|
Understanding through Discussion |
|
|
Register | Sign In |
|
QuickSearch
| EvC Forum active members: 65 (9164 total) |
|
| |
| ChatGPT | |
| Total: 916,914 Year: 4,171/9,624 Month: 1,042/974 Week: 1/368 Day: 1/11 Hour: 0/0 |
| Thread ▼ Details |
|
|
| Author | Topic: A science question | |||||||||||||
|
MangyTiger Member (Idle past 6384 days)  Posts: 989 From: Leicester, UK Joined: |
Welcome to the forum DS650Heavy - I'm sure a friendly admin will be along presently to point you at helpful links showing how to use quote boxes and other nifty features to make posts easier to follow.
Since a vacuum is the absence of matter, heat conduction cannot take place through a vacuum, and therefore a vacuum is a perfect insulator. (Bolding mine) This statement by Percy seems right - heat conduction is by definition the transmission of heat across matter. Since a vacuum contains no matter there can be zero conduction across it and so it is perfect insulator with regard to heat conduction. On the other hand a vacuum is clearly not a perfect insulator with regard to electromagnetic radiation (the clue is that big yellow thing you see in the sky when you look up on a sunny day  ).
A perfect insulator resists the transfer of any form of energy. And even if we were to limit the statement to "Since a vacuum is the absence of matter, heat conduction cannot take place through a vacuum, and therefore a vacuum is a perfect thermal insulator" infrared radiation is a transfer of energy and, therefore, heat. As I said above, you need to change this to "a vacuum is a perfect thermal insulator with regard to conduction". Disclaimer - I haven't done any physics for 26 years so I may well be wrong ! Oops! Wrong Planet
|
|||||||||||||
|
|
Do Nothing Button
Copyright 2001-2023 by EvC Forum, All Rights Reserved
™ Version 4.2
Innovative software from Qwixotic © 2024
