  We study the possibility of observing Schwinger pair production enhanced by a
thermal bath of photons. We consider the full range of temperatures and
electric field intensities from pure Schwinger production to pure thermal
production, and identify the most promising and interesting regimes. In
particular, we identify temperatures of $\sim 20~\mathrm{keV}/k_B$ and field
intensities of $\sim 10^{23}~\mathrm{Wcm}^{-2}$ where pair production would be
observable. In this case, the thermal enhancement over the Schwinger rate is
exponentially large and due to effects which are not visible at any finite
order in the loop expansion. Pair production in this regime can thus be
described as more nonperturbative than the usual Schwinger process, which
appears at one loop. Unfortunately, such high temperatures appear to be out of
reach of foreseeable technologies, though nonthermal photon distributions with
comparable energy densities are possible. We suggest the possibility that
similar nonperturbative enhancements may extend out of equilibrium and propose
an experimental scheme to test this.
