Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Keepongoing]

It keeps bugging me and I am not satified with what I have read.

I looked at this site, but am still not sure. I will explain what I think I understand. Please correct me if I am wrong.

The earths gravity holds our atmosphere in place. Our atmosphere is created and maintained by an ongoing exchange of fauna, water and the sun?

As we go higher in altitude things get much colder and then gets much hotter. The point where the atmosphere is the hottest is the point where our atmosphere comes to an end. Once we leave our atmosphere things are real cold again. So as you climb in altitude we leave what might be temperate weather and then go through extreme cold and then extreme heat.

When we enter the earths atmosphere; the intial extrance exposes us to extreme heat.


So, am I understanding all of this correctly? I know it is 6th grade science.

[Iago]

Its a bit more complicated than that.

Basically, as i understand it, as you get higher things get cooler because the air pressure decreases therefore cooler (plus less particles to absorb heat i think). Thats for the troposphere (where all the clouds and 'weather happens).

Then u get to the stratosphere and u get a rising temp with altitude. This is because its where the ozone layer is and ozone absorbs UV which is heat, therefore it gets warmer.

Then things cool again in the mesosphere as in the troposphere.

Then (as you pointed out) the outer layer of the atmosphere, the thermosphere, it starts getting really hot (extremely hot). This is because you have nitrogen and oxygen particles being directly bombarded with UV directly from the sun so they get really hot (think solar winds). (bare in mind that the particles are very sparse, so if you held a thermometer up there it would read very cold)

There isn't really an upper limit to the thermosphere so it just carries on into space. Now the reason why space is apparently so cold, is because the figures you will see are "average temperatures" of particles. Particles in the solar wind are EXTREMELY HOT but particles supposedly left around from the big bang are at about absolute zero. So if u get the average (especially further from a sun, when solar particles are less concentrated) the temp is bloody cold.

If you drew a line from earth to sun, you would really find a continuing increase in average temp from the thermosphere outward. I think haha.

I am no physicist, i am a geographer so i am not 100% on the space temps. google it maybe. I feel like such a geek now it is interesting tho.

Hope this helps. Odd question to put on Daves tho, why do you ask?

[Iago]

Actually the average temperate from outer thermosphere to sun may get colder cos of big bang particles lowering the average (these particles are not in the atmosphere so dont lower the average). But the solar wind (coming from sun) particles are still much hotter than thermosphere particles.

[Keepongoing]

Why do I ask? It is one of those things that I expect myself to know and understand and am very curious about. The question has been popping up in my mind for months now. I have read some stuff, but did not understand all of it. It is like history; when I was young it did not interest me, but now I am interested. Physics and astronomy have gained my interest.

[Iago]

Do i make sense?

I am confused now haha.

Post the explanation if u find a good one

[sojourner1]

It appears that substances such as particles and bodies of matter are heated by the sun, but empty space is not since there is nothing in empty space to absorb the suns energy.

[RACETRAITOR]