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David – I think the least Zagoni could do for us is as follows:(1) Explain why neither Slides 68 or 69 explicitly state clear sky and all sky global means are being dealt with (respectively) as Nick has suggested is the case (and I concur seems the most likely interpretation).(2) Confirm he is indeed referring to a global clear sky mean when he shows a slide (Slide 68) claiming the S_T = 90.7 W/m^2 and then explain why he simultaneously claims in the very same slide that K&T97 (known clear sky S_T ~100 W/m^2) is in error by 22.5 W/m^2!(3) Identify which peer reviewed publication the interpretation given in Slide 70 claiming the Miskolczi HARTCODE interpretation of the NOAA 60 year average gives S_T = 60.9 W/m^2 appears when the AGW consensus is for a global all sky S_T of ~40 W/m^2 even as recently as F,T&K08 (which reviews/summarizes the finding of other radiative codes).I'm sorry David but I have absolutely no idea where you get your inference that Ta is unmeasurable? If you look carefully at the literature plenty of people have measured directly and attempted to estimate global means for B and S_T. F,T&K08 list most of those studies, published over more than a decade up to mide 2007. It is easy to find more from the last two years.The bottom line is that Miskolczi is saying there is a 'magic tau' of magnitude 1.87. He has consistently got this by using a B anywhere from about 396 down to about 380 W/m^2 yet somehow the S_T values he gets at the same time always stays in the range of about 63 down to 58.5 W/m^2, resulting in a tau in the range 1.84 – 1.87 (say).To accept Miskolczi Theory as viable we need to be technically very clear on why there is always this discrepancy where the Miskolczi S_T is always significantly greater by about 20 – 25 W/m^2 than the accepted literature range of values – from numerous studies – most using good radiative codes and putting great effort into correctly weighting the land and oceanic all sky values in order to derive a global mean.We also need to understand why the Miskolczi S_T always appears to be much closer to the accepted literature range of values for net LW up i.e. the sum of S_T and that LW IR emitted upwards by clouds. Sheer coincidence? I would hope so.This is no different from scientific processes I have been involved myself a number of times. To resolve why one one or more studies get one or more critical parameter values significantly different from most other studies, a process is entered into whereby those who are getting the significantly different values have to demonstrate why that should be so. If their explanation proves good enough, and is verified/validated it usually results in a shift in the accepted values. This is just part of the normal processes of the advancement of scientific knowledge.Presently this is not the case with Miskolczi. He wants us (as non-experts in this field) to unquestioningly accept a tau (Ta if you will) significantly different from that found by at least a dozen other studies published in the peer-reviewed literature over more than a decade, without explanation and to then move, without further discussion, from that on to A_A = E_D, f = 2/3 etc., etc. Tell me how is this superior to IPCC?

I am glad to see you guys are still trying to make sense of Miskolczi theory. I haven't had time to follow much of this recently, so I can't comment on the St cloud vs clear sky issue. Some time ago Ferenc ran a test where he added water vapour in two layers to determine the effect on the fluxes and optical depths. I had remarked that I didn't understand the results. I wonder if one of you clever scientists can help me with this. The results are shown on this pdf:http://members.shaw.ca/sch25/Ken/h2o.pdfPlease look at page 4 which show the OLR. This makes sense to me. Added water vapour near the surface has almost no effect on OLR as this layer it saturated. It just reduced the mean free path of the photons. But adding water vapour to the upper layer has a large effect as it can absorb photons that otherwise would have escaped to space. I consider the base case as at equilibrium, where OLR = Fo. The graph shows the initial, almost instantaneous response of the radiation field, but before temperatures can respond, so Su is unchanged. The difference between the new and base OLR is the forcing, which will slowly cause temperatures to increase until it reaches base OLR. This agrees with the IPCC statement that the largest feedback occurs in the upper troposphere.Now look at page 1 which shows the optical depth. Adding water vapour to the upper troposphere has little effect on optical depth.I think the graphs should satisfy the equation:OLR = (Su x 2)/(1 + tau + exp(-tau))I think this should hold all time, but of course Su=3OLR/2 only holds at long run equilibrium.Please see my spreadsheet:http://members.shaw.ca/sch25/Ken/Test.xlsColumn O shows my calculated OLR based on the reported transmittance. It does not match the reported OLR in column D. Why not?I expected the change in optical depth to be greatest in the upper layer, where OLR changes.

Hi KenSo far I can't find any math error in your Excel spreadsheet. I was a little puzzled why you had Ta (Column H) entered as a many digit number rather than as the formula =En/Gn but other than that your spreadsheet looks fine.If OLR = (Su x 2)/(1 + tau + exp(-tau)) holds all the time then the results are as you find i.e. increasing water vapor in the lower troposphere decreases OLR as one might expect and this doesn't match M's predicted decreasing tau (as you show in Column D).Your spreadsheet suggests the problem lies somehow with tau [=-ln(Gn/En)] and hence with the data in Column G (S_T) or Column E (S-U). The suggestion that S_U remains constant is therefore not sustainable I think. Interestingly this leads us right back to my observation that Miskolczi's S_T clearly covaries with B (see above), e.g. as in Zagoni's Slide 61 viz:”The bottom line is that Miskolczi is saying there is a 'magic tau' of magnitude 1.87. He has consistently got this by using a B anywhere from about 396 down to about 380 W/m^2 yet somehow the S_T values he gets at the same time always stays in the range of about 63 down to 58.5 W/m^2, resulting in a tau in the range 1.84 – 1.87 (say).”

Columns C thru I are HARTCODE outputs copied from the H2O.dat file. So Ta, the transmittance, is from HARTCODE. Its value is equal to St/Su, as verified in cell H6, which gives the identical value as HARTCODE output for Ta.In this test, by intent, the fluxes are those immediately resulting from adding the water vapour to each layer but before allowing any time for temperatures and Su to change, so Su is the same in all cases. I don't think we should expect (Su-OLR)/(Ed-Eu)=1 to hold in this test. This is an equilibrium condition, where OLR=Fo. Besides, I don't think HARTCODE knows about this equation. In the base case, this ratio is 0.9816, which is close to the theoretical 1.I don't know how HARTCODE handles clouds, but this test is a clear sky simulation, as the base case g factor is 0.3386. As Miklos says, you can always tell clear sky from all sky results by looking at g, which is about 0.333 for clear sky and 0.4 for all sky.Slides 68 & 69 are clear sky, g=0.332 and g=0.339, respectively.

A further point, Ken.Let us say we were to agree that by Miskolczi looking at various 'clear sky' situations where (say) St varied from about 91 down to 58 W/m^2 (a difference of 33 W/m^2) and, if you like, g varied from 0.33 up to about 0.35 then by definition we would also have to agree that these situations only consider the range of situations where cloud cover was substantially less than the global average of around 60% – probably <30% at most (trying to be very generous). This allows us to ask: what about the situations where St varies further from ~58 down to ~40 W.m^2 i.e. the situation where cloud cover rises from <30% even just up to the global average of about 60% (and if you like g rises from 0.35 to 0.40)?It is generally agreed that for an average global cloud cover of ~60% St ~ 40 W/m^2 (and tau ~2.3). For cloud covers up to 100% St is likely to be <<40 W/m^2 – perhaps going as low as ~10 W/m^2 (and tau ~3.7). Where does the magnitude of g go then? And how would we know from Miskolczi's studies?So we would be forced to conclude that Miskolczi has only been looking at no more than about 25 – 30% of the total range of situations for global cloud cover and has not dealt (is still not dealing?) with the remaining range of cloud covers all the way up to 100% which demonstrably do commonly occur. I might add there is even some limited literature evidence of increasing cloud cover over the last decade or so to an average around 66%.But this approach hardly seems reasonable for constructing an empirical theory which purports to infer/explain Greenhouse saturation via changes in lower tropospheric moisture content (where most clouds form and reside) and SW albedo (also mostly due to clouds).Isn't this is a little bit like saying: “I can reliably infer conditions inside a rain forest by studying an open heathland.” ?