🚀 go-pugleaf

> In 1824 Sadi Carnot deduced the prototype of the second law of
> thermodynamics:
>
> All reversible heat engines working between two fixed temperatures
> have the same efficiency.
>
> from two premises:
>
> 1. Perpetuum mobile of the first kind is impossible.
>
> 2. Heat is conserved (cannot be converted into work by the heat
> engine).
>
> Then the second premise was officially declared false but the
> conclusion, the prototype of the second law of thermodynamics,
> remained gloriously true. More precisely, the glory was introduced by
> Clausius who, in 1850, managed to convince the world that the false
> premise should be forgotten and replaced by a true one:
>
> 2'. Heat flows spontaneously from hot to cold.
>
> Theoreticians and philosophers of science have never seen any problem
> in the fact that, originally, a false premise was ESSENTIAL in the
> deduction of a true conclusion. At least they should have considered
> the following hypothesis:
>
> The conclusion, the prototype of the second law of thermodynamics, is
> false as well; Clausius' 1850 ad hoc deduction was invalid.

The 1824 pattern:

TRUE PREMISE: Perpetuum mobile of the first kind is impossible.

FALSE PREMISE: Heat is conserved (cannot be converted into work by the
heat engine).

FALSE BUT MIRACULOUS CONCLUSION: All reversible heat engines working
between two fixed temperatures have the same efficiency.

Einstein studied thermodynamics very carefully:

http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/www/
Albert Einstein 1905: "We will raise this conjecture [TRUE PREMISE]
(the purport of which will hereafter be called the "Principle of
Relativity") to the status of a postulate, and also introduce another
postulate [FALSE PREMISE], which is only apparently irreconcilable
with the former, namely, that light is always propagated in empty
space with a definite velocity c which is independent of the state of
motion of the emitting body.....From this there ensues the following
peculiar consequence [FALSE BUT MIRACULOUS CONCLUSION]. If at the
points A and B of K there are stationary clocks which, viewed in the
stationary system, are synchronous; and if the clock at A is moved
with the velocity v along the line AB to B, then on its arrival at B
the two clocks no longer synchronize, but the clock moved from A to B
lags behind the other which has remained at B by tv^2/2c^2 (up to
magnitudes of fourth and higher order), t being the time occupied in
the journey from A to B. It is at once apparent that this result still
holds good if the clock moves from A to B in any polygonal line, and
also when the points A and B coincide. If we assume that the result
proved for a polygonal line is also valid for a continuously curved
line, we arrive at this result: If one of two synchronous clocks at A
is moved in a closed curve with constant velocity until it returns to
A, the journey lasting t seconds, then by the clock which has remained
at rest the travelled clock on its arrival at A will be tv^2/2c^2
second slow."

http://kea.princeton.edu/che246/organization.htm
Albert Einstein wrote of thermodynamics: "A theory is the more
impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises is, the more
different the kinds of things it relates, and the more extended is its
area of applicability. Therefore, the deep impression which classical
thermodynamics made upon me. It is the only physical theory of
universal content concerning which I am convinced that, within the
framework of applicability of its basic concepts, it will never be
overthrown."

Pentcho Valev
pvalev@yahoo.com