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The atmosphere is emphatically _not_ in equilibrium. Why would you think it was? There's a giant fusion engine pumping energy into it, resulting in a fuck of a
by koverstreet 9y ago
The atmosphere is emphatically _not_ in equilibrium. Why would you think it was? There's a giant fusion engine pumping energy into it, resulting in a fuck of a lot of activity (wind).
In particular, the upper atmosphere would not be colder than the lower if it was at equilibrium. Think about it.
- fenomas 9y agoI didn't say the system was closed. Why would you think I did? All I meant was that energy is free to flow around the atmosphere if it wants to; any macroscopic flow that wanted to occur would have occurred already. In other words, caves like the GP mentioned (presumably) connect two systems between which energy is not otherwise free to move. That is not the case for a tube connecting two different sections of the atmosphere. Make sense? > In particular, the upper atmosphere would not be colder than the lower if it was at equilibrium. Think about it. Temperature varies inversely with pressure for a volume of gas. If low- and high-atmosphere gas had the same temperature, despite being at different pressures, that would be an imbalance.