL/thermodynamics/notes/node37.html
The Clausius statement:"No process is possible whose sole result is the transfer of heat from a cooler to a hotter body."
Teach REAL science to our children !
Ross McLeod