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O.K. You're entitled not to get excited by solutions of simple
problems, but last week you drew me in to this discussion by claiming
that Carl's solution was wrong. In one message you said it was "not
even close" and in another you said it was off by "roughly a factor
of two." It seems to me that we could have saved a lot of confusion
if you had simply told us that you find it boring!
If you calculate one kind of work and then try to set it
equal to the wrong kind of change in energy you'll probably get the
wrong answer, but the mistake will be 100% yours. If you want to say
there is only one work/energy theorem then you'd better be sure that
you don't go around using different definitions of work or energy.
I don't trust a formalism which produces the right answer
if you know the right answer and produces lots of wrong
answers just as easily.
At least we agree on something!*
The "bulk" property of energy is a red herring.
It has no significance to thermodynamics.
It is a waste of class-time to introduce the concept.
What matters is entropy or the lack thereof.
"What matters" and what is a "waste of time" depends on the situation
and the question. So, again, fine; you don't like it. That doesn't
make it wrong.