[deleted]

[removed]

>Carbon-14 and carbon-12 are different isotopes of carbon ... right?

Yes.

I don’t know how anyone counts neurones, but even vertebrates have lots of them outside the brain. We have the huge junction of nerves called the caeliac (or solar) plexus, as well as cervical, brachial, bronchial, cardiac, coronary, gastric, sacral, choroid, lumbar, venous, pelvic and vesicle plexuses (or is it plexi?!)

Add to that all the other areas where our nerves are bundled together to form the spinal column, ganglia, and all nerve junctions, internal body sensors and external receptors. It has to add up to a huge number of neurones. Has anyone counted up the ratio of all of these to the number of neurones in our human brain? I would be interested to know.

Interesting. Does this extend to metals with their delocalised electrons too?

Can you point me to specific books or papers (or even terms) that clarify this further, because from my thermodynamics and stat-phys (and I guess solid-state) knowledge I would definitely call entropy an ensemble property (I'd call it the ensemble property).

I'd guess that you could be talking about mixed-state density matrices, but even that would involve multiple objects, no?

[removed]

When you are studying chemistry, in quantum mechanics we have this thought experiment/math workthrough called 'molecule in a box.'

Basically if one hydrogen atom in a box with nothing else, then you only have to deal with the physics of that one atom bouncing off the side of the box.

Now we said one H atom, one proton, one neutron, one electron. Your example of uranium is a problem because when talking about every molecule, we have two groups of forces- the ones between it and the world and the ones between itself. Uranium is not stable on its own, and is undergoing a tremendous amount of force within itself, those are a lot of different protons and electrons and neutrons, that all have forces on each other.

So short answer, no, long answer, no again but because it is infinitely more complex and even when we are examining a simple scenario we are ignoring factors simply because the dynamics of molecules are way way more complicated than solid liquid and gas.

At that age I never really read a newspaper, that was something old people did.

It doesn't. You need internal degrees of freedom to define temperature. An isolated atom has zero internal degrees of freedom due to Galilean invariance.

Atoms (at least atoms larger than beryllium, give or take) are basically a classical particle for all intents and purposes. They have momentum (assuming non-zero temperature) and mass, and basically just keep flying in a direction until they hit something or a force acts on it to pull it in a new direction.

In a solid, the interactions with nearby atoms (through e.g. electrostatic interactions) and the degree to which the atoms are packed mean the ball's basically just vibrating in place.

In a molecule, "bonds" are just forces resulting from electrons being shared that makes it really tough to pull the atoms apart, but they are still basically just balls moving in a direction until they bounce into something, or a force pulls them in another direction.

There's some quantum weirdness about the nature of the forces themselves, but atoms generally behave F=ma just the same as macroscopic stuff.

[removed]

Wait. Does that mean a single atom essentially doesn't have a temperature?

🤯

That’s not what I’m saying, just that was the message put out by the government in the uk at thee time, the education system was giving the same advice to students at the time. At that point nobody knew any of the data you describe and the advice from authorities was simply don’t have sex without a condom. A lot has changed in 40 years knowledge is very different today. 👍🏻

Not really since kinetic energy in the case of a single atom is the same as saying velocity. And velocity is relative.

[removed]

Could you measure the kinetic energy of the entire atom and estimate “this atom has a level of energy consistent with a solid”?

Could you also note whether or not it’s ionized in a way consistent with plasma?

[removed]

"They don't just make you eat less, they actually interfere with hunger" -- right?

[removed]

I watched a doc recently on YouTube about the "Patient Zero" myth. One of the things that proves it's a myth is the fact that the people coming forward to say they caught it from him would actually have had to get it from him 8 years earlier.

My point being, it was kicking peoples' asses because it's something that's asymptomatic for a long time, and then it's symptomatic through other infections. So nobody knew anything was wrong while it was spreading, then all those people got sick at once.

[removed]

[removed]

[removed]

[removed]