Imagine you had two cups of water, one that was very hot and one that was very cold. Then you take the

Question

two cups of water and pour them together in the same bowl and wait. Describe, in your own words, what
happens to the particles of each cup of water when they interact and eventually what will happen to the
temperature of the water over time

Answer 1

When you pour the very hot water into the bowl with the very cold water, the particles from each cup begin to interact. The hot water contains particles that are moving rapidly and have a lot of energy due to the heat. In contrast, the particles in the cold water are moving more slowly and have less energy.

As the two cups of water mix in the bowl, the fast-moving particles from the hot water collide with the slower-moving particles from the cold water. During these interactions, energy transfers from the hotter particles to the colder ones. This process is known as heat transfer, and it continues until the energy is more evenly distributed between the two sets of particles.

Over time, the temperature of the water in the bowl will start to stabilize as the particles of the hot water lose energy and cool down, while the particles of the cold water gain energy and warm up. Eventually, after enough time has passed, the water will reach a uniform temperature that is somewhere between the initial temperatures of the hot and cold water. This final temperature will depend on the amounts and starting temperatures of each water cup, resulting in a balanced state where the thermal energy is evenly distributed.