Reflections, Day One, Energy Two: Amy (Two of Two)

Thermal energy always increases.

The second two clips focus on the idea (mostly put forth by Nina) that thermal energy always increases. Within the framework of Energy Theater, this seems to suggest that the number of ‘T’s (‘T’ representing a ‘chunk’ of thermal energy) must always be greater at the end of the scene/act than at the beginning.

Nina first brings this up in response a question that Stamatis posed during their discussion of the ball-moving-through-water scenario. The teachers were discussing three forms of energy: kinetic, (gravitational) potential, and thermal, and they were negotiating whether they needed to specifically articulate each transformation (gravitational energy of water to kinetic energy of ball to gravitational energy of ball) or whether they should just focus on the start and end states of the system. Stamatis encouraged them to think about the forms pairwise: whether it was possible to go from each kind of energy to the next, and vice versa. (E.g., Can we go from kinetic to potential? From kinetic to thermal? From potential to thermal? From potential to kinetic? Etc.)

Nina responds that intuitively, she sees thermal energy as a sort of ‘dead end’ – in that other forms of energy can turn into thermal energy, but thermal energy cannot be transformed. (E.g., kinetic energy can become thermal energy, but thermal energy cannot become kinetic energy.)

Later, John seems to ‘buy into’ this idea, or at least use it, when the group is discussing what would happen if the ball were moving through ‘more frictiony’ water in the first place. In this alternate scenario, the group has ‘G’s (in the water) turn into ‘T’s (also in the water, I think), and John says, “…these Ts can’t turn back into Gs, can they?” Nina immediately answers, “No,” and goes on to reiterate her earlier intuitions.

The content-oriented me is totally fascinated by this. When I brought this up yesterday afternoon, Sam reaffirmed what I had been thinking as I listened, which is that it certainly seems intuitive to Nina (and perhaps the other teachers) that something increases over time, and she seems to have associated thermal energy with this quantity. I was impressed by Nina's ‘articulateness’ and how this could certainly turn into a super-productive discussion about entropy.