Re: Fwd: Re: PHYS-L Digest - 12 Nov 2001 - Special issue (#2001-447)

[Jim Green <JMGreen@SISNA.COM>]

Good Grief, I am again getting msgs asking me to chime in.

Folks I think that I have said all  I have to say.  Simply stated: the use
of "heat" as a noun is an abomination which has been carried over from the
Dark Ages.   In no case is it "energy" and in no case does it move.  This
of course assumes that one is equaling "heat" with the First Law's Q.  Now
if one wants to redefine the terms of Thermo and convolute their usage, I
suppose that anything goes.

OTOH the proponents of the various usages have spoken ad nauseam and are
not likely to change their position in this lifetime so why continue the
discussion?  Are there really some on the list who don't have a strong
position?  Well let's hear from them and not from those who have already
settled positions.

Larry Smith seems to be one of them and is still trying to sort things
out.  Larry, good luck.

Carl, I agree that discussions on this list seem to migrate  into chest
thumping diatribes.  I can't make any sense of Def 4 either.

> >I confess that I can't parse defn 4 and I clearly am only interested
> >in undergraduate courses, specifically thermo in the first (survey)
> >and second (thermo) courses. I need a practical simple defn.

 It seems  to me that if one wants to discard the First Law, well and
good,  I  think that it has several big holes.  So let us all agree to
cease discussion about it.  I for one would not be sorry to see it go.

OTOH this would leave all the engineers and chemists in a darker pit than
they are already.  And it would leave out Carl's  naval fighting men and
women who have to learn how to make a ship move.   It might help to teach
them correctly instead  of Aristotelian physics.

So I wish  all  the list well and will change the subject in my next post.

Jim Green
mailto:JMGreen@sisna.com
http://users.sisna.com/jmgreen