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Re: do not use calories




) "James W. Wheeler" writes:
Rumford's boring experiment:

The blades of the the grinder strike molecules, causing them to
oscillate and generating phonons which *flow* and interact with the
other
molecules of brass. These inelastic collisions eventually approach
a Boltzmann equilibrium at an increased mean energy per degree of
freedom.

Now why didn't Rumford think of that?

Perhaps he did! Allow me to quote Rumford directly:
"Finding so much reason to conclude, that the Heat generated in
these Experiments, or excited as I would rather choose to express it, was
not furnished at the expense of latent Heat, or combined caloric of the
metal, I pushed my inquiries a step afarther, and endeavored to find out
whether the air did, or did not , contribute anything to the generation
of it."
(Magie, William Francis, A Source Book in Physics, P. 157, Harvard
University Press, 1963)

Herb Gottlieb from New York City
(Where Rumford's boring experiments are not boring)