or well i guess thermodynamics might be closer but anyways. i usually go to archaic for this but i don't know where he is right now. i heard the gs was looking for union members. not sure of his intrawebs capabilities

so i know that liquids adsorb or transfer heat better than gases (hypothermia in water is quicker than in a field but dry and at the same temperture, yes?). and my guess would be the liquid transfers the heat better because it is denser (more dense?) than the gas, but my question is why does the more dense (denser?) density cause heat to transfer differently?

hashtag lets get braden his grade eleven science.

surface area probably plays a roll in it? beats me I barely passed phys 2

So water is a special case because it has a very high specific heat capacity Cp[J/(Kelvin*kg)] and also quite high heat transfer coefficient h[W/(K*m^2]

When you talk about gases transporting heat less effectively that is very much dependent on pressure. At 200 atm, air will transfer heat probably 150 times better than at 1 atm.

When heat is transported in liquids and gases it is transported not only by conduction but also by convection and, depending on the temperature also by heat radiation. Heat radiation is usually not all that important at human body temperatures. It starts comming into play at around 330-500 Kelvin depending on the system. Ofc in space there is almost only radiative heat transfer.

In fact if a body is to be cooled down to hypothermia in air or water I would say it is 90% convection that matters.
Even convection can be split into two different kinds; Natural and forced convection. Natural convection around a body is the flow of fluid created by the temperature gradients that the body creates. Forced convection is stuff like wind, currents, waves and if the body is transported through the fluid. In theory you could have a system without forced convection, just as a closed unventilated room or a bathtub, but as soon as the body moves it will be forced convection to a degree.

So why does the density matter? Well because the heat transported by convection is a function of, among other things, the thermal inertia of the fluid that comes in contact with the body. Thermal inertia is density times heat capacity. While heat capacity is usually within an order of magnitude the density is about 3 orders higher in water than 1 atm air (1000 times).

Other things matter such as heat transfer coefficient and viscosity are also very different in gases versus liquids, but they also vary significantly between liquids.

could of just replied with "because of magic"

A simpler way to think about it, is that something which is more dense will have more mass in a closer space with which to transfer energy.

Explain it to me like im twelve and in the slow science class.

Heat is atoms shaking. The denser a substance is, the closer the atoms are. They transfer the shaking better.

anything that has less heat then anything will absorb that anything heat.

Ok first don't listen to anything drkpinc says about anything related to science. It will make you dumber. :)

mrford basically explained it so anyone can understand.

Another way to say it is that there is more mass close to transfer the heat to.

As long as my beer stays cold i don't care how it works.

you aren't brit then.

I understand my limitations. When they lied to me and said I can be anything I called them liars. First, I can not be president of the United states (born in Toronto canada), second I'm never going to cure cancer, and three cern isn't calling me to check their long division. Ever.

But I'm smart enough to understand this. You can't even spell bright. And I'm of welsh descent, at the least I'm great brit. Idiot.

Ford: why do the atoms closer together transfer the shaking better? They hit more atoms in the same shake, like for air the shake might hit one other but in water it'll hit maybe four, and every time they hit energy, heat, is transfered from the warmer to the colder?

he wanted it simplified so I made it simpler then what mrford said

Pretty much what Ford said.

Temperature is kind of a relative concept, but basically if you are a higher temperature than the fluid (liquid or gas) surrounding you - you are transferring some of your energy to the fluids molecules to transfer to their neighbors, to transfer to their neighbors, etc. Eventually you transfer enough of the energy from your vibrating molecules to the fluids molecules that you are both the same temperature. The denser the fluid is, the more neighboring molecules are able to carry away your energy - ergo you cool faster.

This is sort of how a heat pump is able to both heat and cool your house, though with a few added steps.

Energy can technically never be created or destroyed, but it has to be transferred. The closer the atoms are together, the higher the likelihood that the transfer will be local, instead of elsewhere.

This is also crudely why energy/heat generally transfers from high to low contencentrations naturally.

Obviously it is more complicated than this.

Thermodynamics has another interesting trait - it is the reason many chemical and mechanical engineering majors end up getting industrial engineering degrees.

I took thermo and fluid. fluff both.

At my school, the mechanical engineering dropouts went straight to psyc degrees lol.