Equal Masses. Unequal Answers.

You'll learnwhy two objects reach the same final temperature but not the same thermal energy.

Drop 100 g of aluminum at 90 °C into 100 g of water at 20 °C. Same mass, seventy degrees apart, so it settles halfway at 55 °C — and it does not. The number that comes out instead tells you what temperature is, what heat is, and why they are not the same word. Twelve short steps; press Next for each one.

12 STEPS · 6 QUICK CHECKS · q_Al + q_water = 0 · c_Al = 0.90, c_water = 4.18 J/(g·°C) · v4

equal temperature · unequal energy · one boundary

Before you start

What you're looking at

A 100 g aluminum block at 90 °C held over 100 g of water at 20 °C. The block is drawn smaller because 100 g of aluminum takes up a third of the space.

The question

Equal masses, seventy degrees apart — do they really settle halfway, at 55 °C?

Step 1 / 12