First, let's briefly review the nature of temperature. Heat is the movement of atoms and molecules within matter. Some atoms or molecules may initially be moving faster than others. But collisions between them, which imparts kinetic energy to the slower moving ones, gradually evens out the energy of movement so that it creates a fairly uniform temperature.
If we were to make matter colder and colder, meaning that the component atoms or molecules are moving slower and slower, eventually we reach a point where all molecular motion has ceased and the matter cannot get any colder. This lowest possible temperature is known as absolute zero, because it is not possible to get any colder. Absolute zero is -273.16 Celsius, or -459 Fahrenheit.
The Celsius scale of temperature is based on water, which freezes or melts at 0 degrees and boils at 100 degrees. The Fahrenheit scale is arbitrary. A German scientist by that name chose a very cold day and designated the temperature as zero degrees, water at normal atmospheric pressure boils at 212 Fahrenheit.
You may notice that a temperature reading in Fahrenheit can easily be converted into Celsius by subtracting 32, and then multiplying by 5/9.
The science of extremely low temperatures is known as cryogenics. In discussing temperatures not far above absolute zero, we usually use what is known as the Kelvin Temperature Scale. Kelvin uses the same degrees to measure temperature as the Celsius Scale, but Kelvin begins at absolute zero rather than at the freezing point of water. This means that, in Kelvin, ice melts or water freezes at 273.16 degrees and water boils at 373.16 degrees.
At temperatures close to absolute zero, some strange things take place. If we take a tough and flexible sheet of rubber, and cool it to very low temperatures, it will easily shatter like glass. There is one experiment in which air is cooled so much that it liquifies. Then, if we dip a flower into the liquid air, the flower will shatter at the slightest impact like the most fragile glass.
This extreme brittleness as we near absolute zero cannot be explained by conventional chemistry. The rubber is so tough and flexible because it consists of very long molecules, known as polymers, which latch together to form a flexible material that is very difficult to tear or pull apart. The low temperatures do not change this structure. So, how can we explain such a drastic change in material properties due to temperature alone?
Now, let's briefly review my cosmological version of string theory.
So many otherwise unexplainable things about the universe and the nature of reality all fall neatly into place if we accept that matter consists of very long strings, originating and being thrown across space by the Big Bang, in more dimensions of space than we are able to access.
The fastest possible velocity is what we perceive as the speed of light, but that is only because this is the speed at which our consciousness moves along the bundles of strings composing our bodies and brains. This is why everything in Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity is a function of the speed of light, but we can find no real reason why the speed of light is what it is.
This means that there is one spatial dimension that we perceive as time. We cannot see into this dimension, but only into our usual three spatial dimensions. The result is that we perceive matter as particles, such as electrons, rather than strings because we can only see one spot on the string at a time. What we perceive as heat is explained in the theory as the bundles of strings that we see as atoms and molecules wrapped around one another, so that we see them as continuously colliding.
I find it to be extremely ironic that we measure both heat and angles in, apparently unrelated, units that we call degrees. My cosmological theory explains heat as the relative angles of the strings composing matter. When the strings are straight, relative to one another meaning no relative angles, we have the matter at a temperature of absolute zero.
A material, such as the rubber sheet, is actually held together by it's component strings being intertwined. We, in our limited dimensional state, do not see it this way. We see this intertwining of the strings composing the matter as atoms and molecules in continous collision, what we refer to as heat. The truth is, according to my cosmological theory, that it is this intertwining of strings that actually holds the material together.
At extremely low temperatures, the structure of polymers and complex molecules latched together is still there. But the fundamental bundles of strings, which we perceive as atoms, form nearly straight lines rather than being wrapped around one another. Without this intertwining of strings, the rubber sheet becomes extremely brittle, even though the latching together of complex molecules which seems to us to give the rubber it's strength, is still there.
I see this as yet more proof that the version of string theory must be correct.
We can see how this explanation of heat as actually the angular bend of the bundles of strings composing atoms and molecules in matter is reflected in what is known as the Ideal Gas Law. Basically a gas, such as oxygen or nitrogen in the air, takes up more volume when it's temperature is increased so that (pressure times volume) divided by absolute temperature remains roughly constant.
This is explained by temperature being actually the relative bend, or angle, of the strings composing the gas. A mass of strings, bent at a certain angle, will be aligned in all different directions. The strings will naturally require a minimum of space if they were all in straight lines so that they are aligned in the same direction. In this condition, we would perceive the material of which the strings are composed as being at a temperature of absolute zero.
More space is obviously required as the strings become more bent so that their directional alignment angles are increasingly different from one another, and to the direction along which they are primarily aligned. This is why we perceive a gas as requiring more volume as it's temperature increases.
Temperature of a gas requires a certain density. If a gas is too sparse, the concept of temperature is rather meaningless. It is the force of what we perceive as the collisions, rather than the what we perceive as the actual velocity of the what we perceive as the particles composing the matter, that makes up it's temperature.
The bends of individual bundles of strings, atoms, tend to even out to an average by interaction with one another, which we perceive as collisions. We experience this bending of the strings in all different directions as heat because our consciousness is moving along the bundles of strings composing our bodies and brains at what we perceive as the speed of light.
We know that there is a minimum temperature, absolute zero. But is there a maximum possible temperature, at least from our perception?
My conclusion as to maximum possible temperature is that temperature depends on this interweaving of strings, or the fundamental bundles of strings that we perceive as atoms, undergoing what we perceive as collisions due to heat energy. A single particle or atom or group of atoms in motion has no temperature. This must mean that there is, in fact, a maximum possible temperature and it can be described as a function of the speed of light.
A collection of the strings that we perceive as atoms or particles cannot be interweaved if their component strings are bent at an angle of more than 45 degrees, which in my string theory represents half of what we perceive as the speed of light. Therefore, the maximum possible temperature is when the rapidly colliding atoms are particles are moving with an average velocity of half the speed of light.
In other words, component particles with regard to temperature cannot be moving away from each other at more than what we perceive as the speed of light. Remember that if the matter we are dealing with is enclosed in a container of some type, the atoms of which the conatiner is composed is also a part of the average.
This cannot, unfortunately, be readily expressed in degrees of temperature because it would be different for different component particles because the heavier the particle, the more kinetic energy in their motion and thus the higher the possible temperature.
We can state that, at least theoretically, the energy required to heat a given mass to it's maximum possible temperature is equal to energy required to accelerate the mass, as a whole, to half the speed of light. I say "theoretically" because some of the energy, applied as heat, could go to breaking atoms apart into their component particles at such high temperatures, as well as being lost by radiation, instead of going toward the actual raising of the temperature.
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