Author: LorentzLorentz Date: Feb 26, 2008 10:44
On Feb 25, 1:13 pm, "Perplexed in Peoria" Unlike your ideas, which
> assume a cycle once a day or so, Muller thinks that
> the relevant cycles were more like once a minute or
> so. You get a thermal cycle this fast if you are a molecule
> which is circulating in a convection cell.
Or a molecule in subject to waves and turbulence in the ocean.
The wind causes surface waves of high coherence on the top of the
ocean. The waves cycle the water up and down at about the rate he is
talking about.Waves are highly periodic (cycles?). The temperature
goes down with depth, slightly. So there is your thermal cycling.
Incidently, the wave cycle also varies the uv and visible light from
the sun. So there is Tom's uv cycle, but on a much faster rate than a
24 hour day.
Turbulence cycles chaotically. No, not like a meteorite. Real
chaos. The Richardson number is rather low in the top layers of the
ocean, so the energy decoheres quickly.. The surface waves shed vortex
eddies of shorter diameter and higher frequency. These eddies create
"cycling" at an even faster rate than the original surface waves
themselves. However, the eddies are out of phase. So these
quasiperiodic motions are not easily characterized by one narrow band ...
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