Dissipation
Dissipation is the result of irreversible processes that take place in inhomogeneous thermodynamic systems. A thermodynamic dissipative process is one in which energy, internal, bulk flow kinetic, or system potential, is transduced from some initial form to some final form, the capacity to do mechanical work of the final form being less that that of the initial form. For example, transfer of energy as heat is dissipative because it is a transfer of internal energy from a body at one temperature to a body at a lower temperature. The second law of thermodynamics implies that this reduces the capacity of that internal energy to do mechanical work.
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Famous quotes containing the word dissipation:
“Life is hard, we say. An oyster’s life is worse. She lives motionless, soundless, her own cold ugly shape her only dissipation ...”
—M.F.K. Fisher (b. 1908)
“But there are other things than dissipation that thicken the features. Tears, for example.”
—Rebecca West (1892–1983)
“They had both noticed that a life of dissipation sometimes gave to a face the look of gaunt suffering spirituality that a life of asceticism was supposed to give and quite often did not.”
—Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980)