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Re: Heat as an indestructible substance



Bernard Cleyet wrote:

"But they sent him to a mental institution (others were to become the discoverers)
..."

Not quite, like the kat, he had more than one life.

The essence of the story. In 1842, Mayer writes:

"Just as heat appears as an EFFECT of the diminution of bulk and of the cessation of
motion, so also does heat disappear as a CAUSE when its effects are produced in the shape
of motion, expansion, or raising a weight."

In 1845, Joule writes:

"....it is obvious that the VIS VIVA of the particles of a pound water at (say) 51* is
equal to the VIS VIVA possessed by a pound of water at 50* plus the VIS VIVA which would
be acquired by a weight of 817 lb. after falling through the perpendicular height of one
foot."

The crucial difference is that, although Joule does indeed claim that falling of a weight
generates vis viva (heat), he does not even suspect that, vice versa, vis viva could be
converted into raising of a weight. It will take him 5 more years to understand Mayer's
paper - by 1850, Mayer's discovery becomes Joule's (sometimes also Kelvin's and
Helmholtz') discovery. By the same year Mayer attempts suicide and is sent to an asylum.

Pentcho