In a room there are two completely identical metal balls. One is lying on a table and the other is hanging on a cable attached to the ceiling. At the same moment, 1 Joule of heat energy is applied to each of them. Immediately after that, the balls are perfectly insulated, such that absolutely no heat transfer is possible.
Which one is the coldest?

(In reply to Just a question by Leming)

Leming, youir question is answered at http://perplexus.info/show.php?pid=2964&cid=22221

Ajosin, you say that the ball on the table is the coldest because it has higher potential energy.
Now suppose this experiment:
We move the Earth a bit away and also make the table legs a bit longer (Such that the ball doesn't move).  The ball has now a higher potential energy.  So according to your theory it will cool even further.  This means that moving the Earth would influence the temperature of the perfectly insulated ball.  Is this correct?

Posted by Hugo on 2005-04-08 19:39:26