Do Living Physicists Support DLR/Backradiation?

The inventor of the idea of DLR/backradiation supporting CO2 alarmism: Pierre Provost, 1791.

In Section 5.2 of Mathematical Physics of Blackbody Radiation I recall the following statement from Planck's The Theory of Heat Radiation:

• We shall assume that the radiation in one direction is completely independent of the radiation in a different direction, even opposite.
• But the empirical principal law that the emission of any volume-element depends entirely on what takes places inside of this element holds true in all cases (Prevost's principle). A body A at $100^{\circ} C$ emits toward a body B at $0^{\circ} C$ exactly the same amount of radiation as toward an equally large and similarly situated body B' at $1000^{\circ} C$. The fact that the body A is cooled by B and heated by B' is due entirely to the fact that B is weaker, B' stronger emitter than A.

This statement can be seen as the origin of the idea underlying CMB and DLR that the radiation from a blackbody is independent of the temperature the environment or background. Planck refers as support to Prevost's exchange principle from 1791:

• Absolute equilibrium of free heat is the state of this fluid in a portion of space which receives as much of it as it lets escape. Relative equilibrium of free heat is the state of this fluid in two portions of space which receive from each other equal quantities of heat, and which moreover are in absolute equilibrium, or experience precisely equal changes.
• The heat of several portions of space at the same temperature, and next to one another, is at the same time in the two species of equilibrium.

Mathematical Physics of Blackbody Radiation I give a new analysis of blackbody radiation challenging the idea of Provost/Plank of two-way radiative exchange of heat between two bodies with the hotter winning the game of net heat transfer as a stronger emitter.

So what is true physics:

1. Is radiative heat transfer one-way from hot to cold, as my analysis suggests?
2. Is radiative heat transfer two-way with the hotter being the stronger, as Provost claimed in 1791?

Does it matter? I say yes, because the stability properties can be vastly different in one-way and two-way transfer. It can be the difference between a harmless climate sensitivity of 0.3 C and and alarming of 3 C.

To empirically distinguish between 1. and 2. is difficult since only net heat transfer is directly observable. To refer to two-way transfer as an empirical principal law, as Planck does, is questionable.

The question is open. It would be interesting to see new independent support of 2. from active physicists living today. One can argue that the 2nd law of thermodynamics supports 1. but not 2. The 2nd law was unknown to Provost.

A scientist putting forward a certain statement as true often refers to some other scientist as being the responsible, typically the scientist who first gave the evidence of the truth. If that

first scientist is dead and cannot answer questions, which is often the case (as in Planck's reference to Provost), a scientific controversy may arise from different interpretations of what the now dead scientist actually meant or did. Therefore science should be carried by living scientists who carry the responsibility and are willing to answer questions.

In the present case there is a confusion between

• radiation as electromagnetic wave,
• radiation as heat transfer,

which makes the debate confusing, but there seems to be no living physicist willing to answer the questions and carry the responsibility.