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henrywang
- 14
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Im not satisfied with the answer: that's just what it is... Because it kinda doesn't explain anything.
Please help me, anyone?
Please help me, anyone?
Delta² said:Hmmm regarding heat flow from hot to cold: The hot body's molecules have higher kinetic energy so we would expect during colisions with the molecules of the cold body that the total kinetic energy would tend to be shared between the molecules. I mean at least my intuition about a collision tells me that is highly unlikely that the molecule with the higher kinetic energy will receive energy from the lower kinetic energy molecule while it will transfer much less energy to the lower KE molecule during the same collision.
Well at least in the case of heat flow we try to explain using the collision mechanism, because there is some sort of symmetry in a collision. When particle A collides with B and trasfers energy to B then B also collides with A and transfers energy to A. If B which is in lower energy manages to transfer big energy to A then A will manage to transfer even more energy to B. Otherwise it would be like there is some sort of different laws of nature for particle A than particle B.henrywang said:But why energy like to be evenly distributed? .
Delta² said:Well at least in the case of heat flow we try to explain using the collision mechanism, because there is some sort of symmetry in a collision. When particle A collides with B and trasfers energy to B then B also collides with A and transfers energy to A. If B which is in lower energy manages to transfer big energy to A then A will manage to transfer even more energy to B. Otherwise it would be like there is some sort of different laws of nature for particle A than particle B.
At any rate it's not a trivial question because it implies that the universe started in an extremely ordered = statistically extremely improbable state (and this means REALLY EXTREMELY IMPROBABLE), which is one of the big puzzles when we take this view of purely statistical probability interpretation of entropy. But it's the best we have by now I believe.henrywang said:thank you guys. that's very helpful!
The second law of thermodynamics states that the total entropy of a closed system will always increase over time. This means that the total entropy change must be positive, as it represents the overall increase in disorder and randomness of the system.
No, total entropy change cannot be negative. This would violate the second law of thermodynamics, which is a fundamental principle in physics that has been observed and tested extensively.
Entropy is a measure of the amount of disorder or randomness in a system. As entropy increases, the system becomes more disordered and less organized.
There are several factors that can contribute to an increase in total entropy change, including: mixing of substances, increase in temperature, increase in volume, and irreversible processes.
Total entropy change is important in thermodynamics because it helps us understand and predict the behavior of energy and matter in a system. It also allows us to identify and analyze irreversible processes and determine the efficiency of energy transformations.