Showing posts with label Thermodynamics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Thermodynamics. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Entropy and the Laws of Thermodynamics

The principal energy laws that govern every organization are derived from two famous laws of thermodynamics. The second law, known as Carnot's principle, is controlled by the concept of entropy.

more

Entropy Explained

The concept of entropy is generally not well understood among laymen. With the help of several physicists, including Wolfgang Gasser and Malcolm Schreiber, I have composed the following article in an attempt to correct a common misunderstanding.[1] Contrary to what many laymen think, there is no Law of Entropy which states that order must always decrease. That is a layman's fiction, although born from a small kernel of reality. The actual Law of Entropy is better known as the Second Law of Thermodynamics. The First Law is that energy is not created or destroyed, and the Third Law is that absolute zero cannot be achieved--each of these laws is actually entailed from the first, in conjunction with certain other assumptions. But it is the Second Law that many laymen incorrectly think says that order must always decrease.

more

Laws of Thermodynamics

Energy exists in many forms, such as heat, light, chemical energy, and electrical energy. Energy is the ability to bring about change or to do work. Thermodynamics is the study of energy.

more

What is Thermodynamics?

In physics, thermodynamics (from the Greek θερμη, therme, meaning "heat" and δυναμις, dynamis, meaning "power") is the study of the transformation of energy into different forms and its relation to macroscopic variables such as temperature, pressure, and volume. Its underpinnings, based upon statistical predictions of the collective motion of particles from their microscopic behavior, is the field of statistical thermodynamics, a branch of statistical mechanics. Roughly, heat means "energy in transit" and dynamics relates to "movement"; thus, in essence thermodynamics studies the movement of energy and how energy instills movement. Historically, thermodynamics developed out of need to increase the efficiency of early steam engines.

more