Re: Thermal Energy - thermalization of rotational energy

[Jim Green <JMGreen@SISNA.COM>]

> I think John's comment that "thermal energy" is tricky, is quite true. I am
> still trying to decide what counts as thermal and what does not, and
> therefore what it means to thermalize something. I am also trying to
> understand which interactions are internal and which interactions are
> external.

Me too, Michael.  I am  still  trying to figure out why we are talking
about "thermal energy" -- We of course are free to agree on a definition,
but in my senility I don't see what good the concept is -- and I surely
don't understand any alleged definition thus far.

I do understand what is usually meant by "internal energy" and how that
concept is used/useful, but we seem to be discussing new physics here.  I
must have missed something in college -- well that was a long time ago --
long before quantum mechanics.

In this thread we have also used the newly invented  term "thermalize"
without much of an agreed definition.   I guess that I need some tutoring
in his regard as  well.

The chemists have defined a Gibgs Energy and a Helmholtz Energy and found
their use helpful -- albeit confusing -- except to  them.  I am aware of a
paper which was submitted to AJP which purported  to define a new state
function as X1==E-muN and another as X2==E+PV-muN and suggested that this
would be a good exercise to find the Maxwell relations for these two new
very useful "energies".

But why would one want to do this?  What good would that exercise
do?   What would be the usefulness?  Except as a mindless homework problem.

The paper was not published.

Now we are talking about "thermalizing" stuff and  a mysterious "thermal
energy". Let's call this "energy" Y.  What good  is this concept?  What new
thermodynamics can  one get by its  use?  Can we calculate the Maxwell
relations for this new energy?  Should we bother?

Just little me over here in my corner of the galaxy.

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