Question

Which substance is most likely to heat up the fastest?

water (specific heat of 4.19 /g • C°)
copper (specific heat of .39 /g • C°)
aluminum (specific heat of .90 /g • C°)
dry air (specific heat of 1.01 /g • C°)

Answer 1

I presume that the units here should actually be considered J/g*C, or joules of energy per gram per degree. If it takes ~4.2 units of energy to heat a gram of water one degree C, whereas it takes only ~0.4 units of energy to heat a gram of water one degree C, you can conclude that the substance most likely to heat up fastest is the one which requires the least energy to be heated. If equal amounts of energy are applied to each of the top four materials, Copper will heat the most rapidly.