From: r_delaney2001@yahoo.com   
      
   On January 26, 2021 Troll wrote:   
   >> How did they make ice, in the days before electricity?    
   >> And, did the inventors manage it empirically, without    
   >> education in thermodynamic theory? I admit,    
   >> without book learning, the compression/condensation/    
   >> evaporation cycle would never occur to me, it’s    
   >> far from intuitive.    
   >   
   > Then before electric or mechanical refrigerators    
   > there was a matter of refrigeration in houses.     
   > If you start using the word 'ancient' however    
   > and compare it with 'classical' it is not obvious    
   > how far back that might go regardless of an official    
   > invention of refrigeration. There are other ways to    
   > preserve food.   
      
   The most interesting question is whether it's possible to invent   
   refrigeration,    
   without studying Carnot, Clausius, and that crowd.   
      
   Doesn't it seem like magic, as per Arthur Clarke's definition?   
      
   Anyhow, I was reading a historical novel of S. Africa, the diamond    
   mines, and as they prospered, a town elder says, "Pretty soon we're    
   going to get ice delivered here."    
      
   This was about 1880, and I wonder, where did the ice come from?   
      
   --   
   Rich   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)