Do blankets warm you?
Believers of the Greenhouse Effect all use the same analogy to get you to believe in their junk science. The site Skeptical Science sets the standard in this article:
So have climate scientists made an elementary mistake? Of course not! The skeptic is ignoring the fact that the Earth is being warmed by the sun, which makes all the difference.
To see why, consider that blanket that keeps you warm. If your skin feels cold, wrapping yourself in a blanket can make you warmer. Why? Because your body is generating heat, and that heat is escaping from your body into the environment. When you wrap yourself in a blanket, the loss of heat is reduced, some is retained at the surface of your body, and you warm up. You get warmer because the heat that your body is generating cannot escape as fast as before.
— Link
And more:
To summarise: Heat from the sun warms the Earth, as heat from your body keeps you warm. The Earth loses heat to space, and your body loses heat to the environment. Greenhouse gases slow down the rate of heat-loss from the surface of the Earth, like a blanket that slows down the rate at which your body loses heat. The result is the same in both cases, the surface of the Earth, or of your body, gets warmer.
— Link
NASA reminds us that:
The greenhouse effect is the way in which heat is trapped close to the surface of the Earth by “greenhouse gases.” These heat-trapping gases can be thought of as a blanket wrapped around the Earth, which keeps it toastier than it would be without them.
— Link
You got that? Blankets warm you! Their logic is so sound that they couldn’t possibly be wrong, could they?
What empirical evidence do they provide for such an assertion? None!
Do they even attempt to predict what temperature a blanket could force? No!
Any such attempt would be very embarrassing for them, so instead they just leave it to the reader’s imagination.
First a note: there is no doubt that a blanket can make you warmer by blocking convection. The issue at hand is whether there is a warming due to radiative heat transfer, as is claimed for the greenhouse effect by analogy.
Let’s consider the case of a typical cotton blanket, whose emissivity ranges from 0.81 to 0.88 [Bellivieu 2019], depending on humidity. I will choose 0.85 for an average humidity condition; The exactness hardly matters. According to the verified program provided in my article The Dumbest Math Theory Ever, a blanket with an emissivity of 0.85 placed on a human being whose normal temperature is at 37°C, should produce a final skin temperature of …
$ ALB=0 TSI=2090.8 bash gheffect 0.85
Sec | Upwelling | Temp | GH Effect | Trapped | To Space
1 | 522.700 W | 36.701 C | 444.295 W | 222.148 W | 300.553 W
2 | 744.848 W | 65.389 C | 410.973 W | 94.413 W | 428.287 W
3 | 839.260 W | 75.642 C | 396.811 W | 40.125 W | 482.575 W
4 | 879.386 W | 79.738 C | 390.792 W | 17.053 W | 505.647 W
5 | 896.439 W | 81.436 C | 388.234 W | 7.248 W | 515.452 W
6 | 903.687 W | 82.151 C | 387.147 W | 3.080 W | 519.620 W
7 | 906.767 W | 82.453 C | 386.685 W | 1.309 W | 521.391 W
8 | 908.076 W | 82.582 C | 386.489 W | 0.556 W | 522.144 W
9 | 908.632 W | 82.636 C | 386.405 W | 0.236 W | 522.464 W
10 | 908.869 W | 82.659 C | 386.370 W | 0.100 W | 522.600 W
11 | 908.969 W | 82.669 C | 386.355 W | 0.043 W | 522.657 W
12 | 909.012 W | 82.673 C | 386.348 W | 0.018 W | 522.682 W
13 | 909.030 W | 82.675 C | 386.345 W | 0.008 W | 522.692 W
14 | 909.038 W | 82.676 C | 386.344 W | 0.003 W | 522.697 W
15 | 909.041 W | 82.676 C | 386.344 W | 0.001 W | 522.699 W
16 | 909.042 W | 82.676 C | 386.344 W | 0.001 W | 522.699 W
17 | 909.043 W | 82.676 C | 386.344 W | 0.000 W | 522.700 W82.6°C ! Really hot!
Note that I set the albedo to zero. This is because I figure any scattering of photons between human and blanket will find its path back to the human (and thus “should” cause warming), with very little leakage at the edges of the blanket. But let us be as generous as possible to climate alarmists and say the blanket has an albedo of 0.22 (The highest value found for cotton in scientific literature: Source 1, Source 2). What then?
$ ALB=0.22 TSI=2090.8 bash gheffect 0.85
Sec | Upwelling | Temp | GH Effect | Trapped | To Space
1 | 407.706 W | 18.040 C | 346.550 W | 173.275 W | 234.431 W
2 | 580.981 W | 44.999 C | 320.559 W | 73.642 W | 334.064 W
3 | 654.623 W | 54.635 C | 309.513 W | 31.298 W | 376.408 W
4 | 685.921 W | 58.484 C | 304.818 W | 13.302 W | 394.404 W
5 | 699.222 W | 60.081 C | 302.823 W | 5.653 W | 402.053 W
6 | 704.875 W | 60.752 C | 301.975 W | 2.403 W | 405.303 W
7 | 707.278 W | 61.036 C | 301.614 W | 1.021 W | 406.685 W
8 | 708.299 W | 61.157 C | 301.461 W | 0.434 W | 407.272 W
9 | 708.733 W | 61.208 C | 301.396 W | 0.184 W | 407.522 W
10 | 708.918 W | 61.230 C | 301.368 W | 0.078 W | 407.628 W
11 | 708.996 W | 61.239 C | 301.357 W | 0.033 W | 407.673 W
12 | 709.029 W | 61.243 C | 301.352 W | 0.014 W | 407.692 W
13 | 709.043 W | 61.245 C | 301.349 W | 0.006 W | 407.700 W
14 | 709.049 W | 61.245 C | 301.349 W | 0.003 W | 407.703 W
15 | 709.052 W | 61.246 C | 301.348 W | 0.001 W | 407.705 W
16 | 709.053 W | 61.246 C | 301.348 W | 0.000 W | 407.706 W
17 | 709.054 W | 61.246 C | 301.348 W | 0.000 W | 407.706 W
61.2°C ! Still very hot.
OK, I’m now going to be extremely generous, and use an emissivity value of 0.5, which is not even scientifically justifiable, but let’s give the alarmists a huge advantage. What then?
$ ALB=0.22 TSI=2090.8 bash gheffect 0.5
Sec | Upwelling | Temp | GH Effect | Trapped | To Space
1 | 407.706 W | 18.040 C | 203.853 W | 101.927 W | 305.780 W
2 | 509.633 W | 34.746 C | 152.890 W | 25.482 W | 382.224 W
3 | 535.114 W | 38.525 C | 140.149 W | 6.370 W | 401.336 W
4 | 541.485 W | 39.448 C | 136.964 W | 1.593 W | 406.113 W
5 | 543.077 W | 39.678 C | 136.167 W | 0.398 W | 407.308 W
6 | 543.475 W | 39.735 C | 135.968 W | 0.100 W | 407.606 W
7 | 543.575 W | 39.750 C | 135.919 W | 0.025 W | 407.681 W
8 | 543.600 W | 39.753 C | 135.906 W | 0.006 W | 407.700 W
9 | 543.606 W | 39.754 C | 135.903 W | 0.002 W | 407.704 W
10 | 543.607 W | 39.754 C | 135.902 W | 0.000 W | 407.706 W
11 | 543.608 W | 39.754 C | 135.902 W | 0.000 W | 407.706 W
Now we get only 39.8°C, for a total warm up of 2.8°C – by a blanket that can only be heated by the human, and starts off colder (or same) as the human.
So is there any evidence to support the heating of human skin by a passively heated blanket via backradiation ?
However, if a cotton blanket heated to 90°C is in contact with skin the patient does not experience the same tissue injuries, because the blanket has less than one third the specific heat of skin. In addition, the blanket has less than 1/1000 the density of skin (the density of a blanket is about 1 kg/m³ because it is roughly half cotton and half air.) The blanket can give up all of its heat to the skin yet raise the temperature no more than 1/80th of the 70°C temperature difference, or about 1°C.
This scientist rightfully does not acknowledge warming by radiative effect. The blanket must be theoretically warmed to 90°C to achieve a rise of about 1°C. A table of empirical results is also provided in [House 2011]:
| Body Part | Unheated Blankets | Blankets Warmed to 43.3°C | Blankets Warmed to 65.6°C |
| Abdomen | 0.17°C | 1.11°C | 2.39°C |
| Lower Legs | 0.33°C | 0.89°C | 1.11°C |
Though there is obviously a tiny amount of warming due to blocking convection, we don’t see any warming as predicted by GH effect radiative heat transfer theory. We should’ve seen a very generous 2.8°C warming as predicted by such a theory in the column Unheated Blankets. We don’t even see such a high number with blankets externally heated to 65.6°C !
Now we move onto [Kabbara 2002]. In this paper we see how expensive equipment can be used to maintain a patient’s temperature. Figure 6 shows how externally heated air prevents a patient’s temperature from falling. But one may ask: What is the purpose of this expensive equipment when climate “scientists” already know that a non-externally heated blanket should raise skin temperature by at least the very generous 2.8°C?
Would you trust these climate “scientists” with your health? Do you think they really believe what they claim?
And now we move onto: US Patent – US6078026A
The blanket A has a maximum power draw of 6.5 amps. With fully charged batteries, the blanket will reach its target temperature (i.e. 100 degrees Fahrenheit or 38 degrees Celsius) approximately 5 minutes and will remain heated for five to eight hours.
An external power source to raise T to 38°C?
Why need external power or even a patent when a simple blanket ought to do the trick?
Please do not object to this article because I based this off a normal temperature of 37°C. Even a hypothermic temperature of 33°C should be raised by 2.72°C, IF the GH effect blanket analogy held any merit.
A search on google scholar for “hospital blankets temperature” should convince anyone with integrity that blankets don’t raise your skin temperature in accordance to radiative transfer theory. For if they did, most of the discussion and science in that search would be moot: human-only heated blankets would solve the problems and special technology would not be necessary.
Skeptical Science finishes off their article:
So global warming does not violate the second law of thermodynamics. And if someone tells you otherwise, just remember that you’re a warm human being, and certainly nobody’s dummy.
— Link
I’ll translate that for you: If you believe their sophistry, you are a dummy!
While using poetic license it is alright to say that blankets warm you, but using actual science, it is not correct. The best a blanket can do is keep you warm, but never make you warmer.
Enjoy 🙂 -Zoe
Addendum
Blanket(s) can suppress your perspiration and make you sick from your own urea, thus causing your temperature to go up. However, this could never be a proper analogy for the greenhouse effect.
Read more at phzoe.com
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Richard Wakefield
| #
The blanket advocates are wrong for a very simple reason. Blankets (all insulation) retard convection by having layers of air. The atmosphere is not layers of isolated air pockets. CO2 cannot prevent convection.
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Richard
| #
In Africa they wear wool blankets to keep themselves cool.
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Charles Higley
| #
They wear multiple dark layers in the desert, as the energy absorbed by the surface layers cause convection up and through the lower layers, creating an moderate air conditioning. Otherwise a single white layer, a la Lawrence of Arabia, is good as the white reflects much of the light and evaporative cooling does the rest.
All that having a blanket does is to suppress convection and yields the temperature gradient, between skin and the outside, longer and not changed at all. Thus the temperature of the middle of the range that we might feel is cold is now farther from the skin. The rate of heat loss to the environment must stay the same once the system has stabilized and having the blanket on longer will not make one warmer.
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Charles Higley
| #
It should be pointed out that any radiation from the blanket back to the skin simply cannot heat the skin, as the blanket is always cooler than the skin and thus the energy levels in the skin equivalent to the blanket’s back IR radiation are full and will be reflected rather than absorbed.
This is why heating of the earth by greenhouse gases simply does not work, with the upper tropical troposphere at -17 deg C and the surface at 15 deg C. Furthermore, do not forget that the models do not do night-time and these radiative gases (their actual name) serve to cool the atmosphere at night, rather than the assumption that they serve to keep the Earth warm at night. Lacking solar input, these gases convert kinetic energy to IR and radiate it in all directions, with that sent downward reflected back up and lost to space. This is why the air cools so quickly after sundown and little breezes kick up so quickly in the moving shadows of scudding clouds on a sunny day.
They also like to ignore the fact that CO2 has very specific IR frequencies and the only one that fits in the real world is the one equivalent to -80 deg C, which means that CO2’s goal in life is to shed energy and bring the world down to -80 deg C.
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Al Shelton
| #
Right… A blanket is a solid and the atmosphere is a gas.
Is it not true that gasses expand and rise when heated?
We all know that the atmospheric gasses rise when heated, so I say that the atmospheric gases act as coolants. No??
Also, if 0.04% CO2 van slow down heat, then why not put 100% CO2 in our all-weather windows, and insulation in our houses?
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Zoe Phin
| #
Mainstream climate scientists believe that the kilometers thickness of sparse radiative gases can be compressed into a radiative blocking solid, like so:
X….
..X..
….X
=
XXX
That is what their conception shows:
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/5c/7c/ce/5c7cced4ecee96520a07b276ac4f6a93.png
Why else would they use a blanket analogy?
Since a solid doesn’t produce the results they claim, neither would tearing this solid up into little pieces and suspending it 3 dimensional space.
And thus neither would a gas.
Yes, gases are coolants, but they are still thermal masses, and thus carry away the energy they got from more dense solid liquids.
That’s why I know gases don’t heat the surface, but … increasing CO2 will increase temperature at 2 meters above the surface, but only by a pitiful amount. That’s not the GH effect.
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Zoe Phin
| #
Corrections:
suspending it IN 3 dimensional space.
they got from more dense solids OR liquids.
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geran
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Dr. Spencer has actually indicated that putting on a sweater is an example of “cold” warming “hot”.
Meaning, in is incompetent knowledge of thermodynamics, that it’s okay to violate 2nd Law.
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Zoe Phin
| #
Cold is king. It forces Hot to get hotter, to maintain equal heat flow from hot to cold to the “coldness” of space.
Conservation of Energy is old and outdated.
Conservation of Heat Flow is the new Conservation of Energy.
Greenhouse Effect is the Das Kapital of Economics. Both are miindless drivel aimed to get an emotional response.
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Carl
| #
“Believers of the Greenhouse Effect all use the same analogy to get you to believe in their junk science.” The “analogy” that is the subject of your article is the blanket.
You realize, of course, that the “Greenhouse Effect” is itself an analogy. So they are using an analogy to “prove” the accuracy of second analogy neither of which mimics the thermodynamic workings of the atmosphere. While both a greenhouse and a blanket inhibit heat loss by conduction (the atmosphere does not) there is another significant difference between the thermodynamics of a greenhouse and a blanket.
It all started in the 19th century when scientists were contemplating the question, “When the Sun is shining why is the air inside of a greenhouse warmer than the air on the outside?” It turns out that the answer is the simple fact that there is a large differential between the volume and mass of the air inside of a greenhouse compared to the air outside of a greenhouse per square meter of ground surface area (square meter of sunlight)—much less inside, much more outside. Since there is less air inside of a greenhouse than there is outside of a greenhouse per square meter of ground surface area, naturally the smaller volume and mass of air inside of the greenhouse heats up more rapidly and attains a higher temperature than the air outside of the greenhouse when the Sun is shining.
This is the very same reason why if you put two pots of water on the stove at the same time the pot with only one quart of water will heat up faster and come to a boil sooner than the pot with one gallon of water in it. “Volume” and “mass” are called “extensive” properties of a thermodynamic system and determine the rate at which the temperature of that thermodynamic system will increase given a constant input of heat (Q). The larger the volume and mass of the thermodynamic system the slower the temperature will increase under the same input of heat (Q). It’s no more complicated than that.
For some reason these 19th century scientists ignored the volume and mass differential between the air inside of a greenhouse vs. the air outside of a greenhouse and imagined that something else was happening. They imagined that the glass ceiling of a greenhouse acts like a one-way electro-magnetic radiation valve of sorts in that it allows short wave, visible Solar radiation into the greenhouse but blocks the exit of long wave infrared (IR) radiation and therefore “traps” IR radiation inside of the greenhouse. They then imagined that it is this “trapped” IR radiation that heats up the air inside of the greenhouse faster and higher than the air on the outside of the greenhouse, completely ignoring of course the large volume and mass differential between the two thermodynamic systems in play: 1) the air inside of the greenhouse and 2) the air outside of the greenhouse.
Those paying attention know that the 19th century version of the “greenhouse effect” hypothesis in which IR radiation is “trapped” within a greenhouse by its glass ceiling was “falsified” by subsequent scientific experimentation on actual greenhouses that demonstrate that the transparency (or lack thereof) of a greenhouse’s glass ceiling to IR radiation has little or no effect on the interior temperatures seen within greenhouses. Rather one regulates the temperature of a greenhouse by simply varying the greenhouse’s ventilation—increasing or decreasing the volume and mass of air flowing through the greenhouse.
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Zoe Phin
| #
“You realize, of course, that”
You realized, of course, that I have to take their analogy literally for my reductio ad absurdum to work.
Thank you, Carl. I wholeheartedly agree with everything you said.
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Jerry Krause
| #
Hi Carl,
Long time no read. I comment here to ask you to look at Zoe’s companion article. You are correct here there is a ‘magnitude’ problem when comparing the limited matter and other factors house interior with the ‘open’ natural environment. I would like you to respond to my comment (s) over at Zoe’s companion article.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Herb Rose
| #
Hi Zoe,
The sun heats both the Earth and the atmosphere. The belief that because the nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere do not absorb visible light they do not absorb radiated energy from the sun is nonsense. All objects absorb radiated energy according to the the laws of thermodynamics. The gases in the atmosphere act as a blanket keeping the Earth cool by holding energy and allowing it to radiate energy back into space. If it was not for the insulation provided by the atmosphere the Earth would have the same temperature characteristics as the moon. The greater the altitude the greater the kinetic energy of the molecules. Use the universal gas law to compare energy at altitudes. P is not atmospheric pressure but gravity that confines the gasses and resist expansion.
Herb
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Carl
| #
In this ongoing discussion of why the average atmospheric temperature about 1.5 meters above the ground and ocean surface is around 15°C instead of -18°C, comparisons to the moon’s surface temperature have always been a red herring, because they are imaginary, while actual science is based on objective facts in the physical world.
To begin the comparison one has to imagine that the Earth has no atmosphere and then one has to imagine that the only thermodynamic effect that the atmosphere has on the ground and ocean surface is that it inhibits the emission of IR radiation directly out into space. That would be an imaginary planet and an imaginary atmosphere that only exist in the imagination of the person making the comparison. This is called a “thought experiment” and “thought experiments” cannot be tested scientifically because independent scientists cannot gather objective data on an things that only exist in someone’s imagination.
Some people favor the “thought experiment” over real science because they themselves control the outcome–the outcome is whatever they imagine it to be. Also, it spares them the expense, time and work of gathering actual data in the physical world and as a bonus they are always right! “I imagine that there is life in the Andromeda Galaxy. Prove me wrong.” “I imagine that there is no biological life in the Andromeda Galaxy. Prove me wrong.”
That being said, not all “thought experiments” are inexpensive nor non-consequential.
The “thought experiment” that I mentioned in a prior post–the “greenhouse effect” hypothesis–has been programmed into expensive computer models whose output shows that a doubling of carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere might cause 2-6°C of global warming and further “thought experiments” that are based on that “thought experiment” suggest that this could be an existential threat to biological life on planet Earth.
Not realizing that this conclusion is based solely on a series of “thought experiments” rather than on actual science, certain political leaders are in a panic. “The world is going to end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change,” says one particular political leader. Based on this series of “thought experiments” an entire political party in the United States has as its goal “to eliminating carbon pollution from power plants by 2035,” which would turn the entire country into California with its rolling black-outs and lead to mass starvation because all of our food is grown, processed and shipped using carbon based fuels.
What they mean, of course, is “carbon dioxide pollution” and carbon dioxide far from being a threat to biological life just happens to be its foundational building block!
This is just one danger that “thought experimentation” poses to humanity. The COVID-19 panic was based on another computer based “thought experiment” that suggested that millions of people would might die in the United States from the disease “if nothing were done.” Again in a panic, many political leaders told everybody to “stay home and stay safe”, essentially putting healthy people in quarantine for the first time in human history. The immediate consequence of this “thought experiment” based public policy was to put millions of people out of work and hundreds of thousands of businesses out of business.
Would that those who claim to practice science would practice actual science.
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Jerry Krause
| #
Hi PSI Readers, PSI Authors, and PSI Commentators,
There you have it simply and clearly stated by Carl as to why though experiments and the resulting arguments are NOT SCIENCE
Only each of you can answer the question: Are you a Scientist according Carl’s description of what a Scientist is NOT.
Have a good day, Jerry
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Zoe Phin
| #
“If it was not for the insulation provided by the atmosphere the Earth would have the same temperature characteristics as the moon.”
Non-sequitur. The moon’s surface only gets ~105K from its internal energy, while Earth gets something like ~277K.
“The greater the altitude the greater the kinetic energy of the molecules.”
So what? Bulk matters. A few super fast moving molecules can pierce through your body and still leave you cold. ISS is located in the thermosphere. Does its skin get to 600C? No!
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Herb Rose
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The reason the moon has less geothermal energy is because it has been radiating energy from the dark side for billions of years while the Earth has been unable to lose the solar energy gained during the day because of the atmosphere.
If you dig into the Earth anywhere, even on the equator, the temperature will decrease as the solar energy absorbed decreases. It will reach an equilibrium point where it then increases because of geothermal energy. In order for it to lose energy by radiating energy into space the solar heated material must cool so the convection from that material does not block the convection from the interior allowing to reach the surface.
We are talking radiating heat into space not collisions with fast moving molecules. In the upper atmosphere radiation is the primary means of heat loss, there’re few collisions. Bulk matters because the energy is distributed to a greater number of molecules.
The ISS has air conditioning to prevent it from overheating. When a Skylab solar panel did not fully deploy they needed to put a covering up to shade it and prevent overheating.
Herb.
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Zoe Phin
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“The reason the moon has less geothermal energy ”
Is because it was MADE with less matter and energy to begin with.
Why would you assume Earth and Moon were made the same and/or at the same time?
“The ISS has air conditioning to prevent it from overheating.”
Yeah from the max temperature of 121C directly from insolation, not the 600C hypothesized for the thermosphere.
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Herb Rose
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So Zoe you think the moon formed first and its core cooled for a time before the Earth formed?
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Zoe Phin
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I can’t tell you what was made first. Radio-dating rocks shows similar age, but that could mean both Earth and Moon were sprinkled by the same supernova. I don’t know, and neither do you.
What I really think is:
The moon was MADE with less matter and energy to begin with.
TL Winslow
| #
[[The reason the moon has less geothermal energy is because it has been radiating energy from the dark side for billions of years while the Earth has been unable to lose the solar energy gained during the day because of the atmosphere.]]
ROTFL.
“The far side of the Moon is the hemisphere of the Moon that always faces away from Earth. The far side’s terrain is rugged with a multitude of impact craters and relatively few flat lunar maria compared to the near side. It has one of the largest craters in the Solar System, the South Pole–Aitken basin. Both sides of the Moon experience two weeks of sunlight followed by two weeks of night; even so, the far side is sometimes called the “dark side of the Moon”, where “dark” is used to mean unseen rather than lacking sunlight.” – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Far_side_of_the_Moon
If I was keeping a list of the crackpot statements of HR, this would be about number 99. 🙂 Too bad he seems to be PR’s #1 physicist 🙂
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Herb Rose
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The dark side of the moon is the side not lit by sunlight which radiates energy into space. Is Pink Floyd one of your sources for physics?
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Michael Clarke
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Hi Zoe,
Loved your essay.
Here is something you may be able to check out.
Moon, smaller but also very very hot 4.5 billion years or so ago.
Earth larger also very very hot 4.5 billion years ago.
Both begin to cool because energy from the sun cannot keep them that hot.
Some time later the Earth obtains/ holds on to an atmosphere while the Moon being smaller cannot.
Rate of cooling of the moon continues as before.
Rate of cooling of the earth slows down.
Fast forward a few billion years and arrive at the current situation.
Cold Moon, hot Earth.
Michael Logician
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Zoe Phin
| #
I don’t think the atmosphere makes anything warmer. I think the thickness of the atmosphere is determined by:
geothermal + solar + availability of gas molecules
If I could snap my fingers and make the atmosphere disappear … the surface of the Earth would get much HOTTER, and another atmosphere would “evaporate” from land and especially oceans … until balance was restored.
The atmosphere is not a magic halo that hovers over the surface. It’s only there because surface energy creates atmospheric pressure. Less energy -> less atmosphere. Never vice versa.
That’s where I stand.
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Herb Rose
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Zoe,
If you have two sources of heat radiating energy there will be an equilibrium point between them where the energy from one source equals the energy from the other source. If you move towards either source the energy/heat will increase. There is nowhere where the energies add creating a hotter area between the sources.
The equilibrium point between the energy radiated by the sun and the Earth’s core is in the Earth’s crust. The energy radiated from the Earth at night is the solar energy absorbed during the day not geothermal energy. The only time the Earth radiates any geothermal energy is when a volcano erupts or another hot spot exists and the local equilibrium point shifts out of the crust and into the atmosphere.
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Zoe Phin
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“The energy radiated from the Earth at night is the solar energy absorbed during the day not geothermal energy.”
There’s a missing gap you haven’t filled. I explain here:
http://phzoe.com/2020/02/25/deducing-geothermal/
P.S. you can add shortwave radiation to a conductively heated object that would normally radiate longwave – to make it warmer. This is exactly what happens!
At the surface, Geothermal delivers a world average of ~4 degrees Celcius. Add ~165 W/m^2 of solar radiation and you get 15 degrees C + latent and sensible heat.
The fact that there is a point about 5km above the surface where incoming geothermal and incoming solar match is completely irrelevant to the surface temperature.
Brian James
| #
September 1, 2020 Europe’s largest Solar Telescope GREGOR unveils magnetic details of the Sun
The Sun is our star and has a profound influence on our planet, life, and civilization. By studying the magnetism on the Sun, we can understand its influence on Earth and minimize damage of satellites and technological infrastructure. The GREGOR telescope allows scientists to resolve details as small as 50 km on the Sun, which is a tiny fraction of the solar diameter of 1.4 million km. This is as if one saw a needle on a soccer field perfectly sharp from a distance of one kilometer.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/09/200901112205.htm
Sep 16, 2020 Cycle 25, Mass Animal Deaths, Diamond Planet | S0 News
Daily Sun, Earth and Science News
https://youtu.be/JOq485LofE4
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lifeisthermal
| #
” there is no doubt that a blanket can make you warmer by blocking convection”
True, but more generally it reduces the amount of heat absorbed, and transferred, to cold surroundings. The aim of insulation is to reduce the absorption of heat in cold surroundings, GHGs enhance heat absorption.
“Heat flow is an inevitable consequence of contact between objects of different temperature. Thermal insulation provides a region of insulation in which thermal conduction is reduced or thermal radiation is reflected rather than absorbed by the lower-temperature body.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_insulation
Heat absorption is the thing that must be minimized to retain heat. GHGs does the opposite. If any gases are “greenhouse gases”, it would be those that doesn´t absorb the surface IR-radiation. They insulate.
Cooling of engines is based on heat absorption in air, directly or via water. It´s amazingly stupid that the GHE uses the same principle for warming of the Earth surface. The atmosphere and the oceans are cooling systems for the planet, without them Earth would be warmer. They are both bodies at much lower temperature than the surface, which means that they reduce the average temperature of the system.
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Max Polo
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Despite all that, guys at Exxon Mobil are investing to capture CO2 from the atmosphere. Even funnier is how they call this technology :https://lnkd.in/deDqP2T.
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Joel Walbert
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Or more simply in my opinion, something that is around 0.04% and is absolutely vital for plant life is not and cannot be problematic. The gloBULL warning cult is nothing but a Death Kult. Warmth is life, cold is death
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T. C. Clark
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Early explorers noted Eskimos wore clothing of animal skins that was loosely fitted around the body but tight at the wrists ankles and neck….apparently air is a good insulator. I just wear layered clothing to meet freezing temps. I believe the moon receives just as much radiation from the sun as earth overall.
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TL Winslow
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Want a laugh? Greenhouses don’t even have to have glass. It’s called a polytunnel.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polytunnel
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