If temperatures are averages, how come we don’t get burned by the hotter particles (in a drink for example) ?

Question

If temperatures are averages, how come we don’t get burned by the hotter particles (in a drink for example) ?

In: 6

Answer 1

You sort of do. That’s why 120-degree water will burn given a little time, but 150-degree water will burn almost instantly: the 150-degree water contains many particles that are high-energy enough to damage your cells, while the 120-degree water contains only a few.

But the distribution falls off pretty fast on the upper end, so the number of particles with very high energy relative to the average is pretty low.