XXXIX.—On the Absolute Zero of the Perfect Gas Thermometer; being a Note to a Paper on the Mechanical Action of Heat

Extract

Temperature being measured by the pressure of a perfect gas at constant density, the absolute zero of temperature is that point on the thermometric scale at which, if it were possible to maintain a perfect gas at so low a temperature, the pressure would be null.

The position of this point is of great importance, both theoretically and practically; for by reckoning temperatures from it, the laws of phenomena depending on heat are reduced to a more simple form than they are when any other zero is adopted.