ABSTRACT
John Tyndall was an Irish physicist and pioneer of climate science. Like Robert Angus Smith, Tyndall studied for a PhD in chemistry in Germany working under the supervision of the eponymous Robert Bunsen. In 1859, Tyndall proved that carbon dioxide, along with other gasses and water vapour, had a ‘greenhouse effect’ in the Earth’s atmosphere. These substances were shown to absorb heat, meaning that it was not just the Sun’s direct infrared radiation that warmed the planet. It has been said that, compared molecule with atom, the absorption of a molecule of vapour is 16,000 times that of air. Now the power to absorb and the power to radiate are perfectly reciprocal and proportionate. The atom of aqueous vapour will therefore radiate with 16,000 times the energy of an atom of air. Imagine then this powerful radiant in the presence of space and with no screen above it to check its radiation.
