Change of Internal State of An Isolated System
If an isolated system is left long enough, it will reach a state of thermal equilibrium, in which its temperature will be uniform throughout, but not necessarily a state of thermodynamic equilibrium, if there is some structural barrier that can prevent some possible processes in the system from reaching equilibrium. An isolated system can change its temperature or its spatial distribution of temperature by changing the state of Longley, R.G. Van Name, Longmans, Green & Co., New York, 1928, volume 1, pages 55-353, particularly pages 144-150. A system prepared as a mixture of petrol vapour and air can be ignited by a spark and produce carbon dioxide and water; if this happens in an isolated system, it will increase the temperature of the system, and during the increase, the system is not in thermal equilibrium; but eventually the system will settle to a uniform temperature. In a system prepared as a block of ice floating in a bath of hot water, and then isolated, the ice can melt; during the melting, the system is not in thermal equilibrium; but eventually its temperature will become uniform. Such changes in isolated systems are irreversible in the sense that while such a change will occur spontanteously whenever the system is prepared in the same way, the reverse change will never occur spontanteously within the isolated system; this is a large part of the content of the second law of thermodynamics. Truly isolated systems hardly occur in nature, and nearly always are artificially prepared.
Read more about this topic: Thermal Equilibrium
Famous quotes containing the words change, internal, state, isolated and/or system:
“You can’t change what happened between you and your ex-spouse, but you can change your attitude about it. Forgiveness doesn’t mean that what your ex did was right or that you condone what he or she did; it simply means that you no longer want to hold a grudge. Forgiveness is not a gift for the other person; it is a purely selfish act that allows you to put the past behind you.”
—Stephanie Marston (20th century)
“Personal change, growth, development, identity formation—these tasks that once were thought to belong to childhood and adolescence alone now are recognized as part of adult life as well. Gone is the belief that adulthood is, or ought to be, a time of internal peace and comfort, that growing pains belong only to the young; gone the belief that these are marker events—a job, a mate, a child—through which we will pass into a life of relative ease.”
—Lillian Breslow Rubin (20th century)
“They that have grown old in a single state are generally found to be morose, fretful and captious; tenacious of their own practices and maxims; soon offended by contradiction or negligence; and impatient of any association but with those that will watch their nod, and submit themselves to unlimited authority.”
—Samuel Johnson (1709–1784)
“Literature is not exhaustible, for the sufficient and simple reason that a single book is not. A book is not an isolated entity: it is a narration, an axis of innumerable narrations. One literature differs from another, either before or after it, not so much because of the text as for the manner in which it is read.”
—Jorge Luis Borges (1899–1986)
“The moral immune system of this country has been weakened and attacked, and the AIDS virus is the perfect metaphor for it. The malignant neglect of the last twelve years has led to breakdown of our country’s immune system, environmentally, culturally, politically, spiritually and physically.”
—Barbra Streisand (b. 1942)