Theory of heat

In the history of science, the theory of heat or mechanical theory of heat was a theory, introduced in 1798 by Sir Benjamin
Thompson (better known as 'Count Rumford') and developed more thoroughly in 1824 by the French physicist Sadi Carnot, that
heat and mechanical work are equivalent.[1][2] It is related to the mechanical equivalent of heat. Over the next century, with the
introduction of the second law of thermodynamics in 1850 by Rudolf Clausius, this theory evolved into the science of
thermodynamics. In 1851, in his "On the Dynamical Theory of Heat", William Thomson outlined the view, as based on recent
experiments by those such as James Joule, "heat is not a substance, but a dynamical form of mechanical effect, we perceive that
there must be an equivalence between mechanical work and heat, as between cause and effect."[3]

In the years to follow, the phrase the "dynamical theory of heat" slowly evolved into the new science of thermodynamics. In
1876, for instance, American civil engineer Richard Sears McCulloh, in his Treatise on the Mechanical Theory of Heat, stated:
"the mechanical theory of heat, sometimes called thermo-dynamics, is that branch of science which treats of the phenomena of
heat as effects of motion and position."

This term was used in the 19th century to describe a number of laws, relations, and experimental phenomenon in relation to heat;
those such as thermometry, calorimetry, combustion, specific heat, and discussions as to the quantity of heat released or absorbed
during the expansion or compression of a gas, etc. One of the most famous publications, in this direction, was the Scottish
physicist James Clerk Maxwell’s 1871 book Theory of Heat, which introduced the world to Maxwell's demon, among others.[4]
Another famous paper, preceding this one, is the 1850 article On the Motive Power of Heat, and on the Laws which can be
deduced from it for the Theory of Heat by the German physicist and mathematician Rudolf Clausius in which the concept of
entropy began to take form.[5]

The term “theory of heat”, being associated with either vibratory motion or energy, was generally used in contrast to the caloric
theory, which views heat as a fluid or a weightless gas able to move in and out of pores in solids and found between atoms.

See also
Cold
History of thermodynamics
Larmor formula
Phlogiston
Thermodynamics
Timeline of thermodynamics, statistical mechanics, and random processes

References
1. Thompson, Benjamin. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 1798, Part I, page 86
2. Clausius, Rudolf (1879). The Mechanical Theory of Heat (https://ia601604.us.archive.org/13/items/in.ernet.dli.20
15.55242/2015.55242.Mechanical-Theory-Of-Heat.pdf) (PDF). Translated by Browne, Walter Raleigh. Macmillan
and Co.
3. Thomson, William. (1851). “On the Dynamical Theory of Heat (http://zapatopi.net/kelvin/papers/on_the_dynamica
l_theory_of_heat.html), with numerical results deduced from Mr Joule’s equivalent of a Thermal Unit, and M.
Regnault’s Observations on Steam.” Excerpts. [§§1-14 & §§99-100], Transactions of the Royal Society of
Edinburgh, March, 1851; and Philosophical Magazine IV. 1852, [from Mathematical and Physical Papers, vol. i,
art. XLVIII, p. 174]
 4. Maxwell, James Clerk (1872). Theory of Heat (https://ia800306.us.archive.org/28/items/theoryheat06maxwgoog/t
heoryheat06maxwgoog.pdf) (PDF) (Second ed.). Longmans, Green, and Co. ISBN 978-1-297-65733-7.
5. Clausius, Rudolf (1850). On the Motive Power of Heat, and on the Laws which can be deduced from it for the
Theory of Heat. Poggendorff's Annalen der Physick, LXXIX (Dover Reprint). ISBN 0-486-59065-8.

External links
Fourier and the Theory of Heat (http://www.victorianweb.org/science/fourier.html) – Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
Mechanical Theory of Heat (http://www.rit.edu/~flwstv/heat.html) - Rochester Institute of Technology
Heat (http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/physics/Heat.html) – Eric Weisstein’s World of Physics (has good "theory
of heat" book reference list)
The collected works of Count Rumford (https://books.google.com/books?id=xjwAAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA469), who
amongst others, began to seriously question the caloric or substance theory of heat, proposing in its place the
modern theory of heat.

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Theory_of_heat&oldid=890544390"

This page was last edited on 2 April 2019, at 00:11 (UTC).

Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. By using
this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia
Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.