If I leave a glass of water on my nightstand overnight and drink it the next morning, the temperature feels notably cooler than that of the air surrounding me. What causes this sensation?
In: Biology
Worth noting that on top of the fact that what we feel isn’t temperature, which has already been mentioned, water is almost always actually cooler than the air.
This is because water constantly evaporates, and another way to think of evaporation is the fastest particles in the liquid jumping out of the liquid and becoming gas.
This overall cools the liquid because only the high energy molecules can leave, leaving water constantly being cooled until its fully evaporated.
Same reason why sweating works.
This causes the water to come to an equilibrium between the evaporative effect and the effect of normal heat transfer from the table/cup to the liquid. That equilibrium is lower than the actual average temperature in the room.
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