This list server has proved invaluable to me already. Dave Bowman
gave generously of his time to explain more of the statistical mechanics
of photons than I have any right to expect to know. He is a thorough
scholar and a fine teacher. I wish to thank everyone for making the
list server possible and, in particular, those who responded to my
inquiry. I apologize for writing "reversible thermophysics" in the
postscript of my posting of June 11th when I meant to write
"IRreversible thermophysics".
Prof. Bowman has made it abundantly clear that I must learn the
methods of Prigogine and co-workers to determine how to write the Second
(and , perhaps, the First) Law of Thermodynamics for an irreversible
situation, such as the transfer of radiant energy from the sun at 6000 K
to the earth at 300 K. Also of interest is how to take into account the
creation of entropy in the earth's control volume, which is taken to
include the atmosphere but not the core of the earth. In zeroth-order
thermophysics (or thermostatics) the entropy creation term is the
*thermodynamic lost work*, cf., Smith and van Ness, divided by the
temperature of the surroundings, which is taken to be a *thermal
reservoir*, i.e., a large heat source or sink such that the quantity of
heat exchanged during the experiment does not affect its temperature,
which temperature is supposed to differ infinitesimally from the
temperature of the control volume. Obviously, this won't work in the
case of the earth, sun, and outer space.
I would not be embarrassed to receive instruction from anyone who is
familiar with Prigogine's formulation of the Second Law or, for that
matter, has any ideas whatever on the proper treatment of this
situation. I need to derive a reasonable approximation to the correct
Combined First and Second Laws statement whereby the two types of
availability are defined in the easy case.
Also, I am not sure how the solar constant is defined. Would anyone
who knows inform me? Is it heat? energy? availability? enthalpy? In
the meantime, I shall keep studying.