The design and calculation of the Calais fort were not particularly difficult, and Monge gave this job to Joseph, in fact, more so that he could get more money. However, Monge soon discovered that Joseph had received more than just a little money for his work.

One day in July, Monge, who was on a business trip to Nice, suddenly received a letter from Joseph. It was a very thick letter, heavy, and if it had not been for the channels of the army, the letter would have cost Joseph more postage. Monge opened the envelope, and inside was a thick stack of stationery, filled with various numbers and symbols.

Monge took a cursory look at it and knew that this letter was discussing the limit of the number of streams. But he was about to go out at this time, and he did not have time to study the letter in detail, so Monge slipped it into the pocket of his coat and went out.

After finishing work, it was already more than four o'clock in the afternoon. A few colleagues went out to dinner together. Naturally, they also invited Monge. Monge, however, excused him on the grounds that he still had some personal matters to attend to. Those colleagues didn't persuade much, so they went on their own.

According to Christianity, there are seven sins that can send a person's soul to hell: pride, jealousy, anger, laziness, greed, food, and lust. If this is true, the French should have the highest chance of falling into hell because of their delicious food in Europe. Like the great eaters of the East, the French, especially the French aristocracy, were famous throughout Europe for their "good night's drink". Compared to Paris, Nice is much cheaper and has an abundance of seafood, and a few people eat it from the afternoon until late at night, until the food and wine fill their stomachs, but even their esophagus, and down to their throats, and then they get into the carriage and return to their lodgings. And when they came back, they found that their life had been very regular, and according to their habits, the light was still on in Mengri's room, where they should have gone to bed a long time ago.

"What is Monge doing?" Someone muttered.

"Whatever, that rigid guy doesn't look like a Frenchman." Another drunken guy replied.

But these drunken guys don't really have to study the question of what Monge is doing. So they just grunted and went back to sleep.

Monge, of course, didn't know what the drunks were saying about him outside his door. In front of his desk, there was a large stack of scratch paper, neat and densely packed, all of which were all kinds of calculations. He frowned and counted carefully, until another candle burned out and the sky outside his window began to glow slightly.

"Joseph's research is pretty good, at least I don't find any problems now. Well, he was inspired when he was dealing with the problem of the construction of the battery? It's really good to be young, when I was younger, my thinking was much more agile than it is now. Monge put down his quill and sighed.

"Joseph should have also sent this paper to the Academy of Sciences. I don't know what those guys in the Academy of Sciences say. Monge thought to the end.

Joseph did send the paper to the Academy of Sciences, but one thing Monge did not anticipate was that within a week Joseph sent a new paper to the Academy of Sciences, in which he also deduced an important inequality. This inequality was originally called the Cauchy inequality in its original history, but now, I'm afraid it has to be renamed.

Half a year later, Joseph published his physics paper "A Study of Tribogenesis", in which Joseph rubbed two pieces of ice enclosed in a glass box submerged in water to melt against each other, while two pieces of ice of equal mass and temperature in the comparison group melted naturally, and recorded the temperature change of the water in the two groups. The temperature of the water used in the rubbing group did not drop more sharply. On the contrary, the decline is smaller, and the decline curve is more gentle. Joseph points out that this phenomenon is diametrically opposed to the inferences that can be made based on the traditional theory of thermal mass. Based on this, he further deduced that the heat mass theory that is popular today may not be correct.

The "thermal mass theory" is a scientific hypothesis that emerged after Lavoisier experimentally overturned the "phlogiston theory". This interpretation assumes that heat is a substance called "caloric matter", which is massless and does not occupy space, and that when an object absorbs it, the temperature rises, and the heat mass flows from a hot object to a low temperature object, and can also pass through the pores of a solid or liquid.

The "thermal mass theory" can explain many physical phenomena quite effectively. For example, the cooling of hot tea at room temperature can be explained by the theory of hot mass: the high temperature of hot tea means that the concentration of heat is higher, so the heat will automatically flow to the area with a lower concentration of hot matter, that is, the surrounding colder air. The thermal mass theory can also explain the expansion of air when heated, as the molecules of the air absorb the thermal mass, making it larger in size. Further analysis of the details of the absorption of heat by air molecules can also explain the thermal radiation, the phase changes of objects at different temperatures, and even most of the gas laws. So until the mid-nineteenth century, the "thermomass theory" was the mainstream scientific hypothesis. At that time, the theory of molecular motion had already been proposed, but in this era, it was generally believed that the two theories were equivalent.

However, there are also loopholes in the "thermal mass theory". Because the "thermal mass theory" holds that "heat" is a substance, and according to Lomonosov's "law of the immortality of matter", "thermal matter" can neither be created out of thin air nor be destroyed, but can only be transferred between one object and another. It follows that if the temperature of one object rises, the temperature of another object must fall, and the total amount of heat mass obtained by the warmed object should be equal to the total amount of heat mass lost by the cooled object. This makes it difficult to apply this hypothesis to explain phenomena such as frictional thermogenesis. Because in this kind of phenomenon, it is very difficult to find, or even impossible to find, objects that have lost their "thermal mass". In Joseph's experiment, for example, there was no source of the heat that melted the ice into water.

Unlike Humphrey David, who first completed this experiment in history. Humphrey Davy was not entirely aware of the meaning behind this experiment, nor did he analyze it mathematically. In fact, he didn't pay much attention to this experiment himself, so it was ignored at the time.

Joseph, however, was different, and he also applied a more rigorous mathematical analysis to this experiment, proving that the theory of thermal mass and the theory of molecular motion are not equivalent in this problem.

"To be honest, this paper has almost already sentenced Hot Tone to death!" Laplace's face was full of pain and said to Lavoisier, "Joseph, this guy is really a headache! There are so many things to study in this world, but he always seems to have fun destroying people's mansions. He...... He's ......."

"Yes, I also felt your pain the last time he brought up light as waves." Lavoisier replied with a bitter face, "In fact, I have just completed a study based on the theory of thermal mass. ”

"Me too." Laplace replied, "I just had an idea that maybe I could correct some of the problems with Newton's formula for the speed of sound by taking into account the changes in thermal mass." Now, however, the research has just begun, and it almost has to be temporarily suspended. ”

"It's not a big deal." Lavoisier said, "First of all, your research hasn't been going on for long, and it's not impossible to change it to the point of view of molecular motion. Moreover, according to Josephus's argument, although molecular motion is not completely equivalent to the theory of thermal mass, in most cases, it can still be regarded as equivalent. So, you should be limited in what you want to change. But my research is all done......"

"So, teacher, what do you think of his paper?" Laplace asked.

"What else can you see?" "As last time, at least for now, I have not identified the problems in his thesis. Of course, there must be something wrong with his view, how can the heat mass theory be wrong? At most, there are changes that need to be made, and there are things that need to be added. Well, he also admits that maybe there are other explanations besides his explanation. The current theory of thermal mass is indeed flawed in the problem of frictional heat generation, but this does not mean that the theory of thermal mass is completely finished, it only shows that in order for it to continue to be true, we must make more repairs to it...... It's just that at the moment, I haven't found an idea to patch it...... This Joseph is always making trouble for us. ”

Laplace noted that although Joseph's research had caused Lavoisier so much trouble, there were many places that conflicted with Lavoisier's research. Under normal circumstances, Lavoisier would not have had a very good impression of Joseph, but now when Lavoisier mentions Joseph, although his mouth is full of complaints, his tone of voice seems to be saying "This child is really naughty", and it does not contain any malicious intent.

"The teacher is such a generous person? It's not like that! Laplace couldn't help but think, "And he didn't agree with Joseph at all, in fact." If someone else had put forward such a point of view, such as me, perhaps, maybe the teacher would have been furious, but why was his attitude so gentle this time? ”

"That kid, he's so smart, but he's too troublemaker. You say it would be nice if he could use all his cleverness to be useful, instead of causing trouble for us. Well, when he comes back, I'll have to talk to him properly. Lavoisier did not notice Laplace's thoughts, and said with a smile.