3.1 On the Nature of Heat: The Caloric Theory of Heat

According to caloric theory, heat is supposed to be an indestructible imaginary fluid called the caloric, which flows from a body at higher temperature to a body at lower temperature. The caloric can neither be created nor destroyed. Heating of a body means addition of caloric; a body is cooled by drawing out caloric from a body.

3.1.1 The Dynamical Theory of Heat

In 1798, while watching the boring of a cannon at the Munich arsenal, Count Rumford found that the supply of heat generated by friction was apparently inexhaustible. From this, he concluded that anything which an isolated system of material bodies could furnish without limitation must be of the nature of work. This idea led to the ...

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