Abstract
1. IT is an accepted fact that the molecules of a gas are in motion among themselves in their normal state, and incapable of acting on each other at a distance; so that a theory of the propagation of sound, based upon the contrary suppositions that the molecules of a gas are at rest in their normal state and capable of acting on each other at a distance, cannot possibly be tenable. It thereby becomes necessary to inquire what view of the propagation of sound is demanded by the acceptance of the kinetic theory of gases; and this inquiry would appear to be all the more important in view of the fact that the mechanism of the propagation of sound in gases forms the physical basis of a great part of acoustics, or the groundwork upon which a number of its problems depend—the physical basis that underlies a system being admittedly the most important of the whole.
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References
Phil. Mag., June, 1877.
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PRESTON, S. On the View of the Propagation of Sound Demanded by the Acceptance of the Kinetic Theory of Gases. Nature 18, 253–255 (1878). https://doi.org/10.1038/018253a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/018253a0