Ping Pong Ball Global Warming Experiment

See http://CoSy.com/views/warm.htm . ( originally posted 20071002 )

20090216 : A simple computer model of the Stefan-Boltzmann law is now at http://cosy.com/Science/TemperatureOfGrayBalls.htm showing that it is correct that isotropic shading drops out of the equation . I.e.: black and white balls will come to exactly the same temperature when radiantly heated in a vacuum .

The GW alarmists claim that minute changes in the reflectivity of the planet will make major changes in its mean temperature . I found no difference between a flat black painted and a natural white ping-pong ball and at most about 2c with a "chrome" painted ball . I also got a feeling for what a small change the at most 0.8c increase in temperature this century is . It's hard to get thermometer reading to be stable within less than ~ 0.2c . I'd really like to see this experiment done "professionally" in a vacuum , ( MythBusters ? ) and I'd really like to see the equations which predict exactly how much heating or cooling different paint jobs will produce . Despite the lifestyles of millions riding on this science , I have failed to find such basic equations anywhere on the web .

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• global
• warming
• physics
• experiment

[hozelda]

How well does lacquer mimic the atmosphere?

Air is a great insulator (ie, conduction is very weak). The lacquer coating, otoh, essentially extends the balls volume to the new surface. An atmosphere does not conduct heat as does lacquer.

Eg, windows that have two glass sheets with air in the middle (despite each face radiating) insulate much better than a thick slab of glass. You can observe a similar phenomenon with any form of insulation (good ones tend to be puffy material full of air).

[CoSyBob]

@hozelda Thanks for the serious questions . I believe CO2 absorbs its peak wavelengths within 100m of the ground directly conducting its heat to ( and at night - from ) the other molecules around it , Macro scale conduction is minimal , but convection can be tornadic . I have never seen any computation is the massive reduction in the diurnal variance in our temperature .

My crude experiment is in reaction to the lack of ANY by "climate scientists" .

The main point of my experiment

[hozelda]

@CoSyBob

1: What would you say is an experiment on climate? How do you think weather forecasts work if we didn't understand enough of the atmosphere and oceans? Experiments conducted in past are why we believe certain equations apply.

2: Doubling CO2 concentration should lower that 100m, perhaps to near 50m, do you agree? Would you agree as well that this will mean higher temps?

3: Can you clarify, "any computation is the massive reduction in the diurnal variance in our temperature"

[CoSyBob]

@hozelda 1 : It's a low tek experiment in 19th century physics . It should be done properly in a vacuum chamber with measured spectra

2 :. It's logarithmic -- Beer's law .

3 : Oops . should be "any computation of the ..." . Here at 2500m altitude the temperature commonly varies 20c overnight ; at sea level commonly less than half that . CO2 plays some role in transferring heat > < the rest of the atmosphere . This should be quantifiable .

[hozelda]

@CoSyBob

1: Can you clarify which 19th cent experiment and suggest how if such fundamentals in knowledge are lacking are we able to do weather forecasts?

2: logarithmic wrt (absorption * path length). Absorption varies directly with concentration. So 2X concentration should 2X absorption, implying 1/2X of path length would result in same effect. Now, it won't be 1/2 because CO2 is not the only ghg. I suppose maybe from 100 -> 80 or 90 or (?)

[CoSyBob]

@hozelda Sounds right . I want to nail down the equilibrium temperatures for any specific spectra before getting into analysis of translucent media . See my CoSy . com/views/warm.htm . I'm working on a more public essential physics page which isn't ready to mention yet . If you're a programmer , I'll be seeking translations of the algorithms to more common languages than the APL I think in .

[hozelda]

@CoSyBob

3: I agree that we should be able to quantify the transfer of heat to atmosphere (at least to first degree). I don't know enough to know if we have/haven't achieved those computations. [I've become fairly interested of late in just this question.]

[hozelda]

I will try to find time to look at the webpage you mentioned, but I want to mention a few things that came to mind.

Assuming all radiation from earth that can be caught by CO2 is caught already, the greenhouse effect is stronger if it is caught lower to the ground (as it would as concentrations increase). This is because back radiation will be greater.. essentially, more energy will be stored in the atmosphere at any given point in time.

Convection cools all the ping pong balls significantly.

[CoSyBob]

@mphello Never had the time to clean it up . This is just the last third of the video I recorded . But it gets across the essential point that however light or dark a radiantly heated gray ball does not effect its temperature . See cosy.com/views/warm.htm . And since CO2 is the building block of life , why lump it with all the other things , including human life itself , you hate ?

[mphello]

Terrible presentation. You haven't made clear your hypotheses, and what it is you are trying to prove. You make zero comment on how your experiment here relates to real-world large-scale systems.

Anyway, we still need radical laws to reduce CO2 emissions and to end torture: outlaw coal, meat, and human breeding (overpopulation).

Anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is still proven fact.