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1、Times Arrow Murphys Law Activation Energy Chemical Kinetics Chemical BondsThis site shows that some ancient questions about “things going wrong“ in our lives have surprisingly simple answers in modern basic chemistry (even things happening to us which cause that painful cry of “Why me?“)Still more i
2、mportant to ones philosophy about life, these chemical ideas can startle us into seeing how fortunate we all are: that things dont go wrong more often! Well talk mainly about down-to-earth things - common solid objects of wood, metal, and bone, not about complex computer chips or programs going wron
3、g (nor about personal relations that fall apart. Even chemistry has limits.)Simple things often are involved in annoying or deadly happenings to us: breaking a surfboard (that then hits us), having a tire blow out, being in a fire in Malibu,flying the X-1 (as Chuck Yeager had to) with a corroded bat
4、tery cableor riding a horse and being thrown - ending up with a broken neck. Why? Why do we get harassed or even have our lives ruined by events like these?Life is hard. But its harder if you dont know how the material world works! Here are some of the powerful keys to understanding from chemistry:S
5、tudents:Students: If youre in a time bind or an exam is coming up,go here for a shorter approach to understanding the second law and entropy.The e-mail address is Next Page Last PageFrank L. Lambert, Professor EmeritusVersion 6.1, September 2005Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA 90041The Encyclope
6、dia Britannica gave this site an Internet Guide Award and allows a direct search link here to its Concise Encyclopedia Articles. Thus, albeit in brief summaries, you can access the entire span of knowledge in the Britannica - all of science, the humanities, and practical matters in the world. The Se
7、cond Law of Thermodynamics!TimesTimes Arrow.MurphysArrow.Murphys Law.EntropyLaw.EntropyQ: Who cares about the second law of thermodynamics? A: Anyone who wonders how the material world - our world of energy and matter -works. Q: Big deal? A: The biggest, most powerful, most general idea in all of sc
8、ience. Why paper, trees, coal, gas and all things like them burn (and why people “should“ spontaneously catch fire in air), why sand and dry ice even in pure oxygen cant ever burn, why the sun will eventually cool down, why iron rusts (but not why it rusts faster nearer the ocean), why there are hur
9、ricanes or any weather at all on earth, what makes things break, why houses get torn apart in tornadoes or explosions, why everything living tends to die. Thats for starters.Q: Just STARTERS? OK, OK, Im impressed. So, what IS the second law of thermodynamics? Well, wait a minute, whats the first law
10、? A: The first law is very simple and important but pretty dull: You cant create or destroy energy.You can just change it from one form to another, for example, electricity to heat, heat that will boil water and make steam, hot steam to push a piston (mechanical energy) or rotate a turbine that make
11、s electricity that in turn can be changed to light in a light bulb or to sound in an audio speaker system, and so forth. Thats it. Important but dull.The second law of thermodynamics looks mathematically simple but it has so many subtle and complex implications that it makes most chem majors sweat a
12、 lot before (and after) they graduate. Fortunately its practical, down-to-earth applications are easy and crystal clear. These are what well talk about. From them well get to very sophisticated conclusions about how material substances and objects affect our lives.Q: Sounds fair. Im listening. A: Lo
13、ok at the direction that energy flows in any happening or process or event. That is the first step to understanding what the second law of thermodynamics is and what it applies to. Energy spontaneously tends to flow only from being concentrated in one place to becoming diffused or dispersed and spre
14、ad out. (Later well come back to those two tricky words “spontaneously“ and “tends“.) Thats it, the big idea. The perfect illustration is: A hot frying pan cools down when it is taken off the kitchen stove. Its thermal energy (“heat“) flows out to the cooler room air. The opposite never happens.Q: C
15、ome on. All this build up for that dumb example? A: Dont put me down. I could have snowed you with differential equations and diagrams instead of what you see everyday. Were being practical and visual rather than going the math route, essential as that is in chemistry. The big deal is that all types of energy spread out like the energy in that hot pan does (unless somehow theyre hindered from doing so) They dont tend to stay concentrated in a small space; they flow toward becoming dispersed if they can - like electricity in a battery or a pow
