Abstract
The principal aims of climate modelling are to understand the physical processes governing the present day mean state of the atmosphere and oceans and also to predict the response of the atmosphere-ocean system to possible changes in imposed conditions, such as fluctuations in the solar heating or changes in atmospheric composition. There are two contrasting approaches currently being used in climate modelling research. One approach assumes that the problem will be solved if all the physical processes influencing the system are understood in sufficient detail, the only remaining difficulty (not to be overlooked!) being the inadequacy of present day computers to include all these details in numerical models. The other approach involves a search for simple “laws” which control the mean system. (Here a mean would usually be a time average over years or longer with, in addition, possible spatial averaging.) Progress towards a solution to the climate problem is likely to come about by a combination of these two methods.
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© 1986 D. Reidel Publishing Company, Dordrecht, Holland
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Mobbs, S.D. (1986). Maximum Entropy Production as a Constraint in Climate Models. In: Willebrand, J., Anderson, D.L.T. (eds) Large-Scale Transport Processes in Oceans and Atmosphere. NATO ASI Series, vol 190. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-4768-9_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-4768-9_8
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