ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to provide a comprehensive introduction to macroscopic thermodynamics (thermostatics) presented so as to highlight its role as a paradigm for systems thinking. It is not our intention to replace the great many excellent textbooks of thermodynamics. Instead, we present thermostatics as a conglomerate of worldviews, methods, and interpretations, which are methodologically and conceptually different from chemistry, physics, or engineering. To benefit from the uniqueness of this methodology, we focus on the modeling aspects of the subject with particular attention to the
construction
of the two state functions that carry information about a thermostatic system: the internal energy and the entropy. This is easiest to do by following the subject’s historical development.
