Askolnick,
umm, I hate to break it to you, and Einstein would have told you something similar, but, Einstein was wrong.
As far as your silly microwave example, we are talking about black bodies right?? Exactly where in the theory is there any mention of black bodies being self powered?? Where in the microwave emitter do you see the equation absorptivity equals emissivity?? A black body emits a range of radiation. Microwaves emit a very narrow range under a powerful and specific stimulus and temperatures much higher than a blackbody could. Does even the sun emit enough microwave radiation from such a small area to heat the needle??
How many photons normally come from an emitter the size of the microwave’s, that is at the correct temperature to create the microwave radiation like a blackbody, in two minutes? How many photons come from the microwave oven’s emitter in two minutes? You are a silly person. No, I do not need the exact number as we both know that materials, undriven will NOT emit enough radiation at that wavelength to warm your wet nailpolish. Next you will be trying to tell us that the earth and its atmosphere operates like a CO2 laser.
The issue is energy density. Atmospheric CO2 has little energy density. If you concentrated the energy from a large area onto one square inch of the earth THEN you would get a microwave like situation and could heat that small area to a higher temp. Using a magnifying glass to concentrate the sun’s rays would be similar. Of course, this means that there is NO, or less, energy going to the areas from which the energy was taken. In other words a passive system will never exceed the density of the driving system over the same area. The average temp will still be the same. Since over half the IR is not going toward the ground you are then stuck with the fact that the passive emitters do not even have half of the energy density of the driver to heat the driver. You must also consider that most of the energy is going to heat the non-ghg gasses through collisions in the atmosphere so you have very little energy density.
Oh, and one little point. If CO2 acts similar to a microwave, exactly why can’t it emit all the heat that is supposed to stack up in the upper troposphere to cause that nasty heating up of the earth?? If it can’t be emitted then you have just proven that Claes is more correct than you are. If it can be emitted I think you just disproved AGW.
