This OP requires a factual answer, but first some relevant background information.
A strange phenomenon occurred in the bedroom last night. There were two phenomena really but the first will receive no wider currency. The second involves the application of elementary physics to a pornographic environment.
I had just finished studying my collection of pornography for points of academic interest. I was tired. I remember feeling distressed at the way I had been shamelessly manipulated by the clever photography employed in these publications. Instead of chucking the magazines under the bed as per usual I threw them carelessly to the end of the bed. I then lay down.
It was a cold night and my electric blanket was unavailable. All of a sudden my right foot encountered the pile of erotic magazines on the duvet and slid under it (and the duvet). I was pleasantly surprised by the sensation. As time went by I noticed that my right foot was getting warmer at a faster rate than my left foot. I wondered why this was so.
I don’t know how much the magazines weigh. (I don’t go into the shop and ask for “2lb of your best quality pornography, please”). I don’t think the actual weight is significant to the general principles of physics anyway. Heat is somehow being transferred from the pile of magazines to my right foot.
I am curious to know whether the increased heat in my right foot occurred because of the weight of the pornography, its temperature or perhaps both. Or was it influenced by external factors in addition. I surmise that temperature is a factor in this conundrum. I’m sure that if I put the pornography in the freezer for a few hours and then went to bed with it and replaced it on my right foot, the rate of increase in heat of that foot would be less than that experienced by me with room-temperature pornography.
Similarly if I heated the magazines in the oven, instinct tells me that my foot would get warmer at a much greater rate.
What is going on at the foot/pornography interface? What physical reaction is taking place between the pornography and my foot?
Forgive my lack of knowledge where even the most basic principles of physics are concerned.
The layers of paper provided additional insulation preventing heat loss into the room, so your covered-up foot kept warmer than your not-covered-up foot, and also the weight of the magazines pushed the duvet down closer to your foot and thus increased its degree of heat retention.
The subject of the magazines had nothing to do with it. A layer of Family Circle would have insulated your foot just as well as the porn.
No, the heat from your foot was simply being prevented from radiating out through the duvet and into the room by the extra layers of paper.
I think it would have more to do with the extra insulation. I would think the weight of the magazines compressing the duvet would acutally serve to make the duvet a worse insulator as it would squeeze the air out of it. (But the extra insulation outweighed (so to speak) the weight of the magazines.
You won’t get as many views or responses if you change it!!
Anyway, back to the OP, like you I am no physics major, but your topic brought back to me the practice of homeless folks sleeping under swathes of newspaper to keep warm. Obviously paper is an excellent insulator.
In principle, yes. But the duvet probably didn’t compress much, making that effect small. On the other hand, pressing the duvet onto the foot would mean less airspace between them, which would mean less convective heat loss.
Oh, and from the OP,
This, my friend, is the writing style that made your posts of yesteryear so beloved. Keep up the good work.
